And as you begin your military careers, proceed with confidence, because our citizens are determined, our country is strong, and the future belongs to freedom. Across the world, liberty is on the march. In the last 18 months, we have witnessed a Rose Revolution in Georgia, an Orange Revolution in the Ukraine, a Purple Revolution in Iraq, a Tulip Revolution in Kyrgyzstan, and a Cedar Revolution in Lebanon -- and these are only the beginning. (Applause.) Across Central Asia and the broader Middle East, we are seeing the rise of a new generation whose hearts burn for liberty, and they are going to have it. America is standing with these democratic reformers because we know that the only force powerful enough to stop the rise of tyranny and terror, and replace hatred with hope, is the force of human freedom. And by extending freedom to millions who have not known it, we will advance the cause of peace and make America more secure. (Applause.)

Some of our men and women in uniform have given their lives in this cause, and others have returned home with terrible injuries. America honors their sacrifice, and we will uphold the cause they served. You are the ones who will take up their mantle, and carry on their fight, and ensure the triumph of liberty in the century ahead.

You are now part of the greatest force for freedom in the history of the world -- the Armed Forces of the United States. In the years ahead, you will see dramatic changes taking place all around you. Yet amid all the tumult and change, there is one thing that won't change -- and that is character of our men and women who wear the uniform. This is your generation's moment. Your mission is necessary and it is noble. The weapons you use will be more powerful and precise than those available to Annapolis graduates who came before you, and you will face enemies they never imagined. But what will make your success possible is the same thing that made their success possible: the courage and honor and personal integrity that you learned at this Academy.

We're going to give you the tools you'll need to prevail in today's war on terror, and the capabilities you'll need to protect us against the dangers that may yet emerge. Now the task is in your hands, and that means it is in the best of hands. Thank you for your courageous decision to serve. Bring honor to the uniform, security to our country, and peace to the world. And congratulations to every member of the class of 2005.

May God bless you.

Democrats clear way for Senate vote on Bolton

Tuesday, May 24

By Vicki Allen WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democrats agreed on Tuesday to clear the way for the Senate to vote on the controversial nomination of John Bolton as the next U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, which was expected to pass mainly on party lines.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, a Tennessee Republican, said he expected a vote this week on Bolton's confirmation, but an agreement to limit debate still was being worked out.

Barbara Boxer, a California Democrat, lifted a procedural hold she had put on the nomination in an unsuccessful effort to wrest more documents on Bolton from the administration.

"We're disappointed that we didn't get the information from the administration," said Boxer's spokeswoman Natalie Ravitz.

But she said Boxer had agreed with Sen. Joseph Biden of Delaware, the senior Democrat on the Foreign Relations Committee, to let the nomination come up for a Senate vote.

The agreement on Bolton came a day after Senate Republicans and Democrats reached a compromise to end years of roadblocks against Bush's judicial nominees.

"You keep mentioning the word 'monogamy'," a staffer named Roland Foster recalls one young woman asking after a lecture. "What is that?"

"That's when you have sex with only one partner," Coburn responded.

"You mean at a time?"

Conservative Christian leaders and STDs are in many ways a natural match. Seen from a biblical mind-set, the growing prevalence of STDs looks like the wages of sin, the price American society pays for the sexual revolution. And even medical experts agree that delaying sex until age 19 or 20 lowers the risk, and the only sure way to avoid ever contracting an STD is to be in a relationship where neither person has ever had another sexual partner.

Also Thursday, several trustees expressed dismay about the gender imbalance at [the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill], where the 2004-05 freshman class was 58 percent female. Among recipients of the Carolina Covenant scholarships for low-income students, the disparity was even greater, with 69 percent women.

That prompted two trustees to ask whether the university could give men admissions preference or start programs such as engineering that might attract more men.

Affirmative action for men is not likely, said Jerry Lucido, vice provost for enrollment management. "It's just extraordinarily rare for a public university to do that," he said.

Sokolove also wrongly stated that "the late Gov. Robert Casey Sr. ... was barred from speaking at the 1992 Democratic National Convention because of his antiabortion views." Though the media have repeated this falsehood numerous times (see here, here, here, here, here, and here), the truth is that convention organizers denied Casey a speech in 1992 because he refused to endorse the Clinton-Gore ticket, not because of his views on abortion. Further, several speakers who opposed abortion rights did address the convention in 1992, and abortion rights opponents have spoken at every Democratic convention since then.

I didn’t know Governor Casey personally. But back in 1992, fate put me within a few feet of him inside Madison Square Garden during the Democratic National Convention. That was when Clinton officials refused a place at the podium for the Democratic governor of America’s fifth-largest state while also providing speaking slots for six pro-choice Republican women. To make sure the point was delivered, one of these was a pro-choice woman who had campaigned for Casey’s Republican opponent.

On Election Day 2004, the silencing of Bob Casey thundered through America’s polling booths. In vain, Casey in 1992 had warned his fellow Democrats about allowing the Party to be become “little more than an auxiliary of NARAL.” In his autobiography he put it this way: ["]Many people discount the power of the so-called “cultural issues”—and especially of the abortion issue. I see it just the other way around. These issues are central to the national resurgence of the Republicans, central to the national implosion of the Democrats, central to the question of whether there will be a third party. The national Democrats may, and probably will, get a temporary bump in the polls—even, perhaps, one more national election victory—from their reactive strategy as the defenders of the elderly and poor who rely on Medicare and Medicaid. But the Democrats’ national decline—or better, their national disintegration—will continue relentlessly and inexorably until they come to grips with these values issues, primarily abortion.["]

To the women of New York City, who like many of their sex in so many places have suffered long lines to answer nature's call, relief is on the way. To the women who have ducked into the men's restroom to avoid embarrassment, the City Council has heard your woes and acted.

The council this week unanimously passed legislation -- dubbed Potty Parity by New York's ever-vivid tabloids -- that establishes a 2-to-1 ratio for women's restrooms in new public venues including, bars, restaurants and concert halls.

From where we sit, then, the actions of the Republican compromisers look like not a capitulation but a way of letting Democrats back down from a losing position without being humiliated.

Why not humiliate the Democrats? Well, here's one reason: "Democrats agreed on Tuesday to clear the way for the Senate to vote on the controversial nomination of John Bolton as the next U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, which was expected to pass mainly on party lines," Reuters reports. Had the Senate gone nuclear yesterday, Bolton's nomination would be suffering from the fallout.

HUSBANDS are such a nuisance. They hog the family computer, watch television at nerve-grating volume, clutter up every flat surface with their hobbies and mess up a room with their very presence. Now a Japanese company thinks it has found the solution: lock up the monster in a soundproof wooden box.

Yamaha has come up with the Avitecs MyRoom, a 2.5sq m (27 sq ft) den that can stand in the corner of the average-sized lounge and perform — albeit on a cramped scale — the functions of a study, cinema and garden shed.

WASHINGTON — For the first time, a majority of Americans say they are likely to vote for Hillary Rodham Clinton if she runs for president in 2008, according to a USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll taken Friday through Sunday.

A&E doctors are calling for a ban on long pointed kitchen knives to reduce deaths from stabbing.

A team from West Middlesex University Hospital said violent crime is on the increase - and kitchen knives are used in as many as half of all stabbings.

They argued many assaults are committed impulsively, prompted by alcohol and drugs, and a kitchen knife often makes an all too available weapon.

Iraqi authorities are preparing to launch the largest show of force in the capital since Saddam's ouster in a bid to curb the rampant insurgency, which has killed more than 650 people since the country's new government was announced April 28.

More than 40,000 Iraqi police and soldiers, backed by American troops and air support, will set up hundreds of checkpoints, raid houses and search vehicles as part of Operation Lightning, Iraqi's interior and defense ministers announced Thursday.

On Monday Republicans were within hours of passing a procedural rule that would have eliminated the Democrats' unprecedented use of the judicial filibuster. It would not only have freed from filibuster limbo seven Bush nominees to the appeals courts, but it would also have ensured future nominees, particularly to the Supreme Court, up-or-down votes.

Then the Republicans flinched. They settled for something less. Far less. How much less is still a matter of dispute, but the fact that they settled when they had within their reach the means to restore Senate practice to the status quo ante 2001 is indisputable. That in itself is a victory for the Democrats and a defeat for the Republicans...

And this is why people loathe the Senate, because some empty, vapid, puffed-up poser, just sobbing and bleating about his grandchildren on there, I mean there are one hundred U.S. Senators out of a potential pool of 300 million. 400 million if you include all the fine, upstanding members of the undocumented American community in your part of the country.

And it should be possible to get a hundred people who can stand there and discuss the issues in an articulate way, instead of blathering cliches about the well being dry. And it isn't. It's overflowing with his sob sister routine.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, M.D. (R-TN) made the following statement today after the Senate denied the cloture motion on the nomination of John Bolton as United States Ambassador to the United Nations:

“Earlier today the Democratic Leader gave a speech denouncing the ‘crossfire of partisan sniping’ in Congress and pressed for comity and cooperation. But tonight, after the Democrats have launched into yet another filibuster of a presidential nomination – this time on John Bolton to serve as UN Ambassador – those words seem empty and hollow.

“Some 72 hours after hailing an agreement that sought to end partisan filibusters, the Democrats have launched yet another partisan filibuster.

“Actions speak volumes, and so does inaction. Given the chance to advance the cause of comity in the Senate, the Democrats have chosen partisan confrontation over cooperation. And rather than working to advance America’s agenda and act by voting on the floor, the Democrats keep stepping on the brake.

“This is a critical time for the United States and for the world. Because of the President’s vision and commitment, democracy is on the march around the globe. And with sensible reform, the United Nations can and should be vital in advancing these developments. But we need to get a UN ambassador in place.

“The cause of peace and international cooperation should not be held hostage to partisan sniping. I would urge my colleagues to end this partisan filibuster of John Bolton.”

I can see the TV ads now:

JD: Hereby I call out all you simplistic, overly optimistic, slippery-slopist, bright-line Papo-cons! This Thursday night at the Nassau Colosseum, I will crush you beneath an infinite-dimensional Hilbert space of PAIN!

RP: Assuming arguendo you could, you won't! You can't tell your modus ponens from your modus tolens! The only slippery slope is the one YOU'RE GOING DOWN!

KJL: If error has no rights, then Derb's got nothing to protect him from a big-time smackdown! Santiago! Matamoros! DURAN DURAN!

Smash cut to logo: NR SMACKDOWN! IT'S THE BLASTOCYST BLAST! ($39.95. Not available in UT, NYC, and Canada.)

...Our position on Hamas is very clear, it's a well-known position and it hasn't changed about Hamas. Hamas is a terrorist group, it's on a terrorist list for a reason. As the elections go forward, of course, we want everybody to participate in the vote. There is something healthy about people campaigning, saying, this is what I'm for. The President ran on a peace platform; you know, maybe somebody will run on a war platform -- you know, vote for me, I promise violence. I don't think they're going to get elected, because I think Palestinian moms want their children to grow up in peace just like American moms want their children to grow up in peace. As a matter of fact, I think the people that campaign for peace will win.

The goal of a -- is, of course, a Palestinian state based upon rule of law, and you cannot have a democracy based upon rule of law if you have armed bands of people who will use their weapons to try to achieve a political outcome. We discussed this with the President....

The Post objects to Tom DeLay's speech against federal funding for embryo-destructive research for two reasons.

First, it says DeLay is guilty of "irresponsible rhetoric" in saying that the other side would "fund with taxpayer dollars the dismemberment of living, distinct human beings for the purposes of medical experimentation." You could object to the word "dismemberment" on hypertechnical grounds, I suppose. But what DeLay said is a fair summary of why most opponents of the bill object to it. Is there another wording the Post would have preferred? Or are those of us who object to the bill to be silent about it because the Post, for reasons undisclosed, thinks our speaking up would be "irresponsible"? (Where would the goo-goo editorialist be without that word? And was the Post irresponsible ten years ago, when it had better editorialists working on these issues?)

Second, it says that DeLay, if he is to be consistent, should also 1) try to ban the freezing of embryos in IVF clinics as a form of torture and 2) try to ban the common fertility-clinic practice of "discarding" "unused" human embryos. There are specific logical problems with the first point, but let me address the general argument that to be principled a politician must either try to prohibit all moral evils or none of them.

Let's say a politician was in a place and time where people approved stoning homosexuals to death--which is not at all a theoretical possibility; there have been places and times like this. Let's say that politician himself believes that the principle of the equal dignity of all human beings entails not stoning homosexuals to death, not criminalizing their sexual conduct, and allowing same-sex couples to marry. There are serious people who believe all these things flow from a valid principle of equality. Leaving aside whether those people are right about these conclusions, what's a politician with those convictions to do?

If he comes out for same-sex marriage, he may lose the ability to make progress on the stoning front. (Or, to transport the debate to, say, Texas in the 1990s: A politician who argued for same-sex marriage might very well lose his ability to make progress in getting rid of anti-sodomy laws.) Since political prudence militates against his pushing for the full realization of his principle, is he therefore to do nothing? If he works within the bounds of the possible, does he therefore have no principles?

The Washington Post's editorial is titled "An Illogical Standard." But its own standard is one it would not apply to any other issue. You could, of course, make the same debater's points in reverse: The Post, to be consistent, should be for infanticide.

Note also that the Post's argument tends to validate slippery-slope fears about the sanctity of life. If we hadn't allowed the routine killing of human embryos by fertility clinics, people wouldn't be trying to use it to justify new moral evils today.

A pro-life position not rooted in logic ends up having the same line- drawing problem. When do pro-life supporters of stem-cell research believe life begins? They would seem to believe that a clump of matter that is not a person somehow becomes inhabited by a person as it develops. Rather than defend this theoretical disaster bordering on superstition, some of these pro-lifers have resorted to the name games that pro-choicers have used in the past: Blastocysts aren't embryos, embryos that have not been implanted are pre-embryos, etc. But none of these nominal distinctions-nor the biological distinctions they denote- mark a point of moral distinction.

[Robert] Bartley describes himself as a member of the "mushy middle" on abortion as though it were good in itself not to draw principled distinctions. He opposes partial-birth abortion because it is ugly, supports stem- cell research because nobody grieves for blastocysts, seeks a middle ground because the extremists are off-putting: a clump of positions united only by sensibility.

The trouble with this middle ground is that, in addition to giving up territory that should be defended, it is itself indefensible territory. Slippery slopes are slippery because the logic that starts you down them will lead you further down. During the stem-cell debate, people have said that it's okay to use embryos for research because we already "discard" plenty of embryos as a byproduct of in vitro fertilization; they could with equal validity say that we should allow research on five-month-old fetuses because we allow them to be aborted. Judges have said that we have to allow partial-birth abortion, or even euthanasia, because we allow abortion. The Washington Post says that the logic of abortion rights does not permit the law to charge people with murder when they kill an unborn child in the course of an assault on a pregnant woman, even if the woman considers it murder.

Slippery-slope arguments rarely succeed because people discount the possibility of remote future horrors; they think they will be able to stop the slide. But horrors can get less horrible as the future becomes less remote. People adjust their sensibilities. In 1973, not even pro- abortion lawyers were challenging Texas's law against partial-birth abortion. Back then, embryo-killing research would have seemed monstrous. I have read the argument (in Reason, the libertarian magazine, as it happens) that people predicted all kinds of dire consequences from in vitro fertilization that did not happen, so why not allow cloning? One of the dire consequences of in vitro fertilization, however, is precisely that we are debating cloning now.

A common trope of the press coverage of the stem-cell conflict-which reeks of weariness at the continued existence of pro-lifers-is that it's a shame this "scientific issue" has gotten caught up in the "politics" of abortion. But it is caught up in the issue because the premises of the arguments are the same: Either conception results in a new human being deserving of legal protection or it doesn't. No amount of sophisticated hairsplitting over bioethics is going to work if it ignores that awkward, obvious question.

1) I don't think that the phrase "genuinely right or wrong" implies absolutism, although it does imply the existence of objective moral truth.

2) I don't think I've committed "metaphysics" any more than when I say that killing infants is wrong (or, for that matter, when I give an account of walking down the street). Nor does classifying a question as "metaphysical" eliminate the possibility of there being a rationally derivable correct answer to it.

3) It should be possible for a majority of the public to reject the idea that early-stage human embryos deserve legal protection without reaching the conclusion that parents should be legally obligated to see that their children get medical treatments derived from killing human embryos--which was the topic that gave rise to your disagreement with the phrase "genuinely right or wrong." Imposing that obligation on parents strikes me as more likely to give rise to "social disorder" than not imposing it.

4) In some sense, public policy will always be something the public is willing to put up with--and that sense is obviously stronger in a democracy. I am not proposing to abolish representative forms of government in order to impose an embryo-protective policy that the public hates. I do think it important to try to persuade voters and their elected representatives to move toward a more embryo-protective policy. It is no objection to that project to say that public policy should reflect public opinion.

5) The proposition that "not many Americans" object to the deliberate destruction of week-old human embryos strikes me as simply untrue.

6) The analogy to the voting age, where an arbitrary line must be drawn, is open to question. For one thing, society does not have to draw a line--it could prohibit the deliberate killing of any member of the human species. For another, the right to vote is not as basic a human right as the right not to be killed.

Retired Gen. Wesley Clark has taken a high-profile role, both on and off Capitol Hill, as a Democratic spokesman and foreign policy adviser, stoking speculation that he is planning another national campaign in 2008.
Clark has emerged as a regular presence on Capitol Hill in the last few months. His allies paint him as a “go-to guy” for Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (Nev.) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) on foreign policy matters, pointing out that he has been repeatedly invited by the duo to address their respective caucuses on the handling of current military situations in Iraq and Afghanistan....

Our moral sentiments are an indispensable prop to our moral conduct. Many times, we can see that an injustice is being done without having to think too hard about it. But moral sentiments are not an unfailing guide to justice. Much of the task of a moral education is to train the sentiments to accord with justice. It is very easy for human beings to assume that others who do not “look like us” do not have any rights that we must respect—especially when ignoring their rights offers, or seems to offer, benefits to us. We need to think about the human embryo, not just look at it and conclude it is worthless except as an object of research.

We know that the embryo is alive, not dead or inanimate. We know that it is not just alive the way that one of our skin cells is alive: It is a distinct organism, not a part of some other organism. It has the capacity, under the right circumstances (circumstances that are in an important sense “normal”), to direct its own development from the embryonic to the fetal to the infant stages of development and beyond. And we know that this organism is human and does not belong to some other species.

We do not generally believe that the right of members of the human species to live—that is, not to be killed—depends on their size, age, location, condition of dependence, or number of limbs. Any claim that the embryo does not have a right to be protected from killing has to involve a denial of the idea that “mere” membership in the human species is enough to confer that right. That right will instead have to be posited to depend on some accidental quality that some human organisms have and others do not. Perhaps that quality is sentience or rich relationships with others or an ability to perform high-order mental functions or something else.

But whatever that something is, making the right to life depend on it creates serious problems. First, it is not just embryos who will be denied protection. Newborns can’t perform high-order mental functions either, which is why philosophers who are consistent about denying the importance of membership in the human species, such as Peter Singer, approve of infanticide. Second, these qualities vary continuously. It is impossible to identify a non-arbitrary point at which an entity would have enough of the quality in question not to be killed. Third, for the same reason, it is impossible to explain why some people do not have more or fewer basic rights than other people depending on how much of this quality they possess. The foundation of human equality is denied in principle when we allow some members of the human species to be treated as mere things.

From one of my economics Hill guys:

Jonah, I thought I might shed some light on your question about possible trends in the size and direction of revisions to GDP data. According to a 2004 study by the Bureau of Economic Analysis of GDP revisions from 1983 through 2004, “none of the mean revisions in GDP are statistically different from zero.” While it may appear to the naked eye that revisions are generally in a positive direction, that is not the case.

I don't know why exactly, but if Derb can have "Pop Culture is Filth" as his slogan, I'd like to see this on a t-shirt:

"Because tsunamis happen, is it okay to slaughter Asians?"

From a military medical guy:

Jonah,

Wow! Finally a corner topic about which I have some actual expertise! The photo certainly could be real and looks like someone with one of the craniosynostosis syndromes, such as Crouzon syndrome (as mentioned in the snopes article), caused by premature closure of the sutures of the bones of the skull. My second opinion is that Voinovich is emotionally unsuitable for public office, and McCain is still a weasel. (well, OK, three opinions)

No names please, or I'll end up with an even worse assignment.

I prefer Weekly Review of National Standards, simply because it would horrify Franch Rich more. From a reader:

I've discovered the plan!!!

The addition of Podhoretz to the corner is a prelude to a full fledged merger of WS and NRO,

To be called: Weekly National Standard Review!!

What a title!!!

From someone in a position to know in Ohio state government:

Though I wish to remain anonymous, you can share with your readers if you wish that I've checked with the people who would know in both the Ohio Adult Parole Authority and the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections, and I can confirm that the Freaky Dude is no hoax, unfortunately (or fortunately, I suppose, given your most recent comment).

From a reader:

Here's an assertion which I don't have the time to check today (I'll see if I can find some stats to either prove or disprove this assertion tonight):

"For an accelerating economy, revisions are generally upwards. For a decelerating economy, revisions are generally downwards."

This makes some abstract sense if you assume a) that GDP estimations are measuring "things" that are coming into and out of existence and b) your best first estimate of the rate of change in the current number of those "things" is the measure from the previous quarter. For instance, consider the creation of companies during an economic cycle.

Now estimating the number of companies in a large economy can be a pretty difficult task. Assuming the change in number of companies is the same as the previous quarter is not a bad first estimate. However, for an accelerating economy, that leads to an undercount in the first estimate as the acceleration has led to a faster growth rate. Similarly during decelerations, that first estimate leads to an overcount.

Now, I'm an engineer, not an economimst, (Dammit Jim!) so the assertion might well be wrong, but it does gives the GDP economists an "out" for being off by 10% for some scenarios.

He thinks that the president's event with families who had adopted "unused" embryos and raised them as children was emotionally manipulative. I suppose we should go back to the sober, rational debate we were having with pictures of disease-stricken celebrities.

His only argument is a version of the naturalistic fallacy: A lot of human embryos die because they fail to implant, therefore they weren't alive in the first place. In other words: because they die naturally, it's okay for us to kill them deliberately. Because tsunamis happen, is it okay to slaughter Asians?

I'm glad John Podhoretz hasn't been "unhinged" by it--a Podhoretz off his hinges is a fearsome thing.

My own take on it, with the benefit of a few days' thought: I cared about the confirmation battles over appellate nominees only insofar as it affected Supreme Court confirmation fights. I still think conservatives are in a strong position to win those latter fights. Their chances are marginally worse because of the deal, for the reasons NR editorialized about. But they're marginally better because so much of the base communicated its displeasure with the deal.

is an interesting one. Let me first note that it has come up in a variety of contexts. For example, the House version of the cloning ban has included a provision that prohibits the importation of cloned embryos or products derived from cloned embryos. The biotech lobby interpreted this to mean that if a person came back from a medical trip with a new organ derived from an act of cloning, he would be arrested at the border. (It was a strained interpretation, and the Senate version of the bill does not include this provision.)

The general question of whether it is licit to enjoy benefits from the wrongful acts of another does not admit of a simple yes-or-no answer. It would depend on the circumstances, and people who agree on the wrongfulness of the act in question will disagree about how to weigh these circumstances. (You may find it helpful, Derb, in thinking through this question, to start with a case where you yourself agree that the underlying act is evil. Let's say we had a miracle cure discovered and produced in China by the extraction of organs from living, unanaesthetized political prisoners.)

The president believes that killing human embryos in the process of research is wrong, but that when that act has already taken place, it can be morally permissible to fund research on the stem cell lines derived in that act. I agree with him, but many other pro-lifers disagreed. The Catholic church has said that it is morally permissible for Catholics to see that their children get vaccines that were developed, in part, through the use of aborted fetuses.

I said the answer depended on circumstances. The questions I think should be asked include: Does getting the benefit require you to align his will with the wrongdoer? Is your getting of this benefit likely to lead to more of the evil in question?

The policy questions also depend on circumstances. W/r/t your analogy to the Christian Scientists: I think it would be wrong for the state to require parents to do a genuinely wrongful act--indeed, that parents would have a moral obligation to defy such a requirement. (Note that the wrongness or rightness of the requirement turns on whether the act is genuinely right or wrong. It does not depend on what the parents happen to believe about it or the sources of their conviction.)

I'm not sure what principles should guide us in thinking about trying to apply a life-protective law extraterritorially--nor, for that matter, what our practices are. My impression is that American law does not adhere to any consistent rule on this. We don't do a lot to prevent American tourists from hiring prostitutes in countries where prostitution is tolerated, but I think we do rather more when children are involved.

Finally, let me suggest that you are wrong to avoid the word "kill" in connection with early human embryos. It seems to me that the word does not necessarily imply a negative value judgment--it is permissible to kill living things in many circumstances (and sometimes obligatory). If you want to say that killing a human embryo in an early stage of development is no more morally troubling than killing a fly--and that one may sometimes have good reasons to do it--that does not commit you to denying that what is going on is in fact killing: causing the death of something that was a living organism.

From the Daily Star:

BEIRUT: A Syrian intelligence officer detained in Baghdad has admitted to launching the missile attack on the late premier Rafik Hariri's Future Television in June 2003, according to Al-Rai al-Aam Kuwaiti newspaper. In an article published on Wednesday, the newspaper said Hussein Ahmad Tah, 32, was arrested by Iraqi police when he was attempting to assassinate employees in an Iraqi public institution. Following his arrest, Tah decided to admit to his previous crimes, among which is the Future TV bombing.

Tah said he worked for Syrian intelligence services, adding that he worked for a long time in Lebanon where he perpetrated several attacks. He then moved to Iraq, where he committed several attacks against mosques and Iraqi civilians. Security sources in Iraq said that Tah recounted the details of the attack on Future TV. The television station, situated near Raouche in Beirut, was attacked on June 15, 2003, resulting in the destruction of one of the newsrooms. No casualties were reported. The attack was considered as a message to then-owner of the station, former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri....

Several readers have asked me what my opinion on the embryo issue is since I almost never write about it. There's a reason for that: I don't know what my position is. I find Ramesh's arguments eloquent and elegant but I've not made the complete leap yet. I do generally support the president's -- and Ramesh's -- position that these embryos do have a moral status but I'm not sure I reach the conclusions of the pro-life community generally. (If you're worried, my lovely bride sets prolife policy in our household). But as a matter of public policy I just don't know where I stand (in part because I just haven't read enough). I think the argument, made by Kathryn and others, that this is something of a red herring and that stem cells can be gotten other ways is more than plausible. And I think it's outrageous the way the left, particularly in Hollywood, have told a lot of sick people that embryonic stem cells will save everybody and cure everything. But it seems to me that once this country went down the path of IVF, prolifers were left with very few good options on this subject.

From the Joint Economic Committee:

Joint Economic Committee

Robert F. Bennett, Vice Chairman

GDP Grew at a 3.5% Annualized Rate in the 1st Quarter

The Bureau of Economic Analysis released a revised measure of inflation-adjusted (“real”) gross domestic product (GDP) for the first quarter of 2005 (at http://www.bea.doc.gov/bea/dn/home/gdp.htm ). Annualized GDP growth in the 1st quarter was revised up from an earlier estimate of 3.1% to 3.5%. In the 4th quarter of 2004, real GDP grew at a 3.8% annualized rate.

Highlights:

Ø The major contributors to GDP growth in the 1st quarter were personal consumption expenditures (which grew 3.6%), private inventory investment (which added 0.78 percentage point to the 1st-quarter change in real GDP), exports (which grew 7.2%), residential fixed investment (which grew 8.8%), and equipment and software investment (which grew 5.6%).

Ø The slight deceleration in GDP growth from 3.8% in the 4th quarter to 3.5% in the 1st quarter reflected slower growth in equipment and software investment (from 18.4% in the 4th quarter to 5.6% in the 1st) and in personal consumption expenditures (from 4.2% to 3.6%). These slowdowns were partly offset by faster growth in exports, private inventory investment, and residential fixed investment and by slower import growth.

Ø Year-over-year inflation in the personal consumption expenditure price index excluding food and energy, the Fed’s preferred measure of consumer price inflation, remained at 1.6% in the 1st quarter, the same rate as in the 4th quarter.

"George W. Bush cut off federal funding for [embryonic stem-cell research] in the U.S nearly three years ago." Actually, Bush provided funding for the first time. Congress had essentially banned funding, the Clinton administration issued preliminary regulations getting around the ban, and then Bush imposed a policy of funding with restrictions.

And at least one opponent of the measure, Senator Sam Brownback, Republican of Kansas, has indicated that if Dr. Frist puts the bill on the agenda, he may try to block it by filibuster.

"I have conveyed to Senate leadership that we must do everything we can procedurally to stop unethical embryonic stem cell research in the Senate, and I will work to do just that," Mr. Brownback said in a statement released Tuesday night.

Today the Senate approved the controversial nomination of Priscilla Owen after a filibuster was ended — the result of a "compromise" by 14 senators Monday night. Democrats filibustered Owen's nomination twice in the past four years, and it is worth noting that they again garnered more than the 41 votes needed to maintain a filibuster, had that option not been removed by the compromise.

"Another notch in Karl Rove's belt," NOW President Kim Gandy called the Senate's 56 to 43 confirmation of Owen to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, which covers Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas.

Owen, whose career from obscure Houston lawyer to the U.S. Court of Appeals was engineered by Karl Rove, embodies the basest of political motives—payback, pure and simple. Rove plucked Owen from relative obscurity and raised nearly $1 million for her first campaign. And he will no doubt be gratified, as Owens' anti-women, anti-civil rights, anti-worker and pro-business opinions benefit the wealthy and powerful—George W. Bush's political base. Like her fellow Texan Tom DeLay, Owen is ethically challenged, having taken campaign contributions from corporations like Enron and Halliburton and then ruling in their favor.

"Priscilla Owen is now the proud owner of a lifetime appointment to the second highest court in the United States, where she can inflict her utter disregard for individual rights on the people of Louisiana and Mississippi—as she has been doing for the more than 10 years in Texas," charged Gandy.

As a member of the Texas Supreme Court, Owen consistently took the side of big corporations and the powerful against workers and against ordinary people who had been injured by wrongdoing. In one case involving a young man who had been injured in a truck accident, Owen delayed writing the opinion for a year and a half. According to the New York Times, "the man, who was on a respirator, died when the family could not afford nursing care because the appeal delayed the multimillion-dollar verdict." Her pro-business bias is so strong that in her 2002 judiciary committee hearing, despite an extensive record of dissents, she could not find even one occasion in which she had dissented in favor of an individual suing a corporation.

Owen's contemptible record on women's rights, civil rights, and individual rights makes her unfit for a lifetime appointment, and many innocent people will pay the price for this base act of political patronage. Her opinions were publicly criticized at least a dozen times by Bush's own Attorney General, Alberto Gonzales, when they were both on the Texas Supreme Court. In one case, when Owen tried to re-write Texas' abortion laws to suit her own ideology, Gonzales referred to the attempt as "unconscionable judicial activism."

"Our democracy and our rights were compromised by the machinations of a power-hungry administration and its lackeys in the Senate who put their allegiance to George W. Bush above their oath of office," Gandy said. "The fight is not over. Moderate senators must put the interests of their constituents ahead of the Republican leadership's slash-and-burn politics, and refuse to be strong-armed into approving any more extremist nominees."

Sheesh, now you're quoting from Oprah? It's not a great idea to stereotype yourself like that in The Corner (it's a man's world...don't you think?). How about some beauty tips from Cosmo? Got any recipes from Martha Stewart Living? Gee, maybe you even read Seventeen?

OPRAH: You caused a media storm by calling Crossfire host Tucker Carlson a d*ck when you went on his show last year. Do you regret that?

JON; I regret losing my patience. That's about it. But calling him a d*ck? Not really. I was calling that guy who was on that show right there a d*ck—I don't pretend to know Tucker as a person. But I regret going on air as tired as I was and not being more articulate with what I wanted to say.

From a reader:

Dear Jonah:

Your 7 of 14 reference was brilliant, on levels you may not even realize. You could start referring to all politicians based on the relative power they hold in their reference group. For instance, John McCain would be ‘7 of 14’. Here’s an example of how the system could work, in a political analysis piece:

“Why did 7 of 14 screw 1 of 100? Two theories immediately leap to mind:

1. 7 of 14 was angry at 1 of 1 for his perceived behavior during the South Carolina primaries, back when 1 of 1 was only 4 of 50.

2. 7 of 14 was tired of being 49 of 100, and was looking to upgrade to 1 of 1 in 2008. He thought helping 2 of 100 out of a jam would impress 61,000,000 of 118,000,000, when he runs against 2 of 2 in ’08.

Conclusion: 7 of 14’s gambit is likely to fail, since 31,000,000 of 61,000,000 will not give him the Republican nomination in ’08. 2 of 2 will become 1 of 1, and 7 of 14 will become 148,632 of 290,000,000.

Enjoy (or not) figuring this out.

A while back there was an episode of "Without a Trace" on which a pregnant teenage girl gets turned away by a doctor "because there is a law against having an abortion after the first trimester". She ended up having the baby, almost killing herself along the way.

I am a Spanish-speaking Canadian; I have been to Cuba thirteen times, and I know from personal observation that almost 100% of what you have written about that country is a pack of lies.
I am aware of your dilemma. Your can't compose a balanced article about Cuba, which would include information about medical care, universal free education, the successful containment of AIDS, etc. because the hysterical rag for which you are writing would never publish it.
Your recent article mentions torture. There is plenty of torture in Cuba, at a place called Guantanamo Bay. I am sure that you have heard about it. Castro has stated that his government has never resorted to such procedures and I believe him. I have never known him to tell a lie in the forty years that I have followed his pronouncements. If I had to choose betwen believing Castro and believing Bush, the decision would be extremely simple. All American presidents since the second world war, with the possible exception of Jimmy Carter, have been caught out in telling flagrant falsehoods.
To call your writings "journalistic prostitution" would be in very doubtful taste, but I must confess that it is a phrase which comes to mind.

**I AM AMAZED OF HOW CUBAN RIGHTWING EXTREMISTS i.e. RADICALS ( GUSANOS & GUSANAS ) LIKE KATHRYN LOPEZ , COLUMNIST FOR THE NATIONAL REVIEW, ABUSE OUR U.S. NEWS MEDIAS TO CHANNEL OUT THEIR LIES, DECEIT AND HATRED FOR CUBAN PRSIDENT FIDEL CASTRO. **IT IS ALSO EXTREMELY IRONIC THAT THESE RIGHTWING LUNATICS WHO FEEL SO STRONG ABOUT TOPPLING FIDEL FROM POWER, THAT FOR THE LAST 46 YEARS ALL THEY DO IS ACT LIKE CRYBABIES & WHINE, BELLYACHE......AND WHINE, BELLYACHE SO MORE.
**THE BIG QUESTON IS: DON'T ANY OF THESE SO-CALLED CUBAN EXILES & "FIDEL HATERS / BASHERS" HAVE THE GUTS TO GO BACK TO THE ISLAND'S SIERRA MAESTRA ( WHERE FIDEL INITIATED HIS GUERRILLA WAR IN 1957 THAT TOPPLED THE U.S.-PUPPET MASS-MURDERER MAFIOSO & DICTATOR FULGENCIO BATISTA ) AND INIATE A COUNTER-REVOLUTION ?????
**ARE THESE COWARDS SO-CALLED CUBAN EXILES WAITING FOR MY SONS TO GO FIGHT THEIR WAR, LIKE THOSE IRAQIS RESIDING IN THE U.S., MAKING A LOT OF MONEY AND WHO ARDENTLY SUPPORT BUSH & HIS BLOODY WAR, BUT DON'T SEND THEIR COWARD SONS AND DAUGHTERS BACK TO IRAQ TO FIGHT THEIR WAR THAT HAS KILLED OVER 1.600 OF OUR KIDS ?????
…**ANOTHER BIG QUESTION IS: PEOPLE LIKE LOPEZ CLAIM THAT CUBANS IN THE ISLAND ARE EXTREMELY REPRESSED BY THE GOVERNMENT. SO WHY IS IT THAT THE "REAL" CUBANS - THE ONES IN THE ISLAND - HAVE NOT TRIED TO INIATE A COUP D'ETAT AGAINST FIDEL FOR THE LAST 46 YEARS?
**I'LL ANSWER MY OWN QUESTION....BECAUSE THE VAST MAJORITY OF THE FOLKS IN THE ISLAND OF 11.5 MILLION, LOVE AND RESPECT THEIR COMANDANTE EN JEFE FIDEL CASTRO. THIS I WITNESSED FIRST HAND IN MY TRIPS TO CUBA AS A FORMER "COMBAT & POLITICAL PHOTOGRAPHER"

You need to do alittle research before you start running off at the mouth about Che. I have to date, never found a more honest man who has dedicated his life to destroying people that prey on the weak and less fortunate. I've lived my life in much the same way, a very long story, someone like you would never understand. So, I won't waste my time.

Speaking of despot's, America's despot to be exact, Fulgencio Batista, whose thugs Che executed, just like I would have if I was in his position. Other American backed despot's like Somoza and Mobutu, murdered and tortured many innocent people to stay in power. Don't believe all the U.S. propaganda you hear about individuals the American government wants to do away with, usually for financial reason's. Like Colin Powell said, we have to demonize someone to get the (stupid, gullible) American people to follow us. You fall into that category. Have a nice day.

Thank you for your column about Fidel Castro. You made him look like an angel next to our president Bush.

Vicious little punks'? Please. I'd say theirs was a healthy response.

The only thing they did wrong in my book was kicking him while he was down. They were certainly right to knock this old perv's block off when he laid his hands on one of them. I'd like to buy those hoods a Coke...

To paraphrase the Misfit, the Church would be a better place if there were punks there beating up cruisy clerics every single day of the Church's life. If a priest or anyone else ever propositioned my kid like this, if my kid wasn't in a position to break the perv's nose, I'd go find him and do it.

Dave, we're talking about an older person offering to pay minors for sex. If this were a man offering to pay two girls for same, I'd feel exactly the same way, except probably more strongly, because they wouldn't have been in a position to defend themselves if the older man had forced himself on them.

Iranian journalist Akbar Ganji was has been arrested, tortured and held in solitary confinement since April 22,2000.

He is a prisoner of conscience. His charges are related to articles he wrote implicating senior Iranian political figures including Hojjatoleslam Rafsanjani in the 1998 murders of a number of intellectuals and writers, and statements he made at a conference on ''Iran after the elections'' held in Berlin on April 7-9,200. The conference had received enormous publicity within Iran, and religious figures accused some of those who attended of apostasy, or turning away from Islam.

Mr. Ganji by completing his fifth year in Evin prison has become the longest imprisoned journalist in Iran during which he has been denied his most basic human rights such as adequate medical care, visitations, and phone call privileges. He is suffering from asthma, chronic bronchitis, and recurrent pneumonia. Since May 19th he has been on an unlimited hunger strike and has been loosing 1 to 1.5 kilograms of his body weight per day. He is being specially tormented to revenge exposing Hojjatoleslam Rafsanjani’s criminal activities.

The world has been ignoring human rights violations in Iran for too long. Mr. Ganji is only one of thousands of political prisoners in the horrific Iranian donjons. Ganji is one of the well-known prisoners of conscience in Iran; where as there are thousand of unknown dissidents who are kept in worse conditions tortured and killed on daily basis. These prisoners have families and friends who are fed up with the western world’s silence on the human rights issue in Iran. Turning the blind eye on these criminal acts will only buy you hatred and will amplify their fury. The EU big 3 (England, France, and Germany) blatant disregard in this matter has created an intense animosity towards them in Iranians. President Bush has recognized this factor in the Middle East and has initiated the democratization policy.

Fortunately the ordinary Iranian citizens are peace loving people and unlike the theocratic Iranian government have not engaged in terrorist acts. The current mood in Iran is similar to volcano ready to explode. If and when this volcano explodes, then the lava will burn the EU interests and subjects.

I urge you to take the Iranian people’s side before it is too late! The Iranian Mullahs must be forced to free all political prisoners.

A longtime email buddy writes:

Knowing how smart and widely-read and just plain common-sensical you are, here’s a prediction: One day, probably far down the road, you will don the Vader head/hat and become a liberal. Love you to death, JG, but there’s something about you that carries the seeds to an awful transformation. Hope as usual, a prediction from this quarter is wrong. Maybe it is a latent contrarian streak in you that will magnify to horrifying proportions, sweeping you along even as you see your doom. You’re nuts, Jonah, a good healthy nuts, but nutty people, including this one, sometimes really lose it. And once you do go to over, it will be hell to pay dealing with you. Please don’t but it’s likely beyond anyone’s, including your own, control.

Me: He's wrong that I'll be moving to the left in any way. But I will say I've been moving steadily to a more operationally -- though not metaphysically -- libertarian position over the last year or two. This is partly due to the lessons I've learned from writing this interminable book. Which I must now get back to. But fear not, my mitochlorians (?) are constitutionally incapable of moving leftward.

I find your lack of faith disturbing.

Seriously, though. Do we know what will happen when Frist brings up one of the 7 of 10 (heh) not covered by the agreement? Do we know Frist won't? Am I missing something? In other words, why are you so sure your math is conclusive?

Human embryonic stem cells, isolated from human embryos for the first time in 1998, have the potential to grow into any cell or tissue in the body, and so hold great promise for treatment of disease. But the embryos are destroyed when the cells are extracted. So Mr. Bush, intending to discourage further embryo destruction, insisted in 2001 that federal financing be limited to studies of those stem cell colonies, or lines, that had already been created.

Instead, Mr. Bush is promoting research on adult stem cells, which are drawn from bone marrow and blood, including umbilical cord blood, and have narrower implications for medicine than embryonic stem cells.

I don't think Conservatives should automatically dismiss a centrist bloc as a bad thing. It all depends "where" in the center the bloc is. If the gang of fourteen moves those seven Democrats even slightly more to the right than the seven Republicans move to the left, then the center of gravity in American politics, or at least the Senate, has probably moved to the right. I think you can make that case. The Democrats -- and not just the 7 of 14 (heh) -- have agreed that two of the most "extreme," "radical" and "rightwing" judges are actually good enough and mainstream enough to get a floor vote. That's progress.

Yes, it's annoying that McCain has solidified his role as a power broker, but the new watchword of the day is centrism. I think that pulls many Democratic Senators to the right and fewer Republican Senators to the left. I guess I'm coming around to the John Podhoretz position.

Tim - A reader tells me that a Yahoo! News headline last night read: "Newly centrist Congress challenges Bush."

Take out your red pens everyone.

Wee, sleekit, cowrin, tim'rous beastie,
O, what a panic's in thy breastie!
Thou need na start awa sae hasty,
Wi' bickering brattle!
I wad be laith to rin an' chase thee,
Wi' murd'ring pattle!

I'm truly sorry Man's dominion
Has broken Nature's social union,
An' justifies that ill opinion,
Which makes thee startle,
At me, thy poor, earth-born companion,
An' fellow-mortal!

I doubt na, whyles, but thou may theive;
What then? poor beastie, thou maun live!
A damien icker in a thrave
'S a sma' request.
I'll get a blessin wi' the lave,
An' never miss't!

Thy wee-bit housie, too, in ruin!
Its silly wa's the win's are strewin!
An' naething, now, to big a new ane,
O' foggage green!
An' bleak December's winds ensuin,
Baith snell an' keen!

Thou saw the fields laid bare an' waste,
An' weary winter comin fast,
An' cozie here, beneath the blast,
Thou thought to dwell,
Till crash! the cruel coulter past
Out thro' thy cell.

That wee-bit heap o'leaves an' stibble
Has cost thee monie a weary nibble!
Now thou's turne'd out, for a' thy trouble,
Buy house or hald,
To thole the Winer's sleety dribble,
An' cranreuch cauld!

But, Mousie, thou art no thy lane,
In proving foresight may be vain:
The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men
Gang aft a-gley,
An' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain,
For promis'd joy!

Still thou art blest, compar'd wi' me!
The present only thoucheth thee:
But, Ouch! I backward cast my e'e
On prospects drear!
An' forward, tho' I canna see,
I guess an' fear!

is making the dumbest argument for expanded funding of embryo-killing research that I have ever heard. His view is that we allow adults to decide to risk their lives for the greater good--as in the case of members of the armed forces. He argues that if the embryos were capable of voluntarily deciding to sacrifice themselves for the good of science, some of them would; and since parents have custody of their children, they can make this choice for them.

Really. That's his argument. He doesn't deny that the embryos are living human beings--he explicitly says that he believes that they are.

If there are any parents out there who want to sacrifice their children for science, they've got a green light from one committee chairman.

Here's the take of the former RNC chairman, now a lobbyist who's been working for the National Republican Senatorial Committee on the issue: "I think the deal’s fine. It’s a deal that gets our judges an up-or-down vote. I would rather have had the vote today on the constitutional option and be done with it." He notes that DeWine and Graham both say that they are willing to change the rules if necessary in the future: "I’m glad they’ve been clear that they just holstered their weapons, they haven’t surrendered them.”

"I think the Democrats have made clear that philosophical disagreement does not constitute an extraordinary circumstance. I think the question is what did Reid get?”

Whichever party "won" from the deal, it's pretty clear that the Republicans have lost the spin war over it. But ultimately that may not matter all that much.

I wrote about this topic for NR a few issues ago (subscription required), disputing the contention (made in the Washington Post and Washington Monthly, especially) that the state-level Republican party was becoming less anti-tax. Recent events, I think, bear me out. The Washington Monthly piece I criticized led with the example of Mitch Daniels, the Republican governor of Indiana. He proposed a tax hike on high earners to balance the budget. I noted that Republicans in the legislature were resisting--and now they have won. The final budget did not include Daniels's proposed tax increase.

Tim Pawlenty, the governor of Minnesota, has gone the other way, proposing a cigarette tax increase. That's not great in my view, but the fact that tax-hiking Republican governors are looking to cigarette taxes--rather than to income taxes, as tax-hiking Republican governors did in the early 1990s--suggests that the anti-tax movement continues to make incremental progress.

From a reader:

Jonah,

I’d like to point out the implications of Howard Dean’s recent remarks.

1. According to Dean, only perfect people have a right to give moral lectures. ("It is galling to be lectured to about moral values by folks who have their own problems.")

2. Dean lectures us morally. ("This is a struggle between good and evil, and we are the good.")

3. The inescapable conclusion, therefore, is that Dean is perfect.

Republicans have often been criticized for their belief in Jesus, but at least so far they’ve stopped short of making Him their party’s chairman.

Update: Another reader dissents:

If you are perfect, then you may lecture on morality. Dean is lecturing us morally.

It does NOT logically follow that Dean is perfect or that he is saying he
is.

A causes B
B
does NOT therefore mean A.

Something ELSE might be causing B.

These would be a better fit.

If you are a blow hard DNC chair, then you may lecture morally.
Dean is a blow hard DNC chair.
Therefore, he may lecture morally.

If you are morally lecturing, then you must be perfect.
Dean is lecturing us morally.
Therefore, Dean must be perfect.

A reader sent me this:

Voice of Tony the Tiger dies

FULLERTON, California (AP) — Thurl Ravenscroft, who provided the rumbling “They’re Grrrrreeeat!” for Kellogg’s Tony the Tiger ads and voiced a host of Disney characters, has died. He was 91.

Ravenscroft died Sunday of prostate cancer, said Diane Challis Davy, director of Laguna Beach’s Pageant of the Masters.

For more than 50 years, Ravenscroft was the affable voice behind Tony the Tiger, TV’s popular cartoon pitchman for Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes.

The Congressional Black Caucus on Tuesday announced its opposition to a Senate deal aimed at preventing a showdown on the so-called nuclear option, calling the agreement “more of a capitulation than a compromise.”

The 43-Member CBC, led by Chairman Mel Watt (D-N.C.), is also penning a letter today to the 100 Senators urging them to oppose the judicial nominations of Janice Rogers Brown and William Pryor. Those nominees, expected to come up for consideration in the coming days, were guaranteed an up or down Senate vote as part of Monday’s agreement.

The CBC argued the two nominees “have documented histories of opposing rights of African Americans and of hostility to the broad mainstream of law and rights enacted by the Congress over the past 75 years.”..

“Diversity,” “sensitivity,” “inclusion” . . . The warm, viscous vocabulary of the multicultural project washes over us day by day, enervating and stupefying us until at last we yield, to watch passively as yet another familiar and cherished aspect of our culture is dismantled and hauled away to the dump. Most of us yield, anyway. Not so the citizens of La Jolla, Calif. In response to demands that the word “Christmas” be dropped from the name of their traditional annual parade to make the event more “inclusive,” the La Jolla town council voted to keep the name just as it is. It will not become a Holiday Parade, a Winter Solstice Parade, or, as in the old Soviet Union, a Grandpa Frost Parade. It will remain a Christmas Parade. Thanks to the good people of La Jolla for thus standing athwart history; and God bless them, every one.

just what the gop needs: two nominees to not vote for: mccain & frist [<K-LO HERE: This totally works with Jonah's backward-strategy .]

this makes your love of mitt look smarter all the time.

I killed a mouse at my parents' house once because it was chewing away at items. But I covered it with a piece of cardboard before I crushed it with a broom and each time I went to strike the object moved a few inches, which was unsettling. It is easier to shoot an antelope or mountain ram than a little mouse. Why? Because larger animals can attack and hurt us, but a mouse is small and helpless. - Why kill the mouse in your office? Has it committed a capital crime? Has it murdered anyone on the NR staff? Has it shot a policeman or blown up a building? Has it committed treason or deserted an army in combat? I expect not. Then why kill it? Russell was wise. My second question: did you measure the mouse's height? Was it taller than you or the other women in the office? Again, I expect not. Why were the women hysterical? Think of the little mouse confronted by several screaming women whose voices must have sounded to the little creature like cyclones and whose height must have seemed like tall buildings threatening to crash down upon it. Methinks the mouse should have been screaming instead of you. Indeed, it probably was in its own squeaking little way and its heart, which Jesus loves, must have been beating painfully within its fragile breast. This is but one more reason I think females should not be allowed to vote in general elections or hold public office.

Subject: damn! It is Rove

I just emailed a friend a small diatribe on exactly the same topic. You might also want to consider the tremendous lead Dean had leading up to the Iowa caucus which seemed to evaporate overnight, his fixture in the race pulled Kerry much closer to the fringe left than he probably wanted, was put in charge of the Dems because of his fundraising prowess and now they lag behind the Republicans 2-1 in cash on hand. Geez, where's Mike Moore to fill in the rest of the dots?

CENTER FOLDS: So a deal has been struck on the filibuster. Republicans will allow Democrats to keep the filibuster as long as Democrats never use it. This way, both sides win (except for the Democrats).

Once again, the Republicans have shown their skillfulness when it comes to resetting parameters. Until recently, the perception had been that Bush had consistently filled the courts with extreme conservatives, with only a handful of truly batty nominees failing to meet the standards of Democrats. Now, facing the threat of the "nuclear option," Democrats have backed down on these as well. ...

[B]y bracketing the debate between two right-wing extremes--confirm every nominee except for a handful or confirm every nominee through use of the nuclear option--the Republicans had won before they'd even begun.

The actual lyrics are:
"What’ve I?
What’ve I?
What’ve I done to deserve this."
As you wrote it: “What have I done…
What have I done…”
It would have entirely too many syllables.

May 24, 2005 - The Cincinnati Enquirer (5/24, Wilkinson) reports, "Today, congressional candidate Pat DeWine will become the second Republican to hit the TV airwaves, with a 30-second spot in which he ties himself to two formidable Republican names -- Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush. The ad, which will start airing on all Cincinnati broadcast TV stations, also points to the now-Hamilton County commissioner's record on Cincinnati City Council, where he successfully led an effort to roll back the city's portion of the property tax." The ad "describes DeWine as a 'Ronald Reagan conservative' who will go to Congress and vote to 'make the Bush tax cuts permanent.'" Republican candidate Jean Schmidt "beat DeWine to the airwaves by about a week, spending $30,000 for a TV ad that is no longer being shown on broadcast stations but is still on cable."

A reader dissents:

Jonah-- You blogged: "Why blow things up on the first pick when you know there will be fights over the second and third no matter what? And if the Dems consider McConnell an extraordinary pick justifying a filibuster better to demonstrate their bad faith as early as possible."

Aren't certain nominees are more likely to provoke a filibuster than others, regardless of where they fall in the order? The Dems will have a better argument for opposing a nominee as "extraordinary" if they have already demonstrated their "reasonableness" by confirming a less controversial pick first. It's easier to say one out of two Bush nominees is extraordinary than one out of one. Pardon the mixed metaphors, but Bush should look at the big picture and not let the Dems off the hook.

Keep up the good work,

Oh Great yet Evil KJL,

Now I have that Pet Shop Boys song in my head. Thank you so very much. I'm gonna go see if I can instigate Jonah to start talking Star {Wars,Trek}.

Hemmer: "There was one other outstanding issue on this though. This ‘extraordinary circumstances’ clause that could come back again. I dunno, maybe in weeks, maybe in months. Ultimately, is that where this debate is headed again?"

Senator John McCain: "No, because, I think that we’re talking about 14 people now, not 100. It’s up to us, the 14 to decide what’s extraordinary circumstances. We trust one another. We’ll know it. It’s like child pornography, you’ll know it when you see it. And I hope that the President will send over more nominees who are acceptable and at the same time in keeping with his philosophy. And I am confident that at least the seven Democrats we are dealing with will not use the judicial filibuster except in most extreme circumstances. I’m confident that this agreement will hold."

Under what possible circumstances could the Democrats stop Pryor from being elevated to CJ without breaking the deal? Here is the logic: Only "extraordinary circumstances" warrant stopping candidates; Pryor (and Brown and Owen and all the others placed on the C of Appeals by GWB) have not been stopped; Therefore, these nominations are not "extraordinary."

Pryor for CJ!!

Wow:

FOREMAN, Ark. - A leap of faith proved hazardous for a smoker in need of a cigarette fix after a night on the town.

Jeff Foran suffered trauma to his nose, eyes and chin after jumping from a car traveling 55-60 mph. Authorities said he was trying to retrieve a cigarette blown out of the passenger-side window.

From a reader:

For a "glass is half full" perspective of the deal, turn on Air America and listen to Jerry Springer bemoan how much these idiot DINO senators gave up for NOTHING. After twenty minutes in the car listening to him, I'm starting to think that maybe the deal wasn't that bad after all. It just goes to show you that 'beauty is in the eye of the beholder' - maybe the deal looks bad from 'our' point of view, but it doesn't look much better from 'theirs' either. Isn't that what a compromise usually results in - two parties who feel like they've given up too much to gain too little but, ultimtately, are prepared to walk away from the table with just so much in hand? Instead of saying its a bad deal, just accept that members of both parties found a need to undercut their leadership and their orthodox base and move forward. Any compromise would have been hard to swallow on both poles. I'm taking solice in the fact that their pole is no less agrieved than ours, and saying shoot for 60 Republican senators to kill any need for compromise in the future.

Whoever it was on the Republican side who coined the term "nuclear option," you should forever be banned from coining clever phrases. This has always struck me as an idiotic phrase on every level. First, it concedes that changing the rules would be radical and dangerous, which plays perfectly into the Democrats' hands. Second, it's factually untrue. Changing the rules wouldn't have blown up the Senate. The Democrats promised reaction to the rule change was the explosive part. If China announces they will launch a nuclear strike against the United States unless we ban usage of the phrase "Peking duck" in favor of "Beijing duck" we wouldn't be exercising the "nuclear option" by using the phrase "Peking duck." The Chinese would be when/if they retaliated unreasonably. But, no, the Republicans had to create a phrase which by its very definition made them sound unreasonable.

And lastly, the phrase simply smacks of that typical, annoying, testosterone drenched attitude of Hill Republicans. Noooo...we can't use a phrase like "restore comity" or "reform debate" for we are Klingons! We must talk the manly talk. We must show off our big swinging nuclear options.

I just listened to some treacle from some woman -- and a bunch of callers -- on C-Span radio about how glorious the Senate compromise is. I don't have a problem with people supporting or opposing the deal based on the merits. But this line about how "now, the people's business can be done!" drives me nuts. This woman explained that while the bases of both parties wanted a showdown over filibusters, most people weren't paying attention, they're saying things like "Hey, I've got to get my kid to the doctor."

Maybe so, but is your kid going to get to the doctor any quicker because Pricilla Owen gets a up-or-down floor vote? Should the Senate really be catering to the demands of the people who aren't paying attention?

I hate this sort of cheap populism where people assume that whatever the Senate is doing now isn't the real priority. Well the whole point of prioritizing is that you can really only do one thing at a time. This was the moment for judges. And, frankly, I have no idea when the doctor's office shuttle service comes up for a floor vote.

The cord blood bill "is not an alternative bill. It's an additional bill," said Elizabeth Wenk, spokeswoman for Rep. Michael N. Castle (R-Del.), who introduced the embryonic stem cell bill with Diana DeGette (D-Colo.). "It's something we'd encourage all members to support because all avenues of stem cell research need to be explored."

Statement of People For the American Way President Ralph G. Neas on Senate Compromise Rejecting Nuclear Option

The explicit language of the agreement reached tonight by a group of senators rejects the nuclear option, preserves the filibuster and ensures that both political parties will have a say in who is appointed to our highest courts. The agreement embodies the very principle of consultation and consensus that the filibuster encourages. This is good news for the American people. Saving the Senate’s constitutional advice and consent role, and the checks and balances that protect judicial independence, is especially important with multiple vacancies expected on the Supreme Court.

The unprincipled nuclear option has been averted. This is a major defeat for the radical right. Senators from both parties have rejected demands by the White House, radical right groups, and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist that the filibuster be eliminated on nominees. It is a rejection of White House demands for virtually unlimited power to undermine the independence of the courts.

Nonetheless, we cannot endorse every aspect of the deal that was announced today. We are deeply concerned that it could lead to confirmation of appeals court judges who would undermine Americans’ rights and freedoms. We will urge Senators to vote against confirmation of nominees who have not demonstrated a commitment to upholding individual liberties and the legal and social justice accomplishments of the past 70 years.

The bipartisan rejection of the nuclear option provides President Bush with a clear path out of the divisive impasse that has been caused by his obstinate refusal to engage in bipartisan consultation and compromise on judicial nominations.

It is time for President Bush to recognize what the senators who negotiated this agreement know – that the Senate is the President’s constitutional partner in appointing federal judges. It is time for the White House to abandon its confrontational strategy on judges, and to work with senators from both parties to find some consensus nominees, especially in the case of expected Supreme Court vacancies.

From a reader:

Dear Jonah,

So let me get this straight. The Democrats agree top allow three votes they can't stop in return for the Republicans stopping all the other votes they ( the Democrats) can't stop. The Republicans agree that the Democrats can do this again if they decide conditions constitute an "extraordinary circumstance", and the Republicans agree that until the next election they will allow them to do this witout fear of retribution. This is what passes for moderation and compromise in Washington? What did we gain that we didn't already have? What did we give up in return for nothing? Forget the RINO argument, any Republican that agreed to this deal is just plain stupid and deserves to be defeated for incompetence.

Here's what the Democrats commit to in the future: "Nominees should only be filibustered under extraordinary circumstances, and each signatory must use his or her own discretion and judgment in determining whether such circumstances exist." Here's what the Republicans commit to: "In light of the spirit and continuing commitments made in this agreement, we commit to oppose the rules changes in the 109th Congress. . ."

So: Democrats can filibuster nominees in "extraordinary circumstances," to be determined according to the "discretion and judgment" of Ralph Neas--I mean, of each individual senator. Republicans, on the other hand, are not getting any wiggle room to vote for a rules change in "extraordinary circumstances"--such as the Democrats' abuse of their wiggle room. It looks as though the majority party got taken in this deal.

Modeled on the Protestant-led congressional prayer breakfast that has been held each February for more than half a century, the National Catholic Prayer Breakfast is in its second year. It attracted 1,600 people, 14 members of Congress and the president to a packed hotel ballroom where waiters in black tie served scrambled eggs to activists who wore sweat shirts that read "You can't be Catholic and pro-abortion."

Today’s lunch at the AIPAC conference was a discussion between AEI’s Richard Perle and Rep. Jane Harman (D., Calif.), moderated by Dan Senor, about the future of the war on terror. (It was billed as a presentation of “two visions,” but as Senor pointed out at the end it was more like one and a half, with Harman taking a pretty hawkish stance on most things.)

At times the audience’s reaction was as interesting as what was said. For example, toward the beginning of the presentation, Senor read aloud from a sermon that aired earlier this month on Palestinian Authority television:

We have ruled the world before, and by Allah, the day will come when we will rule the entire world again. The day will come when we will rule America. The day will come when we will rule Britain and the entire world--except for the Jews. The Jews will not enjoy a life of tranquility under our rule, because they are treacherous by nature, as they have been throughout history.

A few minutes later, responding to Harman’s suggestion that Bush work with Abbas to help him strengthen security, Perle said he thought the president shouldn’t cut the PA too much slack. “We should be tough on Abbas in his own interests and the interests of the Palestinians,” he said. For example, “I would say to Abbas, before you come [to Washington], why don’t you fire the person who put that [clip] on Palestinian television?” The audience loved it.

The audience also liked Perle’s statement that he would hope “if justification for military action developed in Iran,” the United States “wouldn’t expect little Israel to do our job.” He received more applause when he followed that up with, “If Iran is on the verge of a nuclear weapon, we will have no choice but to take decisive action.”

The same crowd erupted into chuckles when Harman said the administration’s short-term goal with regard to Iran should be to set a firm deadline for action by the U.N. Security Council. Perle agreed that tough economic sanctions could be effective, especially if combined with support for Iran’s democratic opposition. But, he said, we should ask “what could the U.N. do, and then what would it do?”

Much of what Harman had to say was well received, but interestingly enough it was Perle who managed to get the audience fired up.

Okay I'll mention it too.

One of the things I think is interesting in a way I've never really thought through is how we've been fascinated by certain things long before science has caught up (by "we" I mean us humans). My dad always used to point out articles that dealt with science's efforts to make alchemy a reality. We've always wanted to transform lead into gold, Paul Krugman's column into genius etc. Science isn't completely there yet, but tinkering with molecules and whatnot to make X into Y still fascinates. And we do make our own diamonds already.

Humans have been looking for other dimensions, planes, realms ever since we were convinced dreams might be real. Physcists have been working hard to put meat on the bones of this instinct.

Something similar goes for cloning. We've been fascinated by dopplegangers, doubles, twins, clones for centuries. Science fiction drips with plotlines involving doubles, bodysnatching, lifelike replacement androids and the like. How many Star Treks involved doppleganger Captain Kirks? (I had to get that in there).

I think that's one of the problems the anti-cloning forces will always have to contend with. There's just something about the idea which titilates as much as it horrifies.

For '08.

Only problem: They don't do that anymore.

Interesting piece for demographic nerds, and probably a few others, in the Jerusalem Post (Reg. req'd). It turns out that the assumptions behind a lot of analysis may have been wrong. Here's the opener:

Demography is a central issue in the Arab-Israeli conflict. Conventional wisdom holds that Israel faces a demographic time bomb because the Palestinian Authority's reported 3.8 million population, combined with Israel's 1.3 million Arabs, already almost equals the Jewish population (5.4 million). Some Israeli demographers contend that given high Arab birthrates, Jews will quickly become a minority between the Jordan and the Mediterranean.

But this doomsday scenario is wrong.

Remarkably, no one had bothered to verify the Palestine Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) numbers until we formed a team of American and Israeli researchers to exhaustively study Palestinian, Israeli and third-party sources. They revealed that the 2004 Arab population in the Territories is closer to 2.4 million than to the PCBS claim of 3.8 million, a 60% overstatement.

This million-and-a-half person gap arose because the PCBS figures are based on predictions, not on actual, real-time measurements. The PCBS also inflated its 1997 census, the base figure for its predictions, and then applied high birth and unrealistically high immigration assumptions to this inflated base, compounding the same errors year after year. Our audit found that the PCBS projections were not met for even one year between 1997 and 2004.

On top of the PCBS error, some Israeli demographers again applied the high growth rates, and continued to build further errors, exponentially, into the future.

Together these groups have built a demographic house of cards.

and the kicker:

The current Jewish majority, with its rising birthrate combined with modest aliya and/or returning overseas Israelis, would easily maintain the demographic balance in favor of the Jews. Parity between Jew and Arab might never be reached if Arab migration and fertility trends continue. And in Israel and the West Bank, Jewish dominance is overwhelming, both in absolute numbers and in terms of growth rates.

Given these factors, demographers who predict that Arab dominance is inevitable are indulging in pure and fallacious conjecture.

What direction will Europe now turn? If France rejects the constitution because of resentments of "neo-liberalism", NATO and the like, while at the same time Germany could be ruled by conservatives and liberals after the recently-announced elections this fall, this could turn out to be quite interesting.

From a reader:

I have spent a great deal of time in Italy and I would venture a guess the majority of Italians are missing the area of the brain for comprehending sarcasm while the Fins are almost as good us.

Dean declared, "Our moral values, in contradiction to the Republicans', is we don't think kids ought to go to bed hungry at night."

Did I miss the pro-hungry children plank in the GOP platform?

Rich - I agree. But I think the fact that this wasn't Dean at his worst was in a way more damning. We got to see how he thinks about things without the distraction of his silly schtick. For example, for a doctor to mock drug addiction is pretty galling. It's one thing to do it on the fly. It's another to be asked about it during a calm moment on a national talk show. Dean explained that since Limbaugh mocks others, it's okay for him to mock him about his addiction in turn. This is simply not how the Hippocratic oath works. Doctors treat murderers all the time. The fact that a patient murdered someone doesn't give a doctor a pass on treating him or mocking his condition. When Dean announced "I will use whatever position I have in order to root out hypocrisy," it demonstrated what a truly shallow thinker he is. Is he going to denounce his donors who fly private jets while lecturing the rest of the country about getting rid of their SUVs (paging that Greek lady). Is he going to denounce all the Democrats who send their kids to private school? Since Limbaugh's hypocrisy stems from the fact that he's supported the drug war, is he saying that if you've ever used drugs, or even if you use them now, you have to be in favor of giving up the drug war?

Does Dean really think liberals and Democrats don't lecture conservatives about morality? I think he probably does because he is an amazingly unreflective person. Every time I see him, I find him more unlikable.

Here's a real toughie but it would save me enormous time and effort, so I would be very, very grateful to anybody who might have access to it.

I need to get my hands on an essay written by Woodrow Wilson in the Nassau Literary Magazine in 1877 titled "Prince Bismarck."

I'd assume it's in the collected papers of Woodrow Wilson. But other than that, I have no idea.

A little lab in St. Louis is at the forefront of the national effort to use stem cells from newborns' umbilical cord blood to treat deadly diseases.

Without fanfare, the St. Louis Cord Blood Bank has amassed the second-largest inventory in the world of cord blood listed on a public registry. Eight stainless-steel freezers in a hospital office building hold the treasure...

JERUSALEM - Officials expressed outrage over the weekend that the City of Barcelona would publish a teachers' training manual comparing "the wall of shame Israel is building in Palestine" to concentration camps.

The manual was published last week and serves as a guide for high school teachers talking about the Holocaust. The specific comparison is found in the chapter dealing the imprisonment of Spanish Republicans.

"The concentration camps can be compared to two other historical events: The wall of shame Israel is building in Palestine and the (American) detention camp in Guantanamo," the manual goes.

According to Israeli diplomatic officials in Spain, the murder of six million Jews is only mentioned in passing.

From a reader:

Dean's "Greatest Hits"

DEAN'S KNOWLEDGE OF FACTS

DEAN: When the Republicans were in power, they kept a
much larger percentage of President Clinton's nominees
to the bench. They didn't do it with the filibuster,
they did it by bottling them up in committee and not
allowing them to move forward.

MR. RUSSERT: The numbers are pretty similar actually.

DR. DEAN: OK. They're similar.

.....

DR. DEAN: Right now the Social Security tax is only
on the first, I think, about $85,000 worth of wages.
I saw an economic analysis the other day that said if
you remove that cap entirely that Social Security will
be solvent. [You think somebody discussing Social
Security reform would know it's $90,000.]

DEAN, NOT VOTERS, SHOULD CHOOSE CONGRESSMEN:

MR. RUSSERT: Here's the Democratic National Committee
Web site this morning. It is, in effect, a mug shot
of Tom DeLay. You can see his height in the back with
inches there, a serial number, 18821. Is that
appropriate, a mug shot?

DR. DEAN: I don't think it's appropriate for Tom
DeLay to be in Congress, Tim. I really don't.

DEAN THINKS THERE WERE WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION

DEAN: Some of the things that the president said on
our way into Iraq, they just weren't true, and I don't
think that's right. So...

MR. RUSSERT: Such as?

DR. DEAN: Such as the weapons of mass destruction,
which we have all known about, but the...

MR. RUSSERT: Well, you said there were weapons of
mass destruction.

DR. DEAN: I said I wasn't sure, but I said I thought
there probably were.

DEAN THINKS BUSH IS MORE NUANCED THAN KERRY

MR. RUSSERT: When did the president ever suggest that
Saddam Hussein was responsible for September 11?

DR. DEAN: He didn't. His nuance--his people
suggested that. He suggested that in a nuanced way in
many of his speeches.

DEAN THINKS WE SHOULD LAY OFF DELAY:

DEAN: We ought not to lecture each other about our
ethical shortcomings.

DEAN THINKS ROE SHOULD BE OVERTURNED, AND ABORTION
SHOULD BE A STATE MATTER:

DEAN: You know what I'd prefer to see, frankly? I'd
prefer to see medical practice boards around the
country, state by state--because people do believe
different things about this in different states. I'd
prefer to see medical practice boards around the
country set ethical guidelines for abortion.

DEAN SEES NO DIFFERENCE BETWEEN SOCIALISTS AND LIBERAL
DEMOCRATS:

DR. DEAN: Well, first of all, [Bernie Sanders is] not
a socialist, really.

MR. RUSSERT: He...

DR. DEAN: He hasn't said that for a while.

MR. RUSSERT: Oh, he has a--he wrote in his book:
"Outside or in the House, I am a Democratic
socialist."

DR. DEAN: Well, a Democratic socialist--all right,
we're talking about words here. And Bernie can call
himself anything he wants. He is basically a liberal
Democrat, and he is a Democrat that--he runs as an
Independent because he doesn't like the structure and
the money that gets involved. . . . The bottom line is
that Bernie Sanders votes with the Democrats 98
percent of the time.

I liked the column and good for him in writing what he did, but I found this graf a bit odd:

No one deserves the personal vituperation that regularly comes Dowd's way, and some of Krugman's enemies are every bit as ideological (and consequently unfair) as he is. But that doesn't mean that their boss, publisher Arthur O. Sulzberger Jr., shouldn't hold his columnists to higher standards.

Both of these amount to something like a non-denial denial defense. So Dowd doesn't deserve the personal viturperation that regularly comes her was because she falls into that subset of people we call "people." Okay, but that leaves room for a lot of non-personal vituperation that she may only irregularly receive.

And as for Krugman, Okrent merely says that some of his critics are as ideological as he is and therefore as bad as he is. While I reject the notion that ideology and unfairness go hand-in-hand, Okrent is still saying that Krugman's as bad as the crazies who criticize him. I'll take that.

Peter, don’t get me wrong. By and large the Queen does her best, often impressively so, but I find it extraordinary that the same sense of duty that prompted her to boycott her oldest son’s recent wedding leads her to attend an event that is an insult to the memory of sailors who died fighting, at least in part, for her ancestors.

The Queen should give this grotesque and insulting charade a miss.

Prince Harry, a young man with an appropriately hazy understanding of history, would, I believe, be an ideal replacement.

Peter, the German people are not being allowed to vote on this question (the ‘nein’ in my headline referred to the North Rhine Westphalia election as yet another example of the increasing discontent on the continent) as their rulers believe that, based on the Third Reich, Germans are forever unable to decide such matters by referendum. You raise, however, two very important points:

(1) Do the no votes from some countries count for more than others? Disgracefully, it seems so. We are told that the French vote matters, but the Dutch referendum is an obstacle that can somehow be overcome, ignored or otherwise be dealt with.

(2) Could we be headed for some sort of crisis within the EU? I’m generally of the view that most ‘crises’ are the creation of overexcited journalists and ambitious politicians and that, in reality, they can generally be dealt with by that most conservative of approaches – muddling through. That said, I think that we may be heading towards the real thing in Europe at the moment.

Lets take a look. If the French vote ‘no’ (which I hope they do) they will be taking the right decision for, very largely, the wrong reasons. It will be a rejection as much of economic liberalism and les Anglo-Saxons as of European integration. The crowning irresponsibility of the EU’s elite is the way that they have allowed necessary free market reforms to be contaminated by the creation of their unnecessary and unwanted superstate.

A Dutch no, meanwhile, will primarily be a rejection of the way that the country has been run into the ground - and their currency trashed - for no good reason other (again) than the mad belief that a superstate is necessary if Europe is to avoid a return to 1940.

Over in Germany, a profoundly irresponsible, unpopular and destructive government will, after today’s provincial election results now likely swing sharply to the left, the last thing the country needs, in an attempt to avoid the electoral annihilation it so richly deserves. The country’s economic problems will remain unaddressed – and the extent to which the introduction of the Euro, ill-judged, ill-planned and economically illiterate, has devastated the country will be glossed over.

Moving to the South, both Italy and Portugal are facing enormous structural problems, with, after the introduction of the Euro, few ways to solve them.

Do I think that people over here are looking enough at all this? No.

Do I think that the administration should be doing or saying anything? No, it would be counterproductive.

Do I think that Condi Rice’s supportive comments on the draft ‘constitution’ reveal an ignorance so profound and an imagination so shallow that I am at a loss to understand why she has the job she has? Yes.

…from Chris Martin of Coldplay

“I think shareholders are the greatest evils of this modern world.”

Tell that, Chris, to Shaima Rezayee.

Meanwhile the New York Post (Page Six, what else?) reports that Martin was seen celebrating his daughter’s (her name is Apple, poor mite) first birthday party at Moby’s restaurant on the Lower East Side. The luckless child was being fed vegan chocolate cheesecake.

The only consolation is the absolute certainty that one day Apple will change her name to something incredibly staid – and will feast all day on veal chops, pate de foie gras and the eggs of endangered birds.

Schroeder loses in North Rhine-Westphalia.

Deutsche Welle has more:

“The loss of NRW could also force Schröder to abandon plans to cut the basic corporate tax rate to 19 percent from 25 percent, a move designed to boost growth but strongly opposed by the left. An extension of the minimum wage to all sectors of the economy and tighter controls on hedge funds are other likely outcomes. SPD party leader Franz Müntefering has been telegraphing the possible return to the left for weeks, launching a scathing attack on "pure capitalism" and likening some financial investors to "locusts". But the leftist rhetoric has come to late to save the state for the SPD. The state had long been an SPD stronghold dominated by the coal and steel industry but NRW has fallen on hard times. Unemployment in NRW, a state in which one in five Germans live, surpassed the one million mark to a post-war high this year. The cause of this, disgruntled residents say, is down to Schröder's controversial labor market reforms, which include jobless benefit cuts.”

And watch for this…

‘The election result has ominous implications for the future of SPD and Greens cooperation as well as the future of the government. NRW was the last German state ruled by the Red-Green coalition and the result leaves the increasingly tense federal partnership in Berlin as the final alliance between the two parties.”

Somewhat counter-intuitively, many Greens are more economically liberal than their coalition partners in the SPD.

It looks like a rough ride ahead in Germany. The last time Schroeder was faced with the danger of election defeat he descended into the gutter for crude anti-Americanism of the worst type. That worked. I’d expect free enterprise to be in for similar treatment this time around.

From the London Times:

“AMONG the Wayampi Indians it is not uncommon for children to give birth at 10 and become grandparents in their twenties. They hunt and fish in red loincloths. Their favourite food is smoked alligator. They are also among Europe’s most civic-minded citizens…Britain has the Pitcairn islands and the Dutch have West Indian Curaçao, but these cannot compete with the impressive French portfolio of dominions around the globe from the Pacific to the Amazon jungle. Their 1.4m voters could swing the result in the closely fought May 29 French referendum on the European Union’s constitution and determine the future of Europe, not to mention influence the timing of Tony Blair’s departure from No 10. The Wayampi do not know him but excitement was building last week at the prospect of playing their part in the politics of the palan isi lena, or the “land of the white man”, as Europe is known. Many speak only rudimentary French and have little understanding of qualified majority voting, but an election is always a welcome occasion for a gathering in this alligator-infested corner of French Guiana in South America."

EU money is pouring into the lands of the Wayampi and France's other overseas territories.

Draw your own conclusions.

From the Independent:

.'This vote is just about the European constitution," pleads Lousewies van der Laan, alone in the studio with a television camera. The window behind her frames the Dutch parliament in The Hague; the desk in front conceals her blue jeans. "It's not about whether to allow Turkey to join the EU, or whether we should abandon the euro and get the guilder back.As one of the more photogenic and articulate MPs backing a "yes" vote in the Dutch referendum on the constitution next week, Ms van der Laan, 39, is much in demand to explain why the Netherlands, one of the six founding members of the European Community should not turn its back on its creation.”

Well, Lousewies, did you let the Dutch people vote on whether to adopt the Euro?

No you didn’t.

Well, Lousewies, do you have any plans to let the Dutch people vote on whether to admit Turkey to the EU?

No, you don’t.

So, stop blaming the Dutch people if they take the chance now to say what they think about the mess that you and yours have made of their country.

Vote nee.

No apologies for reproducing this Washington Post editorial in full:

”PRESIDENT BUSH has publicly cited Saudi Arabia's local and limited council elections as evidence that the kingdom is joining a regional shift toward greater political freedom. Better that he talk about Ali Dumaini, Matrouk Faleh and Abdullah Hamed, three intellectuals who were sentenced to lengthy prison terms last Sunday for advocating liberal democracy. Sadly, their trial was a clearer signal about where Saudi Arabia is headed than was the local balloting trumpeted by the president.

“The three men, a poet and two professors, were arrested along with 10 others in March 2004, after they joined in circulating an independent petition calling for a peaceful transition by Saudi Arabia to constitutional democracy. Mr. Dumaini, who received the stiffest sentence of nine years, further offended his captors by describing the Saudi educational system and Wahhabi religious ideology as causes of extremism -- an observation that by now is obvious to anyone following the stream of Saudi recruits for extremist causes ranging from the Sept. 11 attacks to the Iraqi insurgency. Ten of the dissidents were released after they signed pledges not to make further public statements or talk to the foreign press. When the others bravely refused, they were put on trial.

“The trial process simply served to demonstrate why the intellectuals' original dissent was justified. One open session was held last August; when supporters of the accused appeared there, the judge closed all subsequent sessions. Several lawyers for the defense were disqualified, and one was himself arrested after he refused to keep quiet. Inside the court, prosecutors accused the intellectuals of such crimes as "disobeying rulers" and speaking to foreign journalists.

“In a country where al Qaeda has been active and extremist groups recruit young men for suicide attacks against Iraqi and American soldiers, these would seem to be fairly minor offenses. Yet a Saudi government that has seen fit to pardon associates of al Qaeda proposes to imprison three intellectuals for six, seven and nine years for suggesting that a democratic rule of law gradually replace the power monopoly of the Saudi royal family. The message to society is clear: no independent reform movements, however small or moderate, will be tolerated; any change in Saudi Arabia will be dictated from above.

“The Bush administration's response to this outrage has been disappointingly muted. On Wednesday the State Department belatedly declared itself "troubled by the outcome" of the case, adding with almost comical understatement that the trials "appear to have been conducted in a somewhat irregular fashion." Mr. Bush himself has been silent. That doesn't sound like the president who, in his last inaugural address, promised "democratic reformers facing repression" that "when you stand for your liberty we will stand with you." If he is to keep faith with those words, Mr. Bush should stand up for Ali Dumaini, Matrouk Faleh and Abdullah.”

Well, Mr. President, how about it?

My wife and I also watched "Sideways" last night. While I enjoyed it slightly more than you did, you’re right, the people in it were uniformly wretched. It’s like the Kevin Spacey character from “American Beauty” went on a road-trip.

Ozymandias

I met a traveler from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read,
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed,
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look upon my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

You ask, "Where are the counter-demonstrations? That is, where can adherents of a "religion of peace" be found publicly condemning claims that their religion calls for "death, death, death" over something as comparatively minor as a defiling of the Koran - much less one that didn't happen?"

To answer your question, there is an anti-Islamist demonstration in London every Thursday at 6:00pm outside the Marks & Spencer on Oxford Street near Marble Arch. We don't burn Iranian flags, call for nuking Damascus, chant "death to bin Laden" or do anything else that might attract CNN coverage and earn us a coveted mention in The Corner, but we're there, every week, rain or shine, handing out anti-terrorist and anti- fundamentalist literature to passers-by.

There are many Muslims who oppose the nihilistic death-spiral promulgated by Islamic fundamentalists. I think the reason that most choose not to go public with their criticisms is because of the intimidation campaign that fundamentalists direct at anyone displaying even the slightest wavering from the orthodoxy. I can attest to the (occasionally violent) nature of this intimidation first-hand and the chilling effect this has on my co-religionists. This is a disquieting, sobering and truly sad fact, but not proof that moderate Muslims are insouciant about terrorism, far less that 'religion of peace' needs to be surrounded by scare quotes.

Here via the London Times is a horrific story that highlights, once again, the nature of the challenge that the West faces – and yet seems pathetically unwilling to identify for what it is:

“ SHAIMA REZAYEE was the face of a new generation of young Afghan women: she discarded her shalwar kameez and burkha for Western clothes and a glamorous job as a television presenter on Kabul’s answer to MTV. But two months ago her bosses were forced to dismiss Ms Rezayee, 24, under pressure from conservative mullahs who were disgusted by the “unIslamic values” of her music show. This week she paid for her unconventional choices with her life: she was shot dead in her home by an unknown assailant. “

Roughly half of the population of the Muslim world is under the age of 25. It’s time for the West to spend a little less time appeasing all the clerics, all the mullahs, and all the other aged, benighted irreconcilables and a little more time on helping their young win some of the freedom to which they ought to become entitled.

From the London Sunday Times

“ADMIRAL NELSON saw off the mighty Franco-Spanish fleet at the battle of Trafalgar but 200 years on, he has been sunk by a wave of political correctness. Organisers of a re-enactment to mark the bicentenary of the battle next month have decided it should be between “a Red Fleet and a Blue Fleet” not British and French/Spanish forces.”

And people wonder why children don’t know anything about history these days.

I note that, bringing further embarrassment to her moth-eaten, tatty and absurd family, the Queen is showing up to this charade.

She should be ashamed of herself.

Kathryn, to be clear, I quite agree with you that the future of marriage is no petty matter, but lets also be clear that I am quite at a loss to understand how giving some legal status to the relationships of a tiny minority of a tiny minority will have any impact on an institution that has endured – in one form or another – for thousands of years.

But that’s a discussion for another time. What I thought – and think – was petty was to do nothing to make it easier for people to visit or otherwise help their sick or dying companions.

To be fair, however, one reader pointed out this to me:

“Ehrlich said he agreed with the intent of the bill that would create a registry for partners but thought the version passed by the General Assembly was flawed. He said he would work with the legislature in the next session to create a registry of advance directives and other legal documents to achieve the bill's aims.”

Good.

Get working, Governor.

When it comes to judges, Democrat Sens. Chuck Schumer, Ted Kennedy, Pat Leahy, John Kerry, John Edwards, Harry Reid and company just won't budge.

Not even for a nonpartisan compromise offered by Majority Leader Bill Frist that would allow 100 hours of debate on each judge and guarantee votes on every judicial nominee in the future, whether nominated by a Republican or Democrat President, and regardless of what party controls the Senate. The Democrats still refuse to vote on President Bush's most important and highly qualified nominees to the federal courts of appeal.

Why? They claim it's because these judges, such as Justice Priscilla Owen of Texas and Justice Janice Rogers Brown of California, are "extreme."

If that were true, you can count on it: Left-wing interest groups and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee would be clamoring for a vote; they'd want Republicans on record as having supported such "extremists" in the next election cycle. Surely in 100 hours they could expose these judges as extremists, get the support of mainstream America, and send the Republicans packing.

Truth is, Democrats are hiding from a debate, and hiding from a vote, precisely because these highly qualified judges are the mainstream. ..

He said, however, that the bill's requirement that couples register as life partners "will open the door to undermine the sanctity of traditional marriage."

Ehrlich suggested that most goals of the legislation could be accomplished with existing legal tools, such as advance medical directives, which allow residents to designate someone to make health care decisions for them