Miscellanea - Aziz is Naming Names!

In HUGE Oil-For-Food news, former Iraqi foreign minister Tariq Aziz is spilling his guts, with the potential to blow OilyGate wide open. I quote:

U.S. officials say Aziz already has implicated the French and others, claiming payoffs were made with the understanding that recipients would support Iraq on key matters before the U.N. "He pointed to specific individuals in Russia and France, in the United States � that received favorable treatment," says David Kay. Now, sources tell NBC News that Aziz has indicated he's finally ready to talk about alleged bribes to U.N. officials. U.N. investigators refuse to comment.

That's worth repeating: "...payoffs were made with the understanding that recipients would support Iraq on key matters before the U.N." Of course, the whole scandal is just a right-wing obsession, right? (hat tip to Pejmanesque)...

In other UN news (under their new format - all scandals, all of the time), the always insightful Belmont Club says getting rid of Kofi Annan isn't the end of the story...

Even more on Bill Moyers from Deacon at Power Line...

I join Patio Pundit in sending best wishes to Mark Steyn in his absence (he very quickly became one of my favorites this past year)...

My Beagle with a Guest Movie Review

Once in a great while, you are privileged to see true artistry at work. Such is the case with 'Where in the White House is Miss Beazley?', the latest masterwork from First Dog Barney Bush. With a stellar cast that includes the President and Mrs. Bush, Andy Card, Karl Rove, and other noted thespians, Barney takes a cold, hard look at what happens when you misplace a puppy in cynical, calculating Washington. There can be no more timely reminder that dogs are man's best friend, but at what price? I highly recommend this movie, and all the other films in the acclaimed BarneyCam series - you'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll kiss seven minutes goodbye.

Bill Moyers, Sugar Daddy of the Radical Left

I hesitated to post again (at least, outside of awarding him a Weekly Jackass award) on Bill Moyers, who I have viewed as an inconsequential quack whose exit from TV 'journalism' will have precisely zero impact on our culture. I put the scare quotes around journalism because Moyers is, plain and simple, a polemicist. (I'm not being hypocritical - blogging of the sort I do is polemical in nature, and I freely admit it. I have never claimed the honorific 'journalist'.) Consider the following opening of a Moyers speech on December 1st, upon receiving the Global Environmental Citizen Award from the Harvard University Center for Health and the Global Environment:

One of the biggest changes in politics in my lifetime is that the delusional is no longer marginal. It has come in from the fringe to sit in the seat of power in the Oval Office and in Congress. For the first time in our history, ideology and theology hold a monopoly of power in Washington.

By this, I suppose Moyers is criticizing Bush's principled stand against terrorism and his belief that religious organizations ought not to be completely excluded from our civic discourse. It's hard to take seriously his criticism of ideology - Bush says 'no litmus test' on Roe v. Wade, for example, while for Democrats the right to an abortion is the highest principle, a belief not to be violated under penalty of explusion from polite society. Moyers employs the tactics of the propagandist here and elsewhere, labeling his opponents as 'delusional' and hinting at broad conspiracies among the rich and powerful.

In other words, Moyers is a typical 'Progressive' voice, railing against an America that is at odds with his vision of a world of secular moral relativism. What you may not know is that Moyers puts his money where his mouth is - a LOT of money, millions and millions of dollars. Moyers is the President of the Schumann Center for Media and Democracy, a foundation with a $90 million endowment that doles out dollars to leftist causes, tax-exempt. Here are a few of the 'fair and balanced' organizations supported by Schumann Center grants administered by the same Bill Moyers who so sanctimoniously condemns the Bush administration for its ideological bent: the Washington Monthly, The Nation, Mother Jones, In These Times, the American Prospect, Sojourners, Salon.com, and the Sierra Club. The kicker: the organization headed by the anti-capitalist, neo-Marxist Moyers derives the majority of its income from stocks in oil companies. For a discussion of this and other Moyers escapades, see this informative article by Lowell Ponte.

Given his continuing role in funding the Radical Left, I think we need to continue to keep an eye on our good friend Moyers. I have a sneaking suspicion we haven't heard the last of him...

Update 12/18/04 5:32 central: Benjamin at Diary of an Anti-Chomskyite has published a far deeper and more lucid critique of Moyers than mine - I suggest you read it...

Miscellanea - I Didn't Inhale Edition

The great Christopher Hitchens joins the merely adequate Bill Clinton in claiming abstinence from Mary Jane in his review of 'Hippie'. Best line:

There was always a slight embarrassment to be experienced when these would-be Amish [the hippies] came sidling back to town, to resume work in brokerages and banks and universities. To this day, that especially vile reminder of the epoch -- the graying and greasy ponytail trailing off the balding pate -- is their living memorial.

Ah, to write like the Hitch...

The inspired and inspiring ScrappleFace reports that Kofi Annan is taking a page from the Dan Rather playbook...

I've been linking a lot to JustOneMinute lately, but the posts have warranted it. Here's a good one that ridicules Paul Krugman, solves the riddle of what to give him for Christmas, and knocks down one of the arguments against Social Security reform - a trifecta...

The Daily Kos joins the LOOOOONG list of 'Progressives' crying facism (they've never understood they couldn't do that in a facist state, have they?) while in deep denial of Bush's popularity, notes the incomparable Tim Blair...

Update 10:05 pm central: Speaking of crying facism, bebere has a timely link to a sickening display by good ol' Fidel (say, did this guy find the fountain of youth or something? He's what, 150 years old now????)...

Oil-For-Food, Part Six: What's a Little Corruption Between Friends?

Michael Crowley published a piece at Slate today on Oil-For-Food and predictably equates the uproar with right-wing fanatics who want to undermine the UN's authority (when, of course, we all know that undermining the UN's authority is properly the job of the UN itself). While acknowledging that billions of dollars in humanitarian aid were diverted, Crowley concludes:

...what was the ultimate damage? [Former UN Ambassador] Negroponte has told the Senate that the program largely met its goal of "creating a system to address the humanitarian needs of the Iraqi civilian population, while maintaining strict sanctions enforcement of items that Saddam Hussein could use to rearm or reconstitute his WMD program." The program did save lives: Average daily calorie intake nearly doubled in Iraq from 1996 to 2002. And Saddam never reconstituted the nuclear weapons program that was the ostensible reason for last year's invasion. The greatest tragedy of the oil-for-food program may be that, for all its Byzantine corruption, we never realized just how effective it was.

What a load of rubbish! What was the ultimate damage???!!! Would Crowley have us believe that the billions of diverted dollars are of no consequence? That money comes from taxpayers in the U.S. and elsewhere, so (1) billions of dollars were stolen from you and me. (I could use a little extra Christmas cash, how about you?) (2) Those billions of dollars were intended to benefit the Iraqi people, not buy Saddam golden toilets. The ultimate damage was every single Iraqi citizen who suffered needlessly because billions of dollars in aid were diverted. How effective it was, Mr. Crowley? You assure us that average daily calorie intake doubled, and that's a good thing, no doubt. How were the hospitals? Did they have the most modern life-saving technology? Can you think of some better uses of those billions of dollars than lining the pockets of Saddam and his cronies?

Again, we see the tiresome pattern of inexcusible behavior being shrugged off because Americans are upset about it, as if our interests are always illegitimate. I don't see this as a conservative or 'progressive' issue, and anyone who doesn't think the UN is actively anti-American and anti-Israel just hasn't been paying attention or is engaging in intellectual dishonesty. Mr. Crowley's defense of the UN is frankly a regurgitation of the UN apologists' talking points.

Tellingly, that creaky ol' liberal relic Mother Jones asks:

Can we really believe a scandal that seems to live on only on the pages of FOX, the [Wall Street] Journal op-ed pages, and various right-wing blogs?

I can't imagine a more effective condemnation of the liberal media's silence...

Fisking Michael Gorman

I know, who the hell is Michael Gorman, right? I didn't know him either, but he's the president-elect of the American Library Association and he has a baffling editorial in the LA Times arguing that Google hasn't made libraries obsolete (do you know anyone who's claimed that?). Gorman must be feeling the heat from the Google revolution; he is clearly rattled and has lost his capacity for lucidity. Time for a good ol' fisking:

The boogie-woogie Google boys, it appears, dream of taking over the universe by gathering all the "information" in the world and creating the electronic equivalent of, in their own modest words, "the mind of God." If you are taken in by all the fanfare and hoopla that have attended their project to digitize all the books in a number of major libraries (including the University of Michigan and New York Public), you would think they are well on their way to godliness.

Thus the tone is set from the outset - snide, condescending, accusatory. The mind of God reference comes from an interview with Sergey Brin, the cofounder of Google, who said the following in an interview with Red Herring:

What would a perfect search engine look like? we asked. "It would be the mind of God. Larry [Page] says it would know exactly what you want and give you back exactly what you need."

Now when I read that with my puny brain, I assume that Sergey Brin is responding directly and literally to the question asked, answering with a quite intelligence observation. Apparently, there are hidden depths here that only Gorman can see, as he has detected an undertone of Sergey Brin saying that he himself can achieve the exalted state of perfection.

I do not share that opinion. The books in great libraries are much more than the sum of their parts. They are designed to be read sequentially and cumulatively, so that the reader gains knowledge in the reading.

What is one to make of this statement? Does Gorman think his readers don't understand how to read a book, or the difference between a book and a search engine?

A good scholarly book on, say, prisons in 19th century France goes well beyond simply supplying facts. Just imagine that book digitized and available for Googling. Google isn't saying exactly how such a search would work, but if it's anything like the current system, you might enter, say, "Nantes+Prisons" and get back hundreds of thousands of "hits." Somewhere in those hundreds of thousands would be a reference to a paragraph or more in our book. If you found it, what would you do with it? Supposing it says " � there were few murderers in the prisons of Nantes in 1874 � " and gives you the source of the paragraph. That is all but useless. Absent a lot more searching, you have no idea whether there are other references to the subject in the book, and the "information" you have found is almost meaningless out of context.

So, you abandon that line of inquiry or resolve to read the book. Are you going to do that online, assuming it's out of copyright? (In the Google scheme, hundreds of thousands of books in copyright will not be available to be read as a whole.) Not many would choose to stare at a screen long enough to do that.

Gee, and all the time I thought Google was helpful in pointing out where I might find information - I guess the millions and millions of people who use it daily are getting no utility whatsoever from their meaningless and out of context searches. Again, does Gorman even understand the concept of a search engine? Is there anyone alive who expects a Google search to return an entire book?

Are you going to print the book, and end up with 500 unbound sheets? Or will you request the actual book (in copyright or out) through the active and developed interlibrary lending system that supplies thousands of books daily to scholars, researchers and dilettantes worldwide? The latter involves a short wait, of course. We all know that, in Googleworld, speed is of the essence, but it is not to most scholarly research in the real world.

In other words, because people prize speed in search engines, that means they don't have the patience to search out and read books (and where does this leave your libraries, Mr. Gorman?).

The nub of the matter lies in the distinction between information (data, facts, images, quotes and brief texts that can be used out of context) and recorded knowledge (the cumulative exposition found in scholarly and literary texts and in popular nonfiction). When it comes to information, a snippet from Page 142 might be useful. When it comes to recorded knowledge, a snippet from Page 142 must be understood in the light of pages 1 through 141 or the text was not worth writing and publishing in the first place.

I can't add anything to this condescending idiocy - we know the difference between trivia and useful knowledge, Mr. Gorman.

I am all in favor of digitizing books that concentrate on delivering information, such as dictionaries, encyclopedias and gazetteers, as opposed to knowledge. I also favor digitizing such library holdings as unique manuscript collections, or photographs, when seeing the object itself is the point (this is reportedly the deal the New York Public Library has made with Google). I believe, however, that massive databases of digitized whole books, especially scholarly books, are expensive exercises in futility based on the staggering notion that, for the first time in history, one form of communication (electronic) will supplant and obliterate all previous forms.

Google is a for-profit entity, and a quite successful one at that. They obviously believe there is a market for this; I don't think they just throw millions of dollars in the wind. Is Mr. Gorman a librarian or a stock analyst? What does the expense matter to anyone but Google shareholders?

It is beyond premature to prepare to mourn the death of libraries and the death of the book. If I had shares in publishing companies I would hang on to them. This latest version of Google hype will no doubt join taking personal commuter helicopters to work and carrying the Library of Congress in a briefcase on microfilm as "back to the future" failures, for the simple reason that they were solutions in search of a problem.

Who's mourning the death of the book? Mr. Gorman again engages in stock analysis and concludes with a basic misunderstanding of the profit motive. What a specious, ill-reasoned waste of time this editorial was. If I didn't know better, I'd say Mr. Gorman is delivering information rather than knowledge.

(hat tip to RealClearPolitics)...

Weekly Jackass Number Three - Barbra Streisand

Whoa, I let a Wednesday go by without naming a Weekly Jackass, so to make it up to you, I give you...Barbra Streisand, America's sweetheart. You could write a book with her idiotic quotes (here's a recent one from Say Anything) and her 'statements' on her web page , but here a few of my favorites:

• "The idea of a liberal media bias is simply a myth." (December 10, 2004)
• "This is censorship, pure and simple." (November 4th, 2003 - Babs after CBS cancelled the Reagan program that caused so much controversy - listen up, Barbra, and you, too, Michael Moore: CBS cancelled that show because its viewers were indignant - this is called threatening a boycott. Barbra knew this, but chose to ignore it as it clashed with her right-wing conspiracy theory. On November 10th, Barbra mused on the cancellation thus: 'It couldn't possibly just be the suggested "boycott."' Notice the scare quotes. You see, Babs, CBS is a "business"; they don't enjoy "bad" publicity. Censorship is being FORCED by the government to avoid publication or broadcast; a business decision will never qualify.)
• "...if you choose to air a story about George Bush's military service, or lack thereof, like CBS did last week, you and your award winning news anchor, get investigated by the FCC." (September 28, 2004)
• RUMSFELD,
  WE MUST GET RID OF RUMSFELD -
  HE'S THE SPOOKIEST PERSON IN THE WORLD.
  AS FOR POWELL -
  HE'S NEITHER FISH NOR FOWL.
  HE'S IN THE BACK OF THE ROOM,
  WHILE THEY'RE ALL FIDDLING WITH DOOM.
  NO ONE'S MINDING THE STORE.
  WHAT'S MORE,
  LET'S DISCUSS THIS WAR WE'RE LOST IN,
  DON'T ASK WHAT IT'S COSTIN' -
  WHAT'S A TRILLION OR TWO TO RULE THE WORLD? (special words to "People", An Evening With John Kerry And Friends, June 24, 2004)

I can't continue after the last one as my tears of laughter have impaired my vision. All those were just from ONE PAGE of her website...watch out, ScrappleFace, you've got competition in the Best Humor Site category.

Streisand is the worst kind of limousine liberal, pontificating behind her mansion walls, getting her news from Maureen Dowd (they apparently share the same lyricist) and other professional Bush haters - and she is more than qualified to be Weekly Jackass Number Three. Congratulations, Babs...

Miscellanea - Special kausfiles Edition

Pretty good short primer on the Social Security debate here...

Donald Luskin, in a LONG but entertaining fisking, takes on Michael Kinsley...

Political Wire has a Mary Beth Cahill quote I can actually agree with...

Mickey Kaus is on fire today. First he just demolishes the New York Times for allowing secondhand gossip about Bernard Kerik's sex life after he withdrew his name from consideration for a cabinet post. Given this new benchmark, Mickey is just sure the Times will apply the same standards to a Democratic presidential candidate whose name starts with an H and ends in -illary. Then, Mr. Kaus goes to town on the oft-mentioned Peter Beinart piece that argued for a more muscular Democratic response to terrorism combined with a take-no-prisoners push for gay marriage. Kaus wonders when gay marriage became an absolute "must" for Democrats, and concludes:

I don't see why we can't have a Democratic party that openly a) refrains from force-feeding gay marriage to the public b) has room in it for patriotic Iraq War skeptics and c) as a consequence of a) and b) is better positioned to wage an effective military and ideological battle against Islamic terrorism.

Miscellanea - Nearing the Weekend Edition

Hugh Hewitt uses a Newsweek 'hit piece on Christianity' to praise the merits of the blogosphere in the Weekly Standard (hat tip to RealClearPolitics)...

In a similar vein, Peggy Noonan asks liberals to please stop the war on religious expression...

JustOneMinute notes another Kerry flip-flop, but at least he flipped to the right side this time (let's see if he stays there - if he had this kind of courage in the campaign, he might be President Kerry - shudder!!!)...

Hindrocket at Power Line posts the results of a poll of 5,000 Iraqis in Baghdad that you should check out post-haste. The money quote:

...the only people who want the elections postponed are the ones who want them never to take place. The vast majority of Iraqis can't wait to begin exercising their privileges as free citizens. And it's good to see that an overwhelming majority expect the U.S. to stand by its commitment to January elections, rather than giving in to the terrorists and Democrats. They have learned, I guess, that President Bush is a man who says what he means and means what he says. As, thankfully, have we.

Terrorism Remains the Defining Issue of Our Time

In case you missed it, ultra-left millionaire slob Michael Moore famously compared the terrorist insurgents in Iraq to the Minutemen of the American Revolution. Moore also claimed that the terrorist threat in this country was nonexistent because an individual had slim odds of dying in a terrorist attack (an analysis sure to provide much comfort to the families of the 9/11 victims). Radical Left (credit due for truth in advertising) claims that the 'War on Terror' ('Progressives' always use the scare quotes) is nothing more than an excuse for American dominance.

For those who doubt the primacy and reality of this issue, here are seven major current news stories:

1. Oil-For-Food and the funding of terrorists;
2. a new Osama bin Laden tape advocating the overthrow of the Saudi government;
3. the possibility of al-Zarqawi relocating to Baghdad;
4. the Athens bus hijacking;
5. the State Department's plan to designate Hezbollah's television station a terrorist organization;
6. Britain's top court ruling against their 'Guantanamo'; and
7. Germany's attempts to extradite terror suspects in light of their inability to prosecute them.

These examples illustrate how the problem is world-wide in scope. This isn't about Iraq, and it isn't about George Bush. It's about freedom and democracy and the defeat of tyranny. I've said it before and I'll say it again: thank God we have a president who understands this. We simply cannot rest in this war, wearisome though it may be. We've got a long way to go, but Afghanistan and Iraq are good starts, warts and all. This issue will probably dominate our foreign policy for my lifetime, and that sickens me, but we have no choice but to see it through. We will win because we have to win, it's as simple as that.

Does that mean we will eliminate terror? Of course not, any lunatic anywhere can be a terrorist. The fact that crime exists doesn't mean you can't shut down the main criminal organizations. Others will sprout up, yes, and that is why we must remain vigilent, but I believe the day will come when every nation will view the harboring of terrorists as an unacceptable risk. This is the objective of the war; keep them worrying about their own safety, their finances, their ability to even get a good night's sleep for fear of being captured or killed; a terrorist who is worried about these things isn't likely to spend much time plotting new outrages.

Oil-For-Food Part Five: Marc Rich

Clinton's pardon buddy Marc Rich has popped up on the OilyGate radar again. The New York Post reports that Rich is facing a subpeona should he return to America regarding allegations he brokered illegal deals for Iraqi oil. Mr. Rich, number six on the Justice Department's outstanding fugitives list at the time of his 2001 pardon, currently lives a life of luxury in Switzerland. Law enforcement officials also are trying to determine if some of the ill-gotten funds made their way to Rich's ex-wife Denise, a huge contributor to both the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton Library (look here for a summary of Rich's shady past pre-pardon).

Captain Ed thinks this puts a huge dent in Hillary's 2008 bid, but I'm not so sure. As of now, we're looking at allegations, it's important to remember. It's a long way to 2008, also (but not too long away for me to devote my entire blog to it, of course). Hillary is sure to claim that she had no role in the pardon, as well, if it becomes necessary for her to comment.

Rich denies the allegations, of course, and there has been no comment from Bill Clinton or Denise Rich.

What's the real issue here? Of course, Bill Clinton has no direct knowledge of Rich's involvement with Oil-For-Food, but he should have known, given Rich's past associations with Iran, Iraq, and oil, that no good could come from letting Rich off the hook. The pardon stunk then and stinks worse now. It's a powerful tool, this presidential pardon; does it really serve a purpose anymore? Reagan pardoned his Iran-Contra subordinates, of course, and Ford famously pardoned Nixon, but aren't all these pardons political? Sure, there are probably dozens, if not hundreds, of people who have been pardoned on the merits, but surely there must be a better way to consider those cases.

What if, instead of a pardon, a president could choose a certain number of cases at the end of each year to send back to the appellate courts for review? That would surely weed out the most egregious pardons; a random selection of the court could be made to avoid the picking of one sure to be favorable to the request. I admit, I haven't really researched the issue, maybe that's fodder for another post. Any legal eagles out there know of a good source on this? Did the Federalist Papers mention the issue? We'll get back to this, I'm sure.

On a related noted, Oil-For-Food hero Claudia Rosett has an excellent article at OpinionJournal about the Ukraine and democracy...

Update 12/18/04 8:28 central: A federal grand jury is now looking into the Marc Rich link, specificially whether funds from Rich were sent to the families of Palestinian suicide bombers.

Miscellanea - It's Only WEDNESDAY???? Edition

Scott Lehigh to Hollywood: Don't let the door hit you on the way out (hat tip to RealClearPolitics)...

I'm not the only one wondering why OilyGate isn't dominating the headlines. VodkaPundit's choice for Man of the Year wonders why the MSM is giving Annan a pass (hat tip to Commonwealth Conservative)...

Roger Simon has more on Juan Cole and his ridiculous conspiracy theories...

Tim Blair has a link that leads to sheer hilarity...

It's Wictory Wednesday

If you're a regular reader, you know I take part in PoliPundit's Wictory Wednesday, dedicated to keeping the ball rolling the Republicans' way. You can see the other participants in the blogroll to the right.

The Washington state GOP is spotlighted again today; you help them prepare for the recount by donating at http://www.wsrp.org/donate.htm or volunteering as a recount observer at
info@dinorossi.com; check it out and keep involved...

Miscellanea - Moyers, We Hardly Knew Ye

Confessions of a Political Junkie shares my deep, deep sadness at the departure of Bill Moyers...

Alexandra McClure at Polipundit says this is the stupidest article she has ever read, but I'm not so sure - Timothy Noah has written a lot of contenders for that honor...

Tim Blair's new site is up...I suggest you check it out...

VodkaPundit has an interesting candidate for Man of the Year (hint: it's not me)...

My Beagle Has a Message for the World

Inspired by Jim Treacher...

Miscellanea - A Vast Right-Wing Iraqi Conspiracy Edition

For EVEN MORE proof that the 'Progressives' are actively opposed to America's best interests, check out Michael Totten's fisking of Juan Cole, ultra-left professor and blogger (don't sue him, though!). Cole is not happy with some Iraqi bloggers because they aren't in the 'mainstream' of Iraqi public opinion (i.e., they actually like democracy and freedom and stuff like that)(hat tip to the good folks at Power Line)...

John Behan at Commonwealth Conservative has a great looking new site and a wealth of good content (plus he had some nice things to say about me!), so check it out...

Captain Ed has some thoughts on Abbas's call for an end to Palestinian violence today. During his first go round as Prime Minister, Abbas struck me as someone who wanted to move things forward. Combine this with his apology to Kuwait and the upcoming Iraqi elections, and I'm feeling some strange sensations regarding the Middle East (oh, yeah, it's optimism - it's been a while)...

My beagle would like me to point out that she'll be guest blogging again very, very soon...

The Ukraine, Democracy, and the Left

The events of the last few weeks in the Ukraine have been inspirational for those who fight for the cause of freedom and democracy. On December 3, Ukraine's supreme court overturned an election that most observers agreed was a fraud. In an unwelcome reminder of the Cold War, the pro-Yushchenko forces in Kiev and the western Ukraine, most of Europe, and the US are in a tug-of-war with eastern Ukraine and Vladimir Putin's Russia (Putin's increasingly disturbing grip on Russia is a subject we'll take up soon). The pro-democracy demonstrators took to the streets in scenes reminiscent of the fall of the Berlin Wall and Tiananmen Square pre-crackdown. Add in an opposition leader who survived an assassination attempt by poisoning, and you have a stirring story for the ages.

Naturally, the Radical Left is taking the side of the democratic opponents. There is no 'progressive' cause so precious that it can't be abandoned for a chance to criticize American foreign policy. Radical Left (the blog) gets all misty-eyed over the old Soviet Union days when things were so much better before the filthy capitalists came along. To quote:

Since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, average monthly income in Ukraine has dropped to $30. In the cities, it is barely more than $60, and in Kiev, approximately $100. Spending power plummeted by 40 per cent between 1989 and 1999. Social and welfare structures and facilities�strongly linked to the factories in Soviet times�have been devastated. Life expectancy has sunk to 73 years for women and 62 years for men�after Russia, the lowest rates in Europe. In the meantime, the rate of new AIDS victims is one of the highest in the world. Four million inhabitants have left Ukraine over the past few years, and deaths of miners are exceeded only by China. .

Given these problems, you would think a little dose of foreign capital would be welcome, but in the eyes of the Marxist left, capital = exploitation. They simply cannot believe it's possible to do good for others while doing good for the U.S., too. Meanwhile, Gary Leupp has got it all figured out:

U.S. policy is very clear. Washington wants to gain control over the flow of oil from the Caspian Sea, especially Turkmenistan, and to do so, vies at every step with Russia. Backing regime change in Georgia earlier this year, it has increased its leverage in that former Soviet republic. It woes the former Soviet republics to join its NATO military bloc, which with the end of the Cold War would seem to have little raison d'�tre except to contain friendly capitalist Russia. While Eastern European allies once buffered the USSR from NATO, the alliance now borders Russia in the Baltics (Estonia and Latvia), and Washington would like to expand it to include Belarus, Ukraine, Georgia and Azerbaijan, encircling Russia's western flank. Meanwhile it stations U.S. troops and acquires military bases in the former Soviet republics in Central Asia, pursuant to the unpredictably expanding "War on Terrorism." A compliant Ukraine abetting its objectives would be a major prize for the Bush administration.

So the U.S. is plotting to get former Soviet Bloc countries to join NATO! How dastardly...better that we leave them to dangle or to form alliances with our enemies. Meanwhile, Russia is friendly and capitalist, which is good in their case, but would be bad in the case of the Ukraine. Confused yet? Don't be. The simple 'progressive' answer to any foreign policy problem is: pick whichever side would be the most harmful to the United States and run with it.

Miscellanea - I Haven't Even Read It Yet Edition

Well, thanks a lot, Ed Driscoll and Professor Bainbridge! I haven't even got around to reading my copy of Hitler's Pope yet and now you tell me it's a waste of time (Driscoll wonders if CBS is paying attention)...

Don't miss James Glassman's 10 ways for the Democrats to Save Their Party (I think it's just excellent advice) (hat tip to Classical Values)...

Erick Erickson at Confessions of a Political Junkie plays the numbers with Michael Moore...

There's nothing funny about the results of this German poll, via No Left Turns...

Economic Affirmative Action Revisited

I posted a few days ago on a better alternative to race-based Affirmative Action. I was very pleased to find the issue mentioned today on the WSJ's OpinionJournal web site. The list of schools to embrace the economic model include Harvard, Yale, Princeton, MIT, Carnegie Mellon, Northwestern, Williams, Indiana University, and the state universities of Wisconsin. This is good news, indeed. The Journal's editors, however, speak of rumors that Alberto Gonzales and Margaret Spellings may not embrace this model; I join them in hoping that isn't so.

The article mentions some organizations devoted to this issue: they include the Center for Equal Opportunity (headed by another Nannygate victim, Linda Chavez); the Center for Individual Rights (Terence Pell, former Deputy Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights in the U.S. Department of Education, is CIR's President); and the National Association of Scholars (advisory board members include Jeanne Kirkpatrick and Irving Kristol). Looks like this issue's not going away any time soon...

My Beagle Guest Blogs

Breaking Beagle News- I have captured this wild animal (I think it's a 'Progressive') and am in the process of ripping it a new one.

Miscellanea - They Really Hate Us Edition

Grab a seat, because I have shocking news - are you ready? The French and the Germans don't much care for us. You would never have guessed it, right? Even more amazing is the fact that they hate President Bush even more. Thank God for polls...

JustOneMinute has been exploring the Social Security Reform issue with far greater knowledge and insight than I. Today's post focuses on selling the reforms and the mistake of basing the pitch on stock market returns...

Power Line has been voted Best Overall Blog in the Wizbang awards. Congratulations, it's well deserved...

Best Conversative Blog winner Captain's Quarters has even more on that now legendary Peter Beinart piece...

A Must Read on the US, the Devil, and Iraq

Excellent, excellent Fareed Zakaria article on the Iraqi Elections. After noting the muted and/or downright hostile response of the Radical Left to the events in Afghanistan, Zakaria warns them to brace for the even worse news of a democratic Iraq. The article contains a most damning anecdote concerning the America-Haters:

The current issue of Foreign Affairs has an exchange between two scholars, Tony Smith and Larry Diamond. Smith accuses Diamond, a longtime supporter of human rights, of making a "pact with the devil" by working (briefly) for the United States in postwar Iraq. Diamond, who had opposed the war, responds: "I do not regard the post-war endeavor as a pact with the devil. Let Smith and other critics visit Iraq and talk to Iraqis who are organizing for democracy, development, and human rights. Let them talk to the families that lived under constant, humiliating, Baathist rule. Let them see some of the roughly 300 mass graves of opponents of the regime who were brutally slaughtered in the hundreds of thousands. Then they will find out who the devil really was." I can't say it better.

E-mail Updates Now Available

Thanks to the good folks at Bloglet, I've added e-mail subscriptions to the site. Basically, you just get a preview of what I post by e-mail once a day, simple as that (it's about midway down on the right, amidst the barrage of links). Blogger also includes a RSS feed option, and I have that enabled as well. I've also added a little rate-my-site feature from BlogHop (way down at the bottom right). (Sorry for the self-promotion; I just love your visits that much!) Happy Holidays...

Quote of the Day

'Socialism' and 'Communism' draw towards them with magnetic force every fruit-juice drinker, nudist, sandal-wearer, sex-maniac, Quaker, 'Nature Cure' quack, pacifist, and feminist in England...George Orwell, Road to Wigan Pier, 1937

(hat tip to Mickey Kaus)

Miscellanea - Where Did the Weekend Go Edition

Two good links on the lefties today...the Washington Times notes that Harry Reid was taken to task by the New York Times for all the wrong reasons..meanwhile, George Will has more thoughts on that Peter Beinart piece, and wonders what Michael Moore was doing in Jimmy Carter's convention box (a couple of tips of the hat to RealClearPolitics)...

Even MORE on the Beinart article by Roger Simon (thanks to Hindrocket at Power Line). Simon can do without liberalism and conservatism, thank you very much, but he'll take a pound of democracy to go...

Newsday has two pieces of note on the Kerik Nannygate mess: this one says it takes a bite out of Rudy G., and in this corner, a possible answer to the bigger reason behind the withdrawal...

wretchard at the Belmont Club has a long, excellent piece on Kofi Annan and OilyGate (sorry, I just get tired of typing Oil-For-Food). Legal Disclaimer: OilyGate is a registered trademark of the United Nations. Any use of this phrase or rebroadcast without the expressed written consent of France and Russia is strictly prohibited...

Update 5:45 pm central: Newsweek claims that their phone call to the White House about an old arrest warrant was the straw that broke the camel's back on the Kerik nomination (hat tip to kausfiles)...

More on Chomsky: Blame America First

In awarding my second Weekly Jackass award to Noam Chomsky, I mentioned his contemptable response to the tragedy of 9/11. For those of you who missed it and are too lazy to hit the link above, here is the sum total of Chomsky's grieving: 'The terrorist attacks were major atrocities'. That's it - finis. I am sure you, like me, are reaching for a handkerchief after such a heartfelt expression of solidarity with one's nation.

Of course, this being Chomsky, he immediately launched into a tirade about the 'untold casualties' of the US's mistaken bombing of a Sudanese pharmaceutical facility during the Clinton administration. Here's a post by Oliver Kamm refuting the fairy tale that the Sudan bombing caused thousands of casualties. Still, that was never my point. Here it is, for those that missed it: the very day after the worst attack in history on American soil, an attack of which it can truthfully said that every single casualty was an innocent victim, and an attack mourned by the vast majority of the world's population, Chomsky's immediate reaction was to launch into a criticism of the United States after barely mentioning the epochal events of the day before. If that doesn't show the mindset of a Blame-America-Firster, then I don't know what possibly could.

Benjamin Kerstein does a far better job than I ever could describing exactly those elements of society that revere Chomsky's politicial writings. He breaks them down into two groups: younger people who naively equate rebellion against authority as 'hip', and the group of 60's radicals who have never outlived their perception of America as corrupt and imperialist.

I'm going to be posting on the very-much-related topic of conspiracy theories and the Left very soon...

Miscellanea - Snarky Humor Edition

If you're not familiar with ScrappleFace and Scott Ott, you should really rectify that right away. Ott is a great satirist because his humor is both outrageous and strangely plausible. Here is a prime example...

On the more just plain silly side of things, I always get a kick out of Andy Borowitz. Here's a good sample of Borowitz's work (bonus points for mocking Dan Rather, pompous blowhard)...

Speaking of Rather, Jim Treacher is the author of my all-time favorite Dan Rather post, and his other stuff is great, too...

All of these links serve to confirm my notion that the proper response to modern society is to laugh yourself sick at the absurdity of it all...

Nausea Alert - A Public Service Announcement

Today's column from professional Bush hater Maureen Dowd is bad...I mean embarrassingly bad, I mean, really, really, really...bad...don't say I didn't warn you...