Complacency Threatens Civil Liberties - by James Taranto

Complacency Threatens Civil Liberties

"Some centrist Democrats say attacks by their party leaders on the Bush administration's eavesdropping on suspected terrorist conversations will further weaken the party's credibility on national security," reports Donald Lambro of the Washington Times:

"I think when you suggest that civil liberties are just as much at risk today as the country is from terrorism, you've gone too far if you leave that impression. I don't believe that's true," said Michael O'Hanlon, a national-security analyst at the Brookings Institution who advises Democrats on defense issues.

"I get nervous when I see the Democrats playing this [civil liberties] issue out too far. They had better be careful about the politics of it," said Mr. O'Hanlon, who says the Patriot Act is "good legislation."

PowerLine's John Hinderaker doubts the party leadership will heed these warnings:

One basic question is how many centrist Democrats still exist. My guess is that most of those who could legitimately be termed centrist, especially on foreign policy, have left the Democratic Party, or at least stopped voting for its candidates. The party's leadership team of Howard Dean, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi must be the most extreme in modern American history. But I've seen no indication that their extremism hurts them with the party's rank and file. So I don't see much prospect that the Democrats' leftward march will be halted; the question, I think, is whether they are marching off a cliff.

Perhaps tellingly, Lambro does not quote any elected officials who are unhappy about their party's solicitude for the "civil liberties" of terrorists.

It's worth pondering just what it is that the Democrats are arguing here. They claim not that President Bush isn't doing enough to keep America safe from terrorism, but that he's doing too much. The implication is that the threat of terrorism within America is not all that serious and never was--that 9/11, horrific though it was, was a one-off.

There is, at the very least, a tension between this blasé approach and the oft-heard Democratic claim that liberating Iraq increased the threat of terrorism. If that threat still isn't serious enough to justify the merest attenuation of "civil liberties," then this argument against Iraq, even if true, is trivial.

In any case, it strikes us that the Democrats' current approach to terrorism is a dangerously complacent one. The 9/11 attacks plainly were not a one-off; even before Sept. 11, 2001, the World Trade Center had been hit in 1993, and Omar Abdel-Rahman, the so-called blind sheik, had gone to prison in a plot to blow up New York City bridges and tunnels.

True, there hasn't been a major terror attack on U.S. soil since 9/11, but it would be stunningly fatuous to conclude therefrom that the threat is negligible. It may be that we are out of danger for now because of the efforts the Bush administration has taken to prevent attacks, and that the Democrats, by opposing those efforts, are inviting another mass murder of Americans. Or it may be--heaven forbid--that the administration's efforts have not been sufficient, and another terrorist attack is only a matter of time.

Either way, if there is another attack on the scale of 9/11, complacency about terrorism would be wholly untenable. The public would demand much tougher measures. By fretting about imagined threats to civil liberties today, the Democratic left may be helping to endanger real civil liberties tomorrow.

Lemmings of the Press
Our fellow journalists should not escape blame for attempting to foster a climate of complacency that could prove catastrophic. Click on the link atop this item and check out MSNBC's gallery of political cartoons about "domestic spying." Of 24 cartoons spread out over eight pages, 23 take essentially the same position: that civil liberties are in danger, Bush is another Nixon, the government is spying on ordinary people, etc. The only exception is Michael Ramirez, recently fired from the Los Angeles Times.

Although these cartoonists fancy themselves independent-minded rebels, they are in reality a bunch of dull conformists. Fully one in four of the 24 cartoons uses the same gag, a play on "Santa Claus Is Coming to Town" ("gonna find out who's naughty and nice," that kind of thing). Let us hope these sheep do not succeed in leading the rest of us to the slaughter.

Meanwhile, here's a Reuters headline that reveals something of the journalistic mindset: "Secret Surveillance Up Since 9/11." The government stepping up its antiterror efforts after a major terrorist attack ought to be a dog-bites-man story, but to the denizens of Reuterville it apparently is surprising enough to be news.

Hail the Tribune, Swat the Bee
A pair of editorials from medium-size newspapers provide a nice contrast between responsible and irresponsible criticism of the Bush administration. The Chicago Tribune conducts a dispassionate "inquest" of the Bush administration's case for liberating Iraq. It finds some of them wanting ("In putting so much emphasis on illicit weaponry, the White House advanced its most provocative, least verifiable case for war when others would have sufficed") and others compelling ("The White House was correct in predicting that long subjugated Iraqis would embrace democracy").

On balance, the Trib comes down on the side of the president: "After reassessing the administration's nine arguments for war, we do not see the conspiracy to mislead that many critics allege." The paper acknowledges that "people of patriotism and integrity" can disagree. But if they do, they ought to admit where the administration has been right.

By contrast, the Sacramento Bee attacks the administration by repeating a proven lie:

Then there's the story reported in The Standard-Times newspaper in Massachusetts of a University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, student doing a research paper for a history class on fascism and totalitarianism. He requested a copy of Mao Tse-Tung's "Little Red Book" through interlibrary loan for a paper on communism. Two agents of the Department of Homeland Security later showed up at his parents' home in New Bedford, Mass., to interrogate him, telling him they were there because the book was on a "watch list" and the student had spent time abroad.

What else is on that "watch list"--Karl Marx's "Communist Manifesto" or "Das Kapital"? Hitler's "Mein Kampf"? Other staples in the history of political thought courses?

This editorial ran yesterday, three days after the Standard-Times acknowledged it had been snookered by the story, which was never plausible to begin with.

Book recommendation - Bernard Lewis

The Crisis of Islam: Holy War & Unholy Terror

What Went Wrong? The Clash Between Islam & Modernity in the Middle East

The Middle East: A Brief History of the Last 2,000 Years

articles 12/19

President's Address to the Nation
12.18.2005

President's Press Conference
12.19.2005

Why Bush Approved the Wiretaps
by Byron York

Have the Democrats Walked Into A Trap...Again

A War Without Heroes?
Only if you're reading the mainstream media.
by Fred Barnes

"Happy Days!"
The Iraqi elections really could be a turning point.
by Robert Kagan and William Kristol

Democracy At War
by Joseph Epstein

Reporting For Duty
The U.S. military tells Iraqis the truth, and some call it a "scandal."
by John Guardiano

Our Friends The Pakistanis
by Husain Haqquani & Kenneth Ballen

Here Come the Brides
Plural marriage is waiting in the wings.
by Stanley Kurtz

Time
Persons of the Year



The Constant Charmer
The inside story of how the world's biggest rock star, Bono, mastered the political game and persuaded the world's leaders to take on global poverty. And he's not done yet

In The Name of Love
U2's lead singer made debt relief the thing to do


We Just Go Off
Q&A with Bono and Bill Gates

On Friday the House voted 279-109 in favor of a resolution "expressing the commitment of the House of Representatives to achieving victory in Iraq," which means that 108 Democrats and socialist Bernie Sanders are now on record opposing victory. (Fifty-nine Dems voted for victory, and 32 of them, along with two Republicans, voted "present.")


The Defeaticrats
Of hearts and minds, at home and in Iraq
by MARK STEYN

Hands up, everyone who thinks Iraq’s a quagmire.

Not the Iraqi people: According to the latest polls, 70 percent think “life is good,” and 69 percent are optimistic that things will get even better in the year ahead. For purposes of comparison, they took a similar poll in Europe a while back: In France, 29 percent said they were optimistic about the future; in Germany, 15 percent. Sixty-three percent of Iraqis say they feel “very safe” in their own neighborhoods, which is more than the residents of Clichy-sous-Bois can say.

Well, okay, those cheerful Iraqis are probably Shiites and Kurds and whatnot. How about the Sunnis? For a small minority group that held a disproportionate and repressive grip on power for decades, they’ve been getting a more solicitous press from Western “liberals” than the white Rhodesians or South Africa’s National party ever got. But it turns out, after their strategically disastrous decision to stay home in last January’s vote, the Sunnis are participating in Iraq’s democratic process in ever greater numbers.

Oh, okay, so the Shiites and Kurds and Sunnis are feeling chipper, but in the broader Middle East the disastrous neocon invasion has inflamed moderate Arab opinion against America. Well, it’s true the explosive Arab street finally exploded the other day — with 200,000 Jordanians protesting in Amman, waving angry banners and yelling, “Burn in hell, Rumsfeld,” and, “You are a coward, Bush.” Whoops, my mistake: They were yelling, “Burn in hell, Zarqawi,” and, “You are a coward, Zarqawi.” If you want to hear someone yelling, “You are a coward, Bush,” you’ve got to go to Cindy Sheehan’s stakeout. And, in fairness to the network news divisions, it may be because so many of their camera crews have taken up permanent residence at the otherwise underpopulated Camp Cindy that they were unable to cover what was the largest demonstration against terrorism ever seen on the streets of the Middle East.

Oh, well. So the Shiites and Kurds and Sunni Iraqis and the Arab street are all on board, but come on, what about the insurgents? Everybody knows they’re winning . . . but, er, apparently they don’t. The Baathist diehard insurgents have split from the foreign al-Qaeda insurgents. While the latter denounced the Iraqi election as “a Satanic project,” the Saddamite remnants urged Sunnis to participate and said they’d protect polling stations from attacks by the foreign terrorists so that citizens could vote for their approved candidates (the leftover bits of Uday and Qusay, now running on the Psychotic Dictatorship Nostalgia Party ticket). This division between the foreign nutcakes and the domestic nutcakes is the biggest strategic split over the insurgency since Joe Lieberman respectfully distanced himself from Nancy Pelosi.

INSURGENCY AND ITS DISCONTENTS
On the other hand, this does belatedly prove the anti-war crowd’s long-held view that Saddam’s secular Baathists and Osama’s theocrat terrorists would never collaborate, even if it took until last month for the participants themselves to get wise to it. And, alas, unlike the Dems with Hillary, in the Sunni Triangle there’s no Sunni triangulator to craft a more nuanced position to hold both the Lieberbaathist and Pelosama wings together.

So the Shiites, Kurds, Sunnis, the Arab street, and the Baath party have figured Iraqi democracy’s winning. That leaves al-Qaeda. Well, not exactly: Ayman Zawahiri, the number-two honcho in al-Qaeda while they’re maintaining the polite fiction that bin Laden’s still functioning, recently rapped terror leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi on the knuckles and called on him to cut out killings that “the masses do not understand or approve.” (The twitchy Mr. Zawahiri was presumably thinking of, for example, the assassination of the septuagenarian grand imam of Fallujah for urging Sunnis to get out and vote.)

So the Shiites, Kurds, Sunnis, the Arab street, the Baath party, and bin Laden’s deputy think the insurgency’s a bust. Hands up, who thinks it’s winning?

Well, there’s Howard Dean: “The idea that we are going to win this war is an idea that unfortunately is just plain wrong.” And look over there, it’s Jack Murtha, and he’s a veteran, and he thinks we need to scramble for the last chopper over the embassy compound right now! “There’s a civil war going,” he says. “Our troops are the targets of the civil war. They’re the only people that could have unified the various factions in Iraq. And they’re unified against us.”

By “us,” I think he means him and Zarqawi. And no, I’m not “questioning his patriotism”; I’m questioning his sanity. It was famously said that the Vietnam War was lost on television. In this instance, the Iraq War’s being lost only on television. In Iraq, it’s a tremendous victory. Indeed, it has the potential to be one of the most consequential, transformative victories of the modern age; but even if it doesn’t ever fulfill that potential, it’s still a huge success.

DAZED AND CONFUSED
I’ve never been one for “winning the hearts and minds” of Iraqis. Heart-wise, an awful lot of them dislike infidels and Jews and American soldiers, and, while one may deplore that, it’s just a fact of life. But, in their minds, as those poll numbers indicate, the Iraqis are rational enough to work out where their best interest lies. And, quite reasonably, they figure it doesn’t lie with a psychotic death cult that nowadays mainly blows up Muslims on buses, in shopping markets, schools, and even mosques. That’s the worst corporate diversification since Seagram’s bought Universal Pictures. And at least Seagram’s still made whisky; Zarqawi isn’t killing a lot of infidels these days.

So Iraq’s hearts and minds are operating far more rationally than the Democrats, who these days are both heartless, in their indifference to the aspirations of ordinary Arabs, and mindless, in their calculation of their own best interests. I find Chirac-Schroeder obstructionism easier to understand than the Dean-Boxer variety. For EU politicians, as those French and German poll numbers indicate, there’s not a lot of good options when half the babies in your maternity wards are Muslim. But what’s the thinking behind what the Democrats are doing?

Easy, you say: It’s naked partisan politics. And, to be sure, the broader culture has kind of internalized it as such, to the point where, for example, Dan Balz can publish a huge piece in the Washington Post that from its headline down — “Hillary Clinton Crafts Centrist Stance on War” — assumes that it’s perfectly natural to talk about the foreign policy and national security of one’s own country entirely in political terms. For Balz and for everyone he quotes in the piece, the point of a “policy on Iraq” is not to have a policy that affects Iraq in any real sense but to have a policy that advances domestic political fortunes. “Iraq” might as well be a board game you’re in the national playoffs of.

Example: “Her refusal to advocate a speedy exit from Iraq may reflect a more accurate reading of public anxiety about the choices now facing the country.” Note that Balz takes it for granted that Senator Rodham Clinton should have no principled position on Iraq, no strategic view of the Muslim world, no philosophical preference as to America’s mission abroad, no genuine concerns about security, etc. Indeed, he’s implicitly arguing that the greatest strength of Hillary as a viable Democratic presidential candidate — poor Joe Lieberman’s “Joementum” won’t even place him in the Top Ten in the Iowa caucus — is that she’s the least encumbered with anything that will prevent her from agreeing with whatever the 10 p.m. internal polling numbers are showing.

Take that headline: What would a “centrist stance” be on, say, the Second World War? Every few days, some media outlet or other runs a piece about how Bush is “in a bubble” — and no doubt he is, to one degree or another, as busy world leaders tend to be, by definition. But the American media raging that Bush is in a bubble are the equivalent of that famous British newspaper headline: “Fog in Channel. Continent Cut Off.” Whatever bubble Bush is in, it’s a vast jostling metropolis of diverse peoples stretching to the horizon compared with the shrunken little bubble the Democrats and the media inhabit, reinforcing each other’s illusions, like two madmen playing Chinese whispers. No serious person — by which I mean a fellow who’s aware there’s a real country called “Iraq” and it’s in a part of the world called “the Middle East” — could read that Balz analysis without weeping with laughter. Pseudo-policies are soberly considered as if they had any meaning in reality: Should we withdraw from Europe six months after D-Day? Or commit ourselves to a phased drawing down over three to nine months? Clearly, if we announce we’ll be leaving the Continent by October 27, that might embolden Herr Hitler. But, if we say 10 percent of our forces might remain until February 1947, that will give us a more flexible exit strategy with strong centrist appeal.

REALITY CHECK
Meanwhile, back on Planet Earth, even the media are occasionally obliged to explain the disconnect between received wisdom on Iraq and the actual physical territory that goes by that name. “85 percent of people in the capital are looking to the future with great enthusiasm,” noted Der Spiegel, as impeccably anti-Bush as any publication on the planet, but nonetheless reporting the economic boom, rising incomes, etc., now enjoyed by many Iraqis. The magazine went on: “How does this happily expectant mood fit in with the bloody scenes of bombings and shootings, the reports of kidnappings, curfews, and shortages?” How indeed? Over to you, media-ethics professors.

It’s not difficult: I said a year and a half ago that the way to look at Iraq is that the Sunni Triangle is Northern Ireland, Kurdistan is Scotland, and the Shiite south is England. Don’t let a pub bombing in Ballymena prevent you from investing in that privatized telecom company in London.

I’m not one of those fellows minded to defer to Jack Murtha because he was a hero in the last war. You could have said the same of Marshal Pétain, and Churchill never listened to him. But I carelessly assumed Murtha did, in fact, have something to say. Instead, as he told Newsweek — in one of those “Bush in the Bubble” stories — he’s piqued because the president didn’t reply to his memo, which, rather than getting hoots of derision, is now regarded as the greatest affront to constitutional propriety since Jim Jeffords failed to land an invite to the White House’s Teacher of the Year reception, for which slight he flipped control of the Senate to Tom Daschle. (Remember him?) If Murtha and Newsweek weren’t trapped in their own bubble, they might understand that a “principled stand” has to be more than a guy whining that the president of the United States won’t return his calls: “The White House has made no attempt to reach out to Murtha since then. ‘None. None. Zero. Not one call,’ a baffled Murtha told Newsweek. ‘I don’t know who the hell they’re talking to. If they talked to people, they wouldn’t get these outbursts. If they’d talked to me, it wouldn’t have happened.’”

I know who the hell they’re talking to: On Iraq, the White House is talking to rather a lot of people. They’re called “Iraqis.” But Murtha is now the lion of the moment, Cindy Sheehan and Joseph Wilson IV merged into the Murtha of all anti-war heroes. So what if there’s no crushing of his dissent, only a sad man who was crushed by being dissed.

But let’s take it as read that I’m a neocon hack clinging to my feeble Wolfowitz-Perle script as Kurdistan secedes and Shiite theocrats seize the south and Zarqawi commands overwhelming support from the Sunni people. Assume that John Kerry is right that “young American soldiers” are “going into the homes of Iraqis in the dead of night, terrorizing kids and children, you know, women” and that those rampaging Rumsfeldian torturers have brutalized so many of the Iraqi people that they’re unified against us.

Even so, even as crude political finessing, will this pitch work for the Democrats? No. Listen to Howard Dean and Nancy Pelosi. They didn’t become leaders because some freak accident took out the other contenders. They head the party because they speak for it. It’s one thing to be defeatist, but the perverse triumphalism of Dean’s defeatism will keep his party mired in the minority through 2006 and 2008. Even if they were right, what’s the “meta-story,” as they say, of Mad How’s soundbite? We’re the party that glories in defeatism? “Vote for us. We told you Americans were losers and we’re right.” Even as shameless self-interest, the Defeaticrat position is a flop.

Unlike those depressed Continentals, Americans are not a pessimistic people, especially when they’ve got nothing to be pessimistic about. The tragedy is that, on so-called “liberal” terms, this is a war Democrats ought to be gung-ho for: More Iraqis participate in the democratic process than Americans; Afghanistan has more women in electoral politics than Canada. Meanwhile, in the most powerful nation on the planet, the two-party system is seizing up because one party’s gone nuts. From Murtha’s “We’re all doomed unless we quit by Tuesday” to John Kerry’s “I was against setting deadlines before I was for them,” the Defeaticrats simply have no serious contribution to make to the most pressing issue of the age. Shame on them, trapped in a quagmire of the mind with no exit strategy in sight.

Mr. Steyn is NR’s back-page columnist, and a writer for many other publications. His website is www.MarkSteyn.com.

'Twas the fight before Christmas

by Suzanne Chamberlin Bowdey
Dec. 17, 2005

If you're wondering what tops Santa's list this year, try job security. Despite the "clause" in his contract, St. Nick could fall victim to Corporate America's newest Ebenezer: holiday pluralism. And what's worse, with Christ on the outs and "X-Mas" on thin ice, charities may suffer their worse yuletide to date. This year, the war for goodwill has enlisted new troops: the Salvation Army and Religious Right.
In the bulls-eye of this holiday controversy (which is as old as the season itself) is Target Corporation, one of the country's largest retailers. Religious activists are up in arms about the company's decision to ban the Salvation Army from soliciting on its premises. The charity was ordered to stop ringing its bells at collection kettles, citing, "an increasing number of inquiries from nonprofit organizations . . . to open its doors to other groups that wish to solicit."
Some act surprised that the stores are more concerned about their bottom dollar than underprivileged families. But let's face it -- corporate America will dump competition faster than you can say "figgy pudding." To them, there's no business like snow business. And according to reports, it's a booming one for the industry, which stands to make 20 percent of its revenue in November and December.
Believe it or not, one spokesperson justified the decision by saying that the noise of the bells "is a bit too nerve-racking for the people [working]." But if the sound was truly their motivating factor, then the solution is easy -- lose the chime and keep the change. Instead, it's just another day in the commercialization of Christmas -- with the retail pot is calling the Army kettle black.
But before you put Target on your naughty list, it should be noted that the retail giant has tried to make amends for giving the Salvation Army the silent treatment, though precious little has been written about their new partnership. And with good reason). According to their recent announcement, "From Nov. 25, 2005 through Jan. 25, 2006, visitors to Target's Web site can view and purchase clothing, household items, personal products, and Gift Cards to be donated to [hurricane victims] across the country. The Salvation Army will distribute the purchases. . . ."
In other words, Target's latest "charitable" effort still stands to make a sizeable profit -- and on the less fortunate to boot. The company, in all of its benevolence, didn't offer to donate the merchandise but would be more than willing to take the money of those who would. Obviously the "ring" of the bells is more disturbing than the "cha-ching" they've come to expect from consumers.
As for the claim that stores like Target, Sears, Home Depot, Costco and K-Mart are bah-humbugging "Merry Christmas" in favor of "Happy Holidays," most chains insist that they have no policy against the greeting. Still, chalk it up to another victory for Generation Generic, whose list of politically correct victories is as compelling as their paranoia. Rather than accommodate all religions, these so-called pluralists have marginalized America's largest. Businesses everywhere are sending the message that when it comes to tolerance, 86 percent of the population need not apply.
Proponents of the move suggest that the store's decision has less to do with the bottom line and more to do with drawing it against church and state. But does protecting the feelings of a few customers at the expense of the majority really serve anyone's best interests? All we want for Christmas is consistency.
Even the Jewish community -- a demographic that retailers insist this measure "protects" -- has chimed in to say that this annual debate does a disservice to 2,000 years of Christian tradition. Don Feder, president of the Jews Against Anti-Christian Defamation, said that major chains ought to be more accommodating to a season that accounts for one-fifth of their earnings. Yet away goes the manger, gone are the carols, and all those wise men? Well, after this debacle, we're still looking.
To be fair, Christmas had been hijacked by plastic reindeer and eggnog lattes long before this latest transgression. For decades people have mistakenly believed that the gospel of pluralism will make up for a lack of true belief, that inclusivity will balance the moral ledger.
That's the snag in chasing parity. Christmas, Hanukkah, Ramadan -- they're all legitimate holidays, but that legitimacy is derived from the history and tradition of their faith -- not by a group of hypersensitive CEOs. Who says the grinches on Wall Street have cornered the market on holiday meaning? Maybe the real problem is that we are looking for validity in all the wrong places. Christmas isn't theirs to take -- it's ours to lose.
And perhaps the biggest rival for faith isn't Target after all, but the reason we go there in the first place. Is there too much rum in the wassail or have we forgotten that it's our fascination with the latest electronic gadget and newest fad toy that the stores are catering to? The gifts on their shelves compete more with Christmas than religious diversity ever will.
So when it comes to defining the season, ask not for whom the bell tolls . . . it tolls for thee.

Suzanne Bowdey is the projects director at the American Conservative Union.

What Planet Are The Eco-cultists On?

By Mark Steyn

Is it just me or are the global warming headlines starting to overheat a little? The Independent on Sunday gave its report on the Montreal climate conference the somewhat overwrought title: "What planet are you on, Mr Bush? (And do you care, Mr Blair?)" Nothing in the rather dull article underneath justified the hectoring hysteria.

And, to be honest, I've no real idea what it means. Is the IoS asking whether Mr Blair cares what planet Mr Bush is on? Well, no doubt he'd be startled to hear the President's moving to Pluto, but I expect he'd take it in his stride.

As to what planet Mr Bush is on, he's not on Pluto but on planet Goofy, a strange lost world where it's perfectly normal for apparently sane people to walk around protesting about global warming in sub-zero temperatures. Or, as the Canadian Press reported: "Montreal - tens of thousands of people ignored frigid temperatures Saturday to lead a worldwide day of protest against global warming."

Unfortunately, no one had supplied an updated weather forecast to the fellow who writes the protesters' chants. So, to the accompaniment of the obligatory pseudo-ethnic drummers, the shivering eco-warriors sang: "It's hot in here! There's too much carbon in the atmosphere!" Is this the first sign of the "New Ice Age" the media warned us about last week?

The story originated in Nature, the hitherto distinguished scientific periodical whose environmental coverage increasingly resembles that celebrated Sunday Sport scoop about the London double-decker bus found frozen in the deepest ice of the Antarctic. That, of course, is absurd - in reality, as the trained scientists at Nature would be the first to point out, the Clapham omnibus would be lucky to make it as far as Tulse Hill before being embedded in a glacier.

The eco-doom-mongers were speculating on possible changes in thermohaline circulation in the Atlantic - or, as the Daily Mail put it: "Is Britain on the brink of a New Ice Age?" Europe could get so chilly that shivering Muslim rioters might burn the entire Peugeot fleet on the first night. Which would be good for the environment, presumably. After that, they'd be reduced to huddling round the nearest fire-breathing imam for warmth.

But the point is, as Steven Guilbeault of Greenpeace puts it: "Global warming can mean colder, it can mean drier, it can mean wetter, that's what we're dealing with." Got that? If it's hot, that's a sign of global warming, and, if it's cold, that's a sign of global warming.

And if it's just kind of average - say, 48F and partially cloudy, as it will be in Llandudno today - that's a sign that global warming is accelerating out of control and you need to flee immediately because time is running out ! "Time is running out to deal with climate change," says Mr Guilbeault. "Ten years ago, we thought we had a lot of time, five years ago we thought we had a lot of time, but now science is telling us that we don't have a lot of time."

Really? Ten years ago, we had a lot of time? That's not the way I recall it: "Time is running out for the climate" - Chris Rose of Greenpeace, 1997; "Time running out for action on global warming Greenpeace claims" - Irish Times, 1994; "Time is running out" - scientist Henry Kendall, speaking on behalf of Greenpeace, 1992. Admirably, Mr Guilbeault's commitment to the environment extends to recycling last decade's scare-mongering press releases.

"Stop worrying about your money, take care of our planet," advised one of the protesters' placards. Au contraire, take care of your money and the planet will follow. For anywhere other than Antarctica and a few sparsely inhabited islands, the first condition for a healthy environment is a strong economy. In the past third of a century, the American economy has swollen by 150 per cent, automobile traffic has increased by 143 per cent, and energy consumption has grown

45 per cent. During this same period, air pollutants have declined by 29 per cent, toxic emissions by 48.5 per cent, sulphur dioxide levels by 65.3 per cent, and airborne lead by 97.3 per cent. Despite signing on to Kyoto, European greenhouse gas emissions have increased since 2001, whereas America's emissions have fallen by nearly one per cent, despite the Toxic Texan's best efforts to destroy the planet.

Had America and Australia ratified Kyoto, and had the Europeans complied with it instead of just pretending to, by 2050 the treaty would have reduced global warming by 0.07C - a figure that would be statistically undectectable within annual climate variation. In return for this meaningless gesture, American GDP in 2010 would be lower by $97 billion to $397 billion - and those are the US Energy Information Administration's somewhat optimistic models.

I've mentioned before the environmentalists' ceaseless fretting for the prospect of every species but their own. By the end of this century, the demographically doomed French, Italians and Spaniards will be so shrivelled in number they may have too few environmentalists to man their local Greenpeace office. Is that part of the plan? To create a habitable environment with no humans left to inhabit it? If so, destroying the global economy for 0.07C is a swell idea.

But even the poseurs of the European chancelleries are having second thoughts. Which is why, in their efforts to flog some life back into the dead Kyoto horse, the eco-cultists have to come up with ever scarier horrors, such as that "New Ice Age". Meanwhile, the Bush Administration's Asia-Pacific Partnership for Clean Development and Climate brings together the key economic colossi of this new century - America, China and India - plus Australia, Japan and South Korea, in a relationship that acknowledges, unlike Kyoto, the speed of Chinese and Indian economic growth, provides for the sharing of cleaner energy technology and recognises that the best friend of the planet's natural resources is the natural resourcefulness of a dynamic economy.

It's a practical and results-oriented approach, which is why the eco-cultists will never be marching through globally warmed, snow-choked streets on its behalf. It lacks the requisite component of civilisational self-loathing.

Wake up and smell the CO2, guys. Sayonara, Kyoto. Hello, coalition of the emitting.

articles 12/10

Secretary Rumsfeld's Remarks to the John Hopkins, Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies
"The Q&A period which followed rises above his prepared remarks by considerable margin. No transcript is available, a Real Player audio file is available here and it is worth every one its 44 minutes. The subjects he covers run the gamut. What is torture? Are military contractors necessary in Iraq? Why does the perception of the same event differ between segments of the American public? What is military transformation? What are the key advantages of the enemy? If they are not to be called insurgents, then what should they be called? How many troops are enough?"

C. S. Lewis Superstar
How a reserved British intellectual with a checkered pedigree became a rock star for evangelicals.

The Man Behind the Wardrobe
An interview with Douglas Gresham, stepson to the famous writer.

Does Criticism of the War Undermine Troop Morale?
James H. Joyner, Jr., Ph.D.

The Strongest Economy You've Never Heard Of
By Pejman Yousefzadeh
43% of Americans say they believe that the national economy is in a recession...Nothing could be further from the truth.

Bush turned the tables on the Democrats
By Victor Davis Hanson

Narnia & Its Enemies
Sexist, racist, intolerant Lewis?

Democratic Implosion
Can the party of the people be saved from itself?
By Victor Davis Hanson

Lieberman Wins Republican Friends, Democratic Enemies With Support For War
By Shailagh Murray

Lieberman's Pro-War Views Concern Dems
by Andrew Miga

Remarks of Senator Joe Lieberman (D-CT) Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessment Forum on Next Steps for Successful Strategy in Iraq
by Sen. Joseph Lieberman (D-CT)

Saddam's Chief Apologist
by Christopher Hitchens

The Panic Over Iraq
by Norman Podhoretz

Fighting to Win
With the proper strategy, victory in Iraq is far more likely than people think.
by Frederick W. Kagan

Down the Memory Hole
The Pentagon sits on the documents of the Saddam Hussein regime.
by Stephen F. Hayes

The Party of Sam's Club
Isn't it time the Republicans did something for their voters?
by Ross Douthat & Reihan Salam

Eighty Percent of What?
A questionable poll on what Iraqis really want.
by Fred Barnes

Kyoto's Dead Hand
Even signatories are giving up on their emissions targets.

What if . . . . . . Saddam were still in power?
by Holman Jenkins

U.S. Faces Hard Road In World Cup
Team's First-Round Draw Features Italy, Czech Rep.
Advancing will be an achievement

Reds' Casey inspired local teen
By Kevin Garvey

articles 12/7

President Bush's Speech on the War on Terror, Rebuilding Iraq
Omni Shoreham Hotel, Washington, D.C.
12/7/2005

'Do Some Soul Searching'
Why aren't the media telling the whole story about Iraq?
by Donald Rumsfeld
Entire speech

The Wisdom of Solomon
Law schools adopt an Orwellian theory in an effort to keep the military out.

Rally Round the (White) Flag, Boys!
Democrats finally find an Iraq policy they can get behind.
by Edward Morrissey

Sex, Please--We're Young and Chinese
A generation after Mao suits, China is coping with an epidemic of free love

It's All Bad News. . .
Except for the economic reality on the ground.
by Irwin M. Stelzer

Salesman-in-Chief
Bush is talking up the economy and the war. At last.
by Larry Kudlow

The Battle for Narnia
by Adam Kirsch

Global cool
by David Warren

Iraq and the Corruption Trap
by Arnold Kling

It Ain't That Easy, Folks
by Michael Fumento
Iraqi withdrawal is harder and more dangerous than it first appears.

Some Megachurches Closing for Christmas
This Christmas, no prayers will be said in several megachurches around the country. Even though the holiday falls this year on a Sunday, when churches normally host thousands for worship, pastors are canceling services, anticipating low attendance on what they call a family day.

The Promise-Driven Life
by Michael S. Horton

Saddam's Shop of Horrors

articles 12/3

USA Today
Will that be cash, credit — or finger?

What, Me Worry?
Bush abandons the Alfred E. Neuman school of public relations.
by Daniel Henninger

Pouting Pundits of Pessimism
Every bit of good economic news gives them reason for despair.
by Brian Wesbury

'A Beacon on the Summit'
Foreign policy "realists" aren't always very realistic.
by Eliot Cohen

Let There Be Light . . .
. . . in the murkiest recesses of the United Nations.
by Bret Stephens

Truth or Consequences
If the war is to be lost, it will be a collapse of stateside civilian morale that loses it. Everything else is secondary.
by David Tell

Leaking At All Costs
What the CIA is willing to do to hurt the Bush administration.
by John Hinderaker

Pump Up the Volume
Finally the "nonpolitical" White House gets wise.
by Fred Barnes

President Outlines Strategy for Victory in Iraq United States
Naval AcademyAnnapolis, Maryland
National Strategy for Victory in Iraq
Fact Sheet: Training Iraqi Security Forces
In Focus: National Security


Vice President's Remarks at the Frontiers of Freedom Institute 2005 Ronald Reagan Gala
The Mayflower Hotel, Washington, D.C.

Most of you know, I have spent a lot of years in public service, and first came to work in Washington back in the late 1960s. I know what it’s like to operate in a highly charged political environment, in which the players on all sides of an issue feel passionately and speak forcefully. In such an environment people sometimes lose their cool, and yet in Washington you can ordinarily rely on some basic measure of truthfulness and good faith in the conduct of political debate. But in the last several weeks we have seen a wild departure from that tradition. And the suggestion that’s been made by some U.S. senators that the President of the United States or any member of this administration purposely misled the American people on pre-war intelligence is one of the most dishonest and reprehensible charges ever aired in this city. (Applause.)

Some of the most irresponsible comments have, of course, come from politicians who actually voted in favor of authorizing the use of force against Saddam Hussein. These are elected officials who had access to the intelligence, and were free to draw their own conclusions. They arrived at the same judgment about Iraq’s capabilities and intentions that -- made by this Administration and by the previous administration. There was broad-based, bipartisan agreement that Saddam Hussein was a threat, that he had violated U.N. Security Council Resolutions, and that, in a post-9/11 world, we could not afford to take the word of a dictator who had a history of weapons of mass destruction programs, who had excluded weapons inspectors, who had defied the demands of the international community, whose nation had been designated an official state sponsor of terror, and who had committed mass murder. Those are the facts. (Applause.)

What we’re hearing now is some politicians contradicting their own statements and making a play for political advantage in the middle of a war. The saddest part is that our people in uniform have been subjected to these cynical and pernicious falsehoods day in and day out. American soldiers and Marines are out there every day in dangerous conditions and desert temperatures –- conducting raids, training Iraqi forces, countering attacks, seizing weapons, and capturing killers –- and back home a few opportunists are suggesting they were sent into battle for a lie.
The President and I cannot prevent certain politicians from losing their memory, or their backbone -– but we’re not going to sit by and let them rewrite history. (Applause.)

We’re going to continue throwing their own words back at them. And far more important, we’re going to continue sending a consistent message to the men and women who are fighting the war on terror in Iraq, Afghanistan, and many other fronts. We can never say enough how much we appreciate them, and how proud they make us. (Applause.)

They and their families can be certain that this cause is right and just, and the performance of our military has been brave and honorable. And this nation will stand behind our fighting forces with pride and without wavering until the day of victory.

Chamberlin splits from Chase to join Edelman in China

by Hamilton Nolan, PR Week USA

Dec. 2, 2005, 14:22

NEW YORK: JPMorgan Chase is experiencing some turnover as the head of external communications for the Chase card division departs to become head of Edelman's Shanghai office.

David Chamberlin, who was at Bank One until it merged with Chase in 2004, will begin his new post in January. Director of internal communications Paul Hartwick will succeed Chamberlin temporarily.

Fred Hill, the head of communications for JPMorgan Chase, said the company has recently downsized its corporate advertising group and its design group, and cut jobs in the philanthropic area. He added, however, that the communications department is not being downsized.

Melinda McMullen, an SVP of communications and public affairs who is leaving the company at the end of the year, will not be replaced.

When Jamie Dimon takes over as CEO on January 1, Hill will begin reporting to chief strategist Jay Mandelbaum.

"If you look at where [Dimon] has been in his career, he has never had communications report directly to him," said Hill. "Obviously I don't agree with that, but he's the boss."

articles 11/28

Debunking the myth of the underprivileged soldier
by Tim Kane and James Jay Carafano

articles 10/29

A new credit card of Chase Bank with 'blink' technology that lets users wave their cards near a computer reader instead of having to swipe them through a device, is shown Thursday, Oct. 27, 2005 in New York.

Philadelphia Inquirer
Paying in a blink

News-Journal
Chase unveils Wawa credit card
‘Contactless’ device frees customers of PINs, signatures

NY Post
New Card To Make Spending As Easy As A "blink"

Internet News
Gotham Can Purchase Without Contact

WPVI-TV, ABC Philadelphia
New Hi-Tech Credit Cards

Information Week
Chase Rolls Out RFID Credit Cards in NY and Philadelphia

A new credit card and card reader from Chase Bank with 'blink' technology that lets users wave their cards near a computer reader instead of having to swipe them through a device, is shown Thursday, Oct. 27, 2005 in New York.


Bono: The Rolling Stone Interview

Toledo Blade
Bono and U2 ask God some tough questions

Native of Sidney now topples terror

By JARED STRONG
REGISTER STAFF WRITER
October 25, 2005

A little background:

It's a long way from Depot Street in Sidney to the halls of the National Counterterrorism Center. Scott Redd made the trip like he does everything else: one step at a time.

Redd, a 61-year-old retired vice admiral, has held numerous high-level government jobs since 1998, when he left the Navy after 36 years. He's led an intelligence commission on weapons of mass destruction and last year directed programs to rebuild Iraq's infrastructure.

In the news:

Redd was confirmed by the U.S. Senate earlier this year as director of the National Counterterrorism Center. He's been on the job 90 days. The center is the primary organization for analysis of terrorism intelligence, and it helps plan counterterror activity. Redd answers to the director of national intelligence — and to the president. But first, he answers 10 (or so) Questions:

Q. Did you spend your entire childhood in Sidney?
A. Yes, indeed. We lived on what was commonly called Depot Street — no street numbers in those days — which later was christened Fillmore Street. I remember making up a street number for my ham radio license application.

Q. How often could you be seen at the famous Penn Drug Store? Do you miss their vanilla phosphates?
A. Penn Drug was the place to be, and I spent my fair share of time there downing more than a few vanilla phosphates. I wonder if they still make them.

Q. When did you graduate from Sidney High School?
A. 1962. We had, as I recall, 36 in our graduating class.

Q. Did you get along with those guys in Shenandoah?
A. They were OK, but then they were "city boys" compared to those of us from Sidney.

Q. Do you miss the Sidney Rodeo?
A. Of course. Every former resident of Sidney misses the rodeo. I remember that no matter from which direction you entered town, it seemed there was a large sign proclaiming Sidney as the "Largest Outdoor Rodeo in the World."

Q. Were you ever a rodeo participant?
A. No. My skill set didn’t run in that direction. However, I suppose everyone would like to be a bull rider.

Q. Did you play high school sports?
A. I certainly wasn’t a great athlete, but with 36 students in the class, you almost had to play every sport or there wouldn’t be a team. The game I remember most was playing a much larger high school baseball team from Council Bluffs and beating them 1-0. I pitched a one-hitter and won it with a home run. It doesn’t get much better than that.

Q. What is the worst part about growing up in southwest Iowa?
A. Putting up hay on my uncle’s farm in the middle of summer and walking to school in the midst of those Iowa winters.

Q. Hawkeyes or Cornhuskers?
A. Hawkeyes, of course.

Q. How do you plan to stop terrorism from hitting a small town like Sidney? Are there any targets in particular the town should safeguard?
A. Our mission at NCTC is difficult, but it’s straightforward: do everything possible to stop each and every attack.
I’d rather not get into a discussion of what specific locations or site might be tempting targets for terrorists. What I would say is that residents of Sidney, all other Iowans, and everyone in the country should remain vigilant. Report anything suspicious or out of the ordinary to the appropriate authorities.
We need to keep looking out for each other.

Q. Are there any lessons you learned growing up in Sidney that stick with you?
A. Lots of them. I learned the importance of values and integrity there. I also learned the value of hard work, making your world your bond, and getting along with people from varied backgrounds.

Q. How does a man who grew up in small-town Iowa become an important part of the safety net for our country?
A. I guess it sounds trite, but the answer is "one step at a time." Do your best, bloom where you’re planted, take care of those entrusted to your leadership, have a vision for where you want to go. And always be able to look yourself in the mirror.

Redd: U.S. Making Progress on Terrorism

By KATHERINE SHRADER
Associated Press Writer
Thu Oct 13, 3:46 AM ET

Photo 1
Photo 2

A top-secret bulletin zips across the globe, from Iraq to the National Counterterrorism Center, a leading nerve center for U.S. intelligence. The tip is critical: Terrorists may be plotting to blow up New York subways.
The operations center swings into action. Is the information credible? Are the people about to be grabbed in Iraq truly a threat? Well before the sun rises, counterterrorism chief John "Scott" Redd has already received several updates.
Morning, afternoon and middle of the night, conference calls connect counterterrorism experts to as many as a dozen U.S. agencies, including FBI, CIA and the Defense and State departments.
In New York, city officials decide to warn the public to be on the lookout for suspicious packages and behavior. In Washington, federal officials decide the tip isn't credible.
No bombs have gone off.
As the new NCTC chief, Redd was at the center of last week's efforts to analyze the threat.
In an interview at the start of his third month on the job, Redd described how the four years since 9/11 have brought sweeping changes to the way counterterrorism agencies communicate.
His center, for instance, has access to 26 different computer networks containing intelligence information and brings that information together into NCTC online, available to 4,000 counterterrorism experts across the government. That, he says, is unprecedented.
Some information is also shared directly with foreign allies. While Redd declines to offer specifics, intelligence experts have long said countries such as Britain are among the United States' closest partners.
The NCTC's operations center — complete with flat-panel televisions and easy-on-the-eyes lighting — is considered state of the art. Most of the desks can move, allowing the al-Qaida and weapons experts to sit together — or in whatever configuration best addresses the current threats.
The center officially came into existence in December, absorbing a counterterrorism analysis operation called the Terrorist Threat Integration Center. In the process, the NCTC won more authority.
A mathematician, Redd was reluctant to give a score on the progress the U.S. government has made in working together. But, he said, on a 10-point scale, "It's above five."
As often happens in government, the center has had growing pains.
Redd's predecessor and senior CIA leaders fought for months over how many counterterror analysts the CIA should share with the NCTC. Some in Congress and elsewhere have also questioned whether the wave of intelligence reforms has only created more bureaucracy and confusing chains of command.
Redd said he comfortably wears two hats: He's the president's top adviser on terrorism, but he also answers to National Intelligence Director John Negroponte while serving as his "mission manager" for terrorism analysis and strategy.
The retired Navy vice admiral, who spent much of his career aboard ships, has come a long way from Sidney, Iowa, population 1,000.
He remembers making up a street number for his amateur radio license application because the town was so small actual numbers weren't necessary. Redd's first trip east of the Mississippi River was to report for his freshman year at the U.S. Naval Academy in June 1962.
In the bureaucratic hierarchy, Redd is now considered an equal to CIA Director Porter Goss.
Here's a look at some of Redd's views on the latest threats:
• Osama bin Laden can't communicate with his followers the way he had in the past. "The more you communicate, the more you try to directly run an organization, the more vulnerable you are," Redd said. "And he is pretty deep in hiding. We know he is not communicating very much."
• Al-Qaida is changing. "My analysts would probably tell you that since 9/11, there have been very few terrorist operations which have been directed directly by al-Qaida," Redd said. "They may have influenced them, they may have had prior knowledge, but by and large, we have really set them back on their heels."
• While Redd directs specifics on the July attacks in London to British investigators, he said it appears that al-Qaida may have had a closer connection to the successful bombings on July 7 than the failed attacks two weeks later. But "the jury is still out" on any connections to al-Qaida's central leadership, he said.
• The London attacks provide a valuable lesson. "'Fortress America' doesn't work. ... You can't assume that every threat that comes to the country is going to come across the border," Redd said. "There is always the possibility that it could be internal."
• Terrorists are paying attention to events in the United States, including the hurricanes. "We know that they are reasonably media savvy," he said.
• The war on terror may take a generation and that's part of the reason Redd said he took the job. "The Cold War took 40 years. We don't know how long this one is going to take. I may not be around before this is finished, but my grandchildren will be around."
What threat keeps Redd up at night? "The one I don't know about."

articles 9/18

NY Times Magazine
The Statesman
In his global campaign against disease and destitution, Bono has taken the power of rock celebrity to new places — prime ministerial residences, the White House and the offices of the United Nations. But the success he has had is about a lot more than his soaring voice.




Will the GOP be Katrina’s Biggest Casualty?
by Mark Tapscott
Yes, President Bush gave a good speech Thursday night but no amount of inspiring rhetoric can obscure the fact that Hurricane Katrina may well have drowned the Republican Party as a credible vehicle of conservative reform.

LA Times
Louisiana Officials Indicted Before Katrina Hit; Feds found dubious expenditures by state's emergency preparedness agency...

How to Fix the Airline Mess
When Delta and Northwest airlines went bankrupt last week, it was the latest blow to an industry plagued by poor management, combative unions and huge pension burdens. Gordon Bethune, the former CEO and savior of Continental Airlines, says the government has only made the problem worse

A Teen Twist on Sex
A new survey says many U.S. teens have engaged in oral sex--and it's not just boys on the receiving end

College Football Rankings
USC in No. 1 spot for record 22nd straight poll; Oklahoma drops out

articles 9/17

Reuters
Power-dressing man leaves trail of destruction

Reuters
Vatican's search for gays in seminaries raises alarm

The menace of multiculturalism
by Suzanne Fields
It's not easy to dislodge a trendy fad, particularly among the public intellectuals and the aspiring sophisticates of the chattering class, but 'multiculturalism' may be getting an intellectual re-examination.

“The Grapple in the Big Apple”
Hitchens vs. Galloway.
By Alex Massie

'Sinister Piffle'
Christopher Hitchens "debates" a demagogue.
by Kimberley Strassel

George Galloway Is Gruesome, Not Gorgeous
Now, watch me debate him.
By Christopher Hitchens

Reinventing Television
He's the smart-ass host of The Daily Show. But more than that, Jon Stewart is helping invent a new kind of TV -- time-shifted and multiscreen.
By Thomas Goetz

Blame throwing
by David Warren

In two-parent families, the kids are all right
Study finds stability pays big dividends

Chief Justice Roberts
The distinction between law and politics that the Judiciary Democrats do not respect lies at the heart of Roberts's approach to judging

Media Cooked Up Storm Over Katrina
by Victor Davis Hanson

The Bush Doctrine, Unpacked
by David Gelernter

Union trouble
by George Will
Pilots, flight attendants and other members of different unions are crossing the picket lines manned by members of the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association.

NY Times Magazine
Taking Stock of the Forever War

Omaha-Born Man Will Lead Nation's Counterterrorism Center

Back with a Bang
It may be only rock & roll, but the Stones still rule
by David Fricke

Reformation Chart
Just how different are the Roman Catholic and Protestant doctrines?

articles 8/14

She's So Cool, So Smart, So Beautiful: Must Be a Girl Crush

At the Pumps and on the Web, Drivers Check for Lowest Prices
For millions of Americans, filling up the tank has become an eye-popping experience as prices reached levels not seen in decades.

G.I.'s Deployed in Iraq Desert With Lots of American Stuff
Soldiers in Iraq have taken the quest for the succor of the familiar to astonishing levels, accumulating all the accouterments of home.

Inside Iran's Secret War For Iraq
A TIME investigation reveals the Tehran regime's strategy to gain influence in Iraq--and why U.S. troops may now face greater dangers as a result

Don't Let Travel Miles Burn a Hole in Your Pocket
Some advice for using frequent-flier miles on airlines that are close to, or already in, bankruptcy.

The Great American Jobs Machine
Employment is higher than at any time in history.

The New Litmus Test
The left-wing blogosphere is ready to take on the party establishment. What do Democratic candidates have to do to earn the love?
by Dean Barnett

The Overlooked Case Of Mohammed Afroze
Al Qaeda's terrorism isn't really motivated by the Iraq War and Israel.
by Edward Morrissey

Bordering on a Policy
Is there an agreement in the works on immigration?
by Tamar Jacoby

Keep Quiet And Listen!
The words of radical Islam speak for themselves.
by Victor Davis Hanson

Iraqi Game Plan
If you're unhappy about the way things are going in Iraq or Afghanistan, you can now refight the battles yourself, from the comfort of your couch.

The New Soldiers of Fortune
There are dozens of private security companies operating in Iraq, and Triple Canopy is one of the largest. How was it formed, who are its men — and what is the line between "security" and warfare?

Four Amendments & a Funeral
A month inside the house of horrors that is Congress

Bassist turned comic mocks the stars he backed

UnconfirmedSources.com
U2 Will Play Free Concert in Crawford Texas to Honor Cindy Sheehan
World Bank's Paul Wolfowitz Says Bomb Cindy Sheehan

On condemning terrorism

Jeff Jacoby

articles 8/7

Will We Ever Arrive at the Good Death?
Almost 40 years after the birth of the hospice movement, and despite the rise of living wills and palliative care, the end of life remains anxious and hypermedicalized.

AFP
Men do have trouble hearing women, scientists find
Men who are accused of never listening by women now have an excuse -- women's voices are more difficult for men to listen to than other men's, a report said.

AP
Daylight-Saving Switch May Cause Tech Woes
When daylight-saving time starts earlier than usual in the United States come 2007, your VCR or DVD recorder could start recording shows an hour late.

The Rise of the Digital Thugs
The newest big corporate menace: disgruntled techies, who find company secrets and will keep them, for a price.

Finding Bargains (and Headaches) at Foreclosure Sales
If rising interest rates cause more people to default on their adjustable-rate mortgages, investors could face a potential boon.

Pince Me -- Is That Wal-Mart
The house of fuddy duddy is now aiming to become the next trendy-setter.

Liberals Fund New Approach
Democratic backers pledge $80M for advocacy network to compete with conservative groups.

See the War, After an Ad for the Army
by Sarah Boxer
This week the Web site ifilm.com introduced a new "channel" called WarZone with film clips from World War II, Vietnam, Israel and Iraq. Looking at the selection of videos about Iraq, it's hard to say which are scarier: the clips themselves or the advertisements that run with them.

The Blogs of War
On the 21st-century battlefield, the campfire glow comes from a laptop. Military bloggers offer a real-time window into life behind the lines. And they're putting the Pentagon on the defensive.
By John Hockenberry

Rolling Stone
Marine Gone Mad
Andy Raya didn't kill anyone while stationed in Iraq. He waited until he returned home.

New Pope: Reasserting Christianity in the West
The new pontiff has offered clues to the ways in which he will lead the church and, he hopes, change Europe.

The Condi Doctrine
After six months as Secretary of State, she has seized control over U.S. foreign policy. Now comes her toughest test--finding a way out of Iraq. An intimate look at Rice's world.

60 Years Later, Remembering the Pacific War
Sixty years later, veterans of the Pacific War remember: 'Kill or be killed.'

The Black Family: 40 Years of Lies
Rejecting the Moynihan report caused untold, needless misery.

A Feasible Fix for Social Security
Our recipe for saving the system, protecting the poor, and boosting the investor class

Brain Workouts May Tone Memory
Keeping your gray matter in great shape doesn't prevent age-related cognitive disorders like Alzheimer's. But "cognitive fitness" proponents say mental exercises can help stave off such diseases.
By Joanna Glasner.

The Dog Ate My Steroids
Why athletes fail drug tests, in their own words.
By Josh Levin and Rachael Larimore

Rivers of Coke
Drug researchers piss-test an Italian river and find huge quantities of cocaine residue. Seems Italians are sniffing four times as much coke as officials estimate. By Stephen Leahy.

U2's City of Blinding Lights
12,000 daisy-chained LEDs. Spycams controlled by a PlayStation. The Vertigo tour is a monster concert machine - and the ultimate rock-and-roll R&D lab.
By William Gibson

articles 8/6

LA Times
New Chapter in the Mystery of Marilyn: Her Own Words?
By Robert W. Welkos, Times Staff Writer
Miner's Transcript of Monroe Tapes
Miner's Account of Monroe's Death
Former Los Angeles prosecutor John W. Miner was head of the District Attorney’s medical-legal section when Marilyn Monroe died.

Bush v. Rumsfeld
The president knows we have to win the war in Iraq . . . Rumsfeld doesn't.
by William Kristol

Sanctuary No More
It's no longer springtime for jihadis in Britain.
by Gerard Baker

Goldilocks Economy
The bad news is the good news isn't being heard.
by Irwin M. Stelzer

Nuclear Explosion
A portrait of our scary world, 60 years after Hiroshima.
by Fred Ikle

WSJ Editorial
Hiroshima
Nuclear weapons, then and now.

Truth Has Nothing to Do With It
Is Theory going out of fashion in American universities?
by James Seaton

The Cut-and-Run Caucus
Why are some Democrats so eager to give up in Iraq?
by Brendan Miniter

Phone sex firm's odd bedfellows
What do Microsoft, eBay and the Carlyle Group -- employer of a number of former high-ranking government officials -- have in common?

USA Today
Preseason Football Poll
The Wolverines open the 2005 season ranked fourth in the preseason USA Today Coaches poll, the eighth straight season the program has listed in the top 10 of the coaches poll.

Football Tops Big Ten Preseason Media Poll
The Wolverines were selected as the preseason favorite to win the Big Ten Conference in a poll of media attending the Big Ten Kickoff Event.

• Michigan has more wins that any football program in NCAA history, 842-274-36 (.7465277).
• Michigan has the highest winning percentage of any team in the NCAA history (.7465277).
• Michigan has a run of 107 straight AP polls (20 polls longer than Miami) in which it has been ranked in the Top 25, the longest streak in the nation. The streak, which is 80 week long, began Oct. 24, 1998.
• Michigan is 262-82-10 (.756) all-time when listed in the AP Top 10, including a 38-17 mark during Lloyd Carr's coaching tenure.
• Michigan has had 343 football games televised, which leads the NCAA.
• Michigan has appeared in 30 straight bowls, the longest current streak in NCAA history.
• The Wolverines set an NCAA record in 2004 by averaging 111,025 fans per game at Michigan Stadium.
• The Michigan football program is the only Big Ten team in any sport to win a conference title in each decade. It is the winningest overall athletic program in Big Ten Conference history.
• Michigan ranks #1 all-time in composite AP final football polls (1936-2003), passing Notre Dame for the top spot after last season's #6 final ranking.
• Michigan has appeared in more Rose Bowls (19) than any other Big Ten Conference school. They are 8-10.
• Michigan has 42 Big Ten titles (OSU -29) which is the most of any college football program in ANY conference.
• Michigan has 11 national championships (5th all-time) to OSU's 7.
  

Lloyd Carr Stats

• Head coach Lloyd Carr has a career winning percentage of .779 (95-28), ranking him fifth among active Division I coaches.
• Michigan has a 35-18 overall record against AP nationally ranked teams under Lloyd Carr. The Wolverines have compiled a 125-104-8 (.542) all-time record against AP nationally ranked teams.
• He now leads active Big Ten coaches with 63 conference wins (63-17).
• His teams are an amazing 14-4 against Top 10 opponents and 7-2 against Top 5 opponents.
• He grabbed the active career lead in Big Ten wins during the 2003 season.
• He is the eighth coach in conference history to claim five or more Big Ten championships.
• He is fourth among active Division I-A coaches with a .77236 winning percentage.

Bono gives an explicit confession of being saved by Grace, not Karma

August 6, 2005
Salty Dogman
by Gene Edward Veith

Is Bono, the lead singer and songwriter for the rock group U2, a Christian? He says he is and writes about Christianity in his lyrics. Yet many people question whether Bono is "really" a Christian, due to his notoriously bad language, liberal politics, and rock star antics (though he has been faithfully married for 23 years). But in a new book of interviews, Bono in Conversation by Michka Assayas, Bono, though using some salty language, makes an explicit confession of faith.

The interviewer, Mr. Assayas, begins by asking Bono, Doesn't he think "appalling things" happen when people become religious? Bono counters, "It's a mind-blowing concept that the God who created the Universe might be looking for company, a real relationship with people, but the thing that keeps me on my knees is the difference between Grace and Karma."

The interviewer asks, What's that? "At the center of all religions is the idea of Karma. You know, what you put out comes back to you: an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, or in physics—in physical laws—every action is met by an equal or an opposite one," explains Bono. "And yet, along comes this idea called Grace to upend all that. . . . Love interrupts, if you like, the consequences of your actions, which in my case is very good news indeed, because I've done a lot of stupid stuff."

The interviewer asks, Like what? "That's between me and God. But I'd be in big trouble if Karma was going to finally be my judge," says Bono. "It doesn't excuse my mistakes, but I'm holding out for Grace. I'm holding out that Jesus took my sins onto the Cross, because I know who I am, and I hope I don't have to depend on my own religiosity."

Then the interviewer marvels, "The Son of God who takes away the sins of the world. I wish I could believe in that."

"The point of the death of Christ is that Christ took on the sins of the world, so that what we put out did not come back to us, and that our sinful nature does not reap the obvious death," replies Bono. "It's not our own good works that get us through the gates of Heaven."

The interviewer marvels some more: "That's a great idea, no denying it. Such great hope is wonderful, even though it's close to lunacy, in my view. Christ has His rank among the world's great thinkers. But Son of God, isn't that farfetched?"

Bono comes back, "Look, the secular response to the Christ story always goes like this: He was a great prophet, obviously a very interesting guy, had a lot to say along the lines of other great prophets, be they Elijah, Muhammad, Buddha, or Confucius. But actually Christ doesn't allow you that. He doesn't let you off that hook. Christ says, No. I'm not saying I'm a teacher, don't call me teacher. I'm not saying I'm a prophet. I'm saying: 'I'm the Messiah.' I'm saying: 'I am God incarnate.' . . . So what you're left with is either Christ was who He said He was—the Messiah—or a complete nutcase. . . . The idea that the entire course of civilization for over half of the globe could have its fate changed and turned upside-down by a nutcase, for me that's farfetched."

What is most interesting in this exchange is the reaction of the interviewer, to whom Bono is, in effect, witnessing. This hip rock journalist starts by scorning what he thinks is Christianity. But it is as if he had never heard of grace, the atonement, the deity of Christ, the gospel. And he probably hadn't. But when he hears what Christianity is actually all about, he is amazed.

articles 8/3

Why Truman Dropped the Bomb
Sixty years after Hiroshima, we now have the secret intercepts that shaped his decision.
by Richard B. Frank

When Tush Comes to Dove
Real women. Real curves. Really smart ad campaign.
By Seth Stevenson

But Why Can't Hillary Win?
Sen. Clinton's electability problem.
By Jacob Weisberg

God vs. Satan
Who's the better investor?
By Daniel Gross

America’s Pro-Choice Movement at a Crossroads
They've been dreading this moment for decades. How the pro-choice movement is readying for Roberts—and navigating a critical political crossroads.

Frist's Stem Cell Capitulation
by Eric Cohen & William Kristol

Correcting the CIA
by Robert Novak
A statement attributed to the former CIA spokesman indicating that I deliberately disregarded what he told me in writing my 2003 column about Joseph Wilson's wife is just plain wrong.

Health benefits of prayer
by Armstrong Williams
Prayer heals. So say thousands of Americans who use prayer to improve their health.

Senator Frist's grave mistake
by Cal Thomas
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist made some fundamental mistakes in announcing his support of federal funding for stem cell research.

10 Years That Changed the World
A decade ago, Netscape went public, blasting the Web into everyday life. Now, Wired talks to the inside players - from Marc Andreessen to Shawn Fanning to Steve Jobs - about 10 years of boom, bust, and sock puppets.
Interviews by Jeff Howe

The Big Gulp
NASA pisses away millions hauling H2O into orbit. But there's a better way - recycle astronaut urine. Just one question: How does it taste?
By Tom McNichol

Building the Béisbol Brand
Signing Pedro Martínez, developing young phenoms in the Dominican Republic, luring Spanish-speaking fans — Omar Minaya is reinventing the Mets by embracing the Latinization of professional baseball. Is this the future of big-league business?

Rafael Palmiero
• Jayson Stark: Yes vote Buster Olney: Sham artist Raffy busted• Gene Wojciechowski: True lies Ray Ratto: Canseco got it right• Patrick Hruby: A yawner

USA Today
Steroid test nabs first major star
Palmeiro out for 10 days; drugs back in sports spotlight
By Mike Dodd and Hal Bodley, page 1A
Suspended
Full coverage

Palmeiro's image takes hard hit
Steroid suspension may hurt Hall hopes
By Mel Antonen, page 1C
BALTIMORE — One day, Rafael Palmeiro is a legend with elite Hall of Fame statistics. The next, his legacy is swirling in a steroid controversy.
Full coverage

Say it ain't so, Palmeiro
Oriole lets everyone down; ‘accident' story not believable
On baseball By Hal Bodley, page 2C
Rafael Palmeiro, nattily attired in a perfectly tailored navy pinstriped suit, walked into the hallowed halls of Congress on March 17 and said he never used steroids.
Full coverage

Appeals process part of policy
Players have right to challenge result before disciplinary action
By Hal Bodley, page 2C
Rafael Palmeiro received no special treatment from Major League Baseball by having his grievance for testing positive for steroids heard — and decided — before his 10-day suspension was announced Monday.
Full coverage

Orioles fans stunned by violation
By Scott Boeck, page 2C
BALTIMORE — Fans attending Monday's game at Oriole Park at Camden Yards between the Baltimore Orioles and Chicago White Sox expressed shock, disbelief and disappointment when hearing Rafael Palmeiro had been suspended for 10 days after violating Major League Baseball's steroid policy.
Full coverage

Subjection to God and Subjection to the State, by John Piper

Subjection to God and Subjection to the State, Part One
June 12, 2005
Romans 13:1-7
Subjection to God and Subjection to the State, Part Two
July 3, 2005
Subjection to God and Subjection to the State, Part Three
July 10, 2005
Subjection to God and Subjection to the State, Part Four
July 17, 2005

articles 7/24

Bush Rises to the Occasion
The Roberts pick is courageous and important.
by William Kristol

NY Times
Cigarettes, Taxes and Thin French Women
Economists have been wondering whether high cigarette taxes may have the unintended effect of increasing obesity.

Time
Living Under the Cloud
The atom bombs dropped over Japan ended a terrible war and persuaded the world never to use nuclear weapons again. Why that legacy is now in peril--and what we should do about it

NY Times
How Costco Became the Anti-Wal-Mart

US News & World Report
The Pentagon has a secret new strategy for taking on terrorists--and taking them down

Good Riddance . . . But Not Much Improvement
Prince Bandar, Saudi Arabia's ambassador to the United States, is out. Prince Turki is in.
by Stephen Schwartz

The Presidents' Man
Why John Roberts' service in the White House Counsel's office matters.
by Hugh Hewitt

Jihad Made In Europe
There may be more to fear from a mosque in Leeds than a madrassa in the Middle East.
by Reuel Marc Gerecht

Another Link in the Chain
The role of Saddam and al Qaeda in the creation of Ansar al Islam.
by Stephen F. Hayes & Thomas Joscelyn

Your Papers, Please
Will the Democrats go fishing for documents to sink Roberts?
by Duncan Currie

Reading Roberts's Mind
He'll certainly be better than O'Connor. But how much better?
by Terry Eastland

It Takes an Establishment
At some point the radicals need assistance, support, and reinforcement from establishment conservatives--like John Roberts.
by William Kristol

And Then They Came After Us
We’re at war. How about acting like it?
by Victor Davis Hanson

Currency basket case
Of all the news stories regarding China's so-called currency reform, 'Saying Goodbye to Mr. Greenspan,' written by Keith Bradsher of the New York Times, hits the nail closest to the head.

The Neoconservative Convergence
Some once famously dissenting ideas now govern U.S. foreign policy, maturing as they go.
by Charles Krauthammer

Wedding bells aren't ringing, but neither are phones of divorce ...
The U.S. divorce rate has dropped 5% since 1980, while the marriage rate dropped 50% since 1970. Analysts credit the change to the increase in cohabitation -- people living together without being wed. These couples are 40% more likely to break up than married couples.

Cohabitating Americans in 7 states run afoul of the law
The almost 1 million unmarried heterosexual Americans who live together in Florida, Michigan, Mississippi, North Carolina, North Dakota, Virginia and West Virginia are violating state laws against "lewd and lascivious" cohabitation.

'Cohabitation is replacing dating'
More than two-thirds of married couples in the USA now say they lived together before marriage. And the number of unmarried, opposite-sex households overall is rising dramatically even in seven states where laws against intimate relations between unmarried partners are still on the books.

Sweden's 'marriage lite' gets closer examination
The rise of cohabitation in the USA has prompted those who track the state of American marriages and families to take a closer look at Sweden, where unmarried, opposite-sex partners routinely live together.

Where Have All the Jockstraps Gone?
The decline and fall of the athletic supporter.
By Daniel Akst