Irreligious reporters missed it...

This from The Revealer. Jeff Sharlet writes:

I've a short item on Harriet Miers' church, Valley View Christian, coming out in an upcoming issue of Rolling Stone. Poking around the site, I came across a startling link, to the Gospel Broadcasting Association, which declares: "This ministry is directed to the peoples of the world which historically have embraced Christianity--namely, the Caucasians, the Anglo-Saxons, the Celts, the Scandinavians, the Germanic tribes, and kindred groups which inhabit Western Europe and North America. Because of their embrace of Christianity, these groups collectively have been known as 'Christendom', that is, 'the kingdom of Christ'. Not surprisingly, these traditionally-Christian peoples are none other than the literal, physical descendants of the tribes of ancient, Biblical Israel." The site goes on to claim that the Roman Catholic church is a Jewish conspiracy.

Zoinks! Is Harriet Miers a Christian Identity white supremacist?

No. Whatever else she is, she's not that, and neither are her fellow Christians at Valley View. When I spoke to the church's pastor, Dr. Barry McCarty, last week, I asked him about his site's link to this racist fantasy. He was genuinely horrified. The link was supposed to be to the Gospel Broadcasting Mission, not the Gospel Broadcasting Association. He said he had no knowledge of the association; I verified this with the association's sole member, one Russell L. Harris, of Houston, Texas. McCarty saw to it that the link was promptly fixed.

Case closed, as far as Miers is concerned. But the real puzzle here is why no one else caught this. When I pointed it out to McCarty, he was not only shocked, he was perplexed. He said he'd done perhaps 100 interviews since the announcement of Miers' nomination, with reporters who were clearly looking for an angle on the church's fundamentalism. Why hadn't they noticed the raging lunacy of the Gospel Broadcasting Association? Why was I the only one to catch it?

Certainly not because I'm a better reporter. I was writing a short item; I spent about an hour clicking on Miers' church's site links. And bam, there it was. That's all.

Was it overlooked because the political reporters assigned to the Miers story simply had no taste or time for theology? When I spoke to McCarty and Miers' former pastor, Ron Key, both men volunteered responses on abortion and same-sex marriage before I even asked questions about the subject. They'd clearly been grilled dozens of times over, by reporters who understand Christian conservatism as no broader than these two issues.

It can be much broader, and in the case of the Gospel Broadcasting Association, it can be much narrower. But picking up on the nuances requires reading religion, and that, apparently, was too much to ask of a press determined to declare a Miers a fundamentalist in the only terms they understood.

I hold Sharlett in high regard. Killing the Buddha predates the more recent (and perhaps more cohesive...I'm trying to find the polite word here...) Christian Blogosphere. Anyway, I don't know which I find more odious, reporters who are ignorant of faith or leaders of the faith who egg them on.
Excuse me if I seem snarky tonight. I am disappointed to learn of Bene Diction's burnout and end to blogging.

Trial of Saddam #3

Reuters report by Luke Baker

Two years after he was found hiding in a hole near where he was born, the former Iraqi president and his co-defendants go on trial for their lives on charges of crimes against humanity for the killing of more than 140 Shi'ite Muslim men two decades ago.

Prosecutors say the men, from the town of Dujail, north of Baghdad, were ordered killed after a failed attempt on the then leader's life as he visited the town in July 1982. Scores of families from Dujail are also said to have been persecuted.

The day in court for the former dictator has been long awaited by Iraqis, but it may not last long.

Sources close to the tribunal conducting the trial say the case may well be quickly adjourned, perhaps on the first day, so judges can study defense motions for a dismissal or delay.
Saddam's chief lawyer, Khalil Dulaimi, an Iraqi with little experience of major cases, including crimes against humanity, has said he intends to challenge the legitimacy of the court.
[...]
With less than 24 hours to go before the trial, it still has not been decided whether it will be carried live on TV or with a delay, but either way the world will see Saddam in court.

If proceedings are quickly adjourned, sources close to the court say it could be several weeks before they resume, probably after parliamentary elections are held in mid-December.

I saw Michael P. Scharf on NBC News this evening. He strikes me as a bright, young man fully prepared for the task before him. We are about to witness another history-making moment. Even if the procedings are not televised, daily reports will fill the air. A good time to have discussions with kids about what is happening.

* * * *

* * * *

At the Today in Iraq blog, Matt continues the dismal task of documenting the war.
Any time I need reminding that it isn't over yet, I check there. That is where I found the Reuters link and a lot more. (At this moment we are only a handful short of two thousand casualties.)

Bring ‘em on: Two US Marines and four guerillas killed in fighting near Rutba.
Bring ‘em on: Two police officers killed in drive-by shooting in Kirkuk. Two civilians killed in a suicide bomber attack on a funeral for a sheik in Samarra.
Bring ‘em on: Three civilians killed and seven wounded when gunmen attacked the al-Rahman mosque in Mahaweel. An adviser to the Iraqi Industry Minister killed by gunmen outside his home in Baghdad.
Bring ‘em on: Two Iraqi soldiers killed and seven wounded when a roadside bomb struck a joint U.S and Iraqi army patrol in Baiji. Eleven insurgents killed and 57 suspects arrested in a joint U.S and Iraqi army operation in Mahmudiya. Three men shot dead by U.S. Marines, who claimed the men had planted a roadside bomb near Haqlaniya. Aircraft then destroyed caves where weapons were said to be stored and made. About 12 insurgents killed in attack on US Marine base near Qusayba. Three guerillas killed by Marine helicopters in Karabila.
Bring ‘em on: Senior member of the Anbar provincial government and his bodyguard shot dead by gunmen in Ramadi.
Bring ‘em on: One civilian killed and two others injured Tuesday when a mortar shell slammed into their house in Baghdad.
Bring ‘em on: At least five Iraqis were killed by militants on Tuesday. At least one of these deaths is documented in a post above, unclear on the others. In addition, the handcuffed and mutilated bodies of six Iraqis who had been kidnapped and killed in captivity were found in three locations of the capital.
Bring ‘em on: A U.S. fighter jet bombed a crowd gathered around a burned Humvee on the edge of a provincial capital in western Iraq, killing 25 people, including 18 children, hospital officials and family members said Monday. The military said the Sunday raid targeted insurgents planting a bomb for new attacks.
In all, residents and hospital workers said, 39 civilians and at least 13 armed insurgents were killed in a day of U.S. airstrikes in Ramadi, the capital of Anbar province, a Sunni Arab region with a heavy insurgent presence.
The U.S. military said it killed a total of 70 insurgents in Sunday's airstrikes and, in a statement, said it knew of no civilian deaths.
At Ramadi hospital, distraught and grieving families fought over body parts severed by the airstrikes, staking rival claims to what they believed to be pieces of their loved ones.

Economic indicators from Iraq

Michael Rubin writing in the WSJ via Andy McCarthy of FDD...

When people fear for their future, they invest in gold; jewelry and coins can be sewn into clothes and smuggled out of the country. When people feel confident about the future, they buy real estate. Property prices have skyrocketed across Iraq. Decrepit houses in Sadr City, a Shiite slum on the outskirts of Baghdad, can easily cost $45,000. Houses in upper-middle-class districts of Mansour and Karrada can cost more than 20 times that. Restaurant owners spend $50,000 on top-of-the-line generators to keep open despite the frequent blackouts. In September 2005, there were 40 buildings nine stories or higher under construction in the Kurdish city of Sulaymani. Five years ago, there were none. Iraqis would not spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on real estate if they weren't confident that the law would protect their investment.

Iraqis now see the fruit of foreign investment. A year ago in Baghdad, Iraqis drank water and soft drinks imported from neighboring countries. Now they drink water bottled in plants scattered across Iraq. When I visited a Baghdad computer shop last spring, my hosts handed me a can of Pepsi. An Arabic banner across the can announced, "The only soft drink manufactured in Iraq." In August, a Coca-Cola executive in Istanbul told me their Baghdad operation is not far behind. Turkish investors in partnership with local Iraqis have built modern hotels in Basra.

Cameras and reporters do not lie, but they do not always give a full perspective. Political brinkmanship devoid of context breeds panic. Beheadings and blood sell copy, but do not accurately reflect Iraq. Political milestones give a glimpse of the often-unreported determination that Iraqis and longtime visitors see daily. Bombings and body bags are tragic. But they do not reflect failure. Rather, they represent the sacrifice that both Iraqis and Americans have made for security and democracy. The referendum, refugee return, real estate and investment show much more accurately -- and objectively -- Iraq's slow but steady progress.

That, plus today's referrendum on a new constitution, and Saddam's trial starting tomorrow...things are looking up.

I was and am opposed to this war. But I am sensible enough to understand that it cannot end all at once (and I have a hunch that the decision has been made to bring it to an end) . Meantime, any good news is a step in the right direction.

Robert Fulgham and the prairie dogs

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Our prairie-dog village has expanded from a few cute things running around on the edge of the horse-pasture to an underground housing development that rivals the catacombs of Rome. The holes are dangerous to horses, and a disease threat to people and domestic animals. Soon the creatures will expand right up to the doorways of homes. Cute no more. Even to the most soft-hearted.

(The packrats must have got the word from the prairie dogs – "Come on – they won't hurt us.”)

Traps? Forget it. Fill in their holes? Ha. Poison? No, bad. A vacuum machine that sucks them out of their holes on golf courses in Colorado was considered. Way too expensive. And the live doggies would just get dumped somewhere else to become someone else's problem.

So. A licensed hunter came and shot more than 800 of them in one afternoon last summer. That only cleaned out the old, the stupid, and the slow. The stronger strain that was left behind just dug deeper and further and faster.

So. The next act was to force a high pressure blast of water from the irrigation system into the holes. The plan: As the doggies float out, bash ‘em with a baseball bat. Desperate measures. But it was found that they could swim and hold their breaths under water. Now they have swimming pools.

The tenacity of life is awesome.
It's one reason I believe there probably is some form of life on Mars, despite the cold and wind and darkness. Teeny tiny little packrats and prairie dogs.
Dug in deep.
Waiting.

From San Juan County, Utah
Written Monday, October 12th, the 285th day 2005.
Sorry, no hyperlinks.
After the next journal entry you have to look it up. Good luck.

All I need to know I learned in the Blogosphere

Apologies to Fulgham.
Hat tip to Doc.
Okay, then. Here goes...

**As a whole, people are smarter than you. It's okay. Turn the page.
**The best way to get attention is to give it.
**Manipulation is the currency of fools.
**Never underestimate the capacity of fools to act accordingly.
**If you really need help, ask for it.
**Anonymity isn't what it's cracked up to be.
**Admitting when you're wrong helps you more than the other guy.
**Writing every day is good for the soul.
**Sharing your insides helps others share theirs.
**You're not nearly as important as you think you are.
**What other people think of you isn't nearly as important as what you think of yourself.
**People are like snowflakes, all different, yet all the same.
**Take what you need for yourself, but leave something behind for the other guy.
**Never, ever underestimate your right to freedom or the gift of freedom that you have.
**It's better to be happy than right.
**Technology's greatest gift to humankind is the spellchecker.
**Standing up for your beliefs "come what may" is better than sitting down in comfort with somebody else's.
**Respecting yourself begins with respecting others.
**If you gain from something somebody else says, tell them.
**You can't be a part of something unless you participate.
**Meeting people at core enhances the sweetness of meeting them in person.
**Walk away once in awhile, so you always have the energy to come back.
**Nobody is better than you, but neither is anybody worse.
**Yesterday's successes or failures don't matter much today.
**Laugh and laugh again, especially at yourself.
**Nobody's perfect, not even you. It's okay. Turn the page.

While I'm at it, time to remember Desiderata...

Go placidly amid the noise and haste,
and remember what peace there may be in silence.
As far as possible without surrender be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly;
and listen to others, even the dull and the ignorant;
they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons,
they are vexations to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others,
you may become vain and bitter;
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your own career, however humble;
it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs;
for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals;
and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself.
Especially, do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love;
for in the face of all aridity and disenchantmentit is as perennial as the grass.
Take kindly the counsel of the years,
gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.
Beyond a wholesome discipline,
be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe,
no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.
Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be,
and whatever your labors and aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul.
With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful.
Strive to be happy.

Max Ehrmann, Desiderata, Copyright 1952.

Al-Jezeera as a propoganda organ

Last week I cited a couple of Western sources proposing that Al-Jezeera is an important contributor to a vigorous public debate in the Arab world and therefore a force for a pluralistic, therefore more open and potentially democratic, society. Today John Burgess points to a MEMRI "catch" by a Saudi journalist that does not agree.

Everybody knows that this channel in particular has had the greatest media impact on the shaping, spreading, and strengthening of this dangerous trend, and that it provides it with wide space to express its 'acts of heroism', its statements, and its videotaped operations, to the point where it [Al-Jazeera] has become the primary platform of [Al-Salafiyya Al-Jihadiyya], as is happening today in Iraq.

The main topic of this piece is the corruption of Islam by terror-practicing extremists which he compares with the Nazis of WWII.

Putting an end to terrorism is only possible by putting an end to the ideology that plants it in our society. A security solution is not sufficient, though it is certainly required… He [Al-Maqdisi] preaches takfir [accusing other Muslims of apostasy] and terrorism out of purely political motives – out of an understanding, an inner conviction, premeditation and planning… Al-Salafiyya Al-Jihadiyya... should be dealt with exactly as the Europeans dealt with the Nazis, and as our forefathers dealt with the ideology of the Khawarij.

In my opinion, the ideology of Al-Salafiyya Al-Jihadiyya is very similar to Nazism in terms of its causes and reasons. If the economic depression and the state of frustration that befell the world in 1930 were a cause for the spread of murderous Nazism, it may be said that the economic and cultural setback that has befallen the Arab and Muslim countries and the frustration suffered by Muslims today are also the primary cause for this murderous ideology [i.e., that of Al-Salafiyya Al-Jihadiyya].These [circumstances] allow it to surface and to find followers and supporters among the Muslims. In addition, both ideologies share hatred of the other and [the goal of] eliminating through his physical extermination – and they have many other common denominators as well."

Burgess' comments are as helpful as the article. The more I read about circumstances in the Middle East, the less I seem to understand. The nuances of Islam are far more elaborate than most people know, and I am beginning to think that includes most of those who claim to be faithful followers of the Prophet. (And I can't say that most ordinary Christians understand their own faith any better.)

He also provides a useful term, “Jihadist Salafist,” to help identify where the problems really lie. The terms “Salafist” or “Wahhabi” are no longer useful tags when it comes to identifying the sources of terror. There are legitimate Salafist and Wahhabi religious tendencies, not aligned to terrorism, though whether or not they are “extremist” is a matter of opinion and debate. Like the term “Neo-Salafist,” coined by Anthony Cordesman of CSIS, it serves to clearly and usefully distinquish an important difference.

Aal Al-Sheikh, whose name indicates that he’s from the lineage originating with Muhammad Abdul Wahhab...points to Al-Jazeera TV as a promoter and supporter of Jihadist Salafism...

Neither of these pieces is long.
Both should be read.

The Trial of Saddam, #2, Whose Justice anyway?

I spent a lot of time composing the previous post. This related comment and others that may follow are my way of keeping the process of eating an elephant reduced to single bites.

These comments of Professor David Crane are worth noting. The quote is longer, but here is a part that I like.

Despite my disdain for the way the IST was created outside of international norms by the United States, I must say I am impressed by the way the judges are carefully taking Iraqi law, along with various principles of international law, and shaping it for their use to ensure that justice is done from an Iraqi point of view. It has become their tribunal, despite the public perception that it is a US manipulated aberration. It is the Iraqi’s who are going to have to live with the result and I think that the judges know this as well. In my mind, the IST has only one chance to get it right, as we did in West Africa. One slip and the entire process could unravel. The fragile respect for the rule of law shattered.

The trial of Saddam

In two days the trial of Saddam Hussein is scheduled to begin. Most Americans will regard this proceeding as a non-event, an entertainment spectacle falling somewhere between that of Timothy McVeigh and the afternoon TV judge shows. But in the same way that the O.J. Simpson trial left a deep scar on the face of American justice, an enduring symbol of the racial divide that continues to plague our political landscape, this upcoming trial of Saddam Hussein will not be seen through the same careless lenses by others as it will be by the U.S. viewing audience...although that is one of the questions yet to be determined; i.e. whether or not the trial will be televised. No matter what the outcome, a large population of people are going to be angry and see the results as a miscarriage of justice.

Those who presume that a swift conviction and sentence will put an end to the matter are making a serious mistake. At the risk of using the president's words and name in vain, we should remember that many hearts and minds are still pliable, not only in Iraq but throughout the Middle East. Politicians from democratic traditions know and understand the importance of public opinion. They know that the success or failure of any initiative ultimately depends on whether or not their constituents will buy it. Focusing the political will is the main task of leadership as it seeks consistency in an inchoate blurr of conflicting public opinions.

I came across an important resource for this event, The Grotian Moment Blog. I expect to be following this primary source as the trial unfolds.

As arguably the most important war crimes proceeding since Nuremberg, the trial of Saddam Hussein is likely to constitute a "Grotian Moment" -- defined as a legal development that is so significant that it can create new customary international law or radically transform the interpretation of treaty-based law. This Website features key documents related to the Iraqi Special Tribunal, answers to frequently asked questions, and expert debate and public commentary on the major issues and developments related to the trials of Saddam Hussein and other former Iraqi leaders.

I am very aware of a debate within and about our own Supreme court, reflected in the current debate surrounding its composition, regarding the importance of foreign legal opinion as it relates to the US Constitution. (The public discussion about Justice O'Connor's successor seems ignoble compared with this discussion.) A spirited debate on C-SPAN between Justices Scalia and Breyer articulates this argument quite well, with both men advancing compelling arguments on both sides.

The trial of Saddam Hussein is a larger facet of this important discussion. It goes without saying that the impact of this trial on world public opinion, no matter how unimportant that may be to those of an isolationist bent in this country, cannot be overestimated. Those who deny the importance of its outcome on US fortunes abroad are living in a fool's paradise.

So far, the Grotian Moment Blog has explored fourteen points of interest, with pros and cons presented on each. My aim is to look at all the arguments asking myself with each "If I were a citizen of Iraq, how would this argument sound to me? If I were a man on the street in Cairo or Kabul or Delhi or, for that matter, Rome or Chechnya or Beijing...what would this sound like to me?" I'm as interested in the presentation of the facts as well as the facts themselves.

Among the various links I scanned, there is a link to the Official IST (Iraqi Special Tribunal) website. Drilling into the site, I found a gallery of pictures of mass graves that will be part of the evidence brought to the trial. I will be interested to see how and when these pictures and accompanying commentary, and from what sources, will be put into the spotlight. We know or can guess the outcome of this trial, but we cannot be as certain that that outcome will have the effect we want among any who may still fall in the "undecided" camp.

The Grotian Moment Blog is not especially user-friendly and I am not able to track it with Bloglines, so I spent a few minutes putting together the following links for my own use and anyone else who wants to use them. I may or may not follow up with additions as time passes, but for now this is what I have found. (Later: The right sidebar has the same list. I must have missed it by not paying attention. Anyway, it was good practice at blogging.)

Issue #1: Does Saddam Hussein have a right to represent himself before the Iraqi Special Tribunal like Slobodan Milosevic has done at The Hague?

Here are snips from the commentary illustrating how these questions are being presented.

YES by William Schabas

Article 14 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the principal human rights treaty governing Iraq, a person accused of a criminal offence ''''to defend himself in person or through legal assistance of his own choosing''''. There can be no ambiguity about the text of this provision. However, in its rulings on the Milosevic case, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia has held that this is not an unlimited right, and that there are implicit exceptions.

One exception, of course, is the defendant who disrupts the proceedings. This should not be confused with an accused who undertakes an aggressive and vigorous defense. But where a defendant does not comport in an appropriate manner, he or she may be removed from the courtroom. Really, the rule is no different whether the defendant is represented by counsel or not. Nor is it any different with respect to any other individual in the courtroom.Assuming, for the sake of argument, that Saddam is mature enough to behave appropriately, are there any other grounds allowing the court to deny him the right of self-representation?

NO: By Michael P. Scharf

The decision to permit Milosevic to represent himself in court also affected the ability of the judges to control the dignity of the proceedings. As his own defense counsel, Milosevic has been able to treat the witnesses, prosecutors and judges in a manner that would earn ordinary defense counsel a citation or incarceration for contempt of court. In addition to regularly making disparaging remarks about the court and browbeating witnesses, Milosevic digresses at length during cross-examination of every witness, despite repeated warnings from the bench.

Milosevic, who spends his nights at the tribunal's detention center, has no incentive to heed the judges' admonitions.To the extent that he is playing not to the court of law in The Hague, but to the court of public opinion back home in Serbia, Milosevic's tactics are proving quite effective. The daily broadcasts of his trial (paid for by the US Agency for International Development) have consistently ranked among the most popular television shows in Serbia. His approval rating in Serbia doubled during the first weeks of his trial. A poll taken half way through the trial found that thirty-nine percent of the Serb population rated Milosevic's trial performance as "superior," while less than twenty-five percent felt that he was getting a fair trial, and only thirty-three percent thought that he was actually responsible for war crimes. Milosevic has gone from the most reviled individual in Serbia to number four on the list of most admired Serbs, and in December 2003, Milosevic easily won a seat in the Serb parliament in a nation-wide election. The decision to permit Milosevic to represent himself has thus undermined one of the most important aims the Security Council sought to achieve in creating the Yugoslavia Tribunal: to educate the Serb people, who were long misled by Milosevic's propaganda, about the acts of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes committed by his regime.

Like Milosevic, Saddam Hussein is also an attorney by training, with his law degree from the prestigious Cairo University. Taking a page out of Milosevic's play book, Saddam Hussein''''s legal staff is likely to file a pre-trial motion, asserting that Saddam Hussein has a right to represent himself before the IST. Must the IST grant Hussein''''s motion, thereby enabling Hussein to appear on the nightly news throughout the Middle East, riling against the illegal U.S. invasion of Iraq, insisting that the United States was complicit in Iraqi war crimes against Iran, and encouraging his followers to step up the acts of violence against the United States and new Iraqi government? The answer is no.

As you can see, the discussion has content as well as form. Consider the question of self-representation in other contexts. Asuming some measure of competence and attention to protocol, how does it look if a court refuses to allow the accused to speak in his own defence? This is not an idle question. For the sake of shaping world public opinion it has to be answered in a way that ordinary people will be able to understand if they are to be persuaded that the outcome of the trial is an expression of justice, not retribution. Dismiss this question carelessly at your peril.

The other thirteen points of discussion are these...

Issue #2: Should the Saddam Hussein trial be televised?

Issue #3: Is the Iraqi Special Tribunal, which was established on December 10, 2003 by the Occupying Power and the unelected Iraqi Governing Council, a legitimate judicial institution?

Issue #4: Should Saddam Hussein Be Exposed to the Death Penalty? (Experts Debate the Issues)

Issue #5: Did the Iraqi regimeÂ’s actions to dam rivers, leading to the destruction of the habitat of the Marsh Arabs, constitute a form of genocide?

Issue #6: Did the Anfal Operations constitute Genocide?

Issue #7: Does Saddam Hussein have head of state immunity?

Issue #8: Can Saddam Hussein get a fair trial?

Issue #9: Does the IST protect the basic right to the assistance of counsel?

Issue # 10: Is the Saddam Hussein Trial one of the most important court cases of all time?

Issue #11: Does it make good sense to start with the Dujail case, rather than a greater atrocity like the Anfal campaign?

Issue #12: Whose Justice Anyway?

Issue #13: Does Saddam Hussein Have a Viable Defense Based on the Necessity to Combat Insurgents and Terrorists?

Issue # 14: Should the IST engage in plea bargaining?

Very smart professionals are dedicating years of their professional life to this important case. Anyone tempted to take cheap shots at their historic task should be sensitive to this fact.

Ann Althouse on Miers

This Althouse op-ed in the Milwaukee paper sums it up nicely.

...on the day when Bush announced the nomination, Democratic senators looked pleased. They must be even happier now that a substantial number of erstwhile Bush supporters have not only groused about the nomination, but they have also kept up the pressure of criticism for over a week and even called for Miers to withdraw.

Do the Democrats have reason to think Miers will emerge as a liberal once she has her lifetime appointment? More likely they merely see her as preferable to the staunchly ideological conservatives that were on Bush's short list.

Miers might vote with the liberal justices, but even if she votes with the conservatives, she might write inferior opinions that lack persuasive power and can be denounced as hack work when the time comes.

But whatever the Democrats are predicting will happen if and when Miers ascends to the court, there is no reason they should want to muss themselves up in a fight when Bush's own partisans are tearing up the nominee and - a nice bonus - ripping into each other.
[...]
At this point, no one is very happy with the Miers nomination.

But Bush is not the sort of person who backs down easily.

And if the nomination is not withdrawn, it's hard to see how it will not make it through the Senate (unless some truly damaging information emerges or Miers makes some blatant blunders at the hearings).

So the odds are we will soon be saying "Justice Harriet Miers" and something along the lines of: How did that happen?

I've been reading the Althouse blog. Really sharp.
Don't be fooled by short posts. There's more there than meets the eye. She's just keeping her Fleisch-Kinkaid score where more people can "get it."
If you aren't getting it, its not because she failed to point it out.

Bolton: America's weapon of mass destruction

Could Syria become another Lybia?
Probably not, according to Josh Landis.

The stand-off continues for now. Bolton's leak to journalists in London yesterday that Syria was being offered a "Qadhafi" deal could only have been meant to scuttle any understanding between the two countries. If Bolton were interested in the success of such a deal, rather than regime-change, he would have at the very least called it a Sadat deal. You have to love Bolton, America's WMD. Who is making American policy anyway? Poor Condaleezza Rice.

Missouri is having a baby. Justice Thomas is the dad.

The mother doesn't want it.
Neither does her family.
So the state will get a new baby.
Interesting.
Thanks Josh.
Maxed Out Mama takes note.

A brother remembers

K. Maru's brother has gone to be with that great cloud of witnesses. The accoount of his last hours is a powerful tribute. Anything I write about it will seem trite. No snips. Take the time to read and reflect upon the whole thing.

Waiting, watching, praying

I am led to keep vigil with K. Maru as he and his family wait for God's final healing for his dying brother. As of this morning, nothing has been posted since yesterday, which is okay. Blogging is not, hor should it be, a high priority at a time like this.

Passing the time, I came across something else just now. There is something very wrong with this picture. Again I go back to my previous post...the part about "by extension to all those who have lost family members, friends and acquaintances in the tragedies of September and October, 2005."

Chariots of Fire

Jerusalem, a poem by William Blake, set to music...

And did those feet in ancient time
Walk upon England's mountains green?
And was the holy Lamb of God
On England's pleasant pastures seen?
And did the Countenance Divine
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem builded here
Among those dark Satanic mills?
Bring me my bow of burning gold!
Bring me my arrows of desire!
Bring me my spear! O clouds, unfold!
Bring me my chariot of fire!
I will not cease from mental fight
Nor shall my sword sleep in my hand
Till we have built Jerusalem
In England's green and pleasant land.

The memory of this evocative hymn came to me as I read this evening's post by K. Maru as his brother lies dying. I post it here as a memory and memorial to him, whom I have never seen or met, his loving brother, and by extension to all those who have lost family members, friends and acquaintances in the tragedies of September and October, 2005.

STACKING THE DECK

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...actually stacking the decks, plural. We're looking at lots of decks of cards here. Pretty amazing sight. Tip to BoingBoing. Gallery of pictures and other stuff about stacking cards at Cardstacker.com.

Dan Drezner lost his job

Dan Drezner, one of the smartest and most respected bloggers, has been denied tenure at the University of Chicago. His name recognition as the result of blogging is probably greater, mathematically, than anything else he has done in the world. That may or may not have figured in the short-sighted decision of the tenure committee. Nothing I write could possibly add to the impressive comments left at his post announcing the decision of the tenure committee. The long and growing comments thread is a veritable Who's Who of the blogging world, expressing encouragement and sympathy.

My own take is that the loss is not Dan Drezner's but that of the institution he leaves behind. I cannot speak to the world of academia specifically, but after a lifetime of working and talking with a lot of others about institutional culture in general, I can safely say that decisions about who "succeeds" and who doesn't are made by a fragile and inefficient mechanism. Sometimes it is formally called a "committee." Sometimes it is called nothing more than the "culture." In the end, it all cooks down to one reality: no one individual can insure your success, but there are a great many individuals who can cast a veto. Whether this system of good or bad I have no way of knowing. But I can say flatly that it has been responsible for serious and sometimes embarrassing losses for otherwise respectable institutions. I cannot count the number of good people I have seen in the business world who either left in disgust or were pushed out, just because the Powers that Be or the Corporate Culture was not able to adapt to, much less tolerate, some aspect of a glowing talent.

It is testimony to his character that today's post already puts his own misfortune into a global perspective that illustrates how much bigger he is than the small-minded majority that felt somehow threatened at the notion of keeping him. Peers like those he can do without.

The best to you, Dan Drezner.

Harriet Miers to be withdrawn (by morning?)

[This post was started right after lunch today. Stuff got added as the day wore on. It's now time for bed, but unless something dramatic happens it's all over but the shoutin']

Makes a dramatic headline, doesn't it?
(Tip Randy Barnett at Volokh, see Update)
That's what Stanford professor Robert Weisberg predicts with a measure of confidence.

Miers will not get confirmed by the Senate, because she won’t even come up for a vote. The nomination will soon be withdrawn. Of course, the major reason will be the conservative opposition, but the operational reason will be not the opposition itself but rather the inability of the White House to devise any plan for the hearings. And to explain why, I must speak of the remarkable Arlen Specter.

There follows a convoluted piece of speculation revealing a very fertile but informed imagination. I love this paragraph:

...the point is that the volatility of this convergence of political vectors makes it impossible for the Administration to have a battle plan for the hearings. Compare the Roberts hearing. There was never a chance that he would say anything that would hurt him, and his skill and experience enabled him to exploit a coded but and subtly evasive answers. In fact, Roberts’s career since 1981 had been a brilliant preparation for his hearing, orchestrating the optimal mix of statements and silence to ensure that he could signal his ideas and aspirations to conservatives without becoming vulnerable to liberals. Miers’s situation is now the comic opposite. Roberts was the fine wine subtly aged and blended. Miers is the nightmare mix in a kid’s chemistry set.

Hmm...

"...exploit a coded but and subtly evasive answers...optimal mix of statements and silence...signal his ideas and aspirations to conservatives without becoming vulnerable to liberals."

Is that what we call dog whistle politics?

Is Harriet Miers' problem that she can't whistle?

And who might be responsible for helping pull the rug?
Talk about an optimal mix of statements, silence and signals!

Found this later...

Polipundit: Harriet Miers Must not be Confirmed

Looks like the swarm is forming.

Miers is a documented supporter of “diversity,” a codeword for racial discrimination. She seems to have helped create the White House’s split-the-baby position on this
issue in the University of Michigan cases in 2003, that helped keep affirmative action legal.

Harriet Miers is Alberto Gonzales in a dress. I would not support the confirmation of Gonzales; so why should I support the confirmation of Miers?

Glenn Reynolds has opened a comment thread. That's the blogquivalent of opening a chilled bottle of Dom Perignon.

OTB joins in...I guess if you combine a C student president, a D- congress, and a B+ court nominee, what you get is the complete failure of the Republican party to deliver on anything they promised but were well within their power to achieve. They have proven themselves to be as bad or worse than even the most liberal of Democrats.

I think Anchoress had it right last week. She said Miss Harriet was never meant to be the final pick.

She may not make it to the Supreme Court. Bush may not even intend for her to get there. She may be, rather than the “misdirection,” many expected, an out-and-out decoy, floated to allow both the liberals and the conservatives to blast her out of the water so that Bush can then put up another candidate that both left and right - after having behaved very badly over Miers - will not dare to behave badly over, again.

She got one part right already. That part about "behaving badly." Heck, I don't have a dog in this fight and I'm getting snarkier as the day wears on. Thats bad behavior on my part, too.

Abortion debate

Haven't posted anything lately about the abortion debate. With a sotto voce conflict thinly hidden by code/smoke/mirrors/inference/deception/whatever -- thanks to the Miers nomination, I figure it's time to stir the pudding a bit.

Worth a reprint:

You can want to restrict abortions. You can want to restrict contraceptive use. You can want to severely restrict welfare. But you can only want two out of the three of those things simultaneously unless you are an uncaring bastard.

Sebastian Holsclaw

While you're at it, check out An Open Letter to the Pro Life movement. Two years ago this was written. Comments thread has been trashed by spam, but the post is worth keeping.

Harriet Miers as a Latter-Day Reagan

Vis Pejman's new blognest this wonderful piece of analysis from Dafydd at Big Lizards.

In my last post, riffing off Captain Ed's Washington Post piece on the taxonomy of the Miers debaters, I talked about the fourth class of conservatives, what I called the Cowboys. These are intelligent but non-intellectual (even anti-intellectual) folks who don't try to articulate their conservativeness... they simply live it. I noted that Bush belongs to this class, rather than to the Loyalist Army, the Rebel Alliance, or the Trench-Dwelling Dogfaces, all of whom at least have pretensions to being intellectuals.

...there is a very special kind of person found almost exclusively among the Cowboys. For want of a better word, I'll call this sort a Gipper. A Gipper (Ronald Reagan is the prototypical example) is a person who doesn't need to logically reason his way to rightness, because he has an instantaneous intuitive understanding of right and wrong.

Despite so many of Reagan's friends and mentors falling for the Communist line, and despite the fact that Reagan was a New-Deal Democrat, Ronald Reagan never once, not even for a moment, had anything but absolute contempt and loathing for Communism and its kid-sister Socialism. He started fighting the Communists in the 1940s, during the war, while even FDR himself was pedaling the line that "Uncle Joe" Stalin was an enlightened, progressive, scientific, and democratic leader.
[...]
Anybody who knew Reagan for any length of time knew that, no matter what compromise he was forced to accept due to circumstances, Reagan would never, ever "drift to the left," "grow in office," or accept the nearly universally held postulate that Socialism was the way of the future, and the New Soviet Man was the future of Mankind.

Since everyone reading this far is probably both intelligent and pretty intellectual, I predict that you're way ahead of me. George Bush knows Harriet Miers extremely well; he clearly believes that she is not only a Cowgirl but also has an uncanny knack for immediately knowing the right thing to do (from Bush's point of view).

George Bush sees Miers as a female Ronald Reagan: to him, she is a Gipper.

Truly delightful piece of work. (As is the Captain's Quarters link.)
Anyone not already sick of the Miers nomination tempest should take a look into this teapot.

It does my heart good to see cracks in the politically conservative wall. Those of us from the loyal opposition have had so many contacts with disagreeable people that we have to shower after being in public with them. It's a way of life to rub shoulders with extremists, monomaniacs and the rest of the lunatic fringe. Very tiresome. I just hate it when the only people speaking out against bad things don't use deodorant. But when all we hear from "respectable leaders" is a deafening silence what are the choices?

Jalal Talabani -- worth quoting

We can measure the worth of a man better by his ideals than his accomplishments. In a guest column in the Times of London the president of Iraq appeals to the British not to abandon the cause of a democratic Iraq.

...those who attack mosques and churches, who murder schoolchildren and labourers, who behead foreigners and who kidnap humanitarian workers are not engaged in “resistance”. Those sabotaging Iraq’s first democracy bear no resemblance to the resistors of foreign occupation in wartime Europe. Rather, they are, in their ideology and record, contemporary representatives of the fascism that wreaked such havoc 60 years ago in Europe. They are supremacists and racists, as worthy of our contempt as those who practised apartheid in South Africa.

Nor do these terrorists have a popular base. They are drawn from a minority within Iraq’s Sunni Arab minority. They have no political wing and no manifesto beyond punishing their fellow Iraqis for welcoming British and American liberation and for daring to vote. Many of the suicide terrorists are not even Iraqis, but foreigners driven by religious fanaticism and al-Qaeda’s death cult — the poisonous gift of the Arab world that supported Saddam and now vilifies our nascent democracy.

There are occasional immoral voices that call for a new dictatorship to be installed in Iraq as, they claim, a less laborious means of imposing order. Order is certainly important, but so is freedom. A restored dictatorship in Iraq will be neither friendly nor benign. Animated by vengeance and fed by oil, a new dictatorship will again seek to make Iraq into the Arab Prussia and the overlord of the Gulf, goals [to which] Iraqi regimes before Saddam aspired...

Stirring words.
Win, lose or draw these ideals will stand as a high-water mark of a democratic tide in the Middle East. The image of an "Arab Prussia" is a particularly compelling reference.
Thanks Andrew Apastolou.

The "Endowment Effect"

The rich get rich and the poor get children...
Uh, that's not what it says. I just got a little side-tracked.

While waiting for the printer to finish the next post for later today, I came across this fro the London Times via Gene Expressions.

...our emotional attachment to our possessions is “hard-wired” into our brains to help us to survive.

They cite an experiment in which every other student in a class was given a mug bearing their university’s logo. Students who had been given mugs could then sell them to those who had not received one.

They found that sellers demanded much more for the mugs than buyers were willing to pay. In other words, owners seemed to like the mugs more than buyers who did not have one, demonstrating a near- instantaneous endowment effect.
[...]
“Individuals with a strictly positive endowment effect will never die out in the long run,” the professors say. “An alternative evolutionary explanation for the endowment effect is that if one learns to like what one has, one may spend less costly resources to acquire other goods.”

The "endowment effect" holds that people demand more money to give up an object than they are willing to spend to acquire it, and explains why most of us would not swap our favourite sweater, for example, with something of equal value. Another way to look at, rich or poor, is that a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. Or, stated another way, we have no way to know the "value" of what we do not posess but we unserstand the value of what we do.

I'm not sure what this study says about the widening gap between poor people and rich people both at home and abroad. The worshipers of unrestrained market economics might better have a look.

The Grey Lady returns to NOLA

Just when I was ready to move on to something else, a glance at a NY Times Magazine piece, Wading Toward Home, hooks me.

The police had said that gangs of young black men were looting and killing their way across the city, and the news had reached the men inside the forts. These men also had another informational disadvantage: working TV sets. Over and over and over again, they replayed the same few horrifying scenes from the Superdome, the convention center and a shop in downtown New Orleans. If the images were to be reduced to a sentence in the minds of Uptown New Orleans, that sentence would be: Crazy black people with automatic weapons are out hunting white people, and there's no bag limit! "The perspective you are getting from me," one of Fort Huger's foot soldiers said, as he walked around the living room with an M-16, "is the perspective of the guy who is getting disinformation and reacting accordingly." He spoke, for those few days, for much of the city, including the mayor and the police chief.

No emotion is as absurd as fear when it is proved to be unjustified. I was aware of this; I was also aware that it is better to be absurdly alive than absurdly dead. I broke into the family duck-hunting closet, loaded a shotgun with birdshot and headed out into the city. Running around with a 12-gauge filled with birdshot was, in the eyes of the local militia, little better than running around with a slingshot - or one of those guns that, when you shoot them, spit out a tiny flag. Over the next few days, I checked hundreds of houses and found that none had been broken into. The story about the Children's Hospital turned out to be just that, a story. The glass door to the Rite Aid on St. Charles near Broadway - where my paternal grandfather collapsed and died in 1979 - was shattered, but the only section disturbed was the shelf stocking the Wild Turkey. The Ace Hardware store on Oak Street was supposed to have had its front wall pulled off by a forklift, but it appeared to be, like most stores and all houses, perfectly intact. Of all the stores in town, none looked so well preserved as the bookshops. No one loots literature.

Oddly, the only rumor that contained even a grain of truth was the looting of Perlis. The window of the Uptown clothing store was shattered. But the alligator belts hung from their carousel, and the shirts with miniature crawfish emblazoned on their breasts lay stacked as neatly as they had been before Katrina churned up the gulf. On the floor was a ripped brown paper sack with two pairs of jeans inside: the thief lacked both ambition and conviction.
The old houses were also safe. There wasn't a house in the Garden District, or Uptown, that could not have been easily entered; there wasn't a house in either area that didn't have food and water to keep a family of five alive for a week; and there was hardly a house in either place that had been violated in any way. And the grocery stores! I spent some time inside a Whole Foods choosing from the selection of PowerBars. The door was open, the shelves groaned with untouched bottles of water and food. Downtown, 25,000 people spent the previous four days without food and water when a few miles away - and it's a lovely stroll - entire grocery stores, doors ajar, were untouched. From the moment the crisis downtown began, there had been a clear path, requiring maybe an hour's walk, to food, water and shelter. And no one, not a single person, it seemed, took it.

Here, in the most familial city in America, the people turned out to know even less of one another than they did of the ground on which they stood. Downtown, into which the people too poor to get themselves out of town had been shamefully herded by local authorities, I found the mirror image of the hysteria uptown. Inside the Superdome and the convention center, rumors started that the police chief, the mayor and the national media passed along: of 200 people murdered, of countless rapes, of hundreds of armed black gang members on the loose. (Weeks later, The Times Picayune wrote that just two people were found killed and there had been no reports of rape. The murder rate in the city the week after Katrina hit was unchanged.) There, two poor people told me that the flood wasn't caused by nature but by man: the government was trying to kill poor people. (Another reason it may never have occurred to the poor to make their way into the homes and grocery stores of the rich is that they assumed the whole point of this event was for the rich to get a clean shot at the poor.) In their view, the whole thing, beginning with the levee break and ending with the cramming of thousands of innocent people into what they were sure were death chambers with murderers and rapists, was a setup.
.
Michael Lewis, it seems, is a homeboy from New Orleans that happens also to be a contributing editor to the Times. This is a registration site, but free for the taking. One of the few places I have had the patience to register, and worth the effort. The cookie they put into my PC must be state of the art, because whenever I link - even from another site - the top of the page says "welcome [profile name]". [Later: Access to this story now costs unless you are a Times Select subscriber. I don't have time to read fifty dollars worth a year from the Times, but I still recommend the story for anyone intersted. As I write this (August, 2007) two years have passed and it still makes me mad to read about the way these people were neglected and maligned.]

.

By the time I was 9, I could ride my bike to the houses of both sets of grandparents. My mother's parents lived six blocks away; my father's parents, the far-flung ones, lived about a mile away. I didn't think it was at all odd that so much of my family was so near at hand: one friend of mine had all four of her grandparents next door, two on one side, two on the other. At the time, this struck me as normal.

Looks like my afternoon is cut out for me...after I get the after-church meal, desserts, visits and naps out of the way.

Review: Great read! Both informative and entertaining. You don't get to be a Times editor by mistake; Michael Lewis is a pro. His description of New Orleans brings to mind Savannah and its characters as depicted in Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.
Print, read and pass it on.

Pakistan earthquake link

This morning's earthquake death toll is over 3,000.
The SEA EAT Blog people have set up another site to keep track of this disaster, South Asia Quake Help .

I notice one of the first links to this disaster is a Muslim group, LIFE for Relief and Development.
LIFE Michigan 17300 W. 10 Mile Road, Southfield,MI 48075, Phone 248.424.7493 or 1.800.827.3543
...also LIFE California, LIFE Canada, LIFE Afghanistan/Pakistan, LIFE Iraq, LIFE Jordan, LIFE Syria, LIFE Sierra Leone and LIFE United Arab Emirates.

The whole world is getting a taste of tragedy in 2005. Each time the response should be getting faster and more efficient. What a nasty and disagreeable learning curve!
If there is a bright side, it could be that the world may be better prepared when and if the H5N1 virus mutates into a human-to-human variety.

Update Sunday morning:
Casualty number now up to 18,000.
Joe Gandleman has put together a string of links and snips.

Cement is the main construction material for most of the world, including the US.
As we have seen, when a cement structure starts to come apart, the "pancaking" of floors results. Every time I go into the parking garage and see the way it is put together with naked cement I say to myself What would happen if it started to collapse? Where would one go? How could anyone escape? As I look at the structure I realize how much we depend on the earth not shaking.

We have seen that pancaking effect in Oklahoma City and the World Trade Center. Whether the result of an explosion or an earthquake, the very idea is frightening.

From Reuters...

The U.S. Geological Survey said the tremor occurred at a depth of 10 km (6.2 miles). It struck about 95 km (60 miles) northeast of Islamabad and was felt across the subcontinent, shaking buildings in the Afghan, Indian and Bangladeshi capitals.

The first quake was followed over the next 18 hours by more than 20 aftershocks with magnitudes of between 4.5 and 6.3. Thousands of people in northern Pakistan slept in the open while residents of the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, were kept on edge through the night by tremors.

Some 400 children were killed at two schools in Pakistan's North West Frontier Province. A military spokesman said 215 Pakistani soldiers were killed in the hardest-hit areas.

Half of the Indian deaths were in Uri, the last big town on the road connecting the two sides of the violence-scarred region. The dead included 15 soldiers, some in bunkers close to a military ceasefire line.

Landslides blocked the 300-km (190-mile) road that connects Srinagar, the summer capital of Indian Kashmir, to the rest of India to the south. The Srinagar-Muzaffarabad road linking Indian and Pakistani Kashmir, reopened to traffic this year for the first time in nearly 60 years, was also blocked.

Ghulam Rashool, an official at the Pakistan Meteorological Department, said it was the strongest earthquake in South Asia since the 1905 Kangra earthquake that killed 20,000 people in India's Madhya Pradesh state.

In Islamabad, rescuers found at least two survivors clinging to life in the ruins of apartment blocks that crashed down on scores of residents. Twenty-three bodies had been found but about 90 people were pulled alive from the Margala Towers blocks where expatriate workers and middle-class Pakistanis lived, officials said.

A boy was pulled out alive on Sunday morning to the cheers of rescue workers who said there were other survivors still trapped. A medical officer at the scene, Faisal Kakar, said a woman had been found alive in a space underneath the rubble, and she had said three or four other survivors were with her. A short time earlier, another rescue worker said a man was found alive pinned in the ruins.

Pledges of aid from around the world came within hours. President George W. Bush said U.S. aid was on the way and Britain said it was sending search and rescue
experts and sniffer dogs.

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan sent condolences to Pakistan, and a U.N. Disaster and Coordination Team in Geneva was on standby to be deployed. Oxfam and other aid agencies planned to coordinate their response with the United Nations.
Turkey, which has suffered major earthquakes in the past, said it had sent two military planes carrying aid, doctors and rescue workers. Japan sent a team of 49 aid workers.

In a further sign of easing tension between India and Pakistan, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh called Musharraf to offer assistance. (Additional reporting by Robert Birsel and Suzanna Koster in Islamabad, Kamil Zaheer in Baramulla, Y.P. Rajesh in New Delhi)

Update, still Sunday morning...
The toll is now past 30,000.

Marc Lynch article about al-Jazeera

Homework time.

It's long but important. (Where have you seen that before?) I have a hard time reading a long piece on the monitor, so I print it out so I can go back and re-read, mark, etc. With small type it comes to four pages with margins stretched and two-column format to save paper.

*****

*****

If you are not open to the notion that al-Jazeera may not be an unmitigated evil, better to skip this one. In Watching al-Jazeera Marc Lynch advances the idea that it is an important contributor to a vigorous public debate in the Arab world and therefore a force for a pluralistic, therefore more open and potentially democratic, society.

Al-Jazeera and its Arab television competitors are building a pluralist political culture in which all public issues are up for debate, and disagreement is not only permissible but expected. Its importance cannot be overstated, particularly since neither Islamist movements nor the existing autocratic Arab regimes--the two most powerful competing forces in the Arab world--offer a route to liberal reforms. And pro-American liberals in the region, however brave and eloquent, are, on their own, weak and marginal. Al-Jazeera offers them what American guns cannot: credibility, legitimacy, influence.

This is not my first encounter with this idea. I first heard it expressed in March when Terry Gross interviewed journalist Hugh Miles, an Arabic-speaking son of a British diplomat who studied at Oxford. When people who speak the language disagree with those who only speak English, my tendency is to listen carefully to what they have to say.

What Lynch says is not altogether rosey. He raises serious questions, for example, about whether a more democratic, populist Arab world is really in the best interests of the US.

Al-Jazeera's politics of pluralism are interwoven with an equally potent politics of Arab identity. Protests in Egypt and Lebanon, elections in Iraq and Palestine, parliamentary disputes in Jordan or Kuwait, arrests of journalists in Tunisia and Algeria: Al-Jazeera covers all of these as part of a single, shared Arab story. This narrative binds Arabs together in an ongoing argument about issues on which all Arabs should have an opinion--though not the same opinion. This politics of identity is a great source of strength for al-Jazeera. But it also poses dangers. A frustrated identity politics can easily give way to demagoguery, to a populism of grievances large and small, to demands for conformity—to what American legal scholar Cass Sunstein calls "enclave deliberation," which squeezes out the voices in the middle.

Whether populist, identity-driven but pluralist politics can be the foundation for liberal reforms is one of the most urgent problems facing the Arab world today. What one enthusiast called "the Democratic Republic of al-Jazeera" does not, in fact, exist. Al-Jazeera cannot create democracy on its own, nor compel Arab leaders to change their ways. Television talk shows cannot substitute for the hard work of political organizing and institution building. Talk can become a mere substitute for action, and can even serve the interests of regimes intent on clinging to power.

The author is bloghost of Abu Aardvark which I have followed for some time. He is one of a very small handful of experts whose opinions on the Middle East strike me as keeping up to date and having intelligent comments to make.

Ann Coulter on the Miers nomination

I thought Ann Coulter was a firm supporter of the prez. Silly me. Lookit this:

Bush has no right to say "Trust me." He was elected to represent the American people, not to be dictator for eight years. Among the coalitions that elected Bush are people who have been laboring in the trenches for a quarter-century to change the legal order in America. While Bush was still boozing it up in the early '80s, Ed Meese, Antonin Scalia, Robert Bork and all the founders of the Federalist Society began creating a farm team of massive legal talent on the right.

To casually spurn the people who have been taking slings and arrows all these years and instead reward the former commissioner of the Texas Lottery with a Supreme Court appointment is like pinning a medal of honor on some flunky paper-pusher with a desk job at the Pentagon — or on John Kerry — while ignoring your infantrymen doing the fighting and dying.

And that's not the half of it.
Boozing it up? Whew.
To casually spurn? Split infinitive...man, she is angry!

Three years ago today

At the time of this speech by George Bush I was keenly aware of two realities.

First, there was not a cause-and-effect connection between the attack of September 11 and Iraq or Saddam Hussein. Since that time it has been made clear that there may have been contacts between al-Qaeda and/or OBL and Saddam, but to suggest that there was any meaningful collusion of the two is simply not accurate.

Second, the aims and motivations of Osama and Saddam were/are as incompatible as oil and water. To imagine that the two could or would agree on anything other than their mutual hatred of the US is equally inaccurate.

It is accurate to paint both Saddam and Osama as enemies of the US, both of whom pose threats to our national security. But to couple the two as a pretext for a war in Iraq was and continues to be unconscionable. I was clear about that three years ago and nothing has occurred in the intervening three years to change my mind. This was the speech that I will always recall as a conscious, deliberately-orchestrated effort on the part of President Bush to whip the political will of the country into support for a preemptive war in Iraq.

What exactly was being "preempted" I don't know. There may yet be larger regional issues yet to be revealed that made it important that we start a war at that time. I don't have any knowledge about that. There could be behind the scenes events yet to be revealed over which the president had no control. Again, I cannot comment about that.

From all I can see and grasp, we have spent billions of money and thousands of lives on a war that is creating more problems than solutions in the Middle East. The "regime change" has occurred. Saddam is in custody. It's time to withdraw.

As recently as yesterday the president was still waving the bloody shirt of the World Trade Center attack by way of coupling the two. His rhetoric has become more nuanced but the effect on his audience has become more exact. I am reminded of the way Southern politicians use subtle language cues to signal to white voters that they are on the "right side of the issues." I have heard the same racist language applied to business in a corporate environment. As an old-fashioned white Southern Liberal I know what I am talking about, and it isn't pretty. I can tell when it's raining and when somebody is pissing on my leg.

My instinct is that we will be out of the war by this time next year. The language of politicians and military commanders leads me to believe that policy decision has been made. I find that thought reassuring. Like a train or heavily loaded truck in motion, a war cannot be stopped on a dime. But all the signals are that it is coming to an end. Thank God.

Low wages, taxes in New Orleans

Employers who pay low wages are having a hard time finding people to take those jobs in the aftermath of the hurricane.

Imagine that!

A cutthroat, post-hurricane labor market has sent wages skyrocketing in the fast-food industry and prompted some of the New Orleans region's biggest chains to offer workers thousands of dollars in signing bonuses, perks typically associated with higher-paying white-collar jobs.

Burger King recruiters have been visiting federal disaster recovery centers and newly reopened high schools offering a $6,000 bonus, paid in monthly installments, to anyone promising to work full-time at a metropolitan New Orleans restaurant for at least a year. New part-time workers are being offered $3,000 bonuses.

In other news, tax collectors will have a hard time collecting taxes for property that no longer has houses. I heard the other day that upwards of 800,000 houses have been either completely destroyed or made uninhabitable as the result of huricane damage.

After a press conference Tuesday in which New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin announced the city was laying off roughly half its 6,000 employees, finance director Reggie Zeno explained that the city's sales-tax revenue had fallen from about $13 million per month to almost nothing. The layoffs were expected to save the city up to $8 million a month.

Zeno called property-tax revenue "next year's problem." But it could be a big problem indeed.

Much of the heart of the city's tax base, from eastern New Orleans to Gentilly to Lakeview, has been decimated by floodwaters. And a provision in Louisiana law requires assessors to reappraise all property that has been "overflowed" by water.

NY Subway threat

I woke up this morning expecting to get all crazy following the story of the New York Subway threat last night...just hours after one of the president's most impressive speeches.
Just after the president's speech.
Hmm...

So far, no good.

Michael Savage was laughing on his over-the-edge radio program as the story unfolded. He was amused that "Nineteen" terrorists were reported to be involved. Not twenty. Not nineteen and a midget. But nineteen...the number associated with Sept. 11. He was clearly and openly skeptical that anything important was really going on.

Drudge links to a Newsday piece saying "Police flooded the city's subways Thursday night amid disputed intelligence reports that terrorists with links to Iraq had planned to possibly bomb the system with baby strollers fitted with explosives -- a threat the mayor called the most specific yet against the nation's largest mass transit network."

The mayor! Wow!
But "disputed" reports? Doesn't Hizzonner read the papers?

But further down the story says "The Department of Homeland Security said the intelligence community believes the information is of 'doubtful' credibility.
"Still, the department shared the information with New York officials as a precaution and to allow them take whatever security steps they desired."

Not sure what to make of this. All I know is that when one of the people I work with got news of "something happening" in New York it caused an instant, stomach-knotting fear to well up.

Human behavior being what it is, I am cynical enough to wonder to what extent we as citizens are being manipulated by threats. Or the threat of threats. Or the threat that we may not have enough protection from threats. Or...you get the picture.

I know from personal experience that threats and promises are far better at shaping behavior than reality. I noticed long ago that employees became wonderfully compliant during the weeks leading up to evaluations. After the raises came through, however, there seemed to be a collective sigh as everybody got back to their old selves. Most were okay, but those who were congenitally slow or surly or glum or took long breaks...they would be back to their old familiar habits as well. Good behavior for them was nothing more than a temporary facade.

"Just wait until your father gets home!"
"If you care about getting a raise...."
"If you don't like your schedule I can make other arrangements."
"Have you spoken with the boss about that?"

You get the idea.

Michael Yon from Mosul

Up close and personal.
Michael Yon's reports make the war in Iraq come alive. Those of us who are not there have the luxury of debating about the pros and cons of the US being in the midst of what is essentially a civil war, but the troops who are there are more interested in staying alive and making sense of their piece of the puzzle.

Like all professionals who do their jobs well, whether politicians or baseball players, good warriors are a marvel to admire. According to this report, the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) are getting better by the day under the coaching and example of US soldiers and commanders.

We came into a large group of Iraqi police that had joined the fight. One of them was shot in the leg and his friends put him in a protected area. Needless to say, I also found that protected area. As an American medic started working on the wound, the policeman grimaced and held his leg. Iraqi men and children can be extreme camera hounds, so what happened next might not have surprised me, but even in retrospect it remains one of the strangest moments I experienced in Iraq.

I had not been shooting photos, but when the grimacing policeman noticed the camera hanging off my vest he smiled. A smiling-for-the-camera smile. Shot in the leg, and taking a moment to pose. I was not fast enough with the shutter and I only got him as he lay back. But he did get me to start taking photos again.

The report is fairly long, but there are dramatic pictures and the reading is fast and gripping. Don't go there until you have a few minutes to sit and read uninterrupted.
Link to Battle for Mosul IV.

You know you live on the (Texas) Gulf Coast when...

YOU KNOW YOU LIVE ON THE GULF COAST WHEN...
You have FEMA's number on your speed dialer.
You have more than 300 C and D batteries in your kitchen drawer.
Your pantry contains more than 20 cans of Spaghetti Os.
You now know the meaning of the word 'contraflow'.
You are delighted to pay $3 for a gallon of regular unleaded.
You own more than three large coolers.
You can wish that other people get hit by a hurricane and not feel theleast bit guilty about it.
You have 2-liter coke bottles and milk jugs filled with water in your freezer.
Three months ago you couldn't hang a shower curtain; today you can assemble a portable generator by candlelight.
You catch a 13-pound redfish. In your driveway.
You can recite from memory whole portions of your homeowner's insurance policy.
You have had tuna fish more than 5 days in a row.
You can rattle off the names of three or more meteorologists who work at the Weather Channel.
Someone comes to your door to tell you they found your roof.
Ice is a valid topic of conversation.
Your new "drive-thru" meal consists of MRE's and bottled water.
Relocating to Missouri does not seem like such a crazy idea.
You spend more time on your roof then in your living room.
A battery powered TV is considered a home entertainment center.
Your child's first words are "hunker down" and you didn't go to OleMiss!
Having a tree in your living room does not necessarily mean it's Christmas.
You know the difference between the "good side" of a storm and the "badside."
You go to work early and stay late just to enjoy the air conditioning.

Rusty's World via Fayrouz

Remember, that's from Texas.
I doubt that the folks from Louisiana and Mississippi are as ready for humor.

Oops! James Dobson is having second thoughts

Among the first voices speaking out in favor of the Harriet Miers nomination was that of James Dobson. Unfortunately that nomination is looking more and more like a lead balloon. Well, uh, maybe the endorsement was premature.

"When you know some of the things I know - that I probably shouldn't know - that take me in this direction, you'll know why I've said with fear and trepidation (that) I believe Harriet Miers will be a good justice," Dobson said in a broadcast with co-host John Fuller.

"And John, if I have made a mistake here, I will never forget it. The blood of those babies who will die will be on my hands to a degree. Lord, if I am right, confirm it, and if I am wrong, chastise me and I will repent of it and come before these microphones."

Taking an unpopular position isn't easy, it seems.
Ask me. I know.
Fortunately (or maybe unfortunately) I don't have a revenue stream to keep me in line.

Military prisoner (abuse) issue

This is encouraging. Senator McCain responds to Captain Fishback's letter.

Several weeks ago I received a letter from Captain Ian Fishback, a member of the 82nd Airborne Division at Fort Bragg, and a veteran of combat in Afghanistan and Iraq. Over 17 months he struggled to get answers from his chain of command to a basic question: what standards apply to the treatment of enemy detainees? But he found no answers. In his remarkable letter, he pleads with Congress, asking us to take action, to establish standards, to clear up the confusion – not for the good of the terrorists, but for the good of our soldiers and our country. The Captain closes his letter by saying, “I strongly urge you to do justice to your men and women in uniform. Give them clear standards of conduct that reflect the ideals they risk their lives for.” I believe that the Congress has a responsibility to answer this call – a call that has come not just from this one brave soldier but from so many of our men and women in uniform.

I linked to the letter Monday.
Thanks Josh Claybourn for noticing.
The comments thread reflects the snark to serious range of reactions to the debate. Most people are either in denial or ignorance about the issue. This is a snip that I like.

There is pretty compelling evidence that what happened at Abu Ghraib was not just a few rogue underlings doing what they wanted to do without adequate supervision, but was instead a case of the folks at the bottom following orders from above as part of official policy. It's also quite clear that what went on there was far more serious than what the public has been shown so far, hence the furious reaction to the judge ordering the release of the rest of the photographs. Whenever you hear hysterical complaints about how exposing what the government has done will "undermine the war on terror" and "give aid and comfort to the enemy", you can be damn sure that you're looking at a government frantic to cover up what they've done.