Pelosi Scorecard

Pelosi vowed that five-day workweeks would be a hallmark of a harder-working Democratic majority. So far, the House has logged only one. Lawmakers plan to clock three days this week.

Her vow to clean up the terrible ethical mess left by the Republicans was detoured somewhat when she put Representative Jefferson on the Homeland Security Committee. This had the unfortunate result of handing someone who could not get a security clearance on a committee where he will have access to the nations most highly classified information.

The Washington Post reported during the weekend that she is helping chairmen raise money from donors with business before their committees. Wasn't that Delay's egregious crime?

The speaker has denied Republicans a vote on their proposals during congressional debates -- a tactic she previously declared oppressive and promised to end. Pelosi has opened the floor to a Republican alternative just once.

The list of such failures will probably grow.

Life is not fair

Just when everything seems to be going so well for Al Gore, someone from a group called the Tennessee Center for Policy Research has to mess everything up by making him look like a hypocrite. It seems like they should take into consideration that Gore just won an Oscar for his documentary called "An Inconvenient Truth" which tries to make the case that the world is going to experience dire consequences such as massive flooding if we don't listen to him and reduce our consumption of energy and its resultant release of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. Well, these buttinsky types in his home state have now released this press release that reports data from the Nashville Electric Service which supplies Gore with electricity that his 20 room mansion with eight bathrooms consumes more electricity in a month than the average household in the U.S. consumes in a year. The average household in America consumes 10,656 kilowatt-hours per year and in 2006 gore devoured nearly 221,000 kilowatt-hours which is more than 20 times the national average. Al Gore a hypocrite and phony? Say it ain't so, Joe.

I am sure this will get heavily reported by the liberal media as part of their coverage of his Hollywood honors.

Very Interesting

Three Arab states in the Persian Gulf would be willing to allow the Israel Air force to enter their airspace in order to reach Iran in case of an attack on its nuclear facilities, the Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Siyasa reported on Sunday.

According to the report, a diplomat from one of the gulf states visiting Washington on Saturday said the three states, Qatar, Oman and the United Arab Emirates, have told the United States that they would not object to Israel using their airspace, despite their fear of an Iranian response.

Al-Siyasa further reported that NATO leaders are urging Turkey to open its airspace for an Attack on Iran as well and to also open its airports and borders in case of a ground attack.

From an Israel web site.

I apologize

There was an article in our paper today reporting that the Virginia legislature was apologizing for slavery in that fair state. So, since slaves were brought into the U.S. via ships landing in that state 400 years ago, an apology was being issued. This is similar to apologies in other news items lately. Hillary's mouthpiece and attack dog, Howard Wolfson, wanted Barack Obama to apologize for something one of his donors said. In that vein, I hereby apologize for anything I or any of my ancestors might have done to anyone at any time in the past. Now, isn't that just precious?

The Jet Blue Strategy

According to the Borowitz Report, President Bush has a new plan to bring the troops home from Iraq on Jet Blue. “Setting an exact timetable for a withdrawal from Iraq would be playing right into the enemy’s hands,” Mr. Bush said. “By going with JetBlue, our enemy will have no idea when we’re leaving.” To emphasize his point, Mr. Bush added, “And neither will we.”

Using science

Scientists say conclusive data shows there is no question circumcision reduces men's chances of catching HIV by up to 60 percent - a finding experts are hailing as a major breakthrough in the fight against AIDS. Now, the question is how to put that fact to work to combat AIDS across Africa. O.K., guys form a line on the right.

An English Lesson

Here is what Vice-President Cheney said:

"I think if we were to do what Speaker Pelosi and Congressman Murtha are suggesting, all we will do is validate the Al Qaeda strategy. The Al Qaeda strategy is to break the will of the American people, try to persuade us to throw in the towel and come home, and then they win because we quit."

That is hard to argue with, but Speaker Pelosi thinks those words question her patriotism and is having a case of the vapors. It is typical of liberals to take it personally when someone disagrees with their positions.

Border Security

The New York Times had an article yesterday which provides some evidence that the increased border agents and the security walls seem to be reducing the number of illegals crossing into the U.S. Of course, the dems have pledged to defund the wall construction which wasn't funded all that well in the first place. Now those of us who are paying attention have evidence that the removal of funds is being undertaken not because the wall won't work as they claim but because it will.

Details?

When the rich white guys didn't rape a poor black stripper at a lacrosse party in Durham, North Carolina, the local paper and TV stations didn't have any difficulty identifying the race of those involved. As has been widely reported, the main crime in this case seems to have been committed by the democrat DA pandering to his black constituents. Now we have another rape reported in that fair city. The race of the subjects is known and both are black. Here is the link to the article in the local newspaper. Despite the title, try to discern that from the text of the article. Typical liberal tactics from the media.

Steve Jobs speaks the truth

In a speech on Friday, the chief executive officer of Apple and Disney honcho declared: "I believe that what's wrong with our schools in this nation is that they have become unionized in the worst possible way."

The problem with unionization, Mr. Jobs argued, is that it has constrained schools from attracting and retaining the best teachers and from dismissing the less effective ones. This, in turn, deters quality people from seeking to become principals and superintendents. "What kind of person could you get to run a small business if you told them that when they came in they couldn't get rid of people that they thought weren't any good? Not really great ones because if you're really smart you go, ‘I can't win,'" Mr. Jobs said. He concluded by saying, "This unionization and lifetime employment of K-12 teachers is off-the-charts crazy."

Unions are really against giving some teachers more pay than others because this suggests some teachers are better than others. This illogical stance is comparable to giving each student the same grade regardless of classroom performance.

The great flood

Before Al Gore, the biggest idiot in the world was Paul Ehrlich. Confirmation is given in this essay with some examples given below:

In May 1989, Ehrlich claimed, global warming was going to melt the polar ice caps, causing a flood in which "we could expect to lose all of Florida, Washington D.C. and the Los Angeles basin. ... We'll be in rising waters with no ark in sight." Ehrlich didn't give a time frame, but his panicked report clearly suggested doom around the corner.

The panic was necessary to sell an extremely harsh "solution" of "enormous, rapid change." Ehrlich commanded that to forestall doom, the world needed to cut its energy use in half over 20 years. Industrialization needed to be dragged to a screeching halt, not only in America, but especially in the Third World. Ehrlich felt the next generation of Americans should be denied the Earth-strangling prosperity of their parents, saying the world's ecosystems "cannot support the spread of the American lifestyle to the Third World or even to the next generation of Americans."

As every 3rd grader knows, if you fill a glass with ice and then water, when the two come to room temperature the table is not flooded and the glass does not overflow. The floating ice at the polar caps could melt and not threaten the land masses of earth with flooding.

Ehrlich was back on NBC in January 1990 to sell his "inconvenient truth" line again. This time, he gave a more concrete timeline. Antarctica's ice sheets were slipping, and then "we'll be facing a sea-level rise not of one to three feet in a century, but of 10 or 20 feet in a much shorter time. The Supreme Court would be flooded. You could tie your boat to the Washington Monument. Storm surges would make the Capitol unusable."

It's been almost twenty years, we never cut our energy use in half, and Florida is still above water, not to mention Washington and Los Angeles. We have yet to tie our boats to the Washington Monument. But the media are still handing over their microphones and their accolades to panicky predictions, with no apparent expectation that anyone will ever question their accuracy in a decade or two. How many decades do we wait to question these predictions?

Liberals Explained

This is a very interesting essay on liberals. Here is a snippet.

Being middle class is something to be slightly ashamed of. Being working class on the other hand - or better still affecting to be working class - makes you seem more heroic......As long as you are ‘left wing' you are not only a nicer person but you are also ‘radical' and therefore not boring. If on the other hand you are ‘right wing', well that means you are ‘reactionary' and mean......Business enterprise is essentially disreputable whereas getting a living off the public purse or in the arts and media is highly civilised. Being an engineer or a scientist is OK too, up to a point - for boring people anyway.....And of course all the problems of people in the rest of the world are the fault, not of those people themselves but of the prosperous West. More specifically, the blame lies with ‘the capitalist system'; not you personally of course. You show how much you care by going to Live Aid concerts and that makes you feel much better about yourself.

All people in the Third World are shouldering with dignity a burden imposed upon them by the West in general and America in particular....All businesses are probably trying to screw you....You as a consumer have plenty to whinge about....Politicians should do something about each and every one of the problems you encounter in life....And if you are making a mess of your life its because someone else should have given you more information or more help.

Apologize or else

It is somewhat amusing to follow the situation with Hillary and her loony left critics who want her to apologize for her vote to authorize the military action in Iraq. You can read about some of it here.
This is so characteristic of liberals who can be counted on to put so much more value on style vis a vis substance. Eventually, Hillary will cave since that is what liberals do.

Pop Culture

It is difficult for those who have lived in 8 different decades to appreciate all that seems important today, but I really find it hard to understand why we need photographic proof that Britney Spears has absolutely no hair on her entire body.

Quality and tactics over numbers

"The U.S. must use every tactic and technology to fight this war and provide support to the Iraqi military. If a lineup was put together of 10 Iraqi men, most American soldiers would be hard pressed to figure out which one was an innocent civilian and which was an “insurgent.” If that lineup included five American soldiers, it would be easy to pick them out. It is time for the U.S. to use deception and aggression to fight an enemy that has no regard for the sanctity of human life. We must upset the balance of their operations, disrupt the supply lines, and prepare each battlefield with reconnaissance elements that blend in with the local community. We cannot do this alone, but together with the Iraqi Army and local community, this can be done."

This is how Lt. Col. Scott Rutter sees the recent "surge" in Iraq and in as much as BestView has been saying much the same thing for weeks and maybe even months, it is easy to recommend the entire article.

The oil threat

The al-Qaida organization in Saudi Arabia has threatened the oil facilities in Mexico, Canada and Venezuela with an admitted goal of disrupting the economy of the U.S. The Saudis and the U.S. have security at the refineries and petrochemical plants, so the other countries are easier targets. Mexico and Canada say they will beef up security and Venezuela says they are not going to be attacked since they are our enemy. Right now Venezuela supplies about 10% of our oil and an attack there would hurt us, but it would hurt Venezuela more. Advertising that you are the easiest target out there is not really very smart if the al-Qaida is serious in its stated objectives.

What's the difference?

Jihad Jaara, a senior member of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades said before the 2006 elections:"Americans should vote Democratic,"adding that "it is time the American people support those who want to take them out of the Iraqi mud."
So evidently, the dems and terrorists have an Iraq policy that is indistinguishable one from the other. It is also obvious that the dems now have a vital stake in our Iraq failure. The entire future of the party is invested in Iraq imploding. What if it doesn't? What if the retreat of the Mahdi army at the order of Muqtada al-Sadr who himself seems to have fled to Iran and the closing of the Iran and Syrian borders combined with the other new tactics being advanced by General Petraeus actually bring relative peace to Iraq? Obviously, the dems will be able to brag and say "I told you so" if Iraq goes completely in the crapper, but if our military is allowed to function at full capacity, the dems may have made a bad bet. Pelosi and Reid know this, so we can look for them to do all they can to keep us from succeeding.

Let's hear it for hefty

Now and then we hear of science that makes those of us who tend toward portly feel better. In this case, there is recent evidence that individuals with a Body Mass Index of 18.5-25 (which is considered normal) are less happy than those with an overweight BMI between 25 and 30 which is below the obese level. Not only that, the overweight are more charitable, make more money, and are more likely to donate our time and services to causes and charities. According to the research, the ideal target for fund-raisers is the person with a body mass index of 28.5 which for a 6ft man would be 211 lbs rather than the so-called perfect weight of 184 lbs. That suggests to me that overweight is O.K. and I now need to get down to that 211 lbs.

Good Science

There was a recent article in the paper about a study which is very similar to others criticized by BestView. Usually, these are poorly designed and/or poorly executed and almost always they reach conclusions not supported by the study itself. This latest study suggests that men who take a nap after lunch have fewer cardiovascular problems, such as heart attacks, than men who don't nap. There is nothing particularly novel about this finding since men who are sufficiently stress-free to nap during the day have a decided life-style advantage, but I enjoy my naps so I embrace these results.

Don't you just love it?

The Subcommittee on Energy and Air Quality hearing scheduled for Wednesday, February 14, 2007, at 10:00 a.m. in room 2123 Rayburn House Office Building has been postponed due to inclement weather. The hearing is entitled “Climate Change: Are Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Human Activities Contributing to a Warming of the Planet?”

DC WEATHER REPORT:

Wednesday: Freezing rain in the morning. Total ice accumulation between one half to three quarters of an inch. Brisk with highs in the mid 30s. North winds 10 to 15 mph...increasing to northwest 20 to 25 mph in the afternoon. Chance of precipitation near 100 percent.

The hearing will be rescheduled to a date and time to be announced later.

New York Times Weather

The following are headlines from the NYTimes as cited in another excellent essay by Mark Steyn.

"MacMillan Reports Signs Of New Ice Age" (Sept. 18, 1924)

"America In Longest Warm Spell Since 1776: Temperature Line Records A 25-Year Rise" (March 27, 1933)

"Major Cooling Widely Considered To Be Inevitable (May 21, 1975)

"Past Hot Times Hold Few Reasons To Relax About Global Warming" (Dec. 27, 2005)

Climate Change and Scientific Fraud?

It is especially scary to read the papers right now. All are full of articles relating to the just released IPCC which is shorthand for the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change. Actually, they just released a 12 page summary of a 1,600 page report which won't be released until May. Why so long you maight ask. Well, the official reason is that the summary is a political document negotiated by the governments of 150 countries. Before the official document can be released, it has to be made politically correct. So while we wait for what will be scientific bulls@@t, we can look at what the summary says. For one thing, they have given up on the Hockeystick graph which was released in 2001 and has be shown to be a hopelessly flawed depiction of the "fact" that the 20th Century was "unusually warm". The IPCC's estimates for how much the sea-level will rise are about 1/2 the previous estimate and the catastrophic rise being advanced by Al Gore is now about 20-times that of the IPCC. It makes little difference since none of this is based on any real science, but instead it is all based on computer models which make numerous assumptions for input and none of the computer models can be used to duplicate what actually happened in the last century. For example, there are some 20 greenhouse computer models which all predict warming from 11.5 to 1.4 C and for a doubling in carbon dioxide. Yet, nobody can tell us which of these models is correct and nobody can use one of these models to account for the fact that there was climate cooling between 1945 and 1975 when greenhouse gases were increasing rapidly. If you think logically as a scientist must, this does not give you much confidence in computer models of climates extending into this century when they can't even tell you what the weather will be next week.

Al Gore and his ignorant sycophants in the liberal media will use two arguments to support their case and both are faulty, but our populace is too poorly educated to discern how illogical they really are. The first thing they will try to use is the fact that there is a scientific consensus that all is lost if we don't cut carbon dioxide emissions. This is not how science works. Almost every scientific advance has come from a minority of scientists and often a minority of one---think Galileo or Einstein. Next, they will recite the fact that the climate is warming and carbon dioxide emissions are increasing. Correlation is never proof of causation. For example, as Fred Singer, an environmental scientist at the University of Virginia points out, the birth rate in England is decreasing and so is the number of storks. Does this prove storks bring babies?

Professor Singer has a good essay on all this here.

More talk

It is fine for Democrats to talk of “redeployment” out of Iraq, “engagement” with Syria and Iran, more soft power, Europeans and the United Nations, organizing “regional interests,” etc. — until one realizes that we did mostly just that for most of the 1990s.

And? We got Syrian absorption of Lebanon, Afghanistan as an al Qaeda base, a Libyan WMD program, worldwide serial terrorist attacks, Oslo, a Pakistani bomb, a full-bore Iranian nuclear program, Oil-for-Food — and 9/11. If one doubts any of this, just reflect on why the Democrats have not offered any specific alternative plans. And when pressed, they usually talk only of “talking” and thereby bring embarrassment to even their liberal questioners.

This is part of a fine essay by Victor Davis Hanson. Read it here.

The new paradigm

One of the "funnest" things I am doing as the new Congress gets underway is watch the dems propose new and wonderful changes long overdue since the Republicans have been in charge. My favorite is the pledge by Steny Hoyer to make the congressmen put in a five day work week like everyone else in America. This was applauded by all of us out here, regardless of party. Well, not so fast. In the first place, this new policy had a delicious side-effect. Hoyer represents a district in Northern Virginia and has never had to travel more than a few miles back to his own bed. The rest of his colleagues are not so geographically blessed. Hence, he is catching hell from everyone who has relied on the extended weekends to go home on Thursday, do some political fence tending, see the family, rest up, and then get back to Washington in time for business late Tuesday. I will continue to watch to see how this plays out, but it should be noted that Hoyer has not followed through on the new schedule as of yet and next week they will get Friday off again. This is all the more enjoyable since the cost of living wage increase for Congress has been lost for the year as well because of political infighting. Delicious, indeed.

Liberal crap-trap not selling

The New York Times Co. posted a $648 million loss for the fourth quarter on Wednesday as it absorbed an $814.4 million charge to write down the value of its struggling New England properties, The Boston Globe and the Worcester Telegram & Gazette.

Keeping Score

Most people who are making any effort to keep informed about the war we are waging in Iraq are familiar with the recent battle in which hundreds of terrorists were killed in a Palm grove by U.S. forces called in by Iraqi military. What many may not be aware of is how the liberal media reported the event. In the Washington Post, they stated in a headline that U.S. and Iraqi forces had thwarted 500 fighters who were apparently targeting a Najaf shrine with the fact that two Americans were killed in a helicopter crash.
It is now common place for the liberals who want Bush to be perceived as having failed, while allowing a disproportionate number of our military to die, focus on our casualties. Of course, any loss of our military is cause for note, but the magnitude of our losses should be kept in mind as we follow our efforts in Iraq. The Clinton administration presided over a peaceful era and there were 4,302 active duty deaths in his first four years. This is to be compared with 5,187 during Bush's first 4 years in which we were engaged in 2 wars prompted by a terrorist attack on our country.

Senatorial Idiocy

Let's see if we can make sense of this. Almost all of the loony democrats (Leiberman excepted) and some of the loony rinos are busy drafting resolutions opposing the Bush plan to send extra troops to Baghdad in an attempt to bring more security to that city. Fair enough if they don't think it will work or if it is a bad idea for whatever reason. However, this same group of phonies then turns around and UNANIMOUSLY confirms the general who just testified that more troops is what he recommends and needs to do the job for which he is asking to be confirmed.

About all the sense one can bring to this is these same senators want to be in a position to blame Bush if it fails without taking any measures to keep it from being undertaken.....like denying a Petraeus confirmation or funding for the latest troop deployments.

The old U-turn

There has been an entertaining surge in Democrat reversals on a surge. Here are a couple of well documented examples:

1. "When the Army Chief of Staff and the secretary of state say you're going to war without enough troops, you're going to war without enough troops."
Rep. Rahm Emanuel, July 12, 2006
"No democrat supports an escalation."
Rep. Rahm Emanuel, Jan.10, 2007

2. "If the commanders on the ground said this is just for one short period of time, we'll go along with that."
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Dec. 17, 2006
"Escalating our military involvement in Iraq sends precisely the wrong message and we oppose it."
Jan. 11,2007 statement issued by Reid, Pelosi, Hoyer and Durbin

3."We have to consider the need for additional troops to be in Iraq to take out the militias, stabilize the country, I'd say 20,000-30,000 more."
Rep. Silvestre Reyes, chairman, House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Dec. 5, 2006
"We don't have the capability to escalate to even this minimum level."
Reyes, Jan.11, 2007

Almost all dems were for it before they were against it.

Hillary Warning?

Senator Hillary Clinton began her announcement of a presidential candidacy as follows:"I am in. And I am in to win." Did she want everyone to know she is not just a token candidate or was this a warning to Obama and all the other candidates still in the race beyond a certain point that they should hire extra bodyguards?

Various Thoughts

1. Whatever happened to the disappearing ozone layer? After the liberal doomsday idiots gave up on the coming ice age (back in the 70s) which would devastate life as we know it and before today's hyperventilation about global warming, there was the great concern with a disappearing ozone layer. Maybe the chicken-little fanatics can't focus on more than one catastrophe at a time.

2. There is probably no greater scandal in America than the inner-city schools in America. When Oprah Winfrey decided she wants to spend her own money to improve education in South Africa rather than give it to the losers (the education establishment) who got us into this sad state of affairs, there is an outpouring of criticism about how misguided she is and how they should be listened to prior to her spending decisions. I think much of the opposition to Oprah's efforts is based on her highly selective admission process which made it clear that entrants to her school would be highly qualified, highly motivated and most applicants would be denied admission. Liberals do not like this at all.

3. Charles Murray, in the 3rd of his essays in the Wall Street Journal, makes another valid series of points which also reflect on the failures of our education system in the U.S. Even though the vast majority of our success and advancement in this country is accomplished by the top 10% of our population in terms of I.Q., we have not devised a way to take advantage of this in our schools. Our future depends on how we educate the next generation of people who are gifted with a high level of intelligence. Instead, we construct our educational endeavors in such a way as to deny that there is such a thing as intellectual giftedness and subsequent responsibility to take advantage of that gift. Instead, we ignore the fact that there is such a thing as intellectual gifts since this implies there is an inequality of ability which is considered elitist. The result of this failure is a sense of superiority which develops in the gifted with respect to others in their classes. Murray argues that some humility should be brought to this group by placing them in situations where they can't excel and they have to simply face the fact that they can't do something----like I had to in advanced mathematics. These students need classes where they are neither bored nor coddled, but instead have their feet held to the fire.

4. A corollary to the education deficiency noted above is found in the absolute fury with which teachers and their unions fight to avoid any recognition that some teachers are simply better and more effective than others....especially with salary. At the same time, they don't want parents to have any freedom to take tax-payer money and their children to a school which might succeed where others have repeatedly failed. Teachers know that their past failures will be apparent to even the most casual observer if competition is permitted.

5. An aversion to competition is also evident in the black culture. It is well known that black students who are inclined to study, do their homework and try to succeed in the classroom are subjected to immense pressure from black classmates who accuse them of "acting white". These same students have no such aversion to competition with whites in non-academic endeavors, e.g. athletics.

5. The dems have a brilliant strategy with respect to the so-called war on terror. The left is currently disparaging all efforts Bush has invoked to prevent another attack. Their mantra is that all of these efforts are over-the-top, unnecessary, an infringement on our rights, blah, blah, blah. They want no talk about another terrorist attack. What if there is an attack? Well, regardless of when it occurs, it will be blamed on some Bush deficiency. This will be especially true if there is a dem President at the time.

6. The dems also have a great strategy with respect to the fiasco in Iraq. Whatever Bush wants to do will not work and we will do whatever we can short of actually offering an alternative or jeopardizing our political future to see that it doesn't succeed.

Chicken Little

Al Gore travels the world spreading his flat earth blather, but according to an op-ed piece in the Wall Street Journal today he carefully avoids meeting with anyone who has facts contrary to his global warming message. Even though he scheduled a meeting in Denmark with a newspaper, he didn't show up when his agent found out it would be conducted with someone with an opposite view and some facts. Since he didn't show up, the authors presented some of the things he missed out on. Gore in his movie talks about a sea-level rising 20 feet and avoids the U.N. climate estimate that it might go up 1 foot in the next century just as it did in the previous 150 years. Why does Gore exaggerate this by a factor of 20? According to Gore, Nairobi was founded right where it is too cold for malaria to occur. Now with the earth heating up so rapidly, malaria is appearing in the city. This is contrary to the World Health organization findings. Today, Nairobi is considered free of malaria, but in the 20s and '30s, when temperatures were lower than today, malaria epidemics occurred regularly. Facts don't seem to be something the number 2 man in the Clinton administration holds dear.
According to Gore, Antarctica is the canary in the mine and he presents pictures taken on the 2% of the continent that is dramatically warming and ignores the 98% that has largely cooled over the past 35 years and the U.N. panels estimate that Antarctica will increase its snow mass over the next century. Similarly, Gore points to the shrinking sea ice in the Northern hemisphere and ignores the increase in the sea ice in the Southern hemisphere. Nasty old facts again.
Gore talks about how the increasing temperatures actually kill people and mentions the European heat wave which killed 35,000 people (many when the government was on vacation one week) and avoids the larger number of deaths which will not die from the cold weather. One side of the story.
Now that the democrats are in the majority, we are going to be bombarded by this liberal claptrap as they try to undermine our economy for a dubious set of alarmist climate estimates.

Good news on Iran?

There is an editorial in IBD this morning which offers some interesting and positive perspective on the Iranian situation. First, Bush seems to be actually acting on his rhetoric. As has been reported, the Navy has moved a second battle-carrier group led by the USS Eisenhower into the region and Britain announced it has sent several mine sweepers into the Gulf region. Either something is up or it is something Iran must at least consider.

The most interesting development is on the oil front. The big question surrounding an antagonistic approach to Iran has always been what Ahmadinejad would do to oil availability and energy prices if provoked. The prospect of $100/barrel oil is thought to be something which would restrain Bush and limit his options. However, as the editorial points out, Iran gets 90% of its budget and 40% of its GDP from oil and their economy is already making the populace angry since there are increasing food shortages, a lack of housing and jobs and a growing repression by the government. For these reasons, Iran would have to think twice before withholding their 3 million barrels of oil from the market.

This brings us to the Saudiis who are long time foes of Iran and currently very dovish about the oil situation considering the price is now down about 20% to near $50/barrel. They have even made the point that they have 3 million barrels in reserve which they could release into the market if necessary.

So, Secretary Rice on Tuesday announced that America's six allies in the region plus Jordan and Egypt have approved Bush's new Iraq plan which includes getting serious about interference by Iran and Syria in Iraq. It would be encouraging to see Bush actually follow through on his threats for once. We'll soon see, I guess.

Murray Part 2

The second of three essays by Charles Murray was in the Wall Street Journal today and so far I haven't been able to get a link to it since I am not a subscriber to the online version. However, his subject today was an extension of yesterday's in that he reviews what those of us who have been in academia have known for a long time---namely the colleges and universities are largely populated by students who have no ability to prosper from the education, per se. They will enjoy themselves at great expense, but a degree in sociology, psychology, economics, or history will not certify them for anything in future employment except maybe perseverance. There are better, faster, more efficient ways to provide credentials for employers.

The really important message of this essay is based on I.Q. as one might expect. He maintains, correctly I believe, that a person with an average intelligence of about 100 will find that a genuine college education in the arts and sciences begins where the students skills (mentally) leave off. Using an estimate of what one's I.Q. should be to pursue a college degree as about 115, he concludes that only about 15% of today's students should go to college and yet we now have 45% of recent high school students enrolling in college and that is enough to absorb everyone down to an I.Q. of about 104. The result of this is our colleges are adjusting their standards and courses to accommodate them and this is largely an economic decision by the schools to get their money.

If I can find a way to link to this article, I will put it up since it is a very interesting read, in my view.

Educational Limits

This little blog has often been critical of the educational establishment in the U.S. because it has failed so many of our students and yet is not willing to change its ways. There is an essay out today, however, by one of the most important social scientists of our era which must be considered and should temper criticism of teachers and their results. As Charles Murray points out 1/2 of all students in the U.S. are below average in intelligence and it is unreasonable to expect some student with a low I.Q. to perform at a level above that limitation. As he points out, however, it does absolutely no good to challenge the test since that won't change the fact that our student population will still fit into a bell-shaped curve with respect to intelligence. The problem comes when you start identifying the students in a given section of that curve. Read it all.

Castro

The world seems to be fixated on the news that Castro is in grave or serious or some other degree of health deterioration. The traders I communicate with are busy trying to find stocks which will go up when he dies. I am struck by the fact that the communist system created by Castro and so greatly admired by the idiot Chavez in Venezuela was not able to produce a single surgeon able to operate on the dictator when his intestinal tract went blooey. He had to go to Spain to get a surgeon. We should keep that in mind as we are lead toward more government control of our health system by the libs now in control of congress.

The bottom line

As usual, Thomas Sowell nails the situation perfectly.

The success or failure of the troop surge in Iraq may depend far more on whether those troops can again be hamstrung by politically restrictive "rules of engagement" than on how many troops there are.

The Maliki government is politically dependent on one of the very Baghdad militias that needs to be disarmed. We can pressure and warn Maliki all we want, but his real choice will be whether he can survive -- either politically or personally -- without militia support.

Our choice may become whether we are prepared to sacrifice more American lives in order to prop up the Maliki government or whether we are prepared to sacrifice the Maliki government in order to restore law and order in Iraq.

That government is a product of our "nation-building" under the banner of a "democracy" for which Iraq may not have been ready.

Terrorists are flexible

As reported by Omar from Iraq, the foreign Arabs in Baghdad are on the move and our "surge" needs to adapt also.

In Diyala, politicians, religious and tribal figures demanded that their province be included in the security plan of Baghdad. This came after dozens of foreign Arab militants ran away from Baghdad to areas across Diyala in order to avoid raids by the Iraqi and American forces during the incoming security plan to secure Baghdad.

Good News

Barbaro seems to be bouncing back again. The Kentucky Derby winner is spending hours in his protective sling, needed to deter sudden movement and make the colt comfortable as he fights back from his latest setback from laminitis.

X-rays on the 4-year-old bay colt showed no additional complications in either hind leg, and chief surgeon Dean Richardson said Barbaro was "acceptably comfortable" in his recovery from having damaged tissue removed from his left hind hoof.

The man needs psychiatric help

Fourteen members of an advisory board at the Carter Center resigned today, concluding they could "no longer in good conscience continue to serve" following publication of former President Jimmy Carter's controversial book, "Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid."

"It seems that you have turned to a world of advocacy, including even malicious advocacy," the board members wrote in a letter, a copy of which was reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. "We can no longer endorse your strident and uncompromising position. This is not the Carter Center or Jimmy Carter we came to respect and support. Therefore it is with sadness and regret that we hereby tender our resignation from the Board of Councilors of the Carter Center effective immediately."

Good Analysis

Jonah Goldberg is one of my favorite columnists since he has a colorful way to put the situation in a manner which can't be debated. Here is an example from his latest column.

Here we have a president forthrightly trying to win a war, and the opposition -- which not long ago was in favor of increasing troops, when Bush was against that -- won't say what it wants. This is flatly immoral. If you believe the war can't be won and there's nothing to be gained by staying, then, to paraphrase Sen. John Kerry, you're asking more men to die for a mistake. You should demand withdrawal. But that might cost votes, so the Dems don't. And, of course, Kerry, Pelosi and other Democrats were in favor of more troops before they were against it.

Plan B

President Bush did a credible job last night in delivering his speech describing the new approach to the Iraq mess. As BestView has stated before, there needs to be a greater military effort without the limits which seem mainly imposed on them so as to not offend any of the disparate factions in Iraq. If the new troops are allowed to eliminate the sources of violence without interference, the prognosis is good because our military will succeed. As I understand the situation, however, this plan depends on the government of Iraq and the armed forces of Iraq to behave in a way is which completely at odds with anything we have seen out of them to date. We should know soon if the Iraqis are up to the task of saving themselves from a disaster.

Budding Influence

Finally, the highly insightful blog known as BestView is getting the respect it deserves. Just last Saturday I complained about us having a military presence in Djibouti which was performing nanny duties. Now we learn they have quit vaccinating camels long enough to send a number of al-Qaida to Allah with an air attack in Somalia. Way to go. More details here.

Another Report from Bill Ardolino

As you listen to President Bush tonight and consider his plan to achieve his objective in Iraq, it might be worthwhile to keep this interview which Bill Ardolino had with a man from Fallujah in mind. If the man he interviewed is correct, and he makes sense, the nature of the insurgency is much different than I had supposed and much less amenable to a military solution than I thought. At least in Fallujah.

IED Patrol

There is a fellow by the name of Bill Ardolino imbedded in Iraq and sending back stories which are almost always excellent. This one describes a day on the road in Falluja looking for IEDs.

Amen, Mark Steyn

"I think in terms of the military approach to Iraq, you know, I've never been one of these people who thinks we need more forces there. You know, I don't think that this is actually a numbers game, or a money game, or a resources game. What it is, is actually about strategy. And so I assume that at some level, the President and his new defense secretary have concluded that these guys on the ground, charged with the day to day operations, were not handling things correctly. And I would have to say that it's hard not to conclude there's a certain amount of truth in that, simply from the fact that you know, the American military has been in control of Baghdad, now, for almost four years, and has not secured the city. That is a great mark of shame upon what is one of the most powerful military in the world. It should be capable...it's certainly got the money, the men, the equipment to pacify that city, so clearly what's been lacking is some kind of coherent strategy to do it. "

Several times recently, BestView has argued for not only a more energetic use of the military, but one more in keeping with the training and purpose of any military. Now it sounds like Mark Steyn agrees with this view and you can't get much better company than that.

The newest Bush Proposal

After several weeks of consideration and consultation with numerous players in the Iraq war, Bush is finalizing his newest plan for the future. He will announce this on Wednesday. Never one to miss an opportunity to criticize the President, the Democrats are already opposed to the new plan, no matter what it is.

The Djibouti Nannies

The U. S. has a military base in Djibouti which is located in the horn of Africa adjacent to Ethiopia and Somalia. It was staffed after the 9/11 attacks to prevent al Qaeda from setting up shop in that location while we focused on them in Afghanistan. As we read in the papers, things are not going according to plan, it seems. Radical Islamist did set up in Somalia and only recently did the forces in Ethiopia have to move into Mogadishu to drive them out. Whether or not the radicals stay out is still an open question, but what of the military we established in Djibouti to prevent what the Ethiopians had to undo? Well, according to an editorial in the IBD today, our military is very busy putting up schools and vaccinating camels in an effort to keep some of the 80 million Muslims in the Horn of Africa from being sympathetic to the call of al Qaeda. Maybe the goal makes sense, but the Bush administration seems to be continuing its inclination to use the military to do things which seem more appropriate for a Peace Corps.

The Mexican War

Most of the focus is on the Iraq front, but there is also a war going on on our Southern border with Mexico and most of the fighting is being waged by forces in Mexico. The newly elected President of Mexico, Felipe Calderon, has sent 3000 Mexican troops to the border town of Tijuana to confront drug traffickers who have been responsible for such crimes as killing 300 people in the past year. This pressure has caused the gangs to move to other places and this fact has been attributed to the recent attack on our National Guard who were patrolling the border in the Tucson area. Since the lame brained Bush administration sent the Guard down to the border with orders not to carry guns or defend itself, the troops had to retreat when attacked and now the National Guard is not even allowed to say whether or not our troops were fired upon. Common sense suggests that if they weren't shot at they wouldn't have retreated. This is just another example of idiotic rules of engagement forced on our military by the Bush administration.

You gotta read it to believe it

O.K. this comes from the BBC which is really a left wing outfit, but it reads like it is factual. If I walked up to you on the street and said that the government was going to put a tax on cow farts, you would surely be dubious, I would hope. Well, don't be so hasty to dismiss this latest from the environmental idiots this blog has tried to unveil. Just click on this link and read it for yourself.

Is the left loony or more sinister?

I often refer to the left and liberals as being loony or loopy, but I just ran across a web site for a group of environmentalists which may force me to search for a more accurate adjective. Here is the web site of a group which feels we should follow their motto and extinguish ourselves to save the planet.

Phasing out the human race by voluntarily ceasing to breed will allow Earth's biosphere to return to good health. Crowded conditions and resource shortages will improve as we become less dense.

Wrong Guy

Missouri Gov. Matt Blunt, quoting his wife after he asked her whether she ever thought in her wildest dreams that her husband would become governor •“Matt, you’re never in my wildest dreams.” —

A good analysis of the Iraq military situatuion

Read it all here.

The military problem - In World War II, our objective was "unconditional surrender" of our enemies. With unconditional surrender, the political problem is solved militarily but in a limited war, the political problem has a separate but related existence to the military problem. It is not enough to "rely on the generals." Solving the civilian-political problem is not their job. After all, what is their writ? To destroy our enemies or make friends with them? The civilians have to make that decision.

It is in the political-civilian area that we have been deficient in our strategy. It may well have been that our model before deposing Saddam was that there was an Iraqi polity that, absent the terror of Saddam, would be able to work out its problems through democratic means. If that was our model, it didn't work. We need a new model. Do we support majority rule - the al-Maliki government? That very likely means that we oppose the Sunni insurgency, even though the Sunni in some sense balance out the influence of the Iranian Shia. Well, that problem is not going to go away. If we are in a war, we have to want our side to win. If our side is to win, we must have a side. That nettle seems not to have been grasped, and no amount of surged troops is going to grasp it. It must be grasped as a matter of policy and then the troops can be given a military objective.

Should we surge troops? Wrong question. The question is (a) what is our objective and (b) what is our strategy for achieving it? Once we decide these two things, then we must find the leader who can execute on the strategy - the Ulysses Grant of this war - and not rotate him out until the job is finished.

Obituaries of 2006

Mark Steyn has profiles of some of the luminaries we lost in 2006. Many of them are too obscure for me to appreciate, but they are all delivered as only Mark can. Here is an example:

MAUREEN STAPLETON, actress
Miss Stapleton didn’t make it to the grand old age of my old friend George Abbott, who died at the age of 107 while working on rewrites of The Pajama Game. Mister Abbott directed Miss Stapleton in a Broadway play a few decades back, when he was a whippersnapper in his 80s and she was half his age. A very vigorous fellow almost to the end of his life, he began an affair with his leading lady, and Miss Stapleton started regaling her girlfriends with rather more details than they wanted about octogenarian action. But she was insistent about his prowess in that particular department that at the end one of them responded: “Wow! Has he got an older brother?”

We should learn from China

If we are going to have a death penalty, this is the way it should be handled. Arrest them, try them, sentence them, give them an appeal, and then kill them if the appeal is upheld. Total time from start to finish is less than a year.

HARBIN -- A 33-year-old man who murdered six children after sexually assaulting them in northeast China was executed on Sunday.

Gong Runbo had been convicted at the Intermediate People's Court of Jiamusi City, Heilongjiang province, of rape and the murders of the six children aged nine to 16.

The court heard he lured the children off street and from Internet cafe to his rented apartment in Jiamusi from March 2005 to February 2006. He also lured and molested five others aged 12 and 13.

He was arrested on February 28, when a boy managed to escape from the apartment and called the police.

Gong was sentenced to death on July 13 and was ordered to pay 661,840 yuan (84,743 U.S. dollars) to the victims.

He had pleaded guilty and said he would not appeal.

The victims appealed to the court to seek compensation from the Internet cafe and apartment owners.

The Heilongjiang Provincial Higher People's Court rejected the appeals and upheld the verdict on December 20.

Obama on Abortion

It should be interesting to hear the gifted orator from Illinois explain why, in 2002, as an Illinois legislator, Obama voted against the Induced Infant Liability Act, which would have protected babies that survived late-term abortions. That same year a similar federal law, the Born Alive Infant Protection Act, was signed by President Bush. Only 15 members of the U.S. House opposed it, and it passed the Senate unanimously on a voice vote.

A Christmas Thought from Mark Steyn

"Nobody should be obliged to believe Jesus is the son of God, but likewise nobody should take such umbrage at trees and tinsel and instrumental versions of "Silent Night" that he would deny the reality of the land he lives in to the vast majority of his fellow citizens. Because the logic of that leads not to a diverse secular society but to an atomized ersatz non-society. And, as those other touchy types the Islamists well understand, once you put reality up for grabs, all kinds of pathologies suddenly become viable. "

That is not as warm and comforting a thought as one should have this season, but BestView wishes all who wander to these pages a very Merry Christmas.

Negotiations Anyone?

In a portion of the tape from Al qaeda No. 2 man, Ayman al Zawahri, made available recently, Zawahri says he has two messages for American Democrats.

"The first is that you aren't the ones who won the midterm elections, nor are the Republicans the ones who lost. Rather, the Mujahideen -- the Muslim Ummah's vanguard in Afghanistan and Iraq -- are the ones who won, and the American forces and their Crusader allies are the ones who lost," Zawahri said, according to a full transcript obtained by ABC News.

Zawahri calls on the Democrats to negotiate with him and Osama bin Laden, not others in the Islamic world who Zawahri says cannot help.

Al Qaeda evidently feels the Democrats are more likely to negotiate with them than the Republicans. He never asked Bush to negotiate. At the present time folks like John Kerry, Chris Dodd, and Bill Nelson are descending on Syria and Iran trying to impress us with the virtue of chats with despots. Even if you throw in a random RINO like Allen Specter, who is also heading to the mideast, it is hard to dispute the Zawahri analysis.

"Bush Official Shreds Documents"

This account is sad but true.

An analysis of President Bush

An anonymous reader offered the following analysis of President Bush in a comment to a blog in the Washington Times. Hard for me to find anything to argue with him about except being a bigger liar than Clinton. No es possible.

Wait Too Late Bush. I call President Bush the wait-too-late president because he eventually waits too late to be effective at anything but liberalism. He waited until the WMD was out of Iraq before going into Iraq. He waited too late to secure the Iraqi border. He waited too late to send enough troops into Iraq to bring the war to an earlier close and do the job properly. He waited too late to secure our southern border. He had six years in which to stop the flow of illegal aliens from crossing our southern border but did nothing. He waited too late to make necessary changes to save Republicans in the last election. The list goes on and on. He is the biggest conservative disappointment in history and is a bigger liar than Clinton because he lied to us conservatives about being at the least a friend of conservatives. President Bush is now more dispised by conservatives then was Bill Clinton. At least with Clinton we expected what we got.

Racism

Here is a very good opinion piece from the L.A. Times on racism which was authored by Shelby Steele, the author of "White Guilt". A sample is below.

"This does not mean that racist behavior today is somehow benign. It means that today racism swims upstream in an atmosphere of ferocious intolerance. Moreover, today's racism is no longer in concert with an overt and systematic subjugation of blacks. While racism continues to exist, it no longer stunts the lives of blacks.

Yet a belief in the ongoing power of racism is, today, an article of faith for "good" whites and "truth-telling" blacks. It is heresy for any white or black to say openly that, today, underdevelopment and broken families are vastly greater problems for blacks than racism, even though this is obviously true. The problem is that this truth blames the victim. It suggests that black progress will come more from black effort than from white goodwill — even though white oppression caused the underdevelopment in the first place.

In other words, this truth is unfair. And when whites or blacks utter it, they are instantly identified with the unfairness rather than with the truth.So propriety causes us to say that racism still explains black difficulty.

This explanation is also a source of power because it portrays blacks as victims. And wherever there are victims, there is justification for seeking power in their name. Thus the specter of black difficulty has been an enormous source of power for the left since the 1960s. To say racism is not the first cause of black problems is to put yourself at odds with the post-'60s left's most enduring fount of power."

Science to keep in mind

As you read the papers with regular stories of food contamination causing outbreaks of illness from such things as spinach, hamburgers, lettuce, etc., keep in mind one reason for much of this. Right now, the American Medical Association, the Centers of Disease Control, the Food and Drug Administration, and the World Health Association have all certified that a big reduction in food-borne illness could be realized by food irradiation. In this process, a fixed and controlled source of gamma rays are very briefly focused on the food and 99.99% of E. coli, for example are killed. There is absolutely no effect on the food itself or any person who later consumes the food. Now, for a quick quiz. Why don't we use this life-saving food preservation method more extensively. If you guessed the lies, misinformation campaign, and lobbying by liberal groups like Public Citizen with its President Jill Clayborn being aided by the liberal media, you get a gold star. They have bullied the FDA into a position where it now requires a label to state that consumption of the product is "risky". In fact, the opposite is true and non-irradiated food should be so labelled.
When an outbreak occurs like the recent on with Taco Bell as the source, the liberal media blames a collusion between industry and the government who should be increasing funds for inspections which the industry doesn't want. Nonsense.
Ironically, Mexico and other countries such as India and Thailand do irradiate food before exporting it to the U.S. So you could well be safer eating food from such otherwise backward countries than from the politically correct U.S.

Carbon Dioxide Facts and Figures

I was reading the other day that a group called Environmental Analysis and Remote Sensing Co. reported that if we scrap all the cars, SUVs, and trucks in America we could reduce greenhouse gasses by 2-3%. Of course, our economy would be brought to a halt and I would be hard-pressed to start riding a bicycle at my age.

According to this report, we could achieve this same reduction by simply putting out the open coal pit fires burning in the world--especially in China where 120 million tons of coal are consumed in uncontrolled fires each year. These fires emit not just carbon dioxide, which is not a pollutant, but many noxious gases, sulfur and soot. Left alone, these fires can burn for hundred or even thousands of years.

Armed with this information, you should now sit back and wait for idiots like Al Gore to suggest we put these fires out instead of wrecking our economy to make it comparable to the Europeans which these liberals admire so much. One action (putting out fires) would be desirable and the other (curtailing our economic activity) is not. Personally, I doubt we will see these liberal loonies stop jetting around the globe calling for the U.S. to adopt actions which lead us into economic oblivion.

Annoying

While waiting in a line at the grocery the other day, I noticed a magazine with a cover story promising to list the 50 most annoying persons in 2006. I didn't look at the story and I have never really seen the TV program, but I am hearing enough about the principals on the show that I would be very disappointed if everyone on "The View" wasn't on the magazines list of 50.

Another Bush Failure

Most of the coverage you see about the recent report by the National Archives and Records Administration showing that Sandy Berger pilfered and hid documents from the archives under a construction trailer focuses on the mea culpa Berger offered that it was an "honest mistake" and that no real documents were removed---just copies. We may never know if that is the case since he admits to cutting them up with scissors and throwing them in the trash, but we do know he lied in his testimony about the incident.

My take is one which I have not seen. We all knew after 8 years that the Clinton administration was capable of misusing FBI files, losing documents required for court proceedings, and then lying about the events. Bush was expected to have different standards, at least by those of us who voted for him. This turned out not to be the case and the pitiful prosecution of Berger's case by the Bush Department of Justice is disgraceful. He should never have been allowed to plea bargain down to a misdemeanor with community service. At the same time, Bush is allowing Scooter Libby to be prosecuted about an account of a non-crime because his account of events differed from those of some reporters. This indicates to me that the Bush standards are no greater than those of Clinton and that is a shame.

Sounds good to me

John McWhorter is one of my favorite intellectuals. He is like Thomas Sowell in that the liberal media mainly ignore him, but I ran across an article today in the New York Sun which everyone should read and seriously consider. Because it makes so much sense and would require us to dismantle something which is a sacred failure, it won't happen. So we will continue with the current sham of an education system.

What McWhorter suggests is that we stop universal education at the 10th grade and let the students pursue the rest of their lives in whatever way seems most appropriate. His supporting reasons are compelling to me and I would love to hear a debate in which the education establishment attempted to defend the current high schools.

Is this time different?

Here is a pretty good essay on war Presidents. The last paragraph is given below, but the whole thing is a worthy read.

Wars are often darkest just before the light. In our day, we must pray for military leadership committed to making Baghdad secure, and Iran and Syria quite afraid. Even conceived of in these limited terms, we need top generals committed, as in 1864, to victory. Many Americans will not believe it can be done. That’s the way it was in 1777, when historians estimate that as many as two-thirds of all Americans in New York and New Jersey had come to support the British. During the meandering carnage of 1863 and 1864, many Americans also gave up hope. Americans ought never to forget Abraham Lincoln’s dark year, just before the sun of victory surprisingly broke through. Contemplating the sacrifices that so many hundreds of thousands had made to keep the Union whole, Lincoln did not believe that the God who gave us liberty when he gave us life, could in the end disregard the sacrifices of so many. That is how Lincoln held on in 1864. As did Washington (and even Tom Paine) before him in the darkest days of winter 1777. Those prayers of Washington and Lincoln would not be bad for Christmas 2006, either.

I need more Bacteroidetes

There is an interesting article in Nature this month describing a study from Washington University in St. Louis that showed obese folks have a different microbial flora in the gut than leaner subjects. This was attributed to the fatter people having greater numbers of organisms in a family called Firmicutes. Evidently these organisms are more efficient in converting complex carbohydrates into sugars which are absorbed by the intestines and converted to fat. If your gut is blessed with greater numbers of Bacteroidetes, on the other hand, the carbohydrates are excreted to a greater extent and sugars which can be converted to fat are not as plentiful.
This suggests some attractive approaches to countering weight gain through manipulation of the gut flora. Surely that would be more fun than a diet and more exercise.

White Christmas

Go here to read a fascinating account of the classic "White Christmas" as could be told by only one person....my favorite columnist. Here is a sample:

Some songs are hits - Number One for a couple of weeks. Some songs are standards - they endure decade after decade. And a few very rare songs reach way beyond either category, to embed themselves so deeply in the collective consciousness they become part of the soundtrack of society. They start off the same as all the other numbers - written for a show or a movie, a singer or an event - but they float free of the writer, they outlast the singer, transcend the movie, change the event. There were a couple of what we now think of as seasonal standards that predated Irving Berlin’s entry into the field, but neither became a pillar of the Xmas pop repertoire, because until “White Christmas” came along there was no such thing.

A Gay Pride March to Mecca

PRESS RELEASE
EMBARGO DATE: December 15, 2006, 4 PM.

IN THE NAME OF FREEDOM AND TOLERANCE, AND IN HARMONY WITH OUR GAY MUSLIM BROTHERS AND SISTERS, WE PROUDLY ANNOUNCE THE FIRST MARCH TO MECCA, FEBRUARY 14, 2007

Human Rights Watch, Moveon.org, ACT-UP, the Huffington Post and David Geffen are proud to present the March to Mecca, a celebration of peace that calls all gay brothers, sisters and people undergoing sex-reassignment to march to the holiest of holy cities, Mecca, the capital city of Saudi Arabia's Makkah province on Valentine's Day, February 14, 2007.

I like to wander over to the other side now and then to see how things are going and in so doing ran into this on The Huffington Post.

Read the whole thing. It is amusing to contemplate.

Obama

From John Fund's Opinion Piece that argues Obama might not run:


"His record as a state legislator is even more liberal. In 1996, he spoke out against the Defense of Marriage Act, which the Senate approved 85-14 and Mr. Clinton signed into law. He twice voted "present" on a bill to ban partial-birth abortions. In 1999 he was the only state senator to oppose a law that prohibited early prison release for sex offenders. " As Fund says, Hillary would love to run against that record.

Solid Science??

I always enjoy pointing out "studies" which appear in the press which can almost certainly be shown to be the result of faulty science. The latest is an article I read which can be summarized as follows:

"A study of thousands of men and women revealed that those who stick to a vegetarian diet have IQs that are around five points higher than those who regularly eat meat.

Writing in the British Medical Journal, the researchers say it isn't clear why veggies are brainier - but admit the fruit and veg-rich vegetarian diet could somehow boost brain power."

Even though this is almost certainly a bunch of hooey, I am still tempted to explore ways to get the information to certain people I know.

Intelligence Chairman not up on basics

Jeff Stein interviewed Congressman Sylvestre Reyes who will be the new Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee since Speaker Pelosi passed over Jane Harmon and reluctantly decided against naming an impeached Judge Hastings. The following is a segment of that interview, but you can read the whole thing here.

We warmed up with a long discussion about intelligence issues and Iraq. And then we veered into terrorism’s major players.

To me, it’s like asking about Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland: Who’s on what side?

The dialogue went like this:

Al Qaeda is what, I asked, Sunni or Shia?

“Al Qaeda, they have both,” Reyes said. “You’re talking about predominately?”

“Sure,” I said, not knowing what else to say.

“Predominantly — probably Shiite,” he ventured.

He couldn’t have been more wrong.

Al Qaeda is profoundly Sunni. If a Shiite showed up at an al Qaeda club house, they’d slice off his head and use it for a soccer ball.

That’s because the extremist Sunnis who make up a l Qaeda consider all Shiites to be heretics.

Al Qaeda’s Sunni roots account for its very existence. Osama bin Laden and his followers believe the Saudi Royal family besmirched the true faith through their corruption and alliance with the United States, particularly allowing U.S. troops on Saudi soil.

It’s been five years since these Muslim extremists flew hijacked airliners into the World Trade Center.

Is it too much to ask that our intelligence overseers know who they are?

Clinton bugs Diana

It says here that the Clinton CIA was bugging the phone of Princess Diana when Atta was planning 9/11 and now the dems are all upset that Bush is bugging real terrorists.

Mark Steyn Analyzes the ISG

This is another great column from Mark Steyn. He focuses on just one of their recommendations, but he does it brilliantly. Read it all here.

"RECOMMENDATION 5: The Support Group should consist of Iraq and all the states bordering Iraq, including Iran and Syria . . ."

Er, OK. I suppose that's what you famously hardheaded "realists" mean by realism. But wait, we're not done yet. For this "Support Group," we need the extra-large function room. Aside from Turkey, Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Iran and Kuwait, the ISG -- the Iraq Surrender Gran'pas -- want also to invite:

". . . the key regional states, including Egypt and the Gulf States . . ."

Er, OK. So it's basically an Arab League meeting. Not a "Support Group" I'd want to look for support from, but each to his own. But wait, Secretary Baker's still warming up:

". . . the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council . . ."

That would be America, Britain, France, Russia, China. A diverse quintet, representing many distinctive approaches to international affairs from stylish hauteur to polonium-210. Anybody else?

". . . the European Union . . ."

Hey, why not? It's not really multilateral unless there's a Belgian on board, right? Oh, and let's not forget:

". . . the Support Group should call on the participation of the United Nations Secretary-General in its work. The United Nations Secretary-General should designate a Special Envoy as his representative . . ."

Oh, but lest you think there are no minimum admission criteria to James Baker's "Support Group," relax, it's a very restricted membership: Arabs, Persians, Chinese commies, French obstructionists, Russian assassination squads. But no Jews. Even though Israel is the only country to be required to make specific concessions -- return the Golan Heights, etc. Indeed, insofar as this document has any novelty value, it's in the Frankenstein-meets-the-Wolfman sense of a boffo convergence of hit franchises: a Vietnam bug-out, but with the Jews as the designated fall guys. Wow. That's what Hollywood would call "high concept."

More U.N. Lunacy

This might seem a big day for U.N. lunacy judging by the Title of BestView entries, but in fact every day could be filled with examples, I suspect. Now we have another guess with absolutely no more scientific basis than other global warming nonsense from this most worthless of institutions. Entire article here.

Mankind has had less effect on global warming than previously supposed, a United Nations report on climate change will claim next year.

The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says there can be little doubt that humans are responsible for warming the planet, but the organisation has reduced its overall estimate of this effect by 25 per cent.

In a final draft of its fourth assessment report, to be published in February, the panel reports that the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has accelerated in the past five years. It also predicts that temperatures will rise by up to 4.5 C during the next 100 years, bringing more frequent heat waves and storms.

More U.N. Lunacy

This is the last one from Senator Coburn's web site. There is no reason to raise the blood pressure unduly, but this is just so outrageous that light must be shown on the extent of our unwise continued association with the U.N.

UNDP pays historian half a million to praise itself

In the meantime, UNDP condemns the US for not giving it millions more "for the poor"

The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) paid $567,379 in 2004 for a historian to lavish praise upon itself in the form of a published book released this year entitled, UNDP: A Better Way? This included the following expenses:

• $252,000 for the historian's 21-month salary
• $87,639 for the "project coordinator's" salary
• $91,559 for "research and editing"
• $37,299 for travel
• $26,752 for office space
• $55,452 for purchasing mass quantities of its own book

Overlooking the fact that the U.N. must pay historians to praise itself, U.N. officials continue to criticize the U.S. for not giving more than the $108 million we give to the UNDP each year. This criticism towards the #1 U.N. donor seems odd at a time when U.N. management should be asking UNDP how many Guatemalan farmers could be trained to maximize crop yields, how many Burmese refugees could be taught to read and write, how many Sudanese survivors of genocide could be fed a meal, how many micro-loans could be administered in India for $567,379?

U.N. Kitchen Upgrade

The United Nations last week approved a $4.3 million plan for a super-luxe makeover to the Secretary General's New York apartment. The U.S. taxpayer, who covers 22% of all U.N. operating expenses, will be expected to donate $1 million towards this lush project.

Part of the plan is to spend $200,000 on a new kitchen alone. For $200,000, the U.N. could purchase 200,000 malaria pills to help save 200,000 kids suffering in Africa.

This and other examples of what happens to your money can be read daily on my favorite politician's web site nearly every day. Yes, it is Senator Coburn from Oklahoma.

Osama bin Laden Study Group

Scott Ott at Scrappleface announces a new study group being formed.

(2006-12-07) — Just a day after the Iraq Study Group released its report and dozens of recommendations to help the United States escape what it termed a “grave and deteriorating” situation, an unnamed al Qaeda spokesman announced the appointment of a similar panel by terror leader Usama bin Laden.

“Mr. bin Laden, peace be upon him, favors a transparent process of laying all of our military and diplomatic options on the table before the world,” said the source. “The civil war in Iraq hinders our efforts to establish Baghdad as the capital of our global Islamic Caliphate. Mr. bin Laden believes it’s not going well enough or fast enough, and he’s open to any good suggestions for finding a way out of Iraq,”

Unconfirmed reports suggest that Mr. bin Laden may terminate his stalwart second-in-command, Ayman al-Zawahiri, and appoint a less controversial man who could garner broader support from the Muslim media and in public opinion polls.

However, an anonymous official at the White Cavern, Mr. bin Laden’s headquarters, provided The New York Times with a classified top-secret memo that indicates the al Qaeda leader is considering a “graceful exit” from Iraq, in order to avoid the political consequences of having the conflict drag on.

A Scientific Fork in the Road?

For several decades I taught medical students that the scientific basis of cancer chemotherapy was based on the concept that tumors were composed of cells which had been triggered to grow more rapidly and with different controls than normal cells. As a result our efforts to counter this proliferative abnormality had to be directed at discovering and targeting the slight alteration which allowed the differential growth rates of the tumor cells. Well, it turns out now that we should turn our attention to a different model. Recent evidence out of Canada suggests that it is stem cells which make cancers grow. This is based on the finding that tumor cells are quite diversified and some of them have very little proliferative potential and are thus unworthy targets of our chemotherapeutic agents currently in use. In fact, the evidence now is that when stem cells are removed the bulk of the tumor cells are not particularly nasty. So, if a tumor cell does not have the abnormal cell division potential, it poses very little threat. It turns out that in one study only 1 cell in 40,000 colon cancer tumor cells was responsible for all the growth in the tumor. Ergo, we need to change our thinking about cancer chemotherapeutic targeting.

I am struck by the way in which this could mesh with an observation by others that when we try to use embryonic stem cells to cure such things as diabetes in animal models, we almost always end up with cancers. This sad fact is no deterrent to the liberals who will not be content until we create embryos on a massive scale to pursue what now seems a dead-end in stem cell research as opposed to the use of adult stem cells which have been shown to be effective in 78 different medical conditions. This perhaps because the adult stem cells cause the proliferation of cells which are deficient in a given medical condition. Thus, nerve cell regeneration, pancreatic cells which make insulin, and other conditions are amenable to treatment with adult stem cells, but not with embryonic stem cells which have not yet differentiated.

Mark Steyn on the ISG

And the only specific strategic proposal is a linkage between Iraq and a “renewed and sustained commitment” to a “comprehensive Arab-Israeli peace” – which concedes the same ludicrous rationale that the Saudi King Abdullah and all the rest of them make: that one tiny ten-mile sliver of Jews is the reason why millions of Muslims from the Straits of Gibraltar to the Emirates are mired in dictatorships, failed economies and jihadist fever. For the Baker group to endorse this clapped out pan-Arabism is disgusting. An “Arab-Israeli peace”? What does that mean? What exactly is Israel doing to Iraq, or Tunisia, or Qatar, or any other Arabs except those in the “Palestinian territories”? To frame it in those terms is to adopt the pathologies of the enemy. Shame on Baker, Hamilton and all the rest.

Read it all here.

Teachers don't understand written English

Teachers unions are supposed to promote the financial interests of, well, teachers--but not in Washington state. Here, the Washington Education Association is fighting some 4,000 nonmember teachers who don't want their paychecks raided each year and used for political activities that they don't believe in. "The right of free speech is being trampled" by the union political spending, complains Scott Carlson, a business teacher in Spokane. "And that's a right I hold very precious."

Too bad the unions don't. The WEA derisively refers to teachers like Mr. Carlson who want their money back not as free-speech advocates but "dissidents." The goal is to squash these dissidents by overturning Initiative 134, a law--approved by 72% of Washington voters in 1992--that requires unions to obtain written approval from teachers before dues are spent on campaigns or candidates. Back in March, the unions got a surprising assist from the state Supreme Court, which ruled that the paycheck protection law places "too heavy" a burden on the free-speech rights of the union.

The Washington law states unambiguously that a union may not use dues "for political purposes without the affirmative consent of the nonmembers from whom the excess fees were taken." The Washington Supreme Court somehow twisted these words to mean that the unions can spend as they wish unless workers object and affirmatively opt out. That's a big distinction, because the unions make it as time-consuming and cumbersome as possible to get the money back once they snatch it.

The case is discussed here and will go before the U.S. Supreme Court in January. Let's hope the court will help the teachers understand their liberal causes should not be supported by coerced money.

Paper Tiger

For some time now I have been uneasy about the action of the U.S. in response to the situations which have arisen in the past few years. The problem has become increasingly evident though the presidencies of the two Bushes and Clinton. In these years we have become increasingly less willing to assert our perogatives and act as the lone superpower on earth should. When Reagan took the oath of office, the Iranians released the hostages immediately. This act revealed an enlightened self-interest which is currently being exhibited again by the Iranians as they openly pursue nuclear weapons because they know that Bush is content to wait for the U.N. to pass another worthless resolution despite opposition from Russia and China. This passive response by Bush is proceeding despite repeated assurances from Ahmadinejad that he will use these same weapons to eliminate Israel.

In Iraq, you have very little talk about victory in a specific sense. Instead, we hear about wanting stability and our generals appear before congressional committees explaining why they can't defeat a militia headed by Muqtada al-Sadr. In the meantime our soldiers who were trained to wage war venture out of the Green Zone to pass out candy and soccer balls to children in the streets.

In other areas we sit by and let Putin resurrect a dictatorship in Russia while providing Iran with anti-aircraft missiles and nuclear technology to be used against us. We let Hugo Chavez solidify his hold on an important country in South America while he develops anti-American alliances with Iran, North Korea and liberals like Joe Kennedy who accepts his heating oil to help the "poor". We apologize for removing 6 Islamic clerics from and airplane, offer to provide them with a meditation room at airports while denying our children in elementary school the right to sing Christmas carols.

Osama bin Laden said early on that America would cave in as we did in Somalia under Clinton, fail to follow through on commitments liked Bush 41 did when he asked the Iraqis to rise up against Saddam, and Bush 43 is continuing in the same timid vein when he ignores his post 9/11 assertion that we would hold those nations who harbor and support terrorists to full account. Such nonsense. How frightened is Iran right now? Syria? Venezuela? North Korea?

It is all very sad and ominous.

Liberal Folly

BestView has observed several times how the loony left seems to have accepted the conclusion that man has caused the global warming and that if we don't take some ill-advised action right now to correct the situation, we are all doomed to some myriad forms of calamity. When they are confronted by the fact that the science behind this chicken-little conclusion is not settled, they say that is better to take some action "just in case".

Contrast that to their idiotic position on a missile-defense system. It is, unfortunately, advanced by Senator Carl Levin who is now going to be Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. He is following a long established democrat position against the development of an anti-ballistic missile system on the basis that it has not been proved to work and we should not do the research to make it work because then it might work and that would be destabilizing in some way. Yes, I know it is moronic, but that is what Levin and his liberal fellow travelers say. He objects to the situation we have now where we have tested parts of a missile-defense system and had some success because the conditions of the test were not against a missile launched by a hostile nation. So the only tests he will accept are those which would come when North Korea actually lobs one our way and the idea that we should follow the flawed logic of the wacky environmentalists and do something "just in case" is not applicable in this case.

Jimmy Carter's Legacy?

It will be interesting to see how much of the following makes it into the news and public discussion. Since I consider Jimmy Carter a traitor to his country, my bias would support the view that the Professor is correct in his description of the situation. Read the whole thing here.

Mark Steyn Is Right Again

Here is how Mark starts his latest essay. Be sure to read the whole thing.

James Baker's "Iraq Study Group" seems to have been cast on the same basis as Liza Minnelli's last wedding. A stellar lineup: Donna Summer, Mickey Rooney, the Doobie Brothers, Gina Lollobrigida, Michael Jackson, Mia Farrow, Little Anthony and the Imperials, Jill St. John. That's Liza's wedding, not the Baker Commission. But at both gatherings everyone who was anyone was there, no matter how long ago it was they were anyone. So the fabulous Baker boy was accompanied by Clinton officials Leon Panetta and Bill Perry, Clinton golfing buddy Vernon Jordan, Clinton's fellow sex fiend Chuck Robb, the quintessential ''moderate'' Republican Alan Simpson, Supreme Court swing vote par excellence Sandra Day O'Connor . . . God, I can't go on. I'd rather watch Mia Farrow making out with Mickey Rooney to a Doobie Brothers LP. As its piece de resistance, the Baker Commission concluded its deliberations by inviting testimony from -- drumroll, please -- Sen. John F. Kerry. If you're one of those dummies who goofs off in school, you wind up in Iraq. But, if you're sophisticated and nuanced, you wind up on a commission about Iraq. Rounding it all out -- playing David Gest to Jim Baker's Liza -- is, inevitably, co-chairman Lee Hamilton, former congressman from Indiana.

Pretty good analysis

From Hillbilly White Trash:

George W Bush invited James Webb into his home. Webb accepted his hospitality by showing up then snubbed his host by refusing to go through the receiving line and shake the President's hand. Mr. Bush made a point of ignoring the insult and reached out to Mr. Webb on the one area in which any civilized person would assume that they could agree - the well being of Mr. Webb's son.

Instead of answering his hosts sincere question with a polite response like, "he's fine, I just heard from him", he chose to give an answer which said, in effect, "screw off, it's none of your business". Well I'm sorry Mr. Webb but as the Commander in Chief the welfare of an active duty Marine is damned well George Bush's business.

Also, consider how much political hay the left could have made if Bush had shown no concern whatsoever over Mr. Webb's son. Would not the mainstream media's action line be something like, "Bush sends Webb's kid to war and then can't even be bothered to ask how he's doing"?

Is this the proper attitude?

I just noticed this in the paper and it seems a bit strange to have a major legal entanglement arise within a religious denomination like this.

Virginia Episcopal Bishop Peter J. Lee is threatening to sue conservative Episcopal churches that soon will vote on whether to leave his diocese, saying individual members of each congregation's governing board will be liable.
In a four-page letter released late Friday, the bishop of the country's largest diocese, with 90,000 members, sent a letter to parishes conducting a 40-day period of discernment on whether to leave the Episcopal Church.
Thousands of Episcopalians already have left the 2.2 million-member denomination over arguments about biblical authority and the 2003 consecration of New Hampshire Bishop V. Gene Robinson, an active homosexual.
"I believe your successors in the future will regret that decision and its destructive consequences to the whole church," the bishop wrote of congregations threatening to leave the diocese. Any congregation attempting to leave without a negotiated settlement with the diocese "will have repercussions and possible civil liability for individual vestry members."

Liberal Compassion

The always insightful Thomas Sowell has skewered the liberals with solid evidence that despite their constant call for forgiveness of loans to 3rd world countries, a living wage for the poor, and a safety net for all, these are all governmental acts of compassion. How about situations where the actual help for someone or something comes out of their own pockets? Not so caring, it seems. You can read his essay here, but at the end you may be reminded as I was that when the press looked at Al Gore's tax information while running for President, they found his charitable contributions for an entire year was $768.00.

The Kyoto Price Tag

There is every indication that carbon dioxide emissions will become an international concern which almost matches the attention currently being paid to Britney's crotch. IBD has an editorial reporting that 90% of Europeans believe that man is responsible for the current warming trend. Even more interesting is the poll showing that 68% of them would be in favor of lifestyle restrictions to help address this "problem". The question now is how much in favor they really are. If the Kyoto accords are actually met by Europe, it is estimated the EU would lose from 1.5 to 4% of their GDP and millions of jobs. This would be 4 million in Spain and 1 million jobs a year in Britain from 2008 to 2012. The Clinton administration correctly concluded that the Kyoto Treaty should not even be submitted to the Senate because it would cost us $400 BILLION a year and nearly 4.9 million lost jobs. Maybe this would be acceptable to the Europeans since they aren't all that crazy about work in the first place, but someone should consider the calculation that each one- billionth if warming avoidance will cost $100,000. So, in order to reduce the global temperature by about 1 degree Celsius, it would cost $100 TRILLION.
As IBD points out, the loony environmentalists bemoan the cost of doing nothing (which is at least as theoretical as the calculations above), but Europeans should at least consider the cost before getting in line for a dubious remedy to a nebulous problem. The same admonition should be made to the newly empowered Dems in the U.S. Congress who will be inclined to follow everything European.

Bush needs to take another look

When they first met, President Bush said he looked into Vladimir Putin's soul and liked what he saw. As Putin continues on his current path to destroy all semblance of democracy in Russia and eliminate his critics by whatever means necessary, Bush needs to reconsider what a proper soul looks like.

Diversity Anyone

The loony left is quite insistent on society providing for diversity unless that includes ideas which come from anywhere this side of Marxism. Witness the reaction on college campuses when speakers who are invited which have ideas that do not comport with their extreme ideology. Such violent demonstrations have been directed toward Ann Coulter , John Bolton, and now Tom Tancredo.