Welcome First-Timers from Dummocrats

Glad you came; hope you look around while here. There's a topical list of posts on the right side-bar, and the last few posts are about:

• The two-year, Incredible, anniversary of the Iraq invasion


• Torturing Terri Schiavo


• Cuban healthcare is deadly


• Iraq as seen by green grunts


• Canada may be glorious, but it ain't free

Hope you return soon.

Anniversary

Today is the second anniversary of the beginning of the second Iraq war. I grieve anew for our losses, and give thanks for the liberation initiated or established "In my Name."

Today also marks two years of address-book culling. Not everyone with whom I disagreed became a former friend, but everyone lacking citations or syllogism did. Victor Davis Hanson's weekly NRO piece perfectly characterizes the latter sort:

The flood of the Hitler similes is also a sign of the extremism of the times. If there was an era when the extreme Right was more likely to slander a liberal as a communist than a leftist was to smear a conservative as a fascist, those days are long past. True, Bill Clinton brought the deductive haters out of the woodwork, but for all their cruel caricature, few compared him to a mass-murdering Mao or Stalin for his embrace of tax hikes and more government. “Slick Willie” was not quite “Adolf Hitler” or “Joseph Stalin.”

But something has gone terribly wrong with a mainstream Left that tolerates a climate where the next logical slur easily devolves into Hitlerian invective. The problem is not just the usual excesses of pundits and celebrities (e.g., Jonathan Chait’s embarrassing rant in the New Republic on why “I hate George W. Bush” or Garrison Keillor’s infantile slurs about Bush’s Republicans: “brown shirts in pinstripes”), but also supposedly responsible officials of the opposition such as former Sen. John Glenn, who said of the Bush agenda: “It’s the old Hitler business.”

Thus, if former Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore breezily castigates Bush’s Internet supporters as “digital brownshirts”; if current Democratic-party chairman Howard Dean says publicly, “I hate the Republicans and everything they stand for" — or, “This is a struggle of good and evil. And we're the good"; or if NAACP chairman Julian Bond screams of the Bush administration that “Their idea of equal rights is the American flag and the Confederate swastika flying side by side,” the bar of public dissent has so fallen that it is easy to descend a tad closer to the bottom to compare a horrific killer to an American president.

Is there a danger to all this? Plenty. The slander not only brings a president down to the level of an evil murderer, but — as worried Jewish leaders have pointed out — elevates the architect of genocide to the level of an American president. Do the ghosts of six million that were incinerated — or, for that matter, the tens of millions who were killed to promote or stop Hitler’s madness — count for so little that they can be so promiscuously induced when one wishes to object to stopping the filibuster of senatorial nominations or to ignore the objection of Europeans in removing the fascistic Saddam Hussein?

Doubtlessly some of my former friends are protesting today, endlessly braying as if a devotional -- a metaphor they would reject -- long-discredited tallies of civilian casualties. Group droning apparently blocks comprehension of the central distinction of our era--that our enemies deliberately target unarmed civilians while America spends billions and sacrifices soldiers to avoid such collateral casualties. Rather than repeating nonsense, the demonstrators should heed Glenn Reynolds' advice:

[A] proper way of marking the date would be with a mass apology to the Iraqi people, and to George W. Bush, for taking the wrong side at a crucial moment in history.

Sackcloth, ashes, and signs reading: WE WERE WRONG, SORRY WE TRIED TO BLOCK ARAB DEMOCRACY, and WRONG ABOUT AFGHANISTAN, WRONG ABOUT IRAQ -- DON'T LISTEN TO US NEXT TIME would be appropriate.

I'm not expecting that.

Nor am I expecting my address book to regain its former bulk.

I observed the occasion without sackcloth or sign, by watching "The Incredibles," just out on DVD. It's a great and entertaining film. But the movie's more profound than most cartoons. I suggest The Incredibles is a metaphor for the Bush Doctrine: The father-knows-best Mr. Incredible/Bob is a neo-con, ever convinced that America can do good in the world. His wife Helen/Elastigirl is a paleo-con: she craves the normalcy of isolationism. Yet--when her husband's in jeopardy--Helen becomes (reluctantly) convinced that offense is America's best defense. Once persuaded, Elastigirl warns her children that--unlike the cartoon evil on TV--these bad guys will give no quarter, even to the extent of killing children. The kids, thus, symbolize the (heretofore immature) American people forced by circumstances beyond their control to grow up, to recognize the threat of global terror and America's responsibility to be pro-active in the fight against evil. Even the movie bad guy fits in. He's a delusional, politically correct, United Nations; he wants everyone to be a "superpower" (the bomb or a UN veto) so that no one is. When the kids confront the bad guy, they're amazed at their "superpower" and thrilled, yet awed, by the "good" their efforts secure.

Historically, America has--not always; sometimes inconsistently--strived for the good. At present, our efforts seem to be working. I hope the left recognizes and repents, discerning our success in the GWOT and ending their infantile demonizing of President Bush. But, failing that, I hope they rent "The Incredibles."

More:

Which Incredibles character are you?

(via Clancy)

First, and Last, Post on Terri

Whatever one's views on euthanasia, why should pushing a pillow on Terri Schiavo's head be classed as homicide, when starving her to death over two weeks isn't? What can be said for systems of morals and jurisprudence where two weeks of torture is Constitutional but executing murderers who happen to be 17 years old isn't?

More:

From the Salt Lake City Tribune, under the headline "Five stranded elk shot; they faced slow starvation":

[Game manager Bill] Bates said it was apparent the surviving animals on the 25- to 30-foot-wide cliff were in trouble. Would-be rescuers returned Thursday with explosives, hoping to "blast a path for them to get back up," Bates said. "But there was just way too much to deal with." . .

After consulting with acting DWR director Miles Moretti, the five living bulls were shot to avoid a slow death from starvation. Bates said the condition of the animals was too poor to salvage the meat.

(via The Corner)

Status Check

Blogger's been acting up all week, either losing or duplicating posts. I've chosen the latter. Bear with me while I yell at my (free) service provider.

Transit Isn't Mass

P.J. O'Rourke in the WSJ on mass transit:

There are just two problems with mass transit. Nobody uses it, and it costs like hell. Only 4% of Americans take public transportation to work. Even in cities they don't do it. Less than 25% of commuters in the New York metropolitan area use public transportation. Elsewhere it's far less--9.5% in San Francisco-Oakland-San Jose, 1.8% in Dallas-Fort Worth. As for total travel in urban parts of America--all the comings and goings for work, school, shopping, etc.--1.7 % of those trips are made on mass transit.

Then there is the cost, which is--obviously--$52 billion. Less obviously, there's all the money spent locally keeping local mass transit systems operating. The Heritage Foundation says, "There isn't a single light rail transit system in America in which fares paid by the passengers cover the cost of their own rides."

Read it all--"for the children."

(via Right Wing News)

No Wonder It's Free

Liberals, the MSN and even small-town papers defend communist Cuba and Castro by reciting "but the people have free healthcare!" As does the Cuban government, buttressed by mortality statistics from the UN's annual rankings. I've always answered with this hypothetical: "You've just been diagnosed with cancer, and must choose medical treatment in one of two places: 1) the best hospital in Cuba; or 2) the Mayo Clinic. Do you buy an airline ticket to Havana or Rochester, Minnesota?"

A more scientific response is available, thanks to Val Prieto at Babalublog, who notes "none of these Free healthcare! cheerleaders have ever been to a Cuban hospital. They've never been to a Cuban clinic. Hospitals and clinics serving the average Cuban." Prieto translates a March 6th article in Gentunio, which includes photos inside the Clínico Quirúrgico in Havana. According to Captain Ed, Castro himself bragged about the facility:

Now, the old hospital has turned into one of the most modern and best ones in the capital. I should explain that this hospital provided services to a large number of people who live at the other side of the Almendares River. . . Not only did the number of beds increase, with blocks and civil construction spreading throughout almost 30,000 square meters of construction, but the power unit is totally new-boilers, electric power generators, etc.

The actual quality and reality on the ground is horrific: cockroaches on swarming the floor of the emergency room, unfinished ceilings, dirt floors, and a "shocking" electrical system. Look at the pictures (more here), and Prieto's conclusion:

This is a hospital strictly for the Cuban people. Foreigners are treated quite differently and their facilities are state of the art and, at least, sanitary. But thats the dichotomy of Cuba. fidel castro's revoution was for the people, the very same people that are now substandard in the eyes of their government.

My family is from a very small town in Oriente province. We were not rich. We were not middle class. Ours was a blue collar family in Cuba and whenever someone needed medical attention, they got it. Babies were born, broken arms were set, appendixes were removed, surgeries were performed. In other words, they had access to pretty darn good medical attention before castro fixed the healthcare system.

Yeah, fidel castro and his revolution built clinics and hospitals and all of his people have access to "medical care." Yet these photos are an example of it. The revolution's healthcare may be free, but it surely isn't proper.

Visiting NGOs, Western doctors and tourists are funneled to Potemkin Village facilities. Meanwhile, ordinary Cubans appear neither nourished nor healthy. And Fidel's mortality numbers, repeated by UNESCO, are an officially-sanctioned work of fiction. I agree with Whither the Fool: "what is hampering Cuba is Communism. The Left doesn’t get that, and never will."

Clinton forced Elian Gonzalez back to the Marxist healthcare hellhole that repeatedly misdiagnosed his mother, resulting in two miscarriages. If the Clínico Quirúrgico is Cuba's best, anyone free to choose will book a flight to Minnesota. Cubans would too, though they can't go non-stop. Their trip begins on a rubber raft.

(via The Captain's Quarters)

Iraq Update--And Grunt's Eye View

If you haven't already, surf over to Instapundit's post that begins with a quote from Strategy Page plus three related emails. Some highlights:

• Iraqi popular opinion has turned against terrorism in a big way. Apparently the key event was the revelation that Osama bin Laden had appointed Abu Musab al Zarqawi as "Emir" (leader) of al Qaeda efforts in Iraq and commanded him to go forth and kill big-time. But as suicide bombing attacks increasingly failed to reach American targets, and killed Iraqis instead, it appeared that a Saudi (bin Laden) was telling a Jordanian (Zarqawi) to kill Iraqis. This attitude never made headlines, but it slowly spread among Sunni Arab Iraqis over the last year.



• [A Major General just home from Iraq] showed a graph of attacks in Sadr City by month. Last Aug-Sep they were getting up to 160 attacks per week. During the last three months, the graph had flatlined at below 5 to zero per week.
  
  His big point was not that they were "winning battles" to do this but that cleaning the place up, electricity, sewage, water were the key factors. He said yes they fought but after they started delivering services that the Iraqis in Sadr City had never had, the terrorist recruiting of 15 and 16 year olds came up empty.



• [When a trooper's US leave was over,] at the Atlanta airport when [his wife] was seeing him off, people would clap as they walked down the concourse -- just like in the Budwiser commercial.



• I was sitting at a SW Airlines gate near the main terminal when I heard loud, extended clapping further down the gateway. I stood up and looked in that direction. In a few seconds, a group of 50 or 60 Army men in fatigues turned the corner and passed all of us on the way to the terminal. Everyone in the gateway passage either stopped or stood and clapped as they passed.

Read the Professor's whole post.

NPR to Hire Jayson Blair?

National Public Radio has fired a reporter whose story was accurate. Some say NPR was merely assuaging an important special interest. Mickey Kaus recommends an all-hands staff meeting chaired by a stuffed moose.

I say firing a journalist for reporting the truth is evidence the others at NPR are liars.

(via Instapundit)

QOTW

From the most trusted Iraq-and-Afghanistan-news-source, Arthur Chrenkoff:

Won't the left and the Islamofascists around the world have fun with this one: a Jeeeewwww in charge of the World Bank. And not just any Jeeeewwww, but a neo-con. . . And with Wolfowitz replacing Wolfensohn, who will be the first one to make a crack that only wolves need to apply?

Canadian Gag

Canadians are proud of their culture and government, and take particular delight in touting their advantages in comparison with America:

These days, Canadian publications are chockablock with surveys showing that Canadians see themselves as something akin to a superior race. . . This strain of nails-on-the-blackboard nationalism is most evident in the recent bestseller Fire and Ice, an Americans-are-from-Mars, Canadians-are-from-Venus study of the two countries' values by Canadian sociologist Michael Adams. Based on three head-to-head values surveys done over a decade, it shows Americans coming up short on matters from militarism to materialism. This is hardly news. But Adams pushes his luck, giving conventional wisdom a twirl by advancing that it is the Americans who are actually the slavish followers of an established order, while Canadians are rugged individualists and autonomous free thinkers.

Near the top of any list of Canadian accomplishments is their "Charter of Rights and Liberties," similar -- superior say Canadians -- to our Bill of Rights. Unfortunately, any serious look at freedom of speech reveals that -- except for Canadian Islamics -- Canada actually criminalizes the free thinking Michael Adams claims to revere.

In America, First Amendment protections for speech and press are just short of absolute:

Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble.

Canada's parallel provision (Fundamental Freedom 2), appears similar on its face:

Everyone has the following fundamental freedoms:

a) freedom of conscience and religion;

b) freedom of thought, belief, opinion and expression, including freedom of the press and other media of communication;

c) freedom of peaceful assembly; and

d) freedom of association.

However when read together with the Charter's First Article, the loophole's larger than the law:

The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.

This limitation goes well beyond censoring "the sailing date of troopships," and subordinates the rights of the Canadian public to the perceived needs of the government. Compare Ford v. Quebec, [1988] 2 S.C.R. 712, with R v. Oakes, [1986] 1 S.C.R. 103.

The Canadian government has invoked this so-called "notwithstanding clause" to justify restrictions on speech that would be unconstitutional in the United States, most notoriously when Quebec mandated that signs outside any commercial premises be predominantly in French. More recently, Canada used the same authority to outlaw hate speech, defined to cover "advocat[ing] or promot[ing] genocide" or "communicating statements, other than in private conversation, [that] wilfully promotes hatred against any identifiable group." Further, Canada's established a "Tribunal" system, allowing judges to interrogate a suspect's state of mind and thought processes.

Such fuzzy standards produce some seemingly outrageous censorship, plus a pile of inconsistent rulings that -- because they blur the border of criminality -- undoubtedly "chill" free speech in Canada. A few examples:

• R. v. Keegstra, [1990] 3 S.C.R. 697 and [1996] 1 S.C.R. 458, upholding the conviction of an Alberta school-teacher who had been communicating anti-Semitic statements to his students in the classroom.



• Ross v. New Brunswick School District No. 15, [1996] 1 S.C.R. 825, upholding an 18 month suspension (but not firing) of an New Brunswick school- teacher for communicating anti-Semitic statements to his students in the classroom.



• R. v. Zundel, [1992] 2 S.C.R. 731, 732, freeing a holocaust denier because he subjectively believed his publication to be true, even though "the majority regards [them] as wrong or false."



• An Ontario tribunal upheld the firing of a teacher who participated in conferences held by white supremacist and anti-Semitic groups, despite the fact that "he never expressed racist views in the classroom or discriminated against any student."



• Another tribunal convicted a Saskatchewan man for his advertisement in the local paper depicting two stick figures holding hands surrounded by a circle with a slash through it, despite his unchallenged defense that he believed, and was repeating, the Bible's condemnation of homosexuality. The magistrate held that while the symbol alone "may not itself communicate hate, when combined with the passages from the Bible, the board finds the advertisement would expose or tend to expose homosexuals to hatred or ridicule."



• This week, the Halton, Ontario police declined to prosecute a controversial Muslim leader who insisted, on a television talk show, that all adult Israelis are "legitimate targets" for Palestinian terrorists:

  Investigators with Region police said that while the comments by Dr. Mohamed Elmasry "were described by many as [a] hate crime," they did not meet the legal definition.
  
  "Although the comments would be considered distasteful to many, in this context they do not constitute a criminal offence," police said in a news release. "The comments were made during a free-flowing discussion between subject-matter experts who were encouraged to express their opinions openly on a topic of significant public interest."

This odious and bizarre jurisprudence demonstrates that ill-defined powers to maintain public order invariably target those without political power, whether or not they're a numerical minority. Still, most Canadians support criminalizing hate crimes. Yet a Canadian MP who said " Damn Americans ... I hate those bastards" and, on a TV talk show, stomped on a George Bush doll was never prosecuted (though expelled from the Liberal Party). And, Canadians have booed American children at peewee hockey games. All in the spirit of debate and fun, I'm sure.

In sum, when traveling in Canada -- or, if by some chance you're Canadian -- freeze a smile on your face and don't even think critical thoughts, much less say 'um. Unless, of course, you're bashing Americans.

More:

According to Sigmund Carl and Alfred via Maxed Out Mama:

[T]oday, on NPR (I heard it this AM) Carolyn Parrish was the voice of the 'reasonable' opposition to US policy. For real.

On taxpayer funded NPR.

More ammunition to de-fund this Alice-in-Wonderland programming. Don't forget to support President Bush's proposal to terminate the Public Telecommunications Facilities Planning and Construction program, which uses taxpayer money to give public broadcasting stations shinny new equipment every few years.

Blackberry Turns Green

Research in Motion (RIM), makers of the indispensable and ubiquitous Blackberry, settled a four-year long patent disbute with Virginia's NTP for $ 450 million. NTP's prior patents covered, inter alia, an "Electronic mail system with RF communications to mobile processors."

According to James Hurst, a patent litigator at Winston & Strawn LLP in Chicago, "In terms of patent settlements with a lump sum payment, this is as big as I have ever heard of." Still, the news that NTP in return agreed to license its patents without any on-going royalty caused RIM's stock to jump $12.56 to $79.65, adding $2-billion to the company's market capitalization.

The settlement came after a 2003 Virginia federal district court ruling that Blackberry had infringed several patents, and awarded NTP $54 million in damages plus an 8.6 percent royalty on all the revenue from U.S. Blackberry sales. Last December, the Federal Circuit upheld most of the patent infringement claims, sending the case back to the lower court for limited reconsideration. The parties soon jointly will file to end the litigation.

NTP's victorious counsel is Jim Wallace of my law firm. I'm thrilled--but that's all I'm allowed to say.

"One Man, One Vote"--California Style

On Monday, a California trial judge upheld gay marriage (In re Marriage Cases decision, in .pdf, here). Judge Richard Kramer of San Francisco County upheld the validity of thousands of marriages performed by the SF Mayor in celebration of a similar holding 3,000 miles away in Massachusetts. Judge Kramer's rationale is a minor variation on Dr. Strangelove--decisions are too important to be left to the people:

At issue were a 1977 law that defined marriage as "a personal relation arising out of a civil contract between a man and a woman," and a voter-approved measure in 2000 that amended the law to say more explicitly: "Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California."

According to the opinion, the equal protection guarantee (Art. I, Sec. 7(a)) of the state Constitution (dating from 1879) applies to sexual preference and thus trumps the legislature (Section 300) and the voters (Section 308.5)). Opponents of gay marriage said they had expected the result in a San Francisco courthouse, but were optimistic the decision would be overturned on appeal. So is UCLA Law teacher Eugene Volokh: "Given my sense of the California Supreme Court's moderately conservative (generally speaking) jurisprudential philosophy, I think the court is likely to hold that the opposite-sex-only requirement is indeed constitutional."

Like earlier rulings in New York and Massachusetts, the decision is a fraud, substituting a Judge's politics for the will of the voters and their elected representatives. It also warps Constitutional and statutory provisions into unrecognizable vessels large enough to hold the flavor of the month, every month, in perpetuity. Because California's people, and their representatives, explicitly prohibited gay marriage a few years ago, the court had to reach back and claim the 126 year old Constitution foresaw and forbade statutory heterosexual qualifications for marriage today. Were there a federal question, I have no doubt Justice Kennedy would declare the three opinions evidence of "the evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society," Roper v. Simmons, Slip Op. at 6 (Mar. 1, 2005), and federalize same-sex marriage.

As NRO's John Derbyshire wrote last year:

With recent events in Massachusetts and California, homosexual marriage — an idea that seems not to have occurred to anyone at all in the entire span of human history until about five years ago — is now a daily topic in our newspapers and TV programs.

Gary at Right Pundit says:

[B]efore the last decade or two of the 20th century, not one civilization in the history of the world that I am aware of recognized homosexual couples as a family. Yes, some civilizations tolerated and even accepted homosexual lifestyles more than others.

Yet suddenly, judicially-imposed gay weddings are the left's latest sine qua non; a litmus test of liberalism.

What's the rush? Surely five years isn't sufficient to radically change an institution as old as civilization itself. Shouldn't we consider the potential consequences, especially unintended consequences? After all, an unintended consequence of the 60s-70s sexual revolution increased the percentage of one-parent families four-fold. What might further tinkering produce?

Most importantly, debate and consideration of such issues is exactly what the democratic process does best. Marriage is primarily a state issue (with an important exception). The state legislature drafts bills after testimony, hearings and studies. Bills become law when passed by a majority of the legislature (and in California, by direct referenda). That's democracy. That's "pro-choice" as well. So why are judges left, lefter and leftyist hostile to one man, one vote? Judge Kramer's ruling disenfranchises the entire California electorate (over 13 million Californians voted last November). Rather than "count every vote," the San Francisco Judge took the role of "one man" then counted his own "one vote."

Sign me on to Kevin's one line conclusion on Wizbang: "Judicial activism - it's whats for dinner..."

(via Right Pundit)

Democracy Update

The Cedar Revolution is swelling, says the ever-excellent Claudia Rosset (she exposed the UN's Oil-for-Food fraud), writing from Beirut for the NY Sun:

Following the American-led overthrow of Saddam Hussein and the massive Iraqi election turnout this past January, the balance is shifting in the Arab world. In Lebanon, which has emerged over the past month as the new frontline of change, Hariri's death - which many blame on Syria - was not the prime cause. It was more, as one opposition member puts it, "the drop of water that finally burst the dam." The truth these protesters are after goes well beyond finding out who, precisely, set up the bomb blast that in killing Hariri blew out windows and shut down buildings still under repair hundreds of yards from the crater.

After a generation spent as a ward of totalitarian Syria, after a long string of murders and disappearances that continued even after the Civil War ended in 1990, after years in which the Baathist apparatus of Syria has wound its way deep into Lebanese politics and cast a long shadow over daily life, many Lebanese want the truth that comes with living in a free society.

"Something magnificent is being done in Lebanon. It is being reborn," says parliamentarian Muhammad Kabbani, a member of the late Hariri's party, and one of more than 10,000 protesters who gathered in Beirut's Martyrs' Square this past Saturday to hold up red, white, and green placards to make a huge, human Lebanese flag. One of the organizers of the protest, Alain Lahoud - an anti-Syrian cousin of the country's pro-Syrian president - provides a tour of the demonstrators' graffiti, including a trash can on which someone has scrawled the name of the head the Syrian intelligence service in Lebanon, inviting him to deposit himself within. "They have broken the wall of fear," says Mr. Lahoud "They are tasting freedom."

The pro-democracy rally was far larger than the Syrian/Hizbollah thug convention last week. And Publius Pundit says, "The protests carried into last night, with the entire camp holding a candlelight vigil." National Review Online posted Walid Phares's round-up of the protests and probable reactions.

NRO also has several photos of the crowd, as does Publius Pundit (scroll down). The Lebanon Daily Star shows the demonstrators forming a human version of the Lebanese flag:


Cedar Power (click to enlarge)

Even more promising, the opposition's already locked up the "babe vote."


Freedom (click to enlarge)


Choice (click to enlarge)

Though most U.S. lefties remain enveloped in Bush-hatred, the AP confirms the opposition is inspired by America:

A line of people in the square carried a 100-yard-long white-and-red Lebanese flag with the distinct green cedar tree in the middle, shaking it up and down and shouting, "Syria out."

Protesters chanted "Truth, freedom, national unity!" or "We want only the Lebanese army in Lebanon!"

"Syria out, no half measures," read a banner, borrowing from President Bush's description of Damascus' gradual withdrawal from this country of 3.5 million.

And support for Bush's policies is mushrooming--even in the Arab world, says Youssef Ibrahim in Sunday's WaPo:

Listen to the conversations in the cafes on the edge of the creek that runs through this Persian Gulf city, and it is hard to believe that the George W. Bush being praised by Arab diners is the same George W. Bush who has been widely excoriated in these parts ever since he took office.

Yet the balmy breeze blowing along the creek carries murmurs of approval for the devoutly Christian U.S. president, whose persistent calls for democracy in the Middle East are looking less like preaching and more like timely encouragement.

Nowadays, intellectuals, businessmen and working-class people alike can be caught lauding Bush's hard-edged posture on democracy and cheering his handling of Arab rulers who are U.S. allies. Many also admire Bush's unvarnished threats against Syria should it fail to pull its soldiers and spies out of Lebanon before the elections there next month -- a warning the United Nations reinforced last week with immediate effects. For Bush, it is not quite a lovefest but a celebration nonetheless.

"His talk about democracy is good," an Egyptian-born woman was telling companions at the Fatafeet (or "Crumbs") restaurant the other night, exuberant enough for her voice to carry to neighboring tables. "He keeps hitting this nail. That's good, by God, isn't it?" At another table, a Lebanese man was waxing enthusiastic over Bush's blunt and irreverent manner toward Arab autocrats. "It is good to light a fire under their feet," he said.

From Casablanca to Kuwait City, the writings of newspaper columnists and the chatter of pundits on Arabic language satellite television suggest a change in climate for advocates of human rights, constitutional reforms, business transparency, women's rights and limits on power. And while developments differ vastly from country to country, their common feature is a lifting -- albeit a tentative one -- of the fear that has for decades constricted the Arab mind.

Remember this when a dyspeptic Democrat insists he knows what's best for Arabs. They also know what's best for Americans, implemented through a far-reaching and expensive nanny state. Ronald Reagan neatly summarized the Democrats' approach on domestic issues:

If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.

According to Michael Barone:

The Democrats' problem is that they have proceeded for years with a goal of moving America some distance toward a Western European welfare state. Just how far, they have not had to decide. But . . . Europe [is] a failing model: high unemployment, stalled economies and the welfare state in retreat. . . For now, Democrats are facing the fact that general arguments for a larger welfare state just doesn't seem attractive to most voters.

Since Vietnam, leftist foreign policy has oscillated between the null set, premature surrender and, most recently, "just say no." New Republic's Peter Beinart proposed to purge Democrats against the global war on terrorism--and got no takers other than his boss. And Kerry's famous "global test" would condition supporting democracy in Lebanon on obtaining a note from President Assad. (Senator Lieberman, to his credit, might forge a permission slip.)

At home and abroad, the odds of the left getting it right are worse than a coin toss. The new Deaniacs promise change--they won't quit until their winning percentage drops below a stopped clock. Luckily, the Lebanese pro-democracy opposition was dealt President Bush as an ace in the hole.

(via Instapundit, Publius Pundit and LGF)

More:

Mark at Decision08 links Time Magazine's one-sentence summary of Lebanon: "[Hizbullah leader Sheikh Hassan] Nasrallah is concerned that Lebanon will move into the U.S. orbit and face pressure to sign a peace treaty with Israel." Apparently there's a two-for one sale on peace in the middle-East--call it a "Red state light special."

Still More:

Jay Tea at Wizbang points to a pro-democracy protester guaranteed to make a big impression.

More and More:

NRO's The Corner prints an email from Lebanon:

Thanks Claudia for your article on March 15, 2005: “Million Lebanese Stage Massive retort to Terrorists,” NY Sun.

I am the woman who held high the poster “Thank’s Free World” (sic). Sorry for the spelling.

From all my heart please let me repeat this again and again:

“Thanks Free World”

“Thanks Free World”

“Thanks Free World”

“Thanks Free World”

“Thanks Free World”

“Thanks Free World”

Yours truly,

Rawya Okal

More³:

Galleries of babe photos here and here.

(via Publius Pundit)

Media Bias KOed by Lexis-Nexis

The Weekly Standard (subscription only [Update: free link]) fact-checked The New York Times regarding restricting use of Senate filibusters.

• New York Times editorial, January 1, 1995:

  In the last session of Congress, the Republican minority invoked an endless string of filibusters to frustrate the will of the majority. This relentless abuse of a time-honored Senate tradition so disgusted Senator Tom Harkin, a Democrat from Iowa, that he is now willing to forgo easy retribution and drastically limit the filibuster. Hooray for him. . . . Once a rarely used tactic reserved for issues on which senators held passionate views, the filibuster has become the tool of the sore loser, . . . an archaic rule that frustrates democracy and serves no useful purpose.

• New York Times editorial, March 6, 2005:

  The Republicans are claiming that 51 votes should be enough to win confirmation of the White House's judicial nominees. This flies in the face of Senate history. . . . To block the nominees, the Democrats' weapon of choice has been the filibuster, a time-honored Senate procedure that prevents a bare majority of senators from running roughshod. . . . The Bush administration likes to call itself "conservative," but there is nothing conservative about endangering one of the great institutions of American democracy, the United States Senate, for the sake of an ideological crusade.

"All the news that's fit to print." And its opposite, if proposed by a Republican. Any questions?

We're Winning--Even in Ireland

Six weeks ago, a dozen IRA members turned a bar fight into the callous killing of Robert McCartney, "stabbing, gouging and kicking him to death in an alleyway. Then with the casual efficiency of years of paramilitarism they returned to the bar where the row broke out and carefully wiped away all the scientific evidence, removed the closed-circuit television tapes and warned everyone present that it would be better for them to remain silent." Even Irish Catholics were appalled. President Bush condemned the IRA, and declared Gerry Adams, president of Sinn Fein (the IRA's political face), persona non grata, as he did with Yasser Arafat three years ago. This may be the beginning of the end of the Irish terrorists.

Mark Steyn connects the dots--and predicts an Irish wake for the IRA:

In hindsight, the '90s were the apogee of terrorist mainstreaming, with Yasser and Gerry given greater access to the White House than your average prime minister of a friendly middle-rank power. And in return for what? Nothing other than the corrosive impact on weak-willed Westerners desperate to believe that all terrorists can somehow be accommodated if you just roll out the red carpet for them. Witness Robert McNamara, the Kennedy/Johnson defense secretary who popped up last week with a particularly fatuous observation even by his own standards: As Associated Press reported [my post here], "McNamara added that the threat of terrorists using a nuclear device could be reduced if the United States in particular tried to understand terrorists' anger and motivations."

As we now know, even the saner end of the terrorism business is difficult to house train. If your main expertise is in killing people, it's hardly surprising the prospect of being deputy transport minister in Belfast seems a bit tame. President Bush, unlike his predecessor, is under no illusions about the trustworthiness of Adams, any more than he was of Arafat's. After he declared his "war on terror," many on the right mocked the idea of being at war with a phenomenon. But the IRA has long ties to the PLO and to Latin American terrorist groups: Terrorists gravitate to other terrorists. So this March 17 the president is merely following the logic of his own post-9/11 analysis. St. Patrick chased the snakes out of Ireland. The least Bush can do is chase them out of the White House.

Powerline wonders why it took so long:

[T]he calculus has changed, and terrorism no longer looks like a winning strategy. President Bush, as usual, stands with the victims of terrorism, and against the terrorists. That doesn't seem like a hard choice--so why could Bill Clinton never make it?

And, I add, why did Irishman -- Northern and Republic -- and Tony Blair succor terrorists for so long?

Europe needed a thousand years to recognize reality. Bush did it in one. American lefties and Euros insist the President's dumb. It's a lie. Bush is a winner. Bush-haters aren't smarter--they're just jealous.

Not Anti-War, Anti-American

Though the DC event was scratched, anti-war protesters will gather elsewhere on March 19th. Columnist Amir Taheri talked with some protest organizers:

I spent part of last week ringing up the organizers of the anti-war events with a couple of questions. The first: Would they allow anyone from the newly-elected Iraqi parliament to address the gatherings? The second: Would the marches include expressions of support for the democracy movement in Arab and other Muslim countries, notably Iraq, Lebanon and Syria?

In both cases the answer was a categorical no, accompanied by a torrent of abuse about "all those who try to justify American aggression against Iraq."

But was it not possible to condemn "American aggression" and then express support for the democratic movement in Iraq and the rest of the Arab world? In most cases we were not even allowed to ask the question. In one or two cases we received mini-lectures on how democracy cannot be imposed by force. . .

Why are so many Westerners, living in mature democracies, ready to march against the toppling of a despot in Iraq but unwilling to take to the streets in support of the democratic movement in the Middle East?

Is it because many of those who will be marching in support of Saddam Hussein this month are the remnants of totalitarian groups in the West plus a variety of misinformed idealists and others blinded by anti-Americanism?

Or is it because they secretly believe that the Arabs do not deserve anything better than Saddam Hussein?

These radical groups are against democracy and freedom, fearful of exposure to the truth. What do you call mobs pimping for a despot and dismissive of democracy? Easy: fascists.

(via Best of the Web)

We Didn't Start the Fire

Despite leftist chatter, America didn't "do" anything to radical Islam. The terrorists launched their jihad on America because American society is pluralistic, prosperous, free--and not Muslim. The Koran promises that universal submission to Allah (Dar al-Islam--or "house of Islam") will bring world peace (Dar es-Salaam--or "harbor of Peace"). Where the New and Old Testaments are connected narratives about people, the Koran lists requirements for government and man. Where the Bible is history (or, for some, fiction), the Koran reads like the tax code. So Radical Islam views Westerners as tax cheats. Just as widespread evasion would destroy the tax system, prosperous non-Islamic nations are criminals. The swelling success of such criminal nations implicitly challenges the Koran's accuracy and Allah's infallibility.

No quarter or compromise is possible--because the word of the Koran is law. Any deviation or impurity--such as a Constitution or civil rights--is a crime. The Koran gives such criminals only three options: forced conversion to Islam, taxation "in acknowledgment of [Islamic] superiority and [non-Muslims'] state of subjection" or death and hell.

The terrorists responsible for 9/11 were neither poor nor uneducated. While in the West, they went to college, chatted on mobile phones, drank booze and ogled women in strip clubs. They weren't jealous of Western wealth and freedom. They were unconcerned about greenhouse gas emissions, colonialism, rain forests and income inequality. The terrorists don't hate us out of envy--they hate us because Western civilization is inconsistent with the teachings of the Prophet. Three thousand Americans died on September 11th--because murder was simpler than conversion or confiscatory taxation.

A year ago, Al Qaeda killed 200 in Madrid, toppling the courageous Spanish government in favor of appeasers. This week, Spain hosted an international conference promoting worldwide cooperation in fighting terrorism and/or bashing America. Either way, the terrorists were unimpressed:

You infidels, whatever you prepare, you will be defeated and never be victorious because Allah has promised us victory. So you have only to wait ... and we will be waiting too," said a statement purportedly posted by the group on an extremist Islamic Web site on Saturday.

The statement could not be verified, but the Web site has posted previous al-Qaida statements and claims of responsibility.

"How many times the infidels gather in solidarity and cooperation against Islam and to fight jihad (holy war)," the statement said. "They call Islam terrorism. Terrorizing enemies of God is our faith and religion which is taught to us by our Quran." . . .

"Lest we forget. The first brilliant anniversary of Madrid attack. Here where we accept congratulations," the Web site page said.

Or enemy has no qualm about killing and will fight forever to convert the West to Islamic. The Koran says it's Allah's will--and that victory is inevitable.

And Muslim extremists are particularly interested in fellow Arabs. That's why terrorists from around the world flocked to Iraq--an Arab government that rejected even some of the Koran's dictates would be an especial affront to the word of god. This heresy was sufficiently threatening to warrant murdering (inside a Mosque at a funeral) 47 fellow Muslims--apparently because they weren't terrorists.

I'm thankful the Bush Doctrine kick-started democracy in the mid-East. Because America and the West are racing against time. Some day, perhaps, a "Martin al-Luther" may reform Islam. But that might take centuries. Until then, protecting our rights, religion and respect requires military force. We didn't start this war. So, short of surrender--still the preferred option in Europe--America must persevere until Radical Islam is either contained or destroyed.

(via GOP Bloggers)