sic semper tyrannis

There’s little doubt that the surge in Iraq has worked. For example, this datum as reported by USA Today:

The number of U.S. combat deaths in Iraq is headed for the lowest level in more than a year and a half and the fifth consecutive monthly decline.

Good news, of a sort. But it masks what may be a darker reality: that our surge is successful only to the extent that we remain in Iraq in sufficient numbers to quell the terrorists and bolster the feckless Iraqi government. Again from USA Today:

Maj. Gen. Benjamin Mixon, who recently completed a tour as commander of Multi-National Division-North, accused Iraq’s Interior Ministry of “foot-dragging” in not moving quicker to hire an additional 6,000 police in Diyala province, north of the capital.Despite the increase in security, U.S. commanders are reluctant to recommend accelerating the withdrawal of U.S forces beyond what is already planned, fearful of jeopardizing hard-fought gains.

The top U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, has said U.S. troop levels will return to pre-”surge” levels, about 130,000 U.S. servicemembers, by next summer.

There hasn’t been a decision beyond that.

That last is a cold, understated way of noting that we may be there for many years. At least that is likely if our goal is to leave Iraq looking like some prosperous suburb in America. Or, again as USA Today puts it, “U.S. commanders are reluctant to recommend accelerating the withdrawal of U.S forces beyond what is already planned, fearful of jeopardizing hard-fought gains.”

Make no mistake. There will be Iraqi-on-Iraqi mayhem when we leave. The problems of tribe, religious sect, and the Arab honor culture, so unlike our notion of honor, will all combine to assure there will never be peace unless and until the disparate groups are separated from one another.

The only true question is this: how many American lives are we willing to waste on peoples unable to drag themselves out of some 7th century feud?

This is how those Muslims who support violent jihad are described by a Columbia University prof. Columbia, which was the home of late and unlamented apologist for terror, Edward Said. Columbia, which provided a philosophically compatible home away from home for the nutjob president of Iran. But one mustn’t assume things, just because so much evil is tolerated at Morningside Heights…

The topic is the term jihad, used by many Islamic terrorists and claimed by them to be justified by the Koran. Turns out that one of our political parties agrees with the hate-America-Columbia University crowd: Jihad just means “struggle” in Arabic (which it does), but this can mean spiritual struggle and doesn’t mean violent struggle to the vast majority of Muslims.

Of course it can mean spiritual struggle. But too often in history it has meant violent struggle. It wasn’t for wanting to discuss philosophy that the Muslim legions conquered North Africa and goodly chunks of Europe in the Middle Ages. It was war, plain and simple. One might argue that this was merely old school geopolitics, and religion was an excuse or even a secondary cause.

Yes, and I’ll need a really sturdy umbrella when those pigs start flying. Islam has been on the march, killing, capturing, and converting at the point of a sword, since is inception in the Arabian desert in the 7th century.

Today’s liberals are quite shy in expressing this simple fact. The Columbia prof is merely one of those who bleat that Islam is a religion of peace, hoping that if they say it often and soothingly, it will come true.

As for the divide between Democrats and Republicans, consider this extract from an enlightening article in the Wall Street Journal (subscription required):

A divide is emerging on the presidential campaign trail over battling terrorists: how exactly to label the fight. While Democrats tend to talk about terrorism in general, Republicans increasingly pin the threat directly on Islam.All the major Republican candidates regularly weave some form of the phrase “Islamic extremism” into their stump speeches. Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has taken the rhetoric to a new level, running a television advertisement about “this century’s nightmare, jihadism.”

Democratic candidates generally don’t emphasize linking Islam and terrorism. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton talks more of “global terrorism,” while Sen. Barack Obama refers to “stateless terrorism.”

Getting back to that Columbia prof, here’s his take, also from the Journal:

“There are insurgents and radical Islamists who use the word to describe what they are doing,” said Gary Sick, an adjunct professor at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs, who served on the National Security Council under Presidents Ford, Carter and Reagan. “But they are a teeny minority [compared with] Muslims in the world who don’t see it that way.”

What are those Muslims who “don’t see it that way” doing about their violent co-religionists? Not nearly enough. And, even if Sick were right, a “teeny minority” of 1.5 billion Muslims can be a very large absolute number of Islamic terrorists and their supporters

Unless and until the non-violent Muslims step up and start policing their own ranks, it is Islam itself that must be taken at face value: at least the face that it presents to the Western world. A face of violence with the stated goal of our submission under a world-wide caliphate, or death.

Neither is acceptable, and while we don’t wish to be at war with Islam, what we are presented with is a difference without a distinction. If we are to prevail, if we are to be left in peace, we must first know who is the enemy, and what it is they want.

By their violent actions for almost 1,400 years they have told us. We need but to listen.

Washington D.C. is two cities: our nation’s capital, and home to some of the most liberal folks on the planet. Especially in Northwest, where there are a lot of Volvo-driving-Birkenstock-wearing people, who are famous for chiding the rest of us for not doing our part to support public education or the environment. And who routinely send their kids to tony private schools, and jet off to Aspen or Europe as they buy carbon offsets to assuage their guilty white liberal consciences.

There are a lot of poor folks who live in D.C., but they primarily act only as a backdrop for The Smugs, as I call them. Poor folks who attempt to scrape out a living, but who are routinely patronized by The Smugs and the enabling D.C. government, thereby ensuring that they’ll always be in poverty. But I digress. The outrage d’jour? God is not welcome in one particularly smug neighborhood.

An area church, McLean Bible, is attempting to broaden its evangelical outreach by planting a church in the Devil’s lair: Cleveland Park, a place that most middle-class folks couldn’t afford to live in. From this Washington Post article, the basics:

McLean Bible Church’s plan to hold Sunday worship services in the Uptown theater in the District’s Cleveland Park neighborhood has been dealt a setback by D.C. zoning officials.

In classic nimby fashion, the locals are upset:

The news cheered opponents of the worship services. They have been lobbying city officials since the church announced in July that it had leased the 800-seat Uptown on Sunday mornings. Even though the theater’s operator has said the weekly worship schedule would not interfere with its movie schedule, neighborhood activists have said they feared the services would change the nature of the Uptown.

Note that last: the residents “feared the services would change the nature of uptown.” Says a lot, actually. R-rated movies that border on pornography, anti-American themes, and all sorts of sleaze can be shown. But the Gospel may not be preached. God may not be welcome in D.C., but Satan apparently has not worn our his welcome:

“It’s the devil we know; it’s the devil we love,” said George Idelson, president of the Cleveland Park Citizens Association. “We would like it to keep running movies. . . . That’s what it’s there for, and that’s what we like about it.”

The good residents of Cleveland Park may be atheistic morons, but someone needs to tell the District of Columbia’s “government” about something called the First Amendment. The theater is already open for business, and presumably the issues with crowds and traffic are resolved so far as entertainment is concerned.

To disapprove religious services is flat discrimination and a violation of our freedom to worship.

It should come as little surprise that a politician would snap at a chance (pun intended) to make an easy million or two off of the rubes in his state. This politician is a supposed man of the people, as many Democrats wish to be pictured: Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) of Maryland, who has been lusting after legalizing slot machines in the Old Line State.

The Guv’s proposal to put the question before the voters simply reflects the difficulty in getting the Maryland legislature to pass the measure. Slots are not terribly popular with civic-minded liberals, which the Maryland legislature has quite a few of. Or at least they should not be. Why would a liberal reject an easy source of revenue? Because it comes from those least able to afford it: the stupid and the poor.

The stupid are those citizens who, against reason, insist that “luck will turn around” and that they are free to ignore the iron-clad fact that if you play the slots for a sufficiently long time, you will lose. The odds favor the house. Always have; always will.

Unfortunately, a lot of citizens who are not technically stupid seem to lose their smarts when faced with one of those one-armed bandits. I’m winning, can’t ya see; I’m on a roll…Until they start to lose, of course, at which time the tune becomes, “I’m about to turn my luck around…”

As for the poor, sometimes the allure of quick, unearned cash is beyond their ability to resist. It is these people that Democrats like O’Malley should protect by resisting slot machines. The poor, by which I mean those who have little to no disposable income; folks whom a dollar lost at the slots is a dollar less to feed their families or pay the rent or utilities. Slots, in different words, pose a harsh and regressive tax on the poor.

I’ve spent time in Las Vegas on business, and also done some very minor league gambling there. I can attest to the allure of the machines, all bright, glittery, and making those marvelous sounds when they pay off. I’ve also been fortunate in that I’ve had disposable income, and could mentally write off my losses as an entertainment expense.

I no longer gamble, unless one counts the daily crap shoot that is driving in and around Northern Virginia where I now live. Gambling is a vice; it can lead to no good. If you win, it’s not because of any merit on your part, and you are left with the message that some material things in life may be had for free.

But of course all those who gamble will lose over the course of time. The only questions are: how much will you lost, and who besides you will be hurt by it.

Libertarians may claim that people should be free to choose their entertainment so long as it does no harm to their fellow citizens. The problem with slots, as with all gambling, is that it does exact a price from all, especially from those least able to pay it.

I hope the people of Maryland will reject this attempt at harlotry, the allure of the slut slots, and send a message to O’Malley: some of us may be poor, but we are not stupid.

John McCain rightly chided Hillary for trying to get some pork for upstate New York. In this case, an earmark for a museum in Sullivan Country that commemorates the Woodstock festival and hippiedom in general. The proponents of the museum are making the usual arguments that pork recipients do: we need this for economic well-being.

In a front-page article in today’s WaPo, we learn how benign this federal pork really is. It isn’t a “hippie museum,” you see. First, the basics, and you already know this music: Democrats propose waste; Republicans object.

OK, except when Republicans also bellied up to the trough, which helped explain last year’s election result. But the Donks are better at it, it being in their political DNA. The rationale for this pork? From the WaPo:

In this rural area [Sullivan County, NY], the project is seen as crucial to the economic recovery of a region hammered by the closing of once-popular Borscht Belt tourist resorts.

But politics and pork are both constants, and this time, a hippie museum was just too much:

…the museum has become a magnet for criticism. A $1 million congressional earmark — pushed by Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D), with fellow New Yorker, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D), signing on — generated a squabble on Capitol Hill, and Republicans, led by Sen. Tom Coburn (Okla.), killed the measure with the help of a handful of Democrats.

Those who would benefit economically were quick to weigh in, and attempted to convince us that pork wasn’t pork:

“This is the farthest thing from a hippie museum that anything could be,” declared Harold Russell, a dairy farmer who is the town supervisor — and a reelection-seeking Republican — in Bethel. “I personally take a little offense to that.”

Since the speaker is identified as “a reelection-seeking Republican,” that must mean that spending my tax dollars on this waste is just dandy. I’ve nothing against the good people of Sullivan County, although my family now lives one county to the south and on the east bank of the Hudson — hardier stock, perhaps. But if a project such as this museum were really going to generate income for the county, then do what we all have to do: go get private investors who believe this, and are willing to invest.

Woodstock may have been fun; hippies are interesting. But don’t spend my tax dollars on their commemoration.

...in the mainstream media. In this instance, an interesting column by Michael Gerson, “Harry Potter’s Secret..” The thesis is that Potterworld is one of tolerance, where the “other” is treated with love and dignity.

Fair enough, given the recent outing of Headmaster Albus Dumbledore by author J.K. Rowling. Mr. Gerson notes that one of the principal themes of the Harry Potter series is tolerance, and he sees no conflict between tolerance and faith, and, in fact, sees a direct connection between faith as a cause of tolerance:

How can a book series about tolerance also be a book series about religion? This represents a misunderstanding of both tolerance and faith. For many, tolerance does not result from the absence of moral convictions but from a positive religious teaching about human dignity. Many believe — not in spite of their faith but because of it — that half-bloods, werewolves and others should be treated with kindness and fairness. Above all, believers are called to love, even at the highest cost.

Mr. Gerson doesn’t address sin, which is expected behavior from a Washington Post columnist. Tolerance seems to be among the great pantheon of liberal virtues, along with such nebulous concepts as “diversity” and “inclusiveness.” I’d be willing to bet large that folks like Michael Gerson, and J.K. Rowling, for that matter, would frown upon rebuking a sinner for his sins.

Do not misunderstand. I’m a great fan of Potterworld; love the books, and the movies. And I see in both a strong Christian undercurrent, which Mr. Gerson does as well. Most especially the notion that there is something that can, or has already, defeated death: Jesus Christ in our case. Since one might argue that Jesus Christ is pure love, then J.K. Rowling is on board with the notion that love conquers all. Including death.

I would be much more impressed with Gerson, Rowling, et.al. if they did not appear to be overly tolerant of all sorts of sinful behavior. If they could, as Christians must, in order to be faithful to Scripture, distinguish between the sinner, whom we are called to love as our brother, and the sin: which we are called on by God to hate and not allow in our presence.

Unfortunately, liberals, regardless of their claims to religious beliefs, tend to see sins through a strong filter of political bias. As opposed to all of the sins enumerated in both the Old and New Testaments; sins which believers should acknowledge are all things that God wishes us not to do. You’ve heard the term “cafeteria Catholics?” It means Catholics who cheerfully ignore inconvenient parts of their church’s dogmas.

The term cafeteria Christian could also apply to any Christians who find some verses of Scripture “inconvenient.” Sin can’t be defeated by defining it away. And, make no mistake, we are all sinners. Some of us attempt to repent, to reconcile ourselves with God. While we (mostly) fail and need to keep on trying, we should never, ever, expect anyone to be tolerant of our sin.

Just tolerant of us, and our struggle to conquer sin.

This is (almost) beyond satire. The head of the See-No-Evil International Atomic Energy Agency, one of the United Nations’ many sinkholes for our dollars, blames everyone for the Israeli bombing of a North Korean-Syrian nuclear project in Syria. The goal of the project? Hmm, let’s see if we can hazard a guess…

Here’s what the See No Evil honcho is up to, according to this WaPo story:

In an interview published yesterday, IAEA director and Nobel Peace laureate Mohamed ElBaradei expressed anger at the Syrians, Israelis and foreign intelligence agencies for not providing information about a suspected nuclear program.”We have said, ‘If any of you has the slightest information showing that there was anything linked to nuclear, we would of course be happy to investigate it,’ ” he told the French newspaper Le Monde. “Frankly, I venture to hope that before people decide to bombard and use force, they will come and see us to convey their concerns.”

ElBaradei also said an airstrike could endanger efforts to contain nuclear proliferation.

Yes, Mo. Diplomacy worked so well with Saddam. Who, of course, had no weapons of mass destruction. As for the idiotic notion that destroying a nascent nuclear program would “endanger efforts to contain nuclear proliferation,” he, and we, have only a single datum: Saddam’s nuke bombed; Saddam left with no nukes.

And, yes, Mo, we should be really, really angry with Israel. They should have come to you, hats in hand, and pleaded with you to start writing your world-famous nastigrams to the Syrians. Bad, bad Israel.

Was the bombing effective? I’d hazard a guess: bombing would be much, much more likely to end any Syrian nuke weapons program than any number of sharply worded communiques from IAEA Headquarters in Vienna. Which are promptly ignored and placed in the round file.

Perhaps we could stop wasting money on agencies of the United Nations such as the IAEA, an agency that is beyond clueless.

A little Spengler, if you please. From this sharp critique of our policy and attitude towards Turkey, Spengler pours some ice-cold reality. The current posturing of Congress as the savior of the Armenians, and the attacks on Turkish soldiers and others by Kurdish terrorists, soon to result in some Turkish cross-border nastiness in Kurdish Iraq, are, at least partly, a result of

Washington’s misguided promotion of Turkey as a model of “moderate Islam”. The abominable stupidity of American policy towards the region – I would use stronger words if I could find them – is in large measure responsible for the looming catastrophe.

Pretty strong stuff. As for the ephemeral notion that there is a “moderate Islam”:

I have never believed that such a thing as “moderate Islam” exists, any more than I believe that “moderate Christianity” exists. Either Jesus Christ died to take away the sins of the world, or he did not; if one believes that Jesus was just another preacher with a knack for parables, one quickly will be an ex-Christian. Either God dictated a final revelation to Mohammed which invalidates the corrupted scriptures of Jews and Christians, and the sign of the crescent should rise above the whole world, or he did not

This is, or should be, a mortal blow to soft-focus feel-good members of the Church of the Fluffy Bunny™ or, as some prefer to have it, “all religions are equally valid.”

Turkey is, as are so many others in that part of the world, a Frankenstein’s monster of a state. As Spengler points out, the Kurds who dominate the eastern third (Anatolia), courtesy of the murdered Armenians whom the Kurds helped usher off this mortal coil, are not Turks. They are Kurds, and would likely press, violently, to join with their Kurdish brothers across the border in Iraqi Kurdistan.

The Kurds like us. For now. They like the fact that we’ve protected them in the recent past from Saddam and his merry band of thugs. They like the fact that we’ve managed to keep the Shiites and remnants of the Baathists from causing them further harm.

My sense is that there ought to have been a Kurdish nation long ago, and now is not too late to establish one. Or, more accurately, to formally recognize that one has formed from the fiction that was Iraq. As for the Turks, well, our job is not to support them, no matter what. Our job is to ensure that they don’t threaten our national interests.

On that matter, I’d vote against the Islamists, even though the secularist Kemalists seem to hate us just as much.

From the only Baptist minister now running for president, Mike Huckabee, in his appearance this past weekend at the . Values Voters Summit (as reported by Byron York at NRO):

We ought not to see things like the world does because most of you, probably like me, grew up being tutored in Sunday school. And I don’t know about you, but I never outgrew some of that. I don’t guess I outgrew any of it. You see, I was led to believe that it was a lot better to be with David — that little shepherd boy with five smooth stones– than it was with Goliath with all his heavy armor. I was thought that it was better to be Daniel than it was a whole den full of lions because Daniel would come out better off then those lions. It went to sleep before it was all over. I was taught that it was better to be one of the three Hebrew children than it was to be the fiery flames of the furnace, because with God’s power those flames couldn’t even leave the smell of smoke on the lives and the clothes of those three Hebrew children.

I was taught to believe that it was better to be Elijah with an altar that had been soaked not once, not twice, but three times with water than it was to be 850 prophets of Ba’al screaming and yelling all day long for the fire to fall on Mount Carmel. I was led to believe that we serve a God who stood in the middle of a boat in the Sea of Galilee in the midst of a storm and said for the storm to stop and it did, or a Jesus who took mud and put it in the eyes of a blind man and he could see again. And one who could take two little fish and five biscuits and feed a crowd of 5,000 people and have enough leftovers that it would make the disciples realize that there was never an end to the supply of what our God could do when our people had faith — a savior who in fact could even go to the tomb of a dead man named Lazarus, so dead that the Scripture says he already was stinking — that’s pretty blunt, folks — (laughter) — and he made him live again.

Regardless of what we think of mixing politics with faith, Mike Huckabee reminds us that our faith should cause us to chose the humble over the exalted; to choose the weak over the powerful. At least as such things are counted here on earth.

He also reminds us that our faith works best when it is humble, and when we attempt, however imperfectly, to do the will of the God who came to live among us and who tasted death so that we might have life everlasting.

This isn’t as catchy as “lions, tigers, and bears, oh my!” but it’ll do for the kids today. A group of idiots-in-training gathered this morning in the nation’s capitol to protest, among other things according to this WaPo account, “global warming, war and sexism.”

One may get some sense of these unemployed, and likely unemployable idiots, from the Post:

The group on Independence Ave. was part of a “No Warming, No War” protest, which combined an environmental agenda with an anti-war stand.”War pollutes our democracy, sexism militarizes our bodies,” read one protester’s sign. Several protesters — including some who were eventually arrested — wore polar bear suits, a statement against global warming.

I’m reasonably smart; IQ in triple digits, spent a few years in school and quite a few out working in the real world. But I’m at sea trying to understand these statements. Having been in and working amongst military men and women for many years, I’m here to state that war is a very, very, bad thing. Except when it is necessary.

As for war “polluting” our democracy, a just and necessary war does just the opposite. It cements the bonds the keep us together as a nation. The current war in Iraq was authorized by Congress, although not through a formal declaration of war. Given that the war in Iraq was poorly planned and executed, there is now strong, and quite vocal opposition to continuing that war.

In different words, our democracy, if by that we mean free speech, debate, and a strong opposition to the Executive branch, then the war in Iraq has, if anything, strengthened our democracy, not “polluted” it. But logic doesn’t work on anyone who bleats nonsense tying global warming, war, and sexism (!) together.

Speaking of those sexist neocon polar bears (interesting Google term, don’t you think?), what, precisely, does the phrase “sexism militarizes our bodies” mean? Does this mean that women are going to become better soldiers? Isn’t this what the militant feminists pretend to want?

This is part of the headline for the continuing Bobby Jindal phenomenon. Governor-elect Jindal happens to be on Indian ethnicity. As in, South Asian Indian, not those native to the Americas. Oh, wait. Wasn’t Jindal born in the Americas? No matter; he is still painted as being a brown-skin by his political opponents, the party of slavery and the KKK.

The Washington Post, of course, would have nothing good to say about slavery and the KKK, but insists on characterizing all people who don’t happen to be White Anglo-Saxon Protestants by some sort of color, racial, religious, or previous condition of servitude tag. Hence Louisiana’s “first Indian-American governor.”

I don’t think that Louisiana has had any “American Indian” governors (most likely not), but, rest assured, any such would be referred to by the more politically correct “Native American governor.”

So what’s the gripe with a headline that focuses on Jindal’s ethnicity? Just that he did not run as an Indian, he ran as a center-right Roman Catholic Republican. One, incidentally, who is both bright (Ivy League; Rhodes scholar) and who has given honest service to the state and in Congress since he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 2004.

Honest service would be a great improvement in Louisiana, given the history of thieves, cheats, liars, and whiners who have been governor. What would be truly useful would be if the mainstream media could just get over the notion that our ethnicity, race, or religion somehow determines our destiny.

In America, it was never supposed to be that way.

Pitchfork Pat Buchanan is at it again: oversimplifying; finding villains in the wrong places. The latest broadside blames the United States for any renewed antagonism between us and Russia. As usual, Pat has grasped a central truth and then built a Potemkin village around that truth. From his article at Real Clear Politics, “Who Restarted the Cold War?”, this bit of truth:

At the Cold War’s end, the United States was given one of the great opportunities of history: to embrace Russia, largest nation on earth, as partner, friend, ally. Our mutual interests meshed almost perfectly. There was no ideological, territorial, historic or economic quarrel between us, once communist ideology was interred.

Fair enough. Even during cold war, it was reassuring to know that our principal enemies were ethnic Russians. Men who could be counted on to be ruthless and hard, but rational in their calculus of great power conflicts. That said, Pat’s also correct in the sense that the ethnic Russians who rule the new Russian Federation have always looked westward to Europe for their models of statecraft, not east or south.

In today’s world, we should have moved ever closer to the Russians, given that we face mutual enemies to Russia’s east (China), south and, most especially, to the ethnic minorities in the Federation who are Muslim. The Chechnya comes to mind here. But, of course, the drastically weakened post-Soviet Russia still has dreams of great power status, without the assets to make that happen.

We’ve seen Putin start acting like the commissars of old, turning into a good (bad actually) old-fashioned autocrat. Democracy is struggling in Russia, but isn’t quite dead. And there is little doubt that Putin’s Russia isn’t cooperating with us in our attempts to contain Iran. Seems they’ve too many rubles invested in Iran’s nuclear enterprise and other industries.

Pitchfork Pat is quick to assign blame…to us. Heading the list is our apparent crime of befriending former Soviet puppet states:

The United States began moving NATO into Eastern Europe and then into former Soviet republics. Six ex-Warsaw Pact nations are now NATO allies, as are three ex-republics of the Soviet Union. NATO expansionists have not given up on bringing Ukraine, united to Russia for centuries, or Georgia, Stalin’s birthplace, into NATO.

Well, one must assume that Buchanan waxes sentimental about Uncle Joe (Stalin) for some reason or another. Perhaps it was the slaughter of land-owning farmers (kulaks) or the show-trials. The problem with NATO expansion isn’t that it might include Ukraine or Georgia. The problem is that Russia, as led by Putin, perceives this as some threat to their sovereignty.

That’s their problem. Our problem is the question, to which reasonable folks may have different answers, “Is it in America’s national interest to have nations such as Ukraine or Georgia in NATO?” My personal answer would be that I would not have either in NATO — not because it would offend Russia, but because they are not our natural allies in the Atlantic context.

Buchanan also brings up our bombing of the Serbs, which I also felt was wrong, given the history of what had gone before in what became both Serbia and Croatia. Not that the Serbs who fought and massacred innocents were any better than the Croats and Muslims they fought against. That the Serbs were, and remain, tied to Mother Russia by ethnicity and religion could only be ignored by the great triangulator, Bill Clinton, who unilaterally declared war.

As usual, Pat is right for the wrong reasons. He’s an isolationist, and faults us for intervening anywhere in the world where there isn’t a smoking gun a la Pearl Harbor. But to worry overmuch about hurting Russia’s feelings? Sorry, Vladimir, but we won. Why not join us in our mutual struggle against militant Islam? And stop your whining. Nobody likes a sore loser.

The Washington Post is a left-leaning part of the mainstream media. Their writers, editorial and news, may be expected to be “safe” on typical lefty issues: abortion on demand; higher taxes for all; more government control and interference in our lives. All gussied up and presented as “good government” or “accountability” or some other code word for the Left’s preference for government solutions to all problems.

That said, every now and again the WaPo will surprise, and show some restraint. Also, When compared to the wretched New York Times, the Post has become one of the few MSM outlets that (usually) provides actual news that does not contain obvious editorializing.

As for the 2008 campaign for president, however, rest assured. The Post will do all in its power to show Republicans in a bad light, and Democrats in soft, soft focus.

They seem especially enamored with Hillary. She is a woman, after all. What must be difficult, in the extreme for the Posties, is to be able to show both Obamarama and Hill in a good light — when the candidates themselves are doing their level best (or crooked best in the case of Clinton) to rip each other’s throats out.

As for the Republicans, expect more stories that cast some or all of them in a bad light. Remember, this is in the “news” section. Case in point, a front page story that is not news to some of us Republicans. The headline has the virtue of being (mostly) true: Evangelicals Lukewarm Toward GOP Field.

Once again, the Posties, who seem to not realize that all Christians must evangelize as part of their faith (Matthew 28:19, also called the Great Commission), simply wish to paint all of the Republicans as being unelectable.

It may be true that some evangelicals say things such as has been attributed to James Dobson. That is, some evangelicals will supposedly support a third-party candidate if Rudy in the standard bearer.

Maybe. You can always find those who wait for the perfect nominee. Evangelicals don’t differ on this than any other interest group. Unfortunately for these lonely evangelicals, Jesus, the truly ideal candidate, is fully booked. Waiting for a candidate to pass a purity test, on virtually any issue, usually means you’ve got a long, long wait.

As for the Posties, it’s curious that the Republican candidate who is most likely to be elected, Rudy Giuliani, is painted in a “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” commentary. The Post found an evangelical who makes pandering sound like something Rudy should be doing:

“Every other candidate has been at least pandering at some level. I am not aware of a single effort [by Giuliani's campaign] to reach out to evangelicals, or Catholics for that matter.”

Bad, bad Rudy. Not pandering.

Here’s a must-read column by Spengler in the Asia Times. Concerning our “friends” the Turks, and, more generally, Iraq and the entire Middle East. There’s a lot in this column, but let’s start with the Turkish fit in response to a non-binding resolution in the U.S. House of Representatives:

News accounts link Turkey’s threat to invade northern Iraq with outrage over a resolution before the US Congress recognizing that Turkey committed genocide against its Armenian population in 1915. American diplomats are in Ankara seeking to persuade the Turks to stay on their side of the border. Why the Turks should take out their rancour at the US on the Kurds might seem anomalous until we consider that the issue of Armenian genocide has become a proxy for Turkey’s future disposition towards the Kurds. “We did not exterminate the Armenians,” Ankara says in effect, “and, by the way, we’re going to not exterminate the Kurds, too.”

As for the president’s objections, as well as those of many Republicans, this:

The sorry spectacle of an American president begging Congress not to affirm what the whole civilized world knows to be true underlines the overall stupidity of US policy towards the Middle East. It is particularly despicable for a Western nation to avert its eyes from a Muslim genocide against a Christian population.

Spengler’s solution to the whole mess? And by mess I mean not just the Turks, but the Kurds, the Sunnis, the Shiites, the Persians, etc. etc. world without end, amen:

Live and let die, I propose instead. For the past seven years I have argued that the West cannot avoid perpetual conflict in the Middle East, and, rather than seeking stability, should steer the instability towards its own ends. Washington should forget about Turkish support in Iraq, allow the Mesopotamian entity to disintegrate into its constituent parts, while helping the Kurds maintain autonomy against Iraq. That would teach the Turks to bite the hand that feeds them. A pro-Western Kurdish state would strengthen Washington’s hand throughout region, with adumbrations in Syria and Iran as well as Turkey. (emphasis added)

Live and let die. Kind of sums up what we should have done a long, long time ago. These peoples are primitive; still wed, for the most part, to tribes and clans. And to eradicating those from different tribes and clans.

Iraq is a fiction, and a bad horror story at that. As Spengler reminds us, there are sizable ethnic minorities in all of the significant “nations” in the region. And all of them are restive; anxious to join with their fellows, and national boundaries be damned. Boundaries all to often drawn by former colonial powers.

For better or worse, we’re now the custodians of this foul brew in the Middle East. I would vote for partition of Iraq, and arm all sides. Keep a significant fighting force in the region, perhaps in the new nation of Kurdistan, and hunt down would-be terrorists. With no respect for any national boundaries. We’re the big dogs; we set the boundaries.

We won’t be loved for doing this, except, perhaps, by the Kurds. On the other hand, right now we are despised by the feckless Euros who lack the stones to fight anyone, and hated with a purple passion by the jihadis in the Middle East. They’ll continue to hate us, no matter what we do. So, as Spengler wisely advises, if there’s to be wars and rumors of wars, let’s use them to our advantage.

At the very least, so that our men don’t die.

I’m what might be called pro-life, but not because of any certainty as to whether a fetus is a human person under law. I also have no firm grasp on when “ensoulment” might occur. My knowledge of biology may be weak, but it includes this: a baby in the womb, from the instant of conception, has the full genetic code to become a human person.

It’s only a matter of time, in other words, before this baby becomes a human person under law. Isn’t that an awkward term? But it’s necessary, because of the minions out there who regard a fetus as nothing more important than a hangnail. Something to be excised from the body if it is a burden to the mother.

It is true that a fetus at any stage of its pre-natal development is not a conscious, rational being. For that matter, neither is a child until he or she is well past being a teen-ager. Teens not being rational creature, as anyone who has raised one would know. Then there is also the fact that many human beings are not capable of rational thought or behavior at any age. For example, the mentally retarded or those afflicted with psychoses. Do we put these people to death because they are not full participants in our society?

No, of course not. We recognize that such persons are still human beings; still made in the image of God. And it is incumbent on us to love them as we love ourselves — they are our neighbors.

This is no less true for a baby in the womb. The baby is no less of a human being because he or she can’t communicate or do sums. He or she is a child, with DNA provided by the same creator who gave us our genetic code.

The lesson? Don’t destroy human life; in the womb; outside of it. Protect those unable to protect themselves. It is our duty as children of God.

Thus opines one Zhang Qingli, commie boss of Tibet, now under the Chinese boot since 1951. What this arrogant aparachnik is exercised about is that we dare to meet with and honor the Dalai Lama, Tibet’s spiritual leader in exile. From the New York Times, this interesting bit of wretched excess:

Tibet’s Communist Party boss, Zhang Qingli, told reporters during the congress. “We are furious,” Mr. Zhang said. “If the Dalai Lama can receive such an award, there must be no justice or good people in the world.”

A couple of labels for this idiot come to mind, but for the sake of decency I won’t use those here. Perhaps it was a translation problem? I would agree that, so long as Red China is not held accountable for the tens of millions of deaths at their hand, there is no justice in the world. And there are no good people in the communist party in China.

China is a huge, huge nation, full of hundreds of distinct cultures, ethnicities and languages, held together by the guns of the communist central government. Tibet is one of those distinct peoples, but is also the source of one of the major strands of Buddhism. And, when some Hollywood stars discovered their inner Buddha, suddenly you began to see “Free Tibet” bumper stickers on cars you just knew were driven by liberals who condemned our “Free Iraq” initiative.

The point is that Richard Gere and other celebs, having had lunch with the Dalai Lama, made Tibet’s cause an acceptable exception to the pass that communist tyrannies usually get from lefties and idiotarians. In different words, supporting Tibet’s freedom is painless, because we’re not actually ever going to go to war over it. It’s safe.

In the meantime, however, the Bushies are still not quite standing tall in the name of truth and honor. They opposed naming the Turks as having perpetrated a genocide; wouldn’t want to offend our “friends”, now, would we?

And, while the president did meet with the Dalai Lama, there were no photos or videos allowed, as they would have been for virtually all other visiting dignitaries. Can’t get the Chinese communists too worked up, now, can we?

Perhaps the communists decided to fully embrace this old saying: If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him. And if the world is watching, tell them to look away, and change the subject.

The Dalai Lama is in town, to receive a well-deserved medal. The Congressional Gold Medal is the highest civilian honor Congress can bestow, but Tibet’s occupying tyrants, the Communist Chinese, are in high dudgeon. And, according to this WaPo story, are using the occasion to do what they do best — use their leverage to check our every move in attempting to bring Iran to heel.

China is an interesting adversary. They are not yet strong enough to even contemplate a military defeat of the Anglosphere, so, for the time being, they’ll trade with us and make us dependent on them.

They’ve always taken the long view of history, and likely consider that we are famously short-sighted and will sell out for a mess of crappy toys and other cheaply-made goods.

A taste of what they ChiComs are cranky about, from the Post:

As for the Dalai Lama, the spokesman, Wang Baodong, said the embassy strongly urges the U.S. side to “stick to its commitment of recognizing Tibet as part of China and not supporting Tibetan independence,” saying the award will encourage separatist activities and further damage U.S.-China relations.

Next year, no matter what, I’m certain that President Bush and a whole lot of other Western worthies will visit Beijing for the 2008 Olympics, fawning all the while over the Chinese tyrants. They won’t especially mention or care about the Chinese rape of Tibet, the eradication of its culture, and the suppression of Tibetan Buddhism.

It’s enough to make me wish that we’d followed General Douglas MacArthur’s advice during the Korean War to push into Red China. Advice rejected out of hand by Harry Truman, who then fired the five-star general. It is interesting to speculate on what might have happened had we actually pressed into China in 1951.

My sense is that we could have achieved our objectives of destroying the North Koreans and then withdrawn back to the Korean side of the border with China. Alternately, we could have gotten engaged in that no-win land war in Asia a decade or so early…

We’ll never know. At this stage in our history, I don’t see us challenging the Chinese over Tibet. But I dearly wish that we had the sand to do so, and to call the Chinese rulers of Tibet by their proper name: tyrants.

It is not hard to find alleged libertarians who complain that we have, somehow, sacrificed essential civil liberties in our fight against terrorism and in our Iraq misadventure. I obviously now agree that the war in Iraq is a disaster, but don’t agree that we’ve given up our fundamental rights in the process.

One of the alleged rights that some people complain about is that our “right to privacy” has been fatally compromised in our zeal to win against the jihadists in Iraq and elsewhere. Sorry to reveal this, but there is no “right to privacy” per se in our Constitution.

There are rights that protect elements of our privacy, most especially the right to not self-incriminate and against unreasonable search and seizure. But those rights deal with alleged criminal offense and one’s prosecution for those offenses. And they are never absolute, nor should they be.

Anyone who believes that our right to habeas corpus (i.e. against unlawful detention) has been eroded must think they’re living in some other nation. The rights of American citizens remain steadfast; foreigners, especially those suspected of conspiring to attack us, were never guaranteed these rights in the first place.

The much maligned Patriot Act is merely a cobbling together of already existing statutes and practices. It is telling that the worst that anyone ever has to say about the act is that it allows “eavesdropping” on foreigners whose electronic communications pass through the United States. Or, one of the parties is a foreigner talking to someone in the United States.

And those who whine, very loudly, and very publicly, about how their free speech has been somehow eroded must wonder why it is that the jackbooted thugs haven’t taken them off to prison for their mass marches and other forms of (protected) speech.

Want a good example? Cindy Sheehan. I may think she’s an idiot, but would never deny her a platform. If we were truly living in a totalitarian “Bushnazi” state, why was she allowed to spout her venom, and so publicly, for so long? She, in all her moonbattery, is a poster child for free speech

It’s been said before, but it needs to be repeated: our Constitution is not a suicide pact. The vast majority of us have an unalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Those who would deprive us of those rights must be stopped — their “rights” do not trump ours.

The pain is starting to get to me, and, I pray, others who value truth. The following is taken from WorldNetDaily, and speaks volumes for the theological confusion that can come from a well-meaning man:

President George Bush has repeated his belief all religions, “whether they be Muslim, Christian, or any other religion, prays to the same God” – an assertion that caused outrage among evangelical leaders when he said it in November 2003.

Bush made the statement Friday in an interview with Al Arabiya reporter Elie Nakouzi.

Al Arabiya is Al Jazeerah’s top competitor in the Mideast.

Christians pray, of course, to a Triune God. Christ, we believe, is a separate person of that Trinity. And, of course, Jesus of Nazareth, who became the Christ, is the begotten, and only, Son of God (e.g. John 3:16). On the other hand, the Koran specifically excludes this as a possibility (e.g. Sura 112).

Fair enough; we all worship differently. Not according to Mr. Bush. The problem is also highlighted in a recent Muslim outreach effort to us infidels. This appears well-intentioned, and has been received in good faith by the usual suspects, which, sadly, include the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and the Archbishop of Canterbury.

But at least one bishop is paying attention. From the Washington Post article:

Anglican bishop Michael Nazir-Ali said, however, that the letter seems to undercut the role of Jesus by emphasizing a part of the Koran that urges non-Muslims not to “ascribe any partners unto” God. The two faiths’ understanding of the oneness of God is not the same, he told the Times of London. “One partner cannot dictate the terms on which dialogue must be conducted,” he said. “This document seems to be on the verge of doing that.”

This is realistic. We infidels must resist our normal impulse to paper over inconvenient differences between us and Islam. They’ve got their story; we’ve got ours. We do no one any favors by pretending that we are the same. We most definitely are not.

Getting back to Incurious George Bush, it is about as bad as it gets in his publicly stated nonsense that “Islam is a great religion that preaches peace ” (via WorldNetDaily). Mr. Bush went so far as to issue a tendentious moral equivalence. Again from WorldNetDaily, more words from the confused leader of the Free World:

And I believe people who murder the innocent to achieve political objectives aren’t religious people, whether they be a Christian who does that – we had a person blow up our – blow up a federal building in Oklahoma City who professed to be a Christian, but that’s not a Christian act to kill innocent people.

Yes, George. Timothy McVeigh was a bad man. But he committed his atrocity in 1995. The latest Muslim atrocity? Check your daily newspaper.

Let’s all have clarity, please. Islam, as practiced around the world, has many, many terrorists and those who enable and apologize for them. Their faith is different from ours, which is a large part of their justification for attacking us. All the soothing speeches by our leaders or bishops do not and can not change this.

Dilbert today faces one of the first problems of the Bush administration: the triumph of loyalty over competence. Harriet Miers; Alberto Gonzales. Need I say more?

Now please note, I don’t attack the Bushies from the left, but from the right. And, knowing what I know now, I’d still have voted for George Bush. Better an administration that overly rewards loyalty than one that doesn’t know the difference between the United States and the United Nations.

The House of Representatives, ever busy, has weighed in on the Armenian genocide perpetrated by Muslim Turks on Christian Armenians. I’ve zero doubt that when the Young Turks attempted to cleanse Anatolia of Armenians, their principal rallying cry was “kill the infidel.” But, words have consequences. And the truth often hurts. But it must be spoken.

This go-round, we have a typical political tussle, with the Democrats attempting to “speak truth to power.” It’s safe; we’re not going to invade Turkey, after all. It’s safe; the events being labeled happened almost a century ago.

The truth, which I’ve heard personally from eye-witnesses to the atrocities visited on the Armenians, is that it very much was an attempt at genocide. It failed, and resulted in an Armenian diaspora around the world. A diaspora which has given witness to the genocide. A genocide that most of the world has ignored.

Including, now, the Bush administration, as well as many “realists” in the foreign policy and defense establishments. Seems that to speak the truth at this late date would offend the Turks. From Dana Milbank’s column this morning, here’s a typical cri de couer:

Nor was Rep. Brad Sherman (D-Calif.) afraid to call a sultan a sultan. He spoke of a need to “speak truth to Turkey” about the 1915 situation.

All very noble on the part of the Democrats, but there was at least one hint that their motives were not pure. Again, from Rep. Sherman according to Milbank:

Sherman, arguing passionately for the label of genocide, acknowledged that the measure was “an irritant to our relationship with Turkey” but then concluded: “That’s the best reason to vote for it.”

The truth this time favors condemning the genocide, and understanding that is exactly what was attempted. If it annoys the Turks, that isn’t a bonus, but perhaps it might bring them to recognize, acknowledge, and reconcile themselves that the truth. Sherman does, however, cast a light on the purity of the Democrats on this matter.

Domestic politics aside, a question for the foreign policy “realists:” what kind of a friend is Turkey, if they become so offended about the truth that they withhold support from the United States because of a non-binding resolution in Congress?

Friends like this we don’t, or should not, need.

Fred Thompson, playing D.A. Arthur Branch on Law and Order, has moved his persona to the big-time. He’s now a serious contender for the Republican nomination, along with the three other top-tier candidates. At least Fred appeals to some conservatives of note. Here’s what Fred Barnes had to say:

First impressions are supposed to be 90 percent of politics. If that’s the case, Fred Thompson should have a decent shot at the Republican presidential nomination. The impression he created in Tuesday’s Republican debate in Detroit wasn’t that of a dominant figure or a replica of Ronald Reagan. But he came across as likable, knowledgeable on issues but not wonky, and unexcitable. So Thompson passed the test of whether he could run with the big boys – Mitt Romney, Rudy Giuliani, and John McCain – in the Republican race.

Fair enough. Thompson is also a bona fide conservative, unlike any of the others — at least if you ask some conservatives. Romney has apparently executed a sea change on abortion and gays; McCain is the co-author of over-regulating political speech through contributions; Giuliani was and has remained a social liberal.

Reasonable folks may argue that none of these things should be a bar to the Republican nomination, but there are quite a few purists out there. As an observation, Fred Thompson may be likable and more consistent on conservative values, but he comes across as being old and tired. Hardly the face to provide a fresh injection of spirit into the Republican race, or, for that matter, for the nation.

McCain is even older than Thompson, but, somehow, does not come across as a tired old man. Perhaps it was the jarring picture of Thompson’s four-year old daughter on his knee. Hey, Fred, nice granddaughter…oh, sorry…As for Mitt Romney, he is too plastic, too scripted, too Mormon.

A big however: None of these are fatal flaws. I like Fred Thompson, and would definitely vote for him is he is the nominee. Bottom line is that while my preferences are, in order, Rudy Giuliani and John McCain, I’d vote for any of the current Republicans now contending for the nomination (except Ron Paul, of course).

Heck, since Hillary is the likely Donk nominee, I might vote for the Devil — at least you know what you’re getting.

As usual, ex-Mayor Ed Koch writes with the sweet voice of reason — with a major exception. He states he is backing Hillary Clinton for president, and projects that Barack Hussein Obama will be her running mate (for what it’s worth, this is the same prediction made by ex-Mayor Guiliani). This is problematic for several reasons.

As a native New Yorker, I resent Hillary blowing into town and taking a Senate seat that should go to a New Yorker. Not to someone who was obviously using it as a launching pad for her own political career.

As for how well Hillary has done in the Senate, it depends on what we mean by “well.” She appears to have attempted to color herself as a centrist, a la the DLC. Perhaps Bill is a centrist, but Hill is not. She is a classic tax-and-spend liberal whose solution to almost any problem is to a) throw more money at it, and b) create the government bureaucracy needed to control that money.

Both a) and b) necessarily increase the costs to us taxpayers.

Are we ready for a woman and a black to head a national ticket? I’d say the answer is conditional: it depends on which woman, and which black. Neither Hillary nor Obama should be rewarded just because of the accident of their birth into a particular gender or race.

My judgment is that both Hillary and Obama are significantly to the left of the large majority of the American people. I only hope that this will become apparent to American voters, as it has become to me, before we make a huge mistake and elect either.

Eugene Robinson is one of the professional black writers who toil for the Washington Post. By “professional black writer” I mean a man who writes as a black about blacks. In short, Mr. Robinson has long been relegated to the WaPo’s ghetto, where he writes on what might euphemistically be called “urban affairs.”

Although he is way left of center, it is hard not to see the kindness and good will behind his apparent lack of understanding of how the world actually works. Today’s column is no exception. In it, he makes an impassioned plea for us to consider the economic and cultural diversity of the black community across America:

Let’s start by opening our eyes and recognizing that if there ever was a monolithic “black America” — absolutely and uniformly deprived and aggrieved, with invariant values and attitudes — there certainly isn’t one now.

That’s his thesis, and he cites a few factors to support it. But then he kind of telegraphs a major problem among blacks — they simply can’t get rid of some of that baggage. Consider this about two of the most divisive and insidious racialists in America:

Why do editors, reporters, columnists and television producers keep only two phone numbers on speed dial for use whenever any news breaks concerning a black person? Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying they shouldn’t call the Revs. Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton for comment — I like and respect both, and I value what they have to say.

Well, Eugene, perhaps the reason that guilty white liberal newsies call the “Reverend” Jackson and the should-be-incarcerated felon Sharpton is that blacks, such as you, continue to play to fool by stating that you “respect” these two race charlatons, and “value” what they have to say.

Robinson either can’t tell the difference, or doesn’t know the difference between the truth and lies. Jackson and Sharpton are professional liars, and can’t be respected, although one might “like” them as charming rogues. So, while Robinson wishes that we would all just recognize blacks as not being monolithic, he can’t, for example, write something like, “hey, I may like Jackson and Sharpton, but if I want to get the truth I’ll call [someone such as] Thomas Sowell.”

The bottom line is that blacks continue to be held hostage to what the liberal media expects of them. And, while Robinson is correct to discuss the economic and cultural diversity in the black community, he is wrong as can be when it comes to politics. Which he, himself demonstrates in his writing.

Blacks remain on the Democratic plantation, with support for a liberal Democratic candidate pretty much guaranteed with at least a 75-25 split. In the 2006 election, for example, 89 percent of the black vote went to Democrats. That’s pretty monolithic, and I’ll bet no other large racial or ethnic group comes even close to those numbers.

Mr. Robinson, I’ll vote with Martin Luther King: what a glorious day it will be when we will judge a man by his character, and not by the color of his skin.

It is not often that one sees this kind of endorsement from these kinds of men. These are, to a man, men of gravitas, of deep experience in American public life. They can not be dismissed as cranks or political hacks by any means. And they make a strong case that John McCain should be our next president.

In this unusual endorsement posted at NRO, here’s their conclusion:

…in sober consideration of what in our judgment it takes to govern the United States: the ability to parse problems correctly, to bring sound analysis to bear, to define viable strategies, to integrate resources, engage allies, and move decisively to lead our country to viable lasting solutions, we have concluded that Senator John McCain is the most qualified candidate to become our next president. We strongly endorse the candidacy of Senator McCain and as a matter of deep personal conviction, call upon all Americans to join us in that judgment.

Who are these men who have signed this? Former secretaries of state and defense, directors of central intelligence, advisers to presidents: George P. Shultz, Henry A. Kissinger, Alexander M. Haig Jr., Lawrence S. Eagleburger, James R. Schlesinger, John F. Lehman Jr., R. James Woolsey Jr., and Robert C. McFarlane.

These men might be cast as being, for the most part, from the “realist” school of foreign affairs. And they are not without their own blemishes. But, in group assembled, they make any likely cabinet assembled by a Hillary Clinton look like a bunch of amateurs and political hacks. Come to think of it, they also do this for the current Bush cabinet.

I still like Rudy Giuliani, and think he would make the best leader for our fight against terror. But I’ve no doubt that a President John McCain would serve with as much honor and distinction as it is possible to bring to this great office.

The Red Mass, while it sounds evil and full of spilled blood, is an ancient Roman Catholic tradition that dates back to 1245. From Wikipedia, it is simply a Mass that

requests guidance from the Holy Spirit for all who seek justice, and offers the opportunity to reflect on what Catholics believe is the God-given power and responsibility of all in the legal profession.

In the United States, a prominent Red Mass is held in Washington DC just prior to the beginning of the Supreme Court’s term (“first Monday in October”). That six Supremes attended, one of whom (Breyer) is Jewish, has some folks knickers in a twist.

One twistee is Marci Hamilton, who has written a rather whiny essay about the topic. While I’ve got all sorts of reservations about something called a “Red Mass”, not to mention the theology that assumes one may ask the Holy Spirit’s blessings only in a special and pompous ceremony, I’ve zero problem with any public official, appointed or elected, attending with the hopes of being blessed by God.

But, for those like Marci Hamilton, if she doesn’t agree with the Catholic Church’s positions on abortion, euthanasia, or, likely, a lot of other things, well, it’s a sin. No, she doesn’t come right out and say this. She uses innuendo and a backdoor approach. Some extracts:

There is good reason to question the judgment of the Justices who attended – Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Scalia, Kennedy, and Alito, who are Catholic, and Justice Breyer, who is Jewish. Attending the Red Mass is a legislative, executive, and Court tradition, but it is hardly a mandatory event, as the absence of Justices Stevens, Ginsburg, and Souter attest. [sounds like she thinks it should be mandatory for them not to attend]

It is one thing for elected representatives, who are inherently accountable to their constituents and the larger public good, to attend; quite a different matter when the independent judiciary does so. [checks and balances, dear Marci -- Justices are appointed but also may be impeached. It's hard to see why any branch of government should be treated differently in this free exercise of religious liberty.]

No one is asking the Justices to abandon their faith – least of all myself. [except when that faith involves inconvenient truths for the abortion-on-demand lobby] Nor am I asking the Justices to be anywhere near as publicly open and candid about the relationship between their faith and their job as was President Kennedy, though it might be illuminating if they were. [Sigh, we all miss Camelot. Too bad Saint Jack didn't confess his sins of serial adultery...] What I am asking them to do is provide the public with greater reassurance that they view their judicial obligations as distinct from their religious obligations. Taking a pass on the Red Mass might well have done just that.

No, she doesn’t care if the “public” has “greater reassurance.” She wants to deny the free exercise of religious liberty to those whose faith requires some heavy lifting. As does the Roman Catholic faith. And, it is worth repeating: It’s hard to see why any branch of government should be treated differently in this free exercise of religious liberty.

Amendment XII to the Constitution ends with this:

no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.

That seems straightforward. Amendment XXII is also direct and to the point:

No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice.

All of this is to burst the bubble, however gently, of those who salivate over a Hill and Bill ticket.

It would never come to pass, of course — both Hill and Bill are far too devious and clever to make their intentions that obvious. But, given that the Democrats are somewhat in thrall to trial lawyers, I wouldn’t put it past some Donk wienies to try to lawyer their way around these two amendments.

After all, it depends on what “no” means.

Obama has just had a flash — “Iraqis don’t distinguish” between private security contractors and U.S. troops. From Fox News, here’s the epiphany from Barack Hussein Obama:

White House hopeful Barack Obama on Saturday said private security contractors in Iraq are raising the risk for U.S. troops because Iraqis don’t distinguish between the forces.

You don’t say.  Iraqis who intend to kill the infidels don’t especially care, and why would they? We’re all alike to them, the racist pigs. Oh, sorry, those aren’t kosher, er, halal, or whatever.

The only obvious reason for Obama and the rest of the Left swarm to attack Blackwater is, well, because they can. They can use Blackwater as a wedge issue, forcing us to surrender. That the Iraqis attempting to kill Americans don’t distinguish between various groups of infidels is hardly news, and one would have to be stupid or a lying bastard to make that claim. Obama isn’t stupid.

Obama also weighs in, again, best interpretation, in ignorance:

He also criticized the pay disparity between soldiers and private contractors, saying the contractors get paid nine times as much as those in uniform. “You’ve got young men and women signing up to serve, willing to spill blood for America. How could they be treated less well than private contractors?

Now, again, best interpretation, perhaps Obama doesn’t realize that the cost per man-year for Blackwater must, of necessity, include all of the logistical tail (training, housing, clothing, arms, equipment, chow, supplies such as gasoline, ammo, etc. etc.). Things that the typical soldier, marine, or airman also needs, but which are not included in their pay.

If the entire cost of training and all the rest were included, the cost per man-year would likely look a lot closer. And, bear in mind, most of Blackwater’s in-theater men are quite senior relative to the typical snuffy.

Perhaps Obama is stupid.

Mario Cuomo, one of those guys who, when he speaks out in public, makes you say to yourself, “Gosh, I didn’t know he was still alive.”

Well, former governor of New York Super Mario is still alive, still to the left of almost everyone else, and has weighed in with some advice for Democratic presidential candidates. From his op-ed in today’s Check the Facts Three Times New York Times:

The Democrats should go still further and announce that no money will be appropriated for any military action against another nation without a proper declaration of war. And this should be the position of the Democratic presidential candidates as well. How else can they make the case that they are less likely than President Bush to wage dangerous, improvident wars?

This is actually a fair point. Although it will make it rather difficult for the left to continue their favorite use of our military: “nation building.” Which, as applied by the feckless Clinton administration, was actually a misuse of our armed forces. Worse, when things got dicey (“Black Hawk Down”), the Clintonistas tucked tail and ran.

This is the reason Bill Clinton should be serving time in Leavenworth, not for getting interns to have non-sex sex in the West Wing. But Cuomo and his ilk would likely not consider “nation building” to be a misuse of our military, even though it is akin to sending the Peace Corps to fight the Taliban.

Now, to the meat of the issue: how do we declare war on a multi-national terrorist conspiracy? One that includes Saudi and other Arab nationalities predominantly, but which also includes Iranians, Palestinians, British, Dutch, Germans, Americans, Indians, Chechins — a veritable United Nations of Terror.

The point being that in order for us to actually fight the war on terror, as opposed to talking them to death, we need our military to be able to strike at trans-national targets. An Afghanistan, run by a terrorist group, is the exception.

In a rational world, if we wished to find nations that supported terror, it wouldn’t be hard to identify the usual suspects — Iran, Saudi Arabia, Syria come readily to mind. But somehow I don’t see anyone rushing to declare war on any of them anytime soon. Just not clean enough for most Democrats, or for Republicans who’ve been bought by big oil (starting with the Bush family…).

As for the past, Cuomo has that covered with typical left wing 20-20 hindsight. Yes, Iraq has been a failure, and, no, we did not formally declare war on Saddam’s Iraq.

Would Congress have gone along with a declaration of war had one been put before them in 2002? Recall, that is when most Democrats supported toppling the Saddam regime, although they were acting on faulty intel. No, MoveOn, not lies. Bad intel, thanks to Clinton’s CIA director George Tenet, who Bush should have fired but did not.

But did Saddam’s apparent WMD program rise to the level of a formal casus belli? We’ll never know, because the question was not asked. And, in retrospect, perhaps it is a good idea to put things in such black and white terms for the simpletons in Congress who seem only to understand pork in its many flavors.

Barack Hussein Obama (I’ll bet he just hates the use of his middle name) is right on at least one score: the image of patriotism that is meant to be conveyed by the all-but-universal display of an American flag. On the lapel, on your car, in front of your house, wherever. A 24/7 display that says: I’m an American!

Of course, such displays would be much more meaningful in another country. After all, for those of us who speak English and live here, the presumption is that we are Americans. But, hey, your results may vary, especially if you wear your American flag lapel pin in some parts of the world.

Now comes a mini-flap involving Obama. From the AP:

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama says he doesn’t wear an American flag lapel pin because it has become a substitute for “true patriotism” since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Sadly, I must agree with Obama. A flag pin, if considered mandatory to express one’s love of country, loses all meaning. Flags are powerful symbols, and, in the right context, are things that we go into battle to defend. But the mere wearing of a pin is, as Obama implies, meaningless by itself.

What counts is what you say and do. Especially the latter. For a left-leaning politico like Obama, his protestations are just a little hollow. Obama is a cut-and-run, surrender while we’re on the way out Democrat. Oh, but, just in case you question his manhood, he’s ready to drop the big one on Pakistan. This is the very kind of braggadocio that the Democrats, sometimes with good cause, accuse the Bushies of.

Obama is right about the wearing of a flag pin, however. It is no substitute for victory or for actual support of our troops in the field.