Another History Quote

"Don’t fire unless fired upon. But if they want a war let it begin here. "

-- Parker, Captain John commander of the militiamen at Lexington, Massachusetts, on sighting British Troops (attributed), April 19, 1775

History Quote

"An unlimited power to tax involves, necessarily, a power to destroy; because there is a limit beyond which no institution and no property can bear taxation."

-- Marshall, John in McCullough v. Maryland, 1819

Happy Halloween

Hope you have an enjoyable one!

Sarah's lament

Sarah, at trying to grok is FRUSTRATED. And I can understand why.

But the media can only shape our opinions if we allow it to. And whether we care to admit it or not, sometimes the media gets it right. In the case of Vietnam and now Iraq, however, the media was, and is, wrong!

Leadership

Jason Riley, senior editorial writer for the Wall Street Journal, has a serious op-ed about civil rights leadership -- past and present.

It's all in the extended entry.

When the Leaders
Of Civil Rights
Were Civilized
We will miss Rosa Parks.

BY JASON L. RILEY
Friday, October 28, 2005 12:01 a.m. EDT

In the last paragraph on the last page of his thoughtful Penguin Lives biography of Rosa Parks, the historian Douglas Brinkley writes: "Finally, according to Rosa Parks there are three autobiographies that all Americans should read and that helped shape her worldview." The first two--Booker T. Washington's "Up From Slavery" and W.E.B. Du Bois's "The Souls of Black Folk"--would, or at least should, make most such lists. But Parks's third choice, James Weldon Johnson's "The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man," caught my attention, and not just because it isn't an autobiography but in fact a novella told in the first person.

Johnson, who died in a car accident in 1938 at the age of 67, was among the most prominent and accomplished black Americans of his day. An irrepressible polymath, he managed to distinguish himself in politics, diplomacy, journalism, literature, the arts and civil rights. But to the extent that he is remembered at all today, it is primarily for "Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing" (aka "The Negro National Anthem"), a song he wrote in 1900 to commemorate Lincoln's birthday. It was an instant hit and remains a black choir staple more than a century later.

---

Johnson's real legacy, however, is his work in the first third of the 20th century, leading up to that famous act of civil disobedience on a bus in Jim Crow Alabama that turned a Montgomery-branch NAACP bookkeeper into a cultural icon and kick-started what would become the modern civil-rights movement.

Starting in 1913, Johnson was editorial-page editor of the New York Age, a black weekly, and his widely disseminated commentaries on racial violence and segregation helped raise much needed awareness. Before becoming the NAACP's first black head in 1920, he was responsible for the formation of new chapters throughout the U.S. Inside of four years, he quadrupled the number. In 1917, foreshadowing tactics that Martin Luther King would use decades later, Johnson organized a silent protest parade down New York City's Fifth Avenue in response to the frequent lynchings and race riots of the period. Some ten thousand blacks participated.

That Rosa Parks cited Johnson as an inspiration along with giants like Washington and Du Bois tells us something about her deep appreciation of him. But it's also a reminder of Parks's dignified brand of social activism. Like Johnson, Parks recalls a time when the NAACP was an important institution staffed by serious people tackling real problems faced by a marginalized race.

While laboring under the thumb of policies enacted to preserve racial inequality, these pioneers consciously compiled a large store of near-universal respect for a movement whose goals couldn't have been more principled. The passing of Parks, and what she represented, leaves us with black leaders who seem to excel in cheapening this legacy when they're not squandering it altogether. .

---

The NAACP's idea of civil discourse in the 21st century is Kweisi Mfume accusing President Bush of "divide and conquer" tactics "when it comes to black organizations and black people and black thinking." It's Julian Bond comparing Republicans to Nazis and the Taliban and asserting that there is a right-wing conspiracy against blacks "operating out of the United States Department of Justice."

Harlem Rep. Charlie Rangel calls President Bush "our Bull Connor," the notorious police commissioner in Alabama who turned dogs and fire hoses on civil-rights demonstrators in 1963. The remark prompts a correction from Major Owens, a fellow member of the Congressional Black Caucus, who insists that the president is "more diabolical" than Connor was. When the rhetoric of so-called elder statesmen is materially no different from hip-hopper Kanye West's, it might be a sign that the movement is in trouble.

Or that it's irrelevant.

An America where blacks run Merrill Lynch, American Express and the State Department no longer needs civil-rights activism of the Rosa Parks and James Weldon Johnson variety, and hasn't for decades. Thanks in large part to their diligence and sacrifices, the battle for legal equality has been fought and won. Blacks still face social and economic challenges, but these result mainly from self-inflicted cultural wounds, not a manifestly unjust society.

The current crop of opportunistic pretenders isn't ready to acknowledge this reality--just ask Bill Cosby--but as more and more black Americans reach the middle class and beyond, it's becoming self-evident.

Mr. Riley is a senior editorial writer at The Wall Street Journal.

[Used with permission from OpinionJournal.com, a web site from Dow Jones & Company, Inc.]

Are you a redneck?

I received this in an email yesterday from my father-in-law. It's worth passing along. . .

You might be a redneck if: It never occurred to you to be offended by the phrase, "One nation, under God."

You might be a redneck if: You've never protested about seeing the 10 Commandments posted in public places.

You might be a redneck if: You still say "Christmas" instead of "Winter Festival."

You might be a redneck if: You bow your head when someone prays.

You might be a redneck if:: You stand and place your hand over your heart when they play the National Anthem.

You might be a redneck if: You treat Viet Nam vets with great respect, and always have.

You might be a redneck if: You've never burned an American flag.

You might be a redneck if: You know what you believe and you aren't afraid to say so, no matter who is listening.

You might be a redneck if: You respect your elders and expect your kids to do the same.

Though I've been an urban/suburban guy all of my life, yet given the definitions above, I might be a redneck after all!

How about you?

Heritage Quote

"The diversity in the faculties of men from which the rights of property originate, is not less an insuperable obstacle to a uniformity of interests. The protection of these faculties is the first object of government."

-- James Madison (Federalist No. 10, 23 November 1787)

No surprises here

Here's a DoD article about the attack on the Palestine Hotel, the referendom, and Iraqi security. Here's how it begins:

Insurgents targeted the Baghdad's Palestine Hotel for its inherent media value, a senior U.S. military official said today during a news conference in Baghdad. "Half the battle is in the battlefield of the media," Army Maj. Gen. Rick Lynch, a spokesman for Multinational Force Iraq, said. "The terrorists will use the media as a combat multiplier to hide their limited capabilities."

There is some guarded optimism in this article. Recommended.

[Hat tip to The Jawa Report. For more on this, click here.]

Heritage Quote

"We have abundant reason to rejoice that in this Land the light of truth and reason has triumphed over the power of bigotry and superstition, and that every person may here worship God according to the dictates of his own heart. In this enlightened Age and in this Land of equal liberty it is our boast, that a man's religious tenets will not forfeit the protection of the Laws, nor deprive him of the right of attaining and holding the highest Offices that are known in the United States."

-- George Washington (letter to the Members of the New Church in Baltimore, 27 January 1793)

Autophagy

I learned a new word today. Check out this New York Sun article that comments on what the New York Times is putting itself through over the Judith Miller kerfluffle.

[Hat tip to Glenn Reynolds over at Instapundit.]

Failures

Star Parker does a good job of describing the danger in relying on our government to bail us out. Here's an excerpt (emphasis added):

When the news of Katrina first broke, I wrote about my cousins from New Orleans who lost everything. Since then, they have moved to North Carolina and are building new lives for themselves. They are working for the same telemarketing firm that they worked for in New Orleans. A local church provided them temporary housing while they got resettled and is providing day care for their youngest child. The two oldest children are back in school, the parents are back at work and a new chapter in their life has begun.

They had the foresight to have purchased renters insurance; now they have funds to make their first home purchase.

The only government involvement in the whole process was the $2,000 check from FEMA.

Americans, white and black, rich and poor, can take care of themselves. We don't need politicians using our personal tragedies as an excuse to spend money that isn't theirs in the first place to try and buy votes and popularity.

I'll second that.

Saddam's legacy

This article, though written 17 months ago, is not easy to read. But reading it is important. Here's how it starts:

Ibrahim al-Idrissi, 37, goes to work every day with a handgun in a holster on his hip. In most countries, the line of work Idrissi is in wouldn't require such firepower. But this is Iraq. Idrissi is the president of the Association for Free Prisoners, an Iraqi non-governmental organization that has been documenting the execution of political prisoners under the regime of Saddam Hussein.

Many of Saddam's torturers and executioners are still at large. There have been two attempts on Idrissi's life, and three on the organization's headquarters in Baghdad. "Fortunately, their aim hasn't been very good so far," Idrissi says.

Heritage Quote

"No country upon earth ever had it more in its power to attain these blessings than United America. Wondrously strange, then, and much to be regretted indeed would it be, were we to neglect the means and to depart from the road which Providence has pointed us to so plainly; I cannot believe it will ever come to pass."

-- George Washington (letter to Benjamin Lincoln, 29 June 1788)

Tribute

Linda Chavez has a nice tribute to Rosa Parks who was instrumental in bringing racism to the forefront of this country's conscienceness. Only then could this nation begin to deal with that cruel inhumanity.

The day that Rosa Parks went to court to be tried for violating Montgomery's bus ordinance, 40,000 black Montgomery residents refused to ride the bus, sparking a boycott that lasted more than a year. The boycott, which established the reputation of a young black minister, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., only ended when the Supreme Court handed down a decision outlawing segregation on public buses.

Recommended.

Remember this?

The Anchoress reminds us that Iraq was widely believed to have WMD capability well before Bush became President.

It's a good read. And it's a fact, too.

Blog Quake Day

I apologize about not getting this post up sooner. You see, today is Blog Quake Day. Bloggers around the world are urging readers to contribute to relief efforts aimed at helping the people of India and Pakistan that have been ravaged by the recent earthquake.

UMCOR is supporting relief efforts now. If you would care to contribute to them, just click here. But there are many other agencies that are working to help. I urge you to contribute to a worthy charity for this purpose.

For more information on the blog quake day, go to DesiPundit » Blog Quake Day.

Constitution Adopted

It is now official.

Iraq's landmark constitution was adopted by a majority of voters during the country's Oct. 15 referendum, as Sunni Arab opponents failed to muster enough support to defeat it, election officials said Tuesday.

Results released by the Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq showed that Sunni Arabs, who had sharply opposed the draft document, failed to produce the two-thirds "no" vote they would have needed in at least three of Iraq's 18 provinces to defeat it.

Nationwide, 78.59 percent voted for the charter while 21.41 percent voted against, the commission said. The charter required a simple majority nationwide with the provision that if two-thirds of the voters in any three provinces rejected it, the constitution would be defeated.

Savagery

I would watch out for those "freedom fighters" in Iraq, if I were you. Unless, of course, I was Michael Moore.

This is the second of our contractors to be kidnapped in the past three weeks. The previous victim was a woman in her mid-40s who has her own company. She was kidnapped in front of her house by a gang of between 10 to 12 terrorists. They first beat up her husband and young son who were standing with her, then fled in a get-away car that was in front of the house next door.

The kidnappers held her for 13 days before releasing her for a ransom I have heard of $200,000. Before dumping her out of a moving car, the "insurgents" (as the MSM refer to terrorists) broke most of her ribs with a baseball bat. Since that didn't seem to satisfy them, they also broke many of the bones in her face with the same bat.

Never let it be said that these Islamists are savages, because we must never forget that one man's savage is another man's "freedom fighter."

Strategy for success

Military historian and author, Frederick W. Kagan, has a well-thought out blueprint for victory in Iraq.

I have excerpts in the extended entry.

Mr. Kagan begins with abrief summary of some expectations and realities in the war in Iraq from it's onset up to the present.

THE NATURE OF THE CONFLICT in Iraq has shifted over the past 30 months. A basic assumption of the war plan executed in March and April 2003, and of the counterinsurgency campaign waged since then, was that the overwhelming majority of Iraqis would welcome the establishment of democracy in their country. And although a majority of Iraqis clearly do welcome democracy, there is an important complication. The most significant challenge the coalition faces in Iraq today is the fact that the Sunni-Arab community is in large part unwilling to accept the consequences of democracy, and has not yet reconciled itself to the loss of its dominant position in the country. U.S. military strategy has largely ignored this problem so far. Victory in Iraq thus requires a refocusing of coalition military efforts against this central challenge.

He then spends a good deal of time walking through the evolution of the three major military objectives of the coalition counterinsurgency effort: Killing or capturing Saddam Hussein and his two sons, neutralizing the jihadists and foreign fighters, and transfer of the responsibility for security in Iraq to the Iraqis themselves.

As he discusses the efficacy of the American efforts in Iraq, Mr. Kagan points out some tactics being used by Americans that serve the terrorists well.

It is also essential for the U.S. political elite to abandon the current fad of discussing "exit strategies" and withdrawal timetables. There are few, if any, examples in history of a regime as young and fragile as the current Iraqi state inheriting an insurgency and defeating it. To imagine that the coalition can withdraw, turn an insurgency over to the inexperienced Iraqi army, and expect that army to defeat the insurgency is folly.

And he outlines an essential strategy for victory in, and for, Iraq.

The measure of success is not the number of "trained" Iraqi battalions available, but the defeat of the insurgency. Both the strategy and the message must be: America will not leave Iraq until the Sunni Arabs, and all other groups and ethnicities, have abandoned the hope that violence will lead to political advantage. This condition is the definitional requirement for any peaceful state, and the job Bush started will not be completed until this condition is met, no matter how many Iraqi soldiers or police are on the job.

During the course of his balanced analysis of the U.S./coalition military efforts in Iraq, he briefly discusses what our forces, under President Bush's leadership, have done right.

THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION and the U.S. military deserve much praise for what has occurred in Iraq these past 30 months. The establishment of a new state, the formation of a new army, the rebuilding of a shattered economy, the foundation of a new democracy--all these are remarkable achievements in a short period of time. They will come to nothing, however, if they do not end in success.

And then he concludes with a warning about the necessity of fully engaging the Sunnis in the democratic process . . . as well as the promise of what that will mean if we succeed in that endeavor.

The problem is within Iraq and specifically within the Sunni community. The coalition and the Iraqis are creating the political preconditions for success and have largely confined the military problems to the Zarqawi network and the Sunni Triangle (where that network is, for the most part, based). But until we, working with our Iraqi partners, have persuaded the Sunni community that violence is counterproductive and cannot improve its political position, the insurgency will continue. That persuasion will require political incentives and military pressure. If we and the Iraqi government apply both in judicious measure over the course of the next few years, there is no reason we cannot win.

Though the article is lengthy, it is well written and very well reasoned. I recommend it.

Heritage Quote

"It is too probable that no plan we propose will be adopted. Perhaps another dreadful conflict is to be sustained. If, to please the people, we offer what we ourselves disprove, how can we afterwards defend our work? Let us raise a standard to which the wise and the honest can repair. The event is in the hand of God. "

-- George Washington (as quoted by Gouverneur Morris in Farrand's Records of the Federal Convention of 1787, 25 March 1787)

Baghdad on referendum day

Michael Yon has an excellent report up at the Weekly Standard about the Iraqi referendum last week. Here's an excerpt:

On the eve of the election, I wanted to be fully prepared for combat in the morning. Once we started out, we'd have no idea how long we might be away, so I headed as quickly as possible to my room, showered, and managed to fall asleep. While I slept, terrorists knocked out electricity to most of Baghdad. Iraqis pulled out their lanterns.

I walked through the morning darkness to meet the soldiers, who were laughing at the terrorists: Don't those dumbasses know that the voting will happen during the daytime? When it comes to winning hearts and minds, cutting off the electricity didn't win any support. I have been saying it for many months: The terrorists are losing. But today was litmus-day.

It's a good article that relates Michael Yon's experiences during the entire day of October 15th in Baghdad. Recommended.

A breath of fresh air, eh?

How about this article praising George Bush for liberating Iraq? It's in the Toronto Sun, no less . . . Here's a taste:

Never before -- anywhere in the Arab world -- has a population participated freely and willingly in the shaping of its government as Iraqis are doing -- despite the tremendous violence directed against them by bloody-minded insurgents. Never, in the 1,400 years of Islam, has an Arab-Muslim despot been brought into a court of justice to answer for crimes of rape, torture and murder of people under him.

This is a uniquely riveting moment in Arab-Muslim history, and everyone in the region is mesmerized by the events occurring in Iraq.

But none of this could have been imagined without regime change in Baghdad. The midwife of a new Arab politics is, without any quibble, U.S. President George Bush.

It needs repeating that without Bush's decision for regime change in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the sacrifices of U.S. and coalition soldiers, more than 50 million Muslims would not have been liberated.

It's a refreshing point of view, isn't it?

On virginity, spirituality, and self-respect

The Anchoress has a great post up about the sanctity of remaining a virgin until marriage. Here's an excerpt:

It won't mean anything to an atheist, of course, or to an adherent of a religion which does not worship the Triune God of Abraham and Moses as Creator of All. But to those of us who do, and who understand that both Old and New Covenants were sealed by the shedding of blood, it makes perfect sense that a Marriage Covenant - which is not only shared between two created creatures, but made before their Creator, with whom they now join in the mystery of Creation, itself - would also be sealed by the shedding of blood. And so . . . it has meaning. Real meaning. Divine meaning. Spiritual meaning. Mature, adult meaning.

I may be considered old-fashioned, but over the years I have come to the realization that what she is saying is absolutely correct. And we are robbing our daughters and sons of innocence, self-respect, and purity, if we teach them differently.

Go read her entire post -- it's well worth it . . .

Heritage Quote

"... [The Judicial Branch] may truly be said to have neither FORCE nor WILL, but merely judgment; and must ultimately depend upon the aid of the executive arm even for the efficacy of its judgments."

-- Alexander Hamilton (Federalist No. 78, 1788)

Why war?

I have to agree with Betsy on this topic.

I'll be posting more on this later in the week.

Record-breaking oil revenue -- in Iraq

Record oil revenues -- despite the supposedly rampant terrorism going on over there.

Assem Jihad, spokesman for the Iraqi oil ministry, confirmed that the Iraqi oil revenues have made a record of 2.6 billion dollars last September. He noted, "This digit is the highest in the history of Iraq, since it started exporting oil during the first half of last century."

Nobel prize winner . . .

. . . and East Timor's Foreign Minister, Jose Ramos-Horta, defends the US troops in Iraq.

TIME and again as I watch the barbarity inflicted on innocent Iraqi civilians, often women and children, pass with seeming silence and indifference from the rest of the world, I ask where are those who are so quick to take to the streets to protest every alleged US sin, be it real or imaginary?

If they are so appalled at the graphic photos showing the depraved acts committed by a small number of American servicemen – photos that, never let it be forgotten, were unearthed as a result of the US Army's own investigation – surely they should be even more appalled by the daily carnage inflicted on the Shiah majority in Iraq.

Instead, those who hate the US seem to believe that every wrong committed by an American serviceman must not only be loudly condemned but portrayed as a deliberate act by the US Government, while the systematic and daily barbarities perpetrated predominantly by Sunni Muslims upon their fellow Muslims pass without comment. Such hypocrisy and unwarranted attacks increase the pressure on the US to cut and run from Iraq...

For all the present violence, in a few years Iraq could easily evolve into a peaceful and democratic country. Whether that transpires ultimately rests in the hands of the millions of Iraqis. But they cannot succeed if they are abandoned. And the brave, young American soldiers whom we today see cruising the treacherous streets of Iraq, sometimes battling the terrorists, sometimes conversing with ordinary Iraqis, will be remembered as the heroes who made this possible.

This was originally published in the Asian Wall Street Journal.

Somebody is finally speaking out truthfully about this . . .

Dr. Demarche, who tipped me off to this article, has much more.

Heritage Quote

"A fine genius in his own country is like gold in the mine."

-- Benjamin Franklin (Poor Richard's Almanack, 1733)

Soldier's Angels needs YOU

Please support this wonderful organization that is working hard to supply our soldiers deployed overseas with many different things to brighten their days and make their lives easier -- from moral support to body armor, and a host of things in between.

Holly Aho shares an email requesting help from the founder of Soldier's Angels.

Democracy is prevailing . . .

. . . in Iraq -- despite gloomy predictions by the western media. I just had to show you one more photo and story of the referendum in Iraq. Compliments of Major K.

Temples

Ed Morrisey has an interesting column up about the modern-day "temples" our cities are building, and what that may be saying about us.

He certainly makes you think . . .

Heritage Quote

"The freedom and happiness of man...[are] the sole objects of all legitimate government."

-- Thomas Jefferson (letter to Thaddeus Kosciusko, 1810)

22 October 1983

Blackfive reminds us of the first terrorist attack on U.S. forces 22 years ago in Beirut.

Picture of the Day

I just had to link you this beautiful picture of Dione!

It'll take a few moments to download the picture if you have a dial-up connection, but it's well worth the wait.

UPDATE: I just fixed the link to point to the right picture.

Heritage Quote

"Would it not be better to simplify the system of taxation rather than to spread it over such a variety of subjects and pass through so many new hands."

-- Thomas Jefferson (letter to James Madison, 1784)

Mala's fate

Thunder6 has a post up at 365 and a Wakeup about a stray bullet that plunged into a little Iraqi girl's head -- and how our soldiers responded in a frantic attempt to save her life.

You have got to go read this post!

Bombing Iraqi civilians?

Jason, over at , who is currently deployed in Iraq, disagrees with the media accounts. And then he tells us the real story -- because he was there.

Of course the MSM is reporting that "civilians" died in the attack. They are not reporting that the cowards who place IEDs on the sides of roads died. They are not reporting that the aircraft saw weapons and they hardly mention that the Cobras where shot at.

Go read it for yourself.

Task Force Quake

Firepower Forward has a post up about how our soldiers in Afganistan and elsewhere moved into Pakistan to assist with disaster relief efforts following the tragic earthquake there.

It is a tribute to our men and women in uniform. And they truly deserve it.

Heritage Quote

"And it proves, in the last place, that liberty can have nothing to fear from the judiciary alone, but would have everything to fear from its union with either of the other departments."

-- Alexander Hamilton (Federalist No. 78, 1788)

Victory in Iraq

Ralph Peters, in the New York Post talks about the significance of the election in Iraq and how the MSM has woefully misconstrued it. He's taking no prisoners, either:

A startling number of editors and opinion columnists have been wrong about every development in Iraq (and Afghanistan). First, they predicted a bloody, protracted war against Saddam's military. Then they predicted civil war. They insisted that Iraq's first elections would fail amid a bloodbath. Then they declared that Iraq's elected delegates would not be able to agree on a draft constitution. Next, they thundered that Iraq's Sunni Arabs wouldn't vote.

Most recently, the sages of the opinion pages declared that the proposed constitution would be defeated at the polls by the Sunni Arabs. All along they've displayed a breathtaking empathy with the Islamist terrorists who slaughter the innocent, giving Abu Musab al-Zarqawi a pass while attacking our president and mocking the achievements of our troops.

A herd mentality has taken over the editorial boards. Ignoring all evidence to the contrary, columnists write about our inevitable "retreat" from Iraq, declaring that "everyone knows" our policies have no chance of success.

That isn't journalism. It's wishful thinking on the part of those who need Iraq to fail to preserve their credibility.

Recommended reading (requires free registration).

Real pictures

Gateway Pundit has put up a post that shows several pictures and quotes from Arab news media that acknowledge the history-in-the-making nature of the Iraqi referendum Saturday.

Something that the western media has either ignored or put a negative spin on.

The post is worth reading -- the pictures are priceless! It is exciting to watch this tremendous victory for freedom going on over there.

Too bad our own news media cannot see it . . .

Introspection

Gagdad Bob, over at One Cosmos, looks at the subject of history from a more philosophical perspective. Here's a taste:

To contemporary observers, the life of Jesus, or of the Hebrew prophets, was invisible. This is highly instructive. That is, the most important and influential events in human history were completely undetected and overlooked by contemporary sophisticates. Rather, they were noticed only by a handful of provincial rubes who "saw" and "heard," not with their eyes and ears, but in a trans-cerebral, intuitive manner.

Then he ties it into the present, and what we see (or fail to see), in terms of history, happening around us.

Heritage Quote

"Why has government been instituted at all? Because the passions of men will not conform to the dictates of reason and justice without constraint."

-- Alexander Hamilton (Federalist No. 15)

Black empowerment

Star Parker makes some good points regarding what blacks need to achieve success in their lives. Here's an excerpt:

It may be news to Farrakhan, and perhaps to other black leaders, that blacks are unique and individual human beings. It's the racists who look at us otherwise. It does not empower black citizens when they hear from their leaders that they are not unique individuals but racial objects. Am I suggesting that blacks in America today do not have to contend with the burden of racism? Of course I am not. What I do claim is that the most damaging racism in our community is what it hears from its own leaders. It is the message that black citizens cannot and should not be treated as free and personally responsible individuals.

What she has to say really applies to all of us, regardless of race. And that is what makes her arguments so credible.

People like Jesse Jackson and Louis Farrakhan are calling for treating blacks differently than everyone else. How can that be anything other than racism on their part? These black "leaders" are leading blacks down the proverbial garden path -- when they should be leading them to self-sufficiency, self-discipline, and self-respect.

Which, by the way, is exactly what is expected of the rest of us . . .

Iraqi optimism

Michael Rubin, over at OpinionJournal has an op-ed up about what the Iraqis think about progress in their country. As opposed to what American "opinion makers" say about it.

Here's an excerpt:

The referendum capped a constitutional drafting process over which Western commentators and diplomats had been quick to panic. They misunderstand that with freedom comes politics. The same U.S. senators who debated the "nuclear option" for judicial nominees failed to recognize political brinkmanship among their Iraqi counterparts.

I've reprinted it in it's entirety in the extended entry.

With Freedom Comes Politics
Iraqis are much more optimistic about their country than American opinion makers.

BY MICHAEL RUBIN
Tuesday, October 18, 2005 12:01 a.m. EDT

On Oct. 15, Iraqis demonstrated that their desire to determine the future through the ballot box was the rule rather than the exception. Arabs, Kurds and Turkmen; Sunnis, Shiites and Christians--all braved threats of violence to vote. The vast majority voted in favor of the constitution. But whatever their positions, Iraqis considered their decision carefully.

The referendum campaign was active. Dueling commercials and newscasts sought to sway the Iraqi vote. Such is the nature of politics in a country no longer subject to state-controlled media.

Some read the constitution. They voted for or against federalism. Some marked their ballot on the basis of how closely they wished religion to be mixed with government. Others did not read the document but learned about it on television, in newspapers and even by text messaging, the latest medium employed by Iraqi politicians to reach constituents. Security, rather than content, was a determinant for some. They voted "yes" to avoid the chaos of failure and the prolongation of occupation.

---

The referendum capped a constitutional drafting process over which Western commentators and diplomats had been quick to panic. They misunderstand that with freedom comes politics. The same U.S. senators who debated the "nuclear option" for judicial nominees failed to recognize political brinkmanship among their Iraqi counterparts.

Many U.S. policy makers worry that disgruntled Sunnis may turn to violence if their demands aren't met. But there is no evidence to support the conventional wisdom that insurgent violence is tied to the political process. Insurgents have not put forward any platform. By denying the legitimacy of the state, pan-Islamic rhetoric is a greater affront to Iraqi nationalism than the presence of foreign troops on Iraqi soil. It is no accident that Iraqi Sunnis have started killing foreign jihadists.

Nevertheless, implying violence to be the result of demands not met is an old Middle East game. And in this game, Iraqi factions have played the Western media and policy makers like a fiddle. White House pressure, for example, led U.S. officials to amend the political process in order to augment the Sunni presence in the Constitutional Drafting Commission. Acceding to such demands is not without cost. Because Iraq's Sunni leaders are more Islamist than their Shiite counterparts, the increased Sunni presence eroded the rights of Iraqi women in the constitution's final draft.

Some critics still maintain that the "yes" vote may exacerbate conflict. What is needed is consensus, they say. On Sept. 26, for example, the International Crisis Group released a statement criticizing "a rushed constitutional process [that] has deepened rifts and hardened feelings. Without a strong U.S.-led initiative to assuage Sunni Arab concerns, the constitution is likely to fuel rather than dampen the insurgency." This NGO bemoaned the referendum as little more than an opportunity for Iraqis "to embrace a weak document that lacks consensus."

But consensus is not always possible. Though Sunnis are perhaps 15% of Iraq's population, they believe themselves to be 50%. Any agreement acceding to their inflated sense of power would automatically disenfranchise the remainder of the population. With the collapse of apartheid in 1994, white South Africans had to confront their minority status. Iraqi Sunnis must face the same reality. The process may be painful, but justice, democracy and long-term stability demand it continue.

Even without consensus, the constitution represents the type of social and political compromise lacking through the Arab world. Members of the Constitutional Drafting Commission and Iraqi power brokers spent months debating and canvassing constituents. Any politician living outside the U.S.-controlled Green Zone--Jalal Talabani, Abdul Aziz Hakim and Ahmad Chalabi, for example--had his parlor filled with Iraqis from different cities and of various ethnic and sectarian backgrounds until the early hours of morning. These Iraqi petitioners voiced interests and demands diametrically opposed to each other. Consensus was not always possible, but compromise was. As with the constitution, the nature of compromise is a result ideal to none but fair to all.

---

The referendum result again demonstrates that American policy- and opinion-makers are more pessimistic than are Iraqis. Part of the problem is that Pentagon officials and journalists alike chart Iraq's success through misguided metrics. Counting car bombs does not demonstrate progress or lack thereof in Iraq. Objective indicators show that Iraqis have confidence that did not exist prior to liberation.

According to an Aug. 16, 2002, commentary in the Guardian--a British newspaper that often opposes U.S. foreign policy--one in six Iraqis had fled their country under Saddam. Millions left because of war, dictatorship and sanctions. Today, several hundred thousand have returned; only the Christians still leave. If Iraq were as chaotic as the media implies, it would export refugees, not resettle them.

Other indicators suggest Iraqis have confidence in their future. The Iraqi dinar, freely traded in international currency markets, is stable.

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.

Michael Rubin, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, is editor of the Middle East Quarterly.

[Used with permission from OpinionJournal.com, a web site from Dow Jones & Company, Inc.]

Right on the mark

Sarah, over at trying to grok has a good post up about international hypocrisy.

She says it like she sees it. And she sees it quite well. Recommended.

Heritage Quote

"Law and liberty cannot rationally become the objects of our love, unless they first become the objects of our knowledge."

-- James Wilson (Of the Study of the Law in the United States, Circa 1790)

SGT Hook

SGT Hook is back in the blogosphere.

As a soldier in today's army, I'm damned proud of the successes in Iraq and Afghanistan on the political side. It means that our sacrifices are not for naught. As a soldier in today's army, I can't begin to describe how good it felt to have breakfast with my son this morning.

Go check out his site . . .

Hopefully so

Wretchard, over at the Belmont Club has a good post up describing the end of the beginning of the new democratic Iraq. And he's not holding back.

Just as the ouster of Saddam by OIF touched off a wave of changes in Libya, Lebanon and the entire region, the impending defeat of the insurgency will paradoxically enhance the ability of diplomacy to address many of the remaining issues. Saddam's defeat confirmed what many military analysts knew from Desert Storm, that it was impossible for any conventional army to stand up against US forces. And that modified the behavior of many rogue states. Yet there remained the hope that the terrorist model of warfare, forged in Algeria and refined against Israel in Lebanon, would bring America to a halt: that rogue regimes acting discreetly could operate within that strategic shadow. Now, for the first time since Algeria, a terrorist force of the highest quality, supported by contributions from oil-rich countries, in the heart of the Arab world, with sanctuary in a friendly regime across the border and eulogized as "freedom fighters" by dozens of major international publications is on the verge of total and ignominious defeat. There are no more strategic shadows.

Recommended.

Finger of victory

Sooni's election photos

Check out these photos of the voting in Baghdad Saturday.

Another victory for democracy happened this weekend. In Iraq. Another step toward bringing our troops home has been taken.

And yet our press seems singularly unimpressed. In fact, they seem downright pessimistic about the whole thing.

It's a shame, really . . .

Heritage Quote

It is a principle incorporated into the settled policy of America, that as peace is better than war, war is better than tribute.

-- James Madison (letter to the Dey of Algiers, August 1816)

Sunset in Iraq

A US transport helicopter takes off at sunset from the International Zone (previously called the "Green Zone"), a heavily guarded area where foreign embassies and Iraq's parliament are based, in Baghdad, Iraq, Sunday Oct. 16 2005. (AP Photo/Vadim Ghirda)

Scopes in reverse

Eighty years ago, a man came under fire for what he taught in the classroom -- Darwin's Evolution. Today, the tables are turned. Here's how the article ends:

John Scopes once said, "If you limit a teacher to only one side of anything, the whole country will eventually have only one thought.... I believe in teaching every aspect of every problem or theory."

Go read the first part . . .

Loyalty

The American Thinker has a good article about loyalty in wartime. Here's an excerpt:

According to the latest polls, barely 40% of the country approves of the way that President Bush is conducting the war in Iraq. But when asked if we should pull our troops out before the job of securing the country and helping the Iraqis achieve a stable, democratic government is complete, fully two thirds of Americans say no. This slap in the face to the leftist narrative of how the American people see the war in Iraq seems to have been lost on this past weekend's partygoers in Washington whose speakers continued to insist that the majority of the people opposed the war and wished the troops to come home.

Leave it to the left to never let the truth stand in the way of a good old fashioned Soviet-style propaganda campaign.

This just further illustrates to me that we cannot continue to look at things as being either black or white -- there are so many shades of gray that it is ludicrous for someone to assert one extreme or another. And it is just as ludicrous for someone to believe that assertion . . .

It's a good read. I recommend it.

Camp Katrina

Go check out the new blog Camp Katrina. It was recently started by Specialist Van T. who has just returned from deployment to New Orleans in support of Operation Vigilant Relief. The blog consists of posts and pictures about the disaster relief efforts throughout the region.

It is well worth checking out now and watching in the future . . .

Question

So is anyone else weary of, yet amused by, the Harriet Miers kerfluffle?

Negative reporting?

The mainstream media maintain that there is no negative reporting about Iraq. Conservatives continuously complain that there is a great deal of negative bias in reporting. The Media Research Center, a conservative organization, has completed a study that shows that the media has overwhelmingly negative reporting about Iraq. Here's how the press release begins:

A new study released today by the Media Research Center, TV’s Bad News Brigade, reveals the three commercial network nightly news broadcasts have been overwhelmingly biased in their coverage of Iraq. The MRC analyzed all broadcasts of ABC’s World News Tonight, NBC Nightly News, and the CBS Evening News from January 1 through September 30 and found 61 percent of the stories were negative or pessimistic while only 15 percent of the stories were positive or optimistic – a four-to-one ratio. The trend in coverage has also become increasingly negative during 2005, with pessimistic stories rising to nearly three-fourths of all Iraq news by August and September. The MRC will release a study on cable news coverage early next year.

I'm sure that reality falls somewhere in between these extremes. But that still means that the news media are not providing balanced reporting, doesn't it?

Oklahoma bomber questions

Mark Davis, a columnist for the Dallas Morning News, raises some serious questions about the suicide bomber who blew himself up outside of a football stadium.

Heritage Quote

"[I]f the public are bound to yield obedience to laws to which they cannot give their approbation, they are slaves to those who make such laws and enforce them."

-- Candidus (in the Boston Gazette, 20 January 1772)

Reconcile this

How do you reconcile this article with the headline:

Iraqi Insurgents Incite Voting Day Violence

when the only paragraph (out of 34) about election day violence in the subsequent article says:

Insurgents attacked five of Baghdad's 1,200 polling stations with shootings and bombs, wounding seven voters, but there were no major attacks reported as U.S. and Iraqi forces clamped down with major security measures around balloting sites.

Five out of 1200 polling sites were attacked (less than 1/2 of a percent), and 7 people of the thousands voting were wounded. Sounds pretty quiet for Iraq . . .

And this is on Fox News, no less . . .

UPDATE: The article was revised and renamed after I posted this. I guess they figured it out . . .

Iraqi Army

Gen. Robert H. Scales (Ret.) wrote an op-ed in the Washington Times about the Iraqi army's progress. Here's an excerpt:

I traveled to Iraq this week with a group of military analysts. From my visit I concluded that the greatest change in the military balance over since last summer has been achieved by the Iraqis Security forces. Their story is only partially told by the recent spike in numbers of Iraqi army battalions from only a few a year ago to 117 today. But soldiers know that the effectiveness of a fighting force is better measured by intangibles such as courage, will to win, skill at arms, leadership, cohesion and allegiance to a higher cause. These are factors that media amateurs and Washington insiders have difficulty comprehending.

Embedded reporter

Michael Yon is back in Iraq and describes the process of becoming an embed. Here's an excerpt:

For most journalists considering Iraq, where the frustrations and dangers are high, where there is little glory and less money, and where the expenses vomit—I've now got probably $35,000 worth of gear that might burn up in the next IED explosion—nobody needs a calculator to figure out this one. Food and lodging are free after the embed process—which greatly helps—but that does not settle the account.

There is much more. It is very illuminating reading . . .

Heritage Quote

"Not all the treasures of the world, so far as I believe, could have induced me to support an offensive war, for I think it murder; but if a thief breaks into my house, burns and destroys my property, and kills or threatens to kill me, or those that are in it, and to "bind me in all cases whatsoever" to his absolute will, am I to suffer it?"

-- Thomas Paine (The American Crisis, No. 1, 19 December 1776)

Another Heritage Quote

"We have abundant reason to rejoice that in this Land the light of truth and reason has triumphed over the power of bigotry and superstition, and that every person may here worship God according to the dictates of his own heart."

—George Washington

Polls

Betsy Newmark discusses how the media used to concentrate on substantive reporting. Now they just seem to report poll results:

The pandemic of polling on every single story is lazy journalism. I'm not saying this simply because the numbers have been going against the GOP, but because I think these polls asking people questions that they know little about are worthless and debase the policy debates.

She refers to an op-ed by Tony Blanckley, and then takes it from there. It's a good read.

Heritage Quote

"[T]he flames kindled on the 4 of July 1776, have spread over too much of the globe to be extinguished by the feeble engines of despotism; on the contrary, they will consume these engines and all who work them."

-- Thomas Jefferson (letter to John Adams, 12 September 1821)

Letter from al-Z to al-Z

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence has released a letter from one terrorist, al-Zawahiri, to another one, al-Zarqawi. Here is the news release:

Letter from al-Zawahiri to al-Zarqawi

October 11, 2005

ODNI News Release No. 2-05

Today the Office of the Director of National Intelligence released a letter between two senior al Qa'ida leaders, Ayman al-Zawahiri and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, that was obtained during counterterrorism operations in Iraq. This lengthy document provides a comprehensive view of al Qa'ida's strategy in Iraq and globally.

The letter from al-Zawahiri to al-Zarqawi is dated July 9, 2005. The contents were released only after assurances that no ongoing intelligence or military operations would be affected by making this document public.

The document has not been edited in any way and is released in its entirety in both the Arabic and English translated forms. The United States Government has the highest confidence in the letter's authenticity.

Al-Zawahiri's letter offers a strategic vision for al Qa'ida's direction for Iraq and beyond, and portrays
al Qa'ida's senior leadership's isolation and dependence.

Among the letter's highlights are discussions indicating:

• The centrality of the war in Iraq for the global jihad.
  
  
• From al Qa'ida's point of view, the war does not end with an American departure.
  
  
• An acknowledgment of the appeal of democracy to the Iraqis.
  
  
• The strategic vision of inevitable conflict, with a tacit recognition of current political dynamics in Iraq; with a call by al-Zawahiri for political action equal to military action.
  
  
• The need to maintain popular support at least until jihadist rule has been established.
  
  
• Admission that more than half the struggle is taking place "in the battlefield of the media."

Looks like things aren't so peachy in Islamofascist Land . . .

"Our nation needs two parties . . ."

". . . that believe in America as a great country."

Michael Barone has a good post up about the failure of the Democrats to move toward the political center, and what that means to the country.

And it's not a good thing . . .

12 Oct 2000

Today is the fifth anniversary of the suicide bombing attack on the USS Cole which took 17 of our sailors' lives and injured 40 others.

What we really didn't understand at the time was that the war on terrorism had already begun -- and the terrorists had started it.

And we need to be the ones to finish it, because terrorism will not end until we destroy those murderers and the conditions in which they thrive.

[Thanks to Michelle Malkin for reminding me about this anniversary. Go here for more.]

Heritage Quote

"Remember democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide."

-- John Adams (letter to John Taylor, 15 April 1814)

And I understand that John Adams was an optimist . . .

[Shamelessly robbed from The Federalist Patriot.]

Oil

OpinionJournal has a good op-ed about our scarcity of oil (or lack thereof).

If gasoline cost today what it cost a family in 1900 (relative to income), we would be paying not $3 but $10 a gallon at the pump. Or consider that in 1860 oil sold for $4 a barrel, or the equivalent of about $400 a barrel in today's wage-adjusted prices. The first of a continuous series of innovations, in this case the invention of modern drilling techniques in 1869, cut the price by more than 90%--to 35 cents a barrel.

I've reprinted the whole thing in the extended entry.

The Oil Bubble
Seventy dollars a barrel? Relax, it'll come down.

Saturday, October 8, 2005 12:01 a.m. EDT

We keep hearing the word "bubble" to describe industries with rapid and unsustainable rising prices. Hence, the Internet bubble, the telecom bubble, stock market bubble, and now, some analysts believe, a housing bubble. Yet for some mysterious reason no one speaks of the oil bubble--though prices have tripled in two years to as high as $70 a barrel.

Reviewing the history of oil-market boom and bust confirms that we are in the midst of a classic oil bubble and that prices will eventually fall, perhaps dramatically. Despite apocalyptic warnings, the world is not running out of oil and the pumps are not going to run dry in our lifetimes--or ever. What's more, the mechanism that will surely prevent any long-term catastrophic shortages in energy is precisely the free-market incentive to make profits that many politicians in Washington seem to regard as an evil pursuit and wish to short circuit.

---

The best evidence for an oil bubble comes from the lessons of America's last six energy crises, dating back to the late 19th century, when there was a great scare about the industrial age grinding to a halt because of impending shortages of coal. (Today coal is superabundant, with about 500 years of supply.) Each one of these crises has run almost an identical course.

First, the crisis begins with a spike in energy prices as a result of a short-term supply shock. Next, higher prices bring doomsday claims of energy shortages, which in turn prompts government to intervene ineffectually into the marketplace. In the end, the advent of new technologies and new energy discoveries--all inspired by the profit motive--brings the crisis to an abrupt end, enabling oil and electricity markets to resume their virtuous long-term downward price trend.

The limits-to-growth crowd has predicted the end of oil since the days when this black gold was first discovered as an energy source in the mid-19th century. In the 1860s the U.S. Geological Survey forecast that there was "little or no chance" that oil would be found in Texas or California. In 1914 the Interior Department forecast that there was only a 10-year supply of oil left; in 1939 it calculated there was only a 13-year supply left, and in 1951 Interior warned that by the mid-1960s the oil wells would certainly run dry. In the 1970s, Jimmy Carter somberly told the nation that "we could use up all of the proven reserves of oil in the entire world by the end of the next decade."

We can ridicule these doom-and-gloom predictions today, but at the time they were taken seriously by scholars and politicians, just as the energy alarmists are gaining intellectual traction today. But as the late economist Julian Simon taught, by any meaningful measure oil (and all natural resources) has gotten steadily cheaper and far more bountiful in supply over time, despite periodic and even wild fluctuations in the market.

---

If gasoline cost today what it cost a family in 1900 (relative to income), we would be paying not $3 but $10 a gallon at the pump. Or consider that in 1860 oil sold for $4 a barrel, or the equivalent of about $400 a barrel in today's wage-adjusted prices. The first of a continuous series of innovations, in this case the invention of modern drilling techniques in 1869, cut the price by more than 90%--to 35 cents a barrel.

Fifty years ago people would have laughed out loud at the idea of drilling for oil at the bottom of the ocean or getting fuel from sand, both of which were technologically infeasible. The first deep-sea oil rig went on line in 1965 and drilled 500 feet down. Now these rigs drill two miles into the ground--and miraculously, the price of extracting oil from 10,000 feet deep in the sea bed today is approaching the cost of drilling 100 feet down from the richest fields in Texas or Saudi Arabia 40 years ago.

This spectacular pace of technological progress explains why over time the amount of recoverable reserves of oil has increased, not fallen. Between 1980 and 2002 the amount of known global oil reserves increased by 300 billion barrels, according to a survey by British Petroleum. Rather than the oil fields running dry, just the opposite has been happening. In 1970 Saudi Arabia had 88 billion barrels of known oil. Thirty-five years later, nearly 100 billion barrels have been extracted and yet the latest forecast is that there are still 264 billion barrels left--although the Saudis have never allowed independent auditors to verify these numbers.

---

In this industry, alas, bad news tends to crowd out the good. When Shell announced earlier this year that its oil and gas reserves were down by 30%, there was a global outcry. But when Canada announced in 2004 that it has more recoverable oil from tar sands than there is oil in Saudi Arabia, the world yawned. There is estimated to be about as much oil recoverable from the shale rocks in Colorado and other western states as in all the oil fields of OPEC nations. Yes, the cost of getting that oil is still prohibitively expensive, but the combination of today's high fuel prices and improved extraction techniques means that the break-even point for exploiting it is getting ever closer.

The energy Malthusians counter that China, India and other nations will satisfy their growing appetite for oil by driving demand and prices ever higher. In the short term, yes. But over the longer term, as the Chinese become more prosperous through free markets, China will become vastly more fuel efficient and also help discover new sources of energy.

America produces twice as much output per unit of energy consumed as it did 50 years ago. Liberals who say we need government to intervene in the energy markets, to patch the alleged failings of the free market, fail to comprehend that the command-and-control economies of the last 50 years have been far and away the biggest wasters of energy (and the biggest polluters). South Korea produces about three times as much output per kilowatt of electricity as North Korea does.

This is no call for complacency or inaction in the face of very high energy prices; it's a call for realism. Higher prices for gas and fuel for home heating have cost the average U.S. family about $1,500 to $2,000 a year. (Thankfully the Bush tax cuts have given back about precisely that amount in lower tax payments to the IRS.) The tax on the American economy from higher oil prices has reached $300 million a day and has chopped nearly a percentage point off GDP growth.

---

Our point is that the constraints on our ability to find and extract new oil are not geologic or scientific. The real constraints on oil production are barriers created by government. Myron Ebell, an environmental analyst at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, notes that roughly 90% of the oil on the planet rests under government-owned land and these resources are abysmally managed.

In the U.S., environmentalists have erected myriad barriers to drilling for new sources of oil. The American Petroleum Institute estimates that there are at least 100 billion barrels that are fairly easily recoverable in Alaska and offshore that oil companies are not permitted to exploit. Once, we could afford the luxury of not drilling there. Now, thanks to a witch's brew of unforeseen circumstances--political turmoil in the oil producing countries, China's surge in demand, and hurricanes that have knocked out Gulf refineries--it's an economic and national security imperative that we do.

Here's one simple idea to increase the domestic supply of oil: Have Uncle Sam share its oil-drilling royalties with the California government. If Californians realized they could go a long way to solving their deficit and overtaxation problems by raising billions of these petro-dollars, the aversion on the left coast toward offshore drilling might well begin to subside.

We will assess at another time the many dreadful ideas--price controls and "windfall profit" taxes--that Congress is considering to deal with the energy crisis. But for today it is sufficient to note that the free market will deliver oil, electricity and other forms of energy at declining prices in the future, if only the government will let the market's benign and productive forces work their magic.

[Used with permission from OpinionJournal.com, a web site from Dow Jones & Company, Inc.]

al Qaeda in Gaza

Here is some interesting news: al Qaeda is moving into Gaza.

[Via Jack Kelly at Irish Pennants.]

More about this from John Hindraker at Power Line: Al Qaeda Moving Into Gaza.

It definitely appears as if al Qaeda is "moving in on the action" in Gaza. Would that be, perhaps, because Iraq is going poorly for them? I really feel sorry for those innocent Palestinians who (after decades of oppression under the PLA, Hamas, and others) now have to suffer under the weight of al Qaeda's "liberation".

Maybe we should move in and clean up the terrorist cesspool in Palestine after Iraq has stabilized?

Heritage Quote

"[J]udges...should be always men of learning and experience in the laws, of exemplary morals, great patience, calmness, coolness, and attention. Their minds should not be distracted with jarring interests; they should not be dependent upon any man, or body of men."

—John Adams

10 foiled plots

Here are the 10 foiled plots that President Bush referred to in his speech last week.

Peace in Iraq - NOT! (yet)

William Shawcross has a good article, in the Los Angeles Times no less, that makes the case that peace in Iraq is not the best solution -- at least not yet. Here's a taste:

. . . U.S. soldiers are being killed not by romantic nationalist insurgents (as some liberal journalists and marchers like to pretend) but by an unholy grouping of Saddamite gangsters furious at losing power, Syrian and Iranian agents intent on creating mayhem and then theocracy, and Islamo-fascists who want to enslave the world and whose local Pol Pot, Abu Musab Zarqawi, boasts of seeking to murder as many of Iraq's majority Shiite population as he can.

He makes some good points. I recommend it.

Health care

Julia Gorin has an article over at OpinionJournal that makes me extremely glad that I live in the USA. The article is about health care under tyrannical governments -- specifically the now defunct USSR, and also North Korea.

I've reprinted it in the extended entry . . .

Born in the USSR
I survived Soviet health care--barely.

BY JULIA GORIN
Monday, October 10, 2005 12:01 a.m. EDT

I recently came face to face with a level of Western ignorance that I hadn't encountered since the 1980s, when Russian immigrants were still a novelty to Americans. A British-American asked my father a question that could only come from someone who has known freedom his whole life: "Why did you leave Russia? Your family was there, you had a job, you had free health care. Why did you leave?" The questioner, a former editor with the New York Times, then proceeded to assert that today's Britain and U.S. are no longer free.

The exchange reminded me just how out of touch many who live in the free world are with the reality of life under tyranny--and why, therefore, so many Americans and Brits think nothing is scarier than war. On the subject even of that oft-cited "perk" of Soviet life, universal health care, a picture of the system in practice on its happiest occasion would shock Americans and Western Europeans alike.

---

Since ordinary people in Russia didn't have cars, Dad called a taxi to take Mom to the hospital when her contractions started on Feb. 25, 1970. Some procedural questions were asked, then Mom was sent to a room called the rodilka, or "birther," where there were 10 or so women at various stages of dilation. For the night there were one doctor, one nurse, a female orderly and a lot of screaming. (Epidurals for painless labor were unheard of.) At this stage of pregnancy a woman loses control of some bodily functions even after taking preventive measures, so that one woman would be defecating into a pot by her bed while another would be eating dinner in the next bed. Medical students passed by casually observing.

After my elder sister was born and the nurses took her away, Mom began the two-day fluid-expulsion process, which in civilized countries is managed by a changing of the sheets as often as every two hours. Back in the USSR, the new mother would soak in her puddles on a small linen sheet and oil cloth, since patients weren't entitled to more than one or two changes per day. If she wanted an extra change, she'd have to beg and brown-nose the nannychka, as the orderly was addressed by the screaming women. Someone would always yell back: "I just gave you new sheets, and you soiled yourself again!"

Those who were able to bribe the nurse or orderly would get better service, but Mom didn't know and hadn't brought anything. One woman kept giving the nurse fruit so that she'd yell at her less and give her what she needed. Mom could only beg, the whole time feeling as if she'd done something wrong. Granted, the nurse was under an inordinate amount of stress. She was alone responsible for so many, and was running nonstop throughout the night.

---

For her second delivery, Mom never went into labor. She was two weeks overdue and the baby had stopped moving. Fearing the worst, she took the metro to the hospital.

"Are you in labor?"

"No."

Again Mom thought she'd done something wrong because people were yelling at her as soon as she walked in: "Then why did you come? You like hanging around hospitals, do you?"

"I don't feel anything moving."

"Oh. OK, wait for the doctor."

Fortunately, a younger nurse overheard the conversation. "What--it's not moving? How long? Since last night? OK, go over there and get undressed."

People stopped yelling at my mother then, and she got more attention.

"I don't hear the baby," said the old doctor who was on duty. "Is this your first child?"

"No."

"Did the first one live?"

"Yes."

"Good. Because the prognosis here isn't good."

Since there was no labor activity, labor was induced. In Russia this was called "stimulating labor," and it required one to drink castor oil. My mother has its taste on her tongue to this day, she told me. Her body contorted inexplicably, and she became catatonic, unable to move her arms or legs.

She could hear the yelling at the others as it continued in the background: "Stop screaming!" "You're not the first to give birth; you won't be the last!" "Shut your mouth!" After some time, Mom's catatonia relaxed and the contractions started. A few hours later the baby was born, and my mother heard the doctor call to an orderly: "Quick! You with the water--the baby is in asphyxia!" My mother lay emotionless, able only to hear spanking for what she believes to be nearly half an hour as the doctor tried to revive me. Finally, she heard crying.

Had my mother been a party boss's relative, her birthing experiences would have looked a lot more like the common woman's in America. But such was delivery for 99% of the Russian female population.

In America, women often remember abortion as traumatic. My mother barely remembers her two abortions (Russian birth control), but she can't forget a single traumatic detail of her children's births.

---

Today the Soviet Union is gone, but the communist system lives on in a few places. The glimpse we have into North Korea's delivery rooms is into those at detention centers for political prisoners, as described to Marie Claire magazine in 2002 by Lee Young Suk, a 65-year-old grandmother who was deported back to North Korea after she defected to China. At a detention center in South Sinuiju province, Lee Young was assigned to help deliver babies of other prisoners.

When she delivered the baby of the first woman under her care and reached for a blanket, a guard stopped her: "You crazy hag, are you out of your mind? What are you doing with the baby? Just put it in the box!" He grabbed the baby by a leg and dumped him into a wooden box that was sitting on the floor. He hit Lee Young's arm with a leather strap.

"North Korea is short of food already," the chief medical officer explained. "Why do we have to feed the offspring of foreign fathers? Since China is an open country, they could even be babies of American sperm, so then we'd be feeding Americans."

The procedure was as follows: Once the box was filled with infants, it would be taken to the mountains and buried. Most of the babies would die within four days, but Lee Young recalled two particularly healthy ones who took longer, moving their heads left to right, opening and closing their eyes and making froglike croaks. Their skin turned yellow and their lips blue until the medical officer finally stabbed them through the skull. Lee Young was reassigned when her heart weakened from what she was witnessing. She eventually bribed her way out of prison and into South Korea.

---

We share the planet with North Korea and its ilk. As many intellectuals, academics and literary and Hollywood luminaries commented soon after 9/11--with some vindication in their tone--we do not live in a vacuum. Yet for the most part they, along with the isolationist right, seem indifferent to the suffering of tyranny's victims. They blithely champion the status quo, or in the case of Iraq the status quo ante, repeating only that Saddam Hussein wasn't a threat to us.

Ms. Gorin is a contributing editor of JewishWorldReview.com.

[Used with permission from OpinionJournal.com, a web site from Dow Jones & Company, Inc.]

Forging ahead in Iraq

Journalist Jack Kelly, over at Irish Pennants, discusses media reporting on the situation in Iraq.

Americans are becoming aware of how badly journalists mis-reported Hurricane Katrina. The light may soon dawn about reporting from Iraq.

And he's not impressed. Neither am I. It's a good read.

The road to victory

Remember Oliver North? Well, he's got an op-ed up at Townhall.com about triumphing over terror. Here's an excerpt:

So as the protests grow louder on the home front, Americans will continue be targets for radical Islamic extremists. The best hope we have of protecting innocent civilians is to continue to improve protection here at home, take violent action against the perpetrators where they gather and train, and ameliorate the conditions that make it conducive for those inciting the jihad to recruit more volunteers. It is a strategy that has been working and which the president expanded upon this week.

Recommended.

"Middle Wife"

Here's a pretty funny story about childbirth -- from a child's perspective -- emailed to me by the Good Clean Funnies List.

I put it in the extended entry . . .

I've been teaching now for about fifteen years. I have two kids myself, but the best birth story I know is the one I saw in my own second-grade classroom a few years back.

When I was a kid, I loved show-and-tell. So I always have a few sessions with my students. It helps them get over shyness, and usually show-and-tell is pretty tame. Kids bring in pet turtles, model airplanes, pictures of fish they catch, stuff like that. And I never, ever place any boundaries or limitations on them. If they want to lug it to school and talk about it, they're welcome.

Well, one day this little girl, Erica, a very bright, very outgoing kid, takes her turn and waddles up to the front of the class with a pillow stuffed under her sweater. She holds up a snapshot of an infant. "This is Luke, my baby brother, and I'm going to tell you about his birthday.

"First, Mom and Dad made him as a symbol of their love, and then Dad put a seed in Mom's stomach, and Luke grew in there. He ate for nine months through an umbrella cord."

She's standing there with her hands on the pillow, and I'm trying not to laugh and wishing I had my camcorder with me. The kids are watching her in amazement.

"Then, about two Saturdays ago, my mom starts saying and going, 'Oh, oh, oh!'" Erica puts a hand behind her back and groans. "She walked around the house for like an hour. 'Oh, oh, oh!'" Now the kid's doing this hysterical duck walk, holding her back and groaning. "My dad called the middle wife. She delivers babies, but she doesn't have a sign on the car like the Domino's man.

"They got my mom to lie down in bed like this." Then Erica lies down with her back against the wall. "And then, pop! My mom had this bag of water she kept in there in case he got thirsty, and it just blew up and spilled all over the bed, like psshhheew!" This kid has her legs spread and with her little hands are miming water flowing away. It was too much!

"Then the middle wife starts saying, 'push, push' and 'breathe, breathe.' They started counting, but never even got past ten. Then, all of a sudden, out comes my brother. He was covered in yucky stuff; they all said was from Mom's play-center, so there must be a lot of stuff inside there."

Then Erica stood up, took a big theatrical bow, and returned to her seat. I'm sure I applauded the loudest. Ever since then, if it's show-and-tell day, I bring my camcorder, just in case another Erica comes along.

Received from Tami D.

--
Rate this funny here.

Brought to you by GCFL.net: The Good, Clean Funnies List
A cheerful heart is good medicine... (Prov 17:22a)
Mail address: GCFL, Box 100, Harvest, AL 35749, USA

Heh.

Heritage Quote

"It is a very dangerous doctrine to consider the judges as the ultimate arbiters of all constitutional questions. It is one which would place us under the despotism of an oligarchy."

—Thomas Jefferson

President Bush's speech on the GWOT

If you missed it, you've got to read President Bush's speech about the war on terror. He's got some good things to say:

Over the years these extremists have used a litany of excuses for violence -- the Israeli presence on the West Bank, or the U.S. military presence in Saudi Arabia, or the defeat of the Taliban, or the Crusades of a thousand years ago. In fact, we're not facing a set of grievances that can be soothed and addressed. We're facing a radical ideology with inalterable objectives: to enslave whole nations and intimidate the world. No act of ours invited the rage of the killers -- and no concession, bribe, or act of appeasement would change or limit their plans for murder.

Read the whole thing -- it's worth the time, and thought.

Superdome eyewitness

Associate Editor Matt Welch interviewed Major Ed Bush, public affairs officer for the Louisiana National Guard, who was in the Superdome the entire time that there were evacuees present. Major Bush describes what really happened in the Superdome during and after Katrina. Here's a taste:

[MJR Bush] But New Orleans, I guess my last point is, I kind of feel upset. Because I have some pictures of a Dad reading stories to his kid. I have a picture of a lady who -- I don't know what the hell she was thinking when she brought it -- but she brought her clown suit, and make-up, and she's in full clown garb, and she's got a wig on, and a nose and everything, and she sat there for days and painted kids' faces all day long. I have 20 amazing stories of people taking care of each other for every one incident of someone stealing, or someone taking somebody's stuff, or someone trying to get into somebody else's business, or someone laying their hands on somebody.

New Orleanians have been kind of cheated, because now everybody thinks that they just turned to animals, and that there was complete lawlessness and utter abandon, when that wasn't the case. Because if there was, we would have completely lost control of the Dome. And we never did. People just kind of hung on, through the heat and through everything, until they got on a bus and left.

I ended up wondering if the press were reporting about a different Superdome during the Katrina disaster . . . because MJR Bush's words directly contradicts the hysteria-filled rhetoric we were bombarded with for most of that first week -- by ostensibly professional reporters like Brian Williams, no less.

You owe it to yourself, and the the people of New Orleans, to read this first-hand account of what really went on there.

Heritage Quote

Here is a good philosophy in regards to charity . . .

"It is a duty certainly to give our sparings to those who want; but to see also that they are faithfully distributed, and duly apportioned to the respective wants of those receivers. And why give through agents whom we know not, to persons whom we know not, and in countries from which we get no account, where we can do it at short hand, to objects under our eye, through agents we know, and to supply wants we see?"

-- Thomas Jefferson (letter to Michael Megear, 29 May 1823)

. . . probably because it invariably blesses the giver much more when he or she sees what it brings to the receiver. At least, that has been my experience.

Battle for Mosul, Part IV

Michael Yon's fourth installment on the battle for Mosul.

Iraqi charter popular

Even Reuters acknowledges that Iraqis favor the democratic process.

Recent polling shows widespread support for a new Iraqi constitution to be voted on Oct. 15, even in strongholds of Sunni Arab groups that are fighting to derail the charter.

This is good news! I am praying for the best outcome in Iraq. Please join me, if you will.

Journalistic fervor

Newspaper owner Edward L. Daley, over at The American Thinker, tells it like he sees it. And he's not pulling any punches . . .

As for the Katrina issue, anyone who doesn't think that the "mainstream" media coverage of that disaster was appallingly inaccurate and intentionally sensationalized, especially during its initial phase, needs to set down the crack pipe they're holding and step slowly away. If journalistic objectivity, professionalism, and integrity were hurricanes, the news media wouldn't be able to muster enough wind to jostle Marvin Kalb's hair.

And there's plenty more . . .

Heritage Quote

"Far from being rivals or enemies, religion and law are twin sisters, friends, and mutual assistants. Indeed, these two sciences run into each other. The divine law, as discovered by reason and the moral sense, forms an essential part of both."

-- James Wilson

07 Oct 2001

Alan Dowd, over at American Enterprise, reminds us about the other anniversary.

. . . it should come as no surprise that after 9/11, Americans responded yet again by taking the battle to the enemy. In fact, the first counterstrike against al Qaeda actually took place on 9/11 itself, when passengers on that fourth plane-turned-missile stormed the cockpit of Flight 93 and prevented al Qaeda completing its mission.

What they began on that doomed jetliner, the US military continued and expanded on October 7, 2001.

He points out something about the unique American character.

Recommended.

Support Operation Purple

Operation Purple is a National Military Family Association program to provide free summer camps for children of deployed service members and it has proven invaluable in helping children deal with the stresses as well as the pain of parental separation.

NMFA developed Operation Purple camps in 2004 in response to the need for increased support services benefiting children of men and women serving in the Armed Forces, especially those whose parents are or will be deployed. With funding from Sears, Roebuck in 2004, NMFA conducted 12 camps reaching nearly 1,000 young people. This year, the program has expanded to host more than 2,000 kids. NMFA estimates that more than 135,000 children are experiencing the absence of a parent due to a deployment to Iraq or Afghanistan. This statistic does not include children who have parents deployed elsewhere around the world.

One way to show our support for our troops is to help their kids. A worthy cause.

Ronnie Earle's crusade

Before making up your mind that Tom Delay is guilty, read Jason's post over at Generation Why?.