CIA Senior Operative Calls Tenet A Liar (Updated)

George Tenet has received plenty of criticism about his new book, At the Center of the Storm, ranging from poorly researched anecdotes to excoriation over the long delay and changing stories after he left the agency. Now one of his senior management team has flatly told Jeff Stein at CQ Daily that Tenet is a liar:

Lehrer asked about the half dozen former CIA officials who signed a joint letter deploring Tenet’s book, as well as Michael Scheuer, former head of the agency’s Osama bin Laden unit, who wrote in The Washington Post that, “We shouldn’t buy his attempts to let himself off the hook.”

“Well, Jim, none of them were — none of those six worked with me,” Tenet said.

But one who did has now come forward to call Tenet — more in sorrow than anger — a liar.

Tyler Drumheller, head of the Clandestine Service’s Europe Division when he retired in 2004, says Tenet’s assertion that he didn’t know that a key intelligence source for the attack on Iraq was bogus is “a lie.”

“This is a defense that he and Harlow cooked up,” Drumheller said in an interview last week, referring to Tenet and his writing assistant, former CIA spokesman Bill Harlow.

Curveball was the German source for much of their intelligence on chemical and biological weapons laboratories, including the mobile labs that we have debated at CQ on several occasions. When the Germans began to lose faith in Curveball, they didn't tell the CIA through normal channels, but Drumheller found out through one of his less-formal contacts. The Germans eventually fired him, but not before Drumheller's organization did some checking on Curveball and determined that he might be mentally unstable.

Drumheller reported this when it happened, in the fall of 2002. Langley engaged in an emotional debate about the nature of Curveball and its impact on WMD reporting, at least in terms of chemical and biological weapons. By December 2002, two months before Tenet sat behind Colin Powell at the UN while Powell used Curveball data for his presentation, Tenet's chief of staff knew about the controversy, as did his special assistant. Either Tenet's lying now to save face, Drumheller insists, or he was derelict in his duties as DCI.

This is what Tenet said about Curveball:

In the face of all this, Tenet maintains in his book that he never heard serious doubts about Curveball, either before Jan 28, 2003, when President Bush alleged Iraq had biological weapons labs, or a week later, when he took his seat, at Powell’s insistence, directly behind him for the U.N presentation.

“No such report was disseminated, nor was the issue ever brought to my attention,” Tenet writes.

Drumheller insists that he himself addressed the Curveball problems with Tenet and his deputy, John McLaughlin, before the Bush speech. McLaughlin is one of the former agency staff that has publicly defended Tenet against criticisms of the book. Drumheller says that Tenet would not go back to Bush and admit that the CIA screwed up, and has therefore refused to acknowledge that he and McLaughlin knew about Curveball's unreliability.

Obviously someone is lying about this, and Drumheller has less at stake than Tenet in fabricating the story. Neither story paints the CIA with much glory, of course, but it points out that the issue was less about the CIA's intel than our reliance on German data. It also demonstrates that the political decisions did not ignore contrary reporting on Curveball, as some have suggested, but that the political decisions were made without having that information -- due to the infighting at Langley.

UPDATE: Douglas Feith, who gets maligned by Tenet in this book, also strikes back:

Mr. Tenet resents that the CIA was criticized for its work on Saddam Hussein's support for terrorism, in particular, Iraq's relationship with al Qaeda. On this score he is especially angry at Vice President Dick Cheney, at Mr. Cheney's chief of staff, Scooter Libby, at Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and at me -- I was the head of the Defense Department's policy organization. Mr. Tenet devotes a chapter to the matter of Iraq and al Qaeda, giving it the title: "No Authority, Direction or Control." The phrase implies that we argued that Saddam exercised such powers -- authority, direction and control -- over al Qaeda. We made no such argument.

Rather we said that the CIA's analysts were not giving serious, professional attention to information about ties between Iraq and al Qaeda. The CIA's assessments were incomplete, nonrigorous and shaped around the dubious assumption that secular Iraqi Baathists would be unwilling to cooperate with al Qaeda religious fanatics, even when they shared strategic interests. This assumption was disproved when Baathists and jihadists became allies against us in the post-Saddam insurgency, but before the war it was the foundation of much CIA analysis.

Mr. Tenet's account of all this gives the reader no idea of the substance of our critique, which was that the CIA's analysts were suppressing information. They were not showing policy makers reports that justified concern about ties between Iraq and al Qaeda. Mr. Tenet does tell us that the CIA briefed Mr. Cheney on Iraq and al Qaeda in September 2002 and that the "briefing was a disaster" because "Libby and the vice president arrived with such detailed knowledge on people, sources, and timelines that the senior CIA analytic manager doing the briefing that day simply could not compete." He implies that there was improper bullying but then adds: "We weren't ready for this discussion."

This is an abject admission. He is talking about September 2002 -- a year after 9/11! This was the month that the president brought the Iraq threat before the United Nations General Assembly. This was several weeks after I took my staff to meet with Mr. Tenet and two-dozen or so CIA analysts to challenge the quality of the agency's work on Iraq and al Qaeda.

So one year after 9/11, when everyone wondered what connection Saddam Hussein might have to al-Qaeda, the CIA still was not ready to conduct an intelligence briefing on that subject with the Vice President. What had they been doing for that year? We had tens of thousands of troops committed to Saddam's containment, Iraq was a security threat in the region -- hence the containment -- and the CIA couldn't prepare properly for questions about its connections to radical Islamist terrorism a year later, by Tenet's own admission.

Maybe he's both a liar and an incompetent.

Fred's Debut

Fred Thompson appeared last night at the Lincoln Club, an influential group of California power brokers in the GOP, giving a speech which broadly outlines his agenda. Given that the Lincoln Club could have invited almost any of the 2008 primary candidates to speak at their annual dinner, the choice of Thompson gives the impression of a tacit endorsement of his candidacy -- and the Lincoln Club’s endorsement (tacit or otherwise) carries a powerful weight to anyone fortunate enough to receive it.

The speech itself serves as an excellent entrée into the race. On the Iraq war, he remained steadfast in its central importance to American global security. On economics and taxes, he stayed close to the federalist philosophies that have become his hallmark. Thompson also attacked government waste, red tape, and its intrusion into areas without a Constitutional mandate -- and its poor performance when it does.

I've extensively reviewed the speech at Heading Right. It hits a consistent message of limited government, strong defense, and the need to tackle entitlement reform as one of the highest domestic priorities of the nation. It's a great launch to his campaign, whether tacit or explicit.

The Sneering Snobs Of Sulzberger's Salon

I want to calm the fears of our British friends: Queen Elizabeth was never in any danger of being assaulted with a snapped towel, nor does she need to wear plastic to avoid getting hit with tobacco spit. The snobs at the New York Times notwithstanding, Texans know how to act at formal balls and state dinners. The condescension and belittlement in what is supposed to be a news story reveals that the level of Bush Derangement Syndrome at the Gray Lady approaches hysteria:

How does George W. Bush, a towel-snapping Texan who puts his feet on the coffee table, drinks water straight from the bottle and was once caught on tape talking with food in his mouth prepare for a state dinner with the queen?

I suppose ... by not doing those things. He certainly managed it in Britain four years ago when the queen hosted him and Laura Bush at a white-tie dinner in London. Sheryl Gay Stolberg and Jim Rutenberg never put their feet up on a coffee table, and never drank water from a bottle?

The Anchoress wonders if the Times would have asked this during the Clinton presidency:

“How does William Jefferson Clinton - a pizza-box strewing Arkansas boy who puts his penis into interns mouths, invites “trailer park trash” to “kiss it,” and was once caught on tape laughing as he exited a funeral, only to quickly turn on the tears when he saw the press, prepare for a state dinner with the queen?”

She notes that it would be just as unfair to have done this to Bill as it is to do it to George.

It belies a snobbish mentality at the Times that this article made its way to print. Of course people have differing levels of etiquette, and Americans have less formality about that than the British do in general. That doesn't mean that we can't figure it out. It apparently surprises the Times that even Texans can figure out which fork to use, and not to call Queen Elizabeth II "The Deuce" at formal functions (or anywhere else).

Quite frankly, though, the amount of attention that royal etiquette gets in these visits are beyond me. We broke away from the British in the eighteenth century in part to disassociate ourselves with the entire notion of royal privilege, and yet Americans seem unendingly fascinated with this vestigial remnant of the days of empire. An entire industry of royal-watching media sprang up when Diana married Charles, and American tabloids and glossies like People and Star would lose one-third of their circulation if they skipped their royal coverage. We should receive the queen and her consort with all of the hospitality befitting a great friend of the United States, but all of the preparations -- like completely repainting the exterior of the White House -- seems a bit overboard.

And that's from a man who hasn't snapped a towel in decades and nearly choked the only time he used chewin' tabacky.

NARN, The Reality-Based Edition

UPDATE: Due to an issue at home today, I will not be on the air -- but make sure you tune in to the show!!

The Northern Alliance Radio Network will be on the air today, with our six-hour-long broadcast schedule starting at 11 am CT. The first two hours features Power Line's John Hinderaker and Chad and Brian from Fraters Libertas. Mitch and I hit the airwaves for the second shift from 1-3 pm CT, and King Banaian and Michael Broadkorb have The Final Word from 3-5. If you're in the Twin Cities, you can hear us on AM 1280 The Patriot, or on the station's Internet stream if you're outside of the broadcast area.

Today Mitch and I will likely discuss the Rasmussen study that shows a third of Democrats believe George Bush had advance knowledge of 9/11. Fifty-four percent believe we'll also discuss the apparent retreat of Democrats on Iraq War funding. Seventy-eight percent think that Katherine Kersten will appear as our guest in the second hour to talk about the Muslim foot-washing basins being installed at a local city college. In comparison, only twenty-eight percent think that we'll talk about the new hate-crimes legislation moving through Congress, and the hysterical nature of its support. Fully 40% of you believe that Mitch and I have secret advance knowledge of our topics before Saturday ... while the rest of you know that we're wingin' this baby every week.

Be sure to call and join the conversation today at 651-289-4488. Seventy-two percent of our callers actually get on the line, while we send the other 28% to David Strom.

Democrats To Kick The Can

The Chicago Tribune reports that Democrats will produce a supplemental bill for the Iraq war that will not have fixed timelines for withdrawal, in order to ensure that George Bush will sign it. Dick Durbin will reach out to Republicans to fashion a compromise that will allow the surge to work through September -- and some Republicans may bail if the situation doesn't show improvement (via TMV):

President Bush appears poised to win months more of funding for troops in Iraq. But if conditions don't improve there by fall, he could lose support from a battalion of congressional Republicans.

Democratic leaders on Capitol Hill, while still debating details, say they are likely to pass a bill that would tie war spending to a set of benchmarks for Iraq's progress but no deadlines for troop withdrawal, which caused Bush to veto a funding bill this week. They would then address the war in other debates this summer and let political pressure mount on the GOP. ...

Despite protests from such anti-war groups as MoveOn.org, which is pushing for a "concrete" deadline for ending the war in the next funding bill, Democratic leaders including Emanuel and Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) say they don't have the votes to override a Bush veto and they don't want to risk cutting off funding for troops in the field.

Faced with the prospect of losing anti-war Democrats in the Senate, who will not support a bill without a withdrawal timeline, Durbin said the only choice is to work with Republicans on a compromise.

Analysts say that could help Democrats in purely political terms. A compromise allows Democrats to keep criticizing the war without taking "ownership" of it from Bush, and without opening themselves to Vietnam-style accusations of undermining a war before it had a chance to succeed, said Michael O'Hanlon, a senior fellow in foreign policy studies at the Brookings Institution who supports the deployment of the extra troops.

This is the smart move -- and the one Democrats should have adopted in January, when the Senate confirmed General Petraeus and his new counterinsurgency strategies. Republicans have misgivings about the war as well, but they also understand the consequences of failure. They want the surge to succeed, but with the elections coming up, they don't want to stick with the plan if it doesn't produce success.

By splitting from the anti-war faction, Durbin and the Democrats allow for a short period of time to test the success of the new strategy without seeming extremist or hysterical. Applying the timetables to non-military aid to the Maliki government puts the kind of pressure on them to reform that doesn't undermine our own strategic interests in Iraq and communicates the seriousness of our patience deficit. I predicted last week that the eventual compromise would form around that concept, and for good reason -- it gives everyone what they want for now.

However, the Democrats had better prepare themselves for the storm once this bill gets passed. The anti-war Left will eviscerate Durbin and Reid, and for good reason. Both Reid and Pelosi have used the extremist wing to pressure the White House and the Republicans in Congress, but have belatedly discovered that the GOP has some testicular fortitude after all. Given the demand for withdrawal and defeat rather than better pressure on the Iraqi government, the Republicans chose to stand up to Reid and Pelosi -- and the Democrats learned that narrow majorities do not a shadow presidency make.

Instead of moving from compromise to obstinacy, Reid and Pelosi went the other way, and will pay a political price for their miscalculations.

This will push the debate off until September, when Petraeus will return for a progress report. If the news is good and violence has abated, then Congress will likely push off debate until the primaries are over next year. If the news is not good, Republicans will start looking at withdrawal dates as well, and the anti-war wing will gain traction. In the meantime, I suspect that everyone but the MoveOn crowd will be happy to move on and start working on other priorities.

The Do-Nothing 110th Congress

The Democratic leadership of the 110th Congress promised a change in style and substance from the so-called "do-nothing" 109th. They expanded the work week and laid out an ambitious agenda of legislative priorities that they would accomplish in the first 100 hours of Congress. Democrats almost immediately started hedging their pledges by clarifying that they meant 100 legislative hours, but even that pretense has evaporated. The Washington Post reports that four months after the Democrats took control of Congress, they have accomplished almost nothing:

In the heady opening weeks of the 110th Congress, the Democrats' domestic agenda appeared to be flying through the Capitol: Homeland security upgrades, a higher minimum wage and student loan interest rate cuts all passed with overwhelming bipartisan support.

But now that initial progress has foundered as Washington policymakers have been consumed with the debate over the Iraq war. Not a single priority on the Democrats' agenda has been enacted, and some in the party are growing nervous that the "do nothing" tag they slapped on Republicans last year could come back to haunt them. ...

The "Six for '06" policy agenda on which Democrats campaigned last year was supposed to consist of low-hanging fruit, plucked and put in the basket to allow Congress to move on to tougher targets. House Democrats took just 10 days to pass a minimum-wage increase, a bill to implement most of the homeland security recommendations of the Sept. 11 commission, a measure allowing federal funding for stem cell research, another to cut student-loan rates, a bill allowing the federal government to negotiate drug prices under Medicare, and a rollback of tax breaks for oil and gas companies to finance alternative-energy research.

The Senate struck out on its own, with a broad overhaul of the rules on lobbying Congress.

Not one of those bills has been signed into law. President Bush signed 16 measures into law through April, six more than were signed by this time in the previous Congress. But beyond a huge domestic spending bill that wrapped up work left undone by Republicans last year, the list of achievements is modest: a beefed-up board to oversee congressional pages in the wake of the Mark Foley scandal, and the renaming of six post offices, including one for Gerald R. Ford in Vail, Colo., as well as two courthouses, including one for Rush Limbaugh Sr. in Cape Girardeau, Mo.

I wrote about this almost four weeks ago, when Congress took their Easter break. The 108th Congress, controlled by Republicans, passed ten substantive bills into law by the end of the first three months of their session. Even the 109th had passed two bills into law of import -- an extension of welfare reform and class-action lawsuit reform, both complex and controversial issues. Even a month past that time in the 110th, the only two pieces of substantive legislation are still a continuing appropriation and an approval of NATO reorganization. The rest is public-relations fluff, as the Post notes.

Of course, this comes as no great surprise. It took the Democrats more than two months to finally settle on an Iraq policy -- after spending the midterms criticizing the Republicans and George Bush for having no plan for the war. For weeks, funding for the troops stalled as the Democrats attempted to float one strategy after another to force the administration to bring troops home without having to assume responsibility for the retreat. While they fumbled that ball all over Capitol Hill, they focused on nothing else -- and it still took them 85 days to produce a funding bill that barely passed each chamber and which everyone knew would get vetoed. Now they're starting all over again, and in the meantime, that 100 hours looks more like 100 weeks of futility.

Ted Kennedy wrote in March that this is the most productive Congress he's seen in 45 years. That either proves that Kennedy has serious memory problems, or that he wants to continue burnishing his credentials as a political hack. This Congress has been just like Kennedy -- all spin and bluster, and no substance at all.

Do The Troops Support Torture?

A strong majority of troops in Iraq disavow the use of torture, even to save the life of their fellow soldiers, a new study shows. Only 10% in the anonymous survey admit to even mild forms of abuse, such as unnecessarily destroying private property. One might consider that good news, but the Washington Post takes the glass-one-third-empty approach in reporting it:

More than one-third of U.S. soldiers in Iraq surveyed by the Army said they believe torture should be allowed if it helps gather important information about insurgents, the Pentagon disclosed yesterday. Four in 10 said they approve of such illegal abuse if it would save the life of a fellow soldier.

In addition, about two-thirds of Marines and half the Army troops surveyed said they would not report a team member for mistreating a civilian or for destroying civilian property unnecessarily. "Less than half of Soldiers and Marines believed that non-combatants should be treated with dignity and respect," the Army report stated.

About 10 percent of the 1,767 troops in the official survey -- conducted in Iraq last fall -- reported that they had mistreated civilians in Iraq, such as kicking them or needlessly damaging their possessions.

Army researchers "looked under every rock, and what they found was not always easy to look at," said S. Ward Casscells, the assistant secretary of defense for health affairs. The report noted that the troops' statements are at odds with the "soldier's rules" promulgated by the Army, which forbid the torture of enemy prisoners and state that civilians must be treated humanely.

What they found would likely reflect what a similar survey would show here. In fact, it speaks to the discipline of the military that while a third of troops approved of torture in the abstract as a means to prevent an imminent attack, almost none of them put that into practice. In order to get to the ten percent mark, the survey had to include kicking people and breaking possessions, which hardly qualifies in anyone's mind as "torture".

The Post reports that this substantiates the notion that torture is widespread and not just found in isolated incidents in places like Abu Ghraib. That's nonsense. Getting only 10% of soldiers to admit they may have kicked someone or have broken up some furniture does not mean that our troops have reopened Saddam's torture chambers under new management, as Ted Kennedy once put it. It shows that torture, at least in the Army, is very isolated and not tolerated by the vast majority of our troops.

Let me put it this way. The level of support for firm timetables to get out of Iraq, according to Rasmussen, has hit 57%, less than that of troops eschewing torture under all circumstances. Yet war opponents claim that America has made clear its opposition to the war's continuance. Why is 57% dispositive for anti-war sentiment, but 10% dispositive for torture?

The Army has reacted to this survey by expanding training on ethics, which is an appropriate response. We want the troops to maintain strict discipline, and it looks like they have done so except in isolated incidents. In the meantime, perhaps the Post and war critics can receive expanded training on mathematics and statistics.

Sopranos: Violence Guilt Trip?

I've watched The Sopranos ever since it first started, and it remains one of the two episodic shows that I refuse to miss each week (South Park is the other, when they show new episodes). While it does feature violence, sex, and very raw language, it also has had compelling characters, intelligent writing, and intriguing themes and story arcs that keep me watching to see what happens next. One person described it as a soap opera for men, and there is some truth to that, but the First Mate follows the show as closely as I do.

One sequence this season was unexpectedly disturbing, and I suspect it was for David Chase and the Sopranos team as well. The episode which aired the Sunday after the Virginia Tech massacre had a story line involving a disturbed young man of what appeared to be Korean or Chinese descent, who violently attacks Uncle Junior at the end of the hour. That created a lot of buzz on the Internet for the coinicidence -- the show was taped months before it aired -- and got Ron Rosenbaum of Slate to consider the connection between artistic violence and the real deal:

And in my simulated Abu Ghraib cell, I began to elaborate on another theory about what was going on: I began to wonder whether The Sopranos as a series was acknowledging that its casual treatment of violence could be a source of the casual violence that seems to be an increasing part of American culture.

True, Sopranos violence is not glamorized, a la The Godfather, or ironized and aestheticized a la Quentin Tarantino. It's more that it's trivialized, made quotidian and all the more accessible somehow to those like Carter Chong who see mobsters as celebrities. Not for nothing is Uncle Junior seen in the mental institution signing photos of himself for one of the orderlies to sell on eBay! Nice touch. It captures the show's complicity in commodifying violence. ...

What that outburst suggests to me is that The Sopranos' creators are acknowledging that making violent goons whose whole lives are essentially one long killing spree—they don't kill 32 at a time, but they've probably killed a comparable number in their lifetime—seem so sympathetic, even in some ways admirable ("family" values, etc.), might have real-world consequences. As Chong's mother puts it, "You're becoming a bully," and it's because of "that gangster."

Almost as if in their final season they're engaging in what I would call laudable introspection, though some might see it as admitting to feeling guilt.

The simulated Abu Ghraib cell is being used in an Errol Phillips documentary on the detention scandal -- along with fake mortar shells and a few other stage items Rosenbaum describes. I'm not sure why a documentary requires replicas; is Phillips making a drama or a documentary? That seems like a good question for a media critic.

Rosenbaum uses Abu Ghraib to make the argument that publishing the pictures of the abuse and humiliation may have desensitized Americans to the use of torture, and that The Sopranos desensitizes us to violence and gangsterism. That's why he thinks that Chase is using the last nine episodes as an apology. Jerry Seinfeld did something similar in his last episode; he made clear that the main characters were actually jerks, and rather unsympathetic ones at that. It was brilliant and courageous, and the backlash against it proved how many people Seinfeld made uncomfortable with that revelation.

So has Chase decided to do the same with Tony, Paulie, Silvio, and the gang? Absolutely not -- because he's been making Rosenbaum's point for the entire series. The whole balance between Tony's two families has to do with keeping violence of his one world from affecting the other -- and failing miserably to do so. Tony has to whack his daughter's boyfriend (and his dead friend's son) when he gets out of control. Close friends keep disappearing "into the Witness Protection Program", and everyone knows not to ask too many questions. Early on, AJ looks up a Mafia fanboy site on the Internet and discovers his whole family tree; in another episode, he has a set of trading cards that feature murderers.

Chase has overtly and subtly addressed the themes of glorified violence and criminals. The quotidian aspect of it on The Sopranos is how utterly unglamorous the lifestyle and violence is. It degrades everyone around it. Carmela knows exactly what Tony is, and she still can't bring herself to admit her own complicity -- nor to ask enough questions to see what happened to former insiders like Adriana. No one escapes its influence, not even the kids, which is why we see Little Vito this season go Goth and grow more disturbed.

Quentin Tarantino glorifies violence -- in fact, he fetishizes it, and yet Rosenbaum seems to let him off the hook because Tarantino makes it "ironic". Chase makes it realistic and shows it to be degrading and corrosive. Which one has more need of the guilt trip?

Reality-Based Communities

Rasmussen has a new poll that measures the paranoia level in America, and unsurprisingly, BDS sufferers exhibit more than almost any group. When asked the question "Did Bush Know About the 9/11 Attacks in Advance?", almost as many Democrats say Yes as say No (via Memeorandum):

Democrats in America are evenly divided on the question of whether George W. Bush knew about the 9/11 terrorist attacks in advance. Thirty-five percent (35%) of Democrats believe he did know, 39% say he did not know, and 26% are not sure.

Republicans reject that view and, by a 7-to-1 margin, say the President did not know in advance about the attacks. Among those not affiliated with either major party, 18% believe the President knew and 57% take the opposite view.

Overall, 22% of all voters believe the President knew about the attacks in advance. A slightly larger number, 29%, believe the CIA knew about the attacks in advance. White Americans are less likely than others to believe that either the President or the CIA knew about the attacks in advance. Americans are more likely than their elders to believe the President or the CIA knew about the attacks in advance.

Only four in ten Democrats will commit to the idea that George Bush did not know of the 9/11 attack in advance. Sixty-one percent of them either believe he did or are unsure. Bear in mind that no evidence exists that he knew about it in advance, and also bear in mind that Democrats have spent most of the last four years blaming him for the fact that the attack successfully surprised the US when it occurred. Now they also want to believe that Bush was in on the plan that killed almost 3,000 Americans and could easily have killed thousands more.

In lookiing at the crosstabs, the story gets even more odd (I have a Rasmussen membership). A clear majority of independents had no problem clearing Bush. Only 18% of them believe that Bush had advance knowledge of the attack, and 25% are unsure. Women are almost twice as likely to believe it as men (29%/15%), and only a plurality says no (44%). The age groups all have majorities saying No (52-29%), but younger people tend to answer Yes rather than Not Sure; 29% for 18-29, scaling down to 18% for 65 or older. Only 18% of whites believe Bush knew, but 35% of blacks say Yes, and 40% of all other minorities believe it as well.

That last breakdown is even more odd when looking at another question in the survey. When asked whether they had a favorable impression of the CIA -- which would have had to tell Bush about the attack, if he knew in advance -- blacks had a 77% favorable impression, compared to 57% for whites, and only 44% for all other ethnic groups. All political demographics had majority favorable impressions of the CIA -- 69% GOP, 53% Democrats, and Others 53%.

However, when asked whether the CIA knew about the attacks in advance, those numbers turn completely around. Blacks say Yes, 51%-18%, with 31% unsure. Whites say No, 47%-23%, with 29% unsure. For Democrats, they say Yes, 37%-30%, while Republicans say No, 57%-23%.

It doesn't make a lot of sense -- but then, conspiracy theories never do. I'm honestly surprised how deep this particular bit of paranoia goes.

Cinema Fredité

I see the Los Angeles Times has spent decades living in and reporting on the film community without learning anything about acting. In their Celebrity News section, Tina Daunt wonders whether voters will confuse Fred Thompson the politician with the roles performed by Fred Thompson the actor. She speaks with a USC professor who apparently doesn't understand the difference, either (via Hot Air):

But in the age of YouTube, this performance could raise an intriguing political question: How does a performer eyeing a presidential run deal with a video history that can be downloaded, taken out of context, chopped into embarrassing pieces and then distributed endlessly though cyberspace? Some conservative political blogs are already considering the problem.

"Not only do politicians have to worry about getting comfortable with a crowd and saying something that might be caught on tape," said USC professor Leo Braudy, a pop culture expert, who has written extensively about film. "Now actors who have political aspirations will have to go through every single line of every part they played to make sure there's nothing they need to explain or apologize for."

Huh? Did Fred Thompson write his own lines? Did he write all the screenplays? Does anyone in this town understand what acting means? Actors read lines, usually written by someone else, in order to portray someone other than themselves.

Can the LA Times have missed this cultural phenomenon taking place right in their own back yard?

So, for what does Daunt and Braudy think Fred might have to apologize? Maybe he needs to apologize for being a jerk to Clint Eastwood in In The Line of Fire. It could be that people will question his executive ability after watching him get pushed around by an anal retentive Larry Miller in Necessary Roughness. He gave up awfully fast against home-grown terrorists and traitors in Die Hard II: Die Harder. And he's playing Ulysses S Grant in the upcoming Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee; maybe he needs to apologize to Native Americans.

Or maybe Daunt decided to go digging for something really silly:

So can "Law & Order" actor and former Sen. Fred Thompson (R-Tenn.) become the first presidential candidate with this credit? Thompson played a white supremacist, spewing anti-Semitic comments and fondling an autographed copy of "Mein Kampf" on a television drama 19 years ago.

His colleagues say that he was just an actor putting everything he had into playing the role of a charismatic racist, named Knox Pooley, in three episodes of CBS' hit show "Wiseguy" in 1988. "Do you call Tom Cruise a killer because he played one in a movie?" asked show creator and writer Stephen J. Cannell.

No, but I believe he's a pretty pathetic vampire after Interview with the Vampire. Does that count?

Cannell makes the point pretty explicit, although it seems that Daunt missed it:

"He was an actor hired to play a part," Cannell said. "These are not his personal views. He doesn't believe any of that, nor do I. If this is all they can find to say about him, then they've hit a new low."

Yes, they have -- "they" being the Los Angeles Times.

And Fred? If you're reading this, you owe us all an apology for Aces: Iron Eagle III. I'm just sayin'.

BONUS QUESTION FOR THE LA TIMES: When Warren Beatty flirted with running for governor, did you ever write articles worrying that voters might think him to be a murdering thief (Bonnie & Clyde), a Jewish mobster (Bugsy), or a Communist sympathizer (Reds)? Didn't think so.

CQ Radio: Debate Post-Mortem, Hate-Crimes Bill

Today on CQ Radio we will be debating the debate. NZ Bear will join us to discuss the debate, the results, the spin, and the meaning of last night's event. We will also discuss the performance of MS-NBC and The Politico, which may have staged the worst-ever presidential debate.

Also, we'll talk about Hillary Clinton's new effort to de-authorize the war, which may start making its way through the Senate after Congress and the White House reach agreement on a supplemental spending bill for Iraq. I also want to talk about the new hate-crimes expansion bill that Bush has vowed to veto. NZ and I will talk with James Walker, president of Watchman Fellowship, to discuss his issues with the entire notion of hate crimes.

Be sure to join the conversation at 646-652-4889 and keep the debate going!

The Imus Comeback, Phase I

No one expected Don Imus to stay silent for long. Less than a month after CBS fired him from his morning radio show, syndicated nationwide, Imus has begun his public campaign to re-establish himself by claiming that he delivered what CBS specifically desired -- and he wants $120 million in damages.

At Heading Right, I discuss the First Amendment implications, and predict a quick return to the airwaves for Imus.

Another Round Of Duck-Duck-Responsibility

The Democrats have always had it in their power to end the Iraq war simply by defunding it, and forcing the Pentagon to retreat from the terrorists and insurgents in Baghdad, Anbar, and leave the Iraqis to the tender mercies of radical Islamists. They chose not to do so, but to dally for 85 days before producing timetables for withdrawal that everyone knew George Bush would veto, a veto that Congress could not possibly override. Now they have apparently decided to rethink the funding bill to exclude withdrawal requirements and take a different tack. Hillary Clinton and Robert Byrd want to amend the 2002 AUMF to place a five-year sunset provision that will force Bush to withdraw from Iraq:

As Democrats in Congress search for new ways to bring an end to the conflict in Iraq while producing a funding bill that President Bush will sign, the front-runner for the party's presidential nomination yesterday endorsed legislation that would revoke the administration's authority to wage the war.

Amid a flurry of backroom negotiations yesterday afternoon, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.) took the Senate floor to join Appropriations Committee Chairman Robert C. Byrd (W.Va.) in offering a bill that would sunset the 2002 authorization of military operations in Iraq. It would take away the president's authority to wage war in Iraq five years to the day after it was granted, meaning Bush would be required to convince Congress to reapprove it in October. ...

Clinton's endorsement of the sunset legislation represents a significant escalation in her opposition to the White House on war policy and signals an effort by Democratic presidential candidates -- including four sitting senators -- to assume higher profiles in the war debate. For Clinton, it is also an opportunity to address what has emerged as perhaps her greatest liability in the Democratic contest: her vote to authorize the war. "If the president will not bring himself to accept reality, it is time for Congress to bring reality to him," said Clinton, who has expressed support for a similar de-authorization, although not as a stand-alone bill.

The Clinton-Byrd proposal, which was floated in February but not introduced, emerged as Democrats began weighing different legislative vehicles to end the war. One approach favored by many House members is to allow a relatively unencumbered, shorter-term spending bill to reach the president, while the weightier and more controversial war-policy language would be shifted to another measure.

This will be even less substantial than the supplemental that Bush torpedoed. The bill will have the same process as any legislation, which means that it has to pass through both chambers of Congress. That will take some time, and with the summer recess approaching, it may not get a vote until June or possibly August. That would leave less than three months to pull 150,000 troops out of Iraq, which is logistically impossible.

Even if it did pass, it would face the same problem as the supplemental. Bush could veto it -- in fact, he would rush to do so, for even better reasons than with the supplemental -- and Congress would have to override the veto to make it law. Democrats would have to do a lot better than the four Republicans they found this week to override, and they won't, which makes this just another PR stunt.

Make that a campaign stunt. Hillary wants to build some anti-war credibility for what has turned into a tough primary fight. She needs to atone for her vote to authorize the use of military force in Iraq, and what better way than to write a bill to revoke that authorization? She can do so safe in the knowledge that it will never pass, and that she will bear no responsibility for the result.

That's been the entire Democratic strategy. Shailagh Murray and Jonathan Weisman make the laughable statement that Democrats are searching for ways to end the war. They have a Constitutional mechanism for doing just that, and it bypasses a veto by simply stopping the funds for the war. However, that would leave Democrats responsible for the catastrophe that would follow an American retreat from Iraq and its devastating impact on the Middle East and our credibility against radical Islamist terrorists. They're not looking for a way out, they're looking to score partisan points, and Hillary has just decided to play the game.

Iraqis: Don't Abandon Us

Perhaps the debate over whether to persevere in Iraq has become too brittle to accept anyone else's opinion, but the foreign minister of Iraq gives it a game try. In today's Washington Post, Hoshyar Zebari implores Americans and the world not to abandon Iraq to the terrorists and sectarian lunatics. Zebari explains that Iraq has changed profoundly since liberation, and the media paint a distorted picture of his country:

Last weekend a traffic jam several miles long snaked out of the Mansour district in western Baghdad. The delay stemmed not from a car bomb closing the road but from a queue to enter the city's central amusement park. The line became so long some families left their cars and walked to enjoy picnics, fairground rides and soccer, the Iraqi national obsession.

Across the city, restaurants are slowly filling and shops are reopening. The streets are busy. Iraqis are not cowering indoors. The appalling death tolls from suicide attacks are often high because of crowding at markets. These days you are as likely to hear complaints about traffic congestion as about the security situation. Across Baghdad there is a cacophony of sirens from ambulances, firefighters and police providing public services. You cannot even escape the curse of traffic wardens ticketing illegally parked cars.

These small but significant snippets of normality are overshadowed by acts of gross violence, which fuel the opinion of some that Iraq is in a downward spiral. The Iraqi people are indeed suffering tremendous hardships and making grave sacrifices -- but daily life goes on for 7 million Baghdadis struggling to take back their capital and country. ...

We remain determined in spite of our losses. Spectacular attacks may dominate foreign headlines, but they cannot change the reality that Iraq has made steady political, economic and social progress over the past four years. We continue to strengthen our nascent democratic institutions, pursue national reconciliation and expand Iraqi security forces. The Baghdad security plan was conceived to give us breathing space to expedite political and economic development by "securing and holding" neighborhoods across the capital. There is no quick fix, but there have been real results: Winning public confidence has led to a spike in intelligence, a disruption of terrorist networks and the capture of key leaders, as well as the discovery of weapons caches. In Anbar province, Sunni sheikhs and insurgents have turned against al-Qaeda and to the side of Iraqi security forces. This would have been unthinkable even six months ago.

Zebari's frustration is easy to understand. The Iraqis have done most of the bleeding and dying over the last four years, but they have worked hard to create a secure nation and a sense of normalcy. They have sacrificed much in that effort, when it may have cost them less in the short term to align themselves with warlords and dictators. Instead, they have trusted the West to help them through the nightmare and into a new morning for a free Iraq.

Now, just when that goal seems within reach, the world has tired of their struggle. The people in whom Iraqis placed their trust now stand at podiums and declare Iraq a lost cause, just when they see Iraq beginning to emerge from darkness and oppression. Zebari knows that all his nation has gained will be lost if his people see their allies abandon them -- and force Iraqis to come to terms with the warlords and the terrorists for their own survival.

Zebari warns what will come of Iraq and the Middle East in general if the West betrays the Iraqis. It will create a haven for terrorists of all stripes, and will spread chaos and conflict throughout Southwest Asia. It might set off a regional war between Sunni and Shi'ite states, with Baghdad as an Armageddon for Persian and Arab cultures.

The world needs a free, united, and stable Iraq, Zebari warns. It may be difficult, but the alternatives are catastrophic.

Chavez To Gobble Up More Industries

Hugo Chavez, apparently not content to nationalize the oil industry alone, has now threatened to take over the banking and steel industries in Venezuela as well. Unhappy with the investment policies and outsourcing, the dictator sent envoys to the leaders in both industries to demand lower prices and total cooperation with his economic plans:

President Hugo Chavez on Thursday threatened to nationalize the country's banks and largest steel producer, accusing them of unscrupulous practices.

"Private banks have to give priority to financing the industrial sectors of Venezuela at low cost," Chavez said. "If banks don't agree with this, it's better that they go, that they turn over the banks to me, that we nationalize them and get all the banks to work for the development of the country and not to speculate and produce huge profits." ...

Chavez also warned that the government could take over steel producer Sidor, which is controlled by Luxembourg-based Ternium. Shares of Ternium fell 3.9 percent to $26.15 in U.S. trading after Chavez's comments.

Sidor "has created a monopoly" and sold most of its production overseas, forcing local producers to import tubes and other products from China and elsewhere, Ch?vez said.

If Sidor "does not immediately agree to change this process, they will obligate me to nationalize it," Chavez said. "I prefer not to."

It seems obvious that Chavez wants to nationalize all industry in Venezuela. He has demanded and received dictatorial powers from the Venezuelan rubber-stamp parliament in order to bring the country out of its economic "crisis", which gave Chavez the authority he needed to nationalize the oil industry. Despite doubts that Chavez can produce under those conditions, now he wants to get total control of investment capital and the steel necessary for an industrial nation.

Earlier this year, Chavez took over the phone system. He also nationalized the electrical providers, and has threatened to eliminate the last of the independent television broadcasters at the end of this month. He wants total control of Venezuela in order to ensure that no one else can wrest him from power. He wants to create a new Cuba on the South American continent.

How long will it be before we start hearing about the superior Venezuelan health-care system from American Leftists?

Where Do You Stop?

The Los Angeles Times reports on the suddenly veto-happy White House, which warned Congress yesterday that its expansion of the federal hate-crimes law would not survive if brought to the Oval Office. The House passed the bill yesterday anyway, leaving it to the Senate to determine whether Congress will set up another showdown with George Bush (via Memeorandum):

A long-stalled bill that would expand the federal hate crime law to cover violent acts based on a victim's gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or disability is headed for approval in the Democratic-controlled Congress but faces a White House veto threat.

The House on Thursday approved the measure, the first major expansion of the hate crime statute since it was enacted in 1968. Senate approval is expected soon, putting the controversial bill on the president's desk for the first time since it was proposed nearly a decade ago.

Under intense pressure from conservative religious organizations to derail the bill, the White House on Thursday called it "unnecessary and constitutionally questionable," issuing the latest in a string of veto threats aimed at the congressional Democratic majority.

The measure was spurred by a number of high-profile incidents, including the 1998 killing of Matthew Shepard, a gay college student who was brutally beaten in Wyoming and left to die tied to a fence.

On one hand, this legislation makes sense. Congress already passed a law that creates a federal violation for crimes committed with specific animus based on race, national origin, religion, or color. Hatred comes in many flavors, however, and Congress did not fully catalog the spectrum when they first passed hate-crime legislation.

Now they want to add sexual orientation, and who can doubt that hatred exists on that basis? Let's add that in, and while we're at it, let's add in gender identity, because transsexuals get hated, too. In fact, let's put gender on the list, too, because some men hate women, some women hate men, and some hate their own kind. Do people actually hate others based on disability? Well, just to be safe, we'll put that on the list too.

But wait -- we haven't fully explored hate yet. Why not class hatred? Poor people hate rich people; why can't we make that a federal crime, too, as well as in reverse? How about the obese? Some people really have irrational hostility to the obese and act upon it. Why won't Congress protect the overweight? Short people? The elderly? Republicans? Democrats? Postal carriers?

Do people understand where this thinking takes us?

Motivation is not a crime; it is a component of a crime. Whether one beats a man to death because of a drug deal gone bad or an irrational prejudice, the victim is just as dead either way, and the crime is the same. It should make no difference what motivated the assault except to the extent that it proves guilt. What this legislation does is create special classes of victims that get a higher priority on justice than others. That's wrong regardless of the sympathetic nature of these victims.

No one's status in the justice system should depend on their class of identity. For too long in our history, the system exhibited preferences to certain people and barriers to others. The solution to that is not to apply that mistake to the fashionable classes of victims of the moment, but to ensure that the system works equally for everyone. Not only should Bush veto this bill, Congress should repeal the existing priority-by-identity system they've already created.

UPDATE: I expected this kind of stupidity, but I didn't expect it from Shaun Mullen:

In the Captain’s carefully proscribed orbit, Democrats are always ducking responsibility and the corner is just about to be turned in Iraq. Monotonously inaccurate, but then my glasses have clear lenses.

But the Captain crossed the line today in a post on the just-passed hate-crimes bill, which President Bush says he will veto because, in so many words, it’s okay to beat up on gays.

I hate to point out the obvious, but that's not what I wrote. It's not okay to beat up anyone. It doesn't make a beating worse if the victim happens to be gay, or obese, or a Democrat. I defy Shaun to identify where I said anything different. Talk about jumping the shark ...

NRO Debate Forum

Last night, I had the pleasure of analyzing the debate with my excellent co-bloggers at Heading Right as it happened, and then recapping it at Debate Central in a half-hour roundtable which has now been podcasted by BlogTalkRadio. Afterwords, National Review offered me the opportunity to participate in their Symposium on the Reagan Library Debate, along with Yuval Levin, Kathleen Parker, John F Pitney Jr, Peter Robinson, Lisa Schiffren, and of course, Kathryn Jean Lopez.

The consensus appears to be that the debate format was so awful as to make it almost inconsequential. Everyone agreed that Rudy did not help himself, although apparently Survey USA's snap poll showed Rudy winning the debate among California watchers. Perhaps that was because he didn't get to talk as much as the other candidates, as Chris Matthews at times seemed to play keep-away from Rudy. After that, the responses vary, and all are intriguing.

Well, all but one: I'd say my piece is unfortunately the weakest, so read the rest. It's well worth it, as always at NRO.

NOTE: A long night and a cranky computer have me off to a slow start; more to come.

Debate Analysis: Romney Wins

The first Republican debate has finished, and the analysis and spin will begin in earnest. I'm sure that by morning, my e-mail will be filled with messages insisting on promoting one candidate over another, but I already have a few conclusions to share with CQ readers and to inspire debate in this comment thread.

* Who won? -- Mitt Romney won this debate. He looked relaxed, answered clearly, showed real warmth and a sense of humor, and actually answered the questions asked of him -- even the stupid ones, to which I'll return shortly. After Romney, one has to think that Jim Gilmore and Mike Huckabee may have made some strides in breaking out of the third tier. They also showed that they could connect emotionally to the audience and give clear, thoughtful answers.

* Who lost? -- Not everyone who didn't win lost, but a couple of candidates obviously lost this debate. Tommy Thompson, who already had problems with comments made to a Jewish audience, said he thought it was OK for people to get fired just for being homosexual. Whats worse, he looked like a deer in the headlights when Chris Matthews first asked the question. He mumbled, stumbled, and vacillated his way through this debate.

Ron Paul also showed that he should depart the race as quickly as possible. He gave one-note answers about federalism and the original intent of the founders for every question asked of him. He looked outraged all night long, but he put the rest of us to sleep.

* Who marked time? -- John McCain and Rudy Giuliani didn't gain ground but didn't do much damage to themselves, either. McCain started off angry, loud, and aggressive in an obviously deliberate manner, as if he had practiced his Mike Gravel imitation before the debate. He also supported federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research, one of only two to do so, and pretty much wrote off the conservative base when he did so. Giuliani stumbled pretty badly on abortion, but he was also the only candidate -- the only candidate -- who offered a defense of George Bush on the war. Everyone else threw him under the bus, especially John McCain.

* How did MS-NBC and Politico perform? -- Poorly. The format guaranteed that we would learn next to nothing about these candidates. The Politico editor kept strolling all over the stage, asking questions from their on-line audience that were embarrassingly inane. Matthews' questions were better, but phrased in a manner that (a) seemed hostile, and (b) didn't allow for thoughtful answers. The better candidates simply worked their way around the questions, while the others looked lost.

* What about Fred? -- Fred helped himself tremendously by staying out of this debate. His absence will make GOP hearts grow much fonder, much faster. At this rate, if Fred stays out of these debates until the primary season begins, he might be the consensus nominee.

* Who's out first? -- The Heading Right folks say Ron Paul, but I think it's Tommy Thompson. He had a disastrous night, while no one expected any more from Paul than we got tonight.

Debate Live-Blog -- Debate Central Wrap-Up Next!

Were live-blogging the debate at Heading Right. Come by and join us!

We're starting the post-debate discussion at 9 pm CT -- be sure to join us!

Debate Coverage At Blog Talk Radio and Heading Right

Tonight, the first Republican presidential primary debate airs at 7 pm CT -- and Blog Talk Radio and Heading Right will team up to cover it. The entire team at Heading Right will be posting live at the site, offering a running conversation as the 90-minute debate progresses. Over a dozen top conservative BTR hosts will debate the debate, live, at the site. Some will also live-blog the debate on their home blogs.

At 9 pm CT, about thirty minutes after the end of the event, we will launch Debate Central, a new debate forum for BTR. I will moderate a post-debate roundtable with a number of BTR hosts for 30 minutes. We'll talk about the highs and lows, who gained and who lost ground, and the impact on the early primary efforts. We can even take your calls, live, to address how you felt about the debates -- so be sure to remember to call 646-478-4565 during the live broadcast. As always, you can download the show as a podcast minutes after the completion of the show.

Once we've given this a good run, we want to bring back this format with every Presidential debate, both for the Republicans and the Democrats. Keep Heading Right in your bookmarks as we develop this into a tradition. We hope you will join the conversation at both Heading Right and Debate Central!

Milbloggers Safe? (Bumped)

Yesterday, Wired reported on new Army operational-security regulations that would have meant an end, for all practical purposes, to milblogging from the front lines. Today, the Washington Times' Jon Ward asked Tony Snow about the new OpSec regulations, and the White House says the change is "overreported". Here's the video, and a transcript of the key portion:

Q: A follow-up, a second question would be, the Pentagon has required all military bloggers to seek approval for their blogging and their -- I think also their e-mail. Some bloggers and military and conservative commentators have said the government is shutting down --

MR. SNOW: Well, that's -- from what we -- from what we understand, that is being overreported a little bit in the following sense.

First, I'm not sure that that is operational, that request. No. 2, to the extent that they have asked -- and I would refer you to the Pentagon for full comment on this, but my understanding is that they're concerned about matters of operational security -- certainly people giving their opinions about what's going on -- as long as they do not disclose information that is going to jeopardize operations ongoing or in the future or in some way give away information that will make it easier for the enemy to kill Americans or Iraqis, and that's normal in a time of war. There is always censorship in a time of war mainly to protect the people who are doing the fighting, similarly with e-mails, but there is no wholesale shutdown.

Again, I'm just giving you what I know, and I would encourage you to talk to the Pentagon for further detail. But my understanding is there's no wholesale shutting down of blogs or of e-mail. But on the other hand, there is sensitivity to the fact that you have to be careful when you're doing these things not jeopardize yourself, your colleagues, the operations, the Iraqis and the overall mission.

I think the point is more that the regulations would make blogging in a real-time sense impossible. Whether that's by design or an accident of ignorance would be hard to determine. The OpSec regulations require a "supervisor" approve all blogposts and e-mails before publication -- which would probably mean a long delay, in most cases. That's the essential problem.

UPDATE AND BUMP: The Army has issued a clarification on this order:

• In no way will every blog post/update a Soldier makes on his or her blog need to be monitored or first approved by an immediate supervisor and Operations Security (OPSEC) officer. After receiving guidance and awareness training from the appointed OPSEC officer, that Soldier blogger is entrusted to practice OPSEC when posting in a public forum.

• Army Regulation 350-1, “Operations Security,” was updated April 17, 2007 – but the wording and policies on blogging remain the same from the July 2005 guidance first put out by the U.S. Army in Iraq for battlefield blogging. Since not every post/update in a public forum can be monitored, this regulation places trust in the Soldier, Civilian Employee, Family Member and contractor that they will use proper judgment to ensure OPSEC.
o Much of the information contained in the 2007 version of AR 530-1 already was included in the 2005 version of AR 530-1. For example, Soldiers have been required since 2005 to report to their immediate supervisor and OPSEC officer about their wishes to publish military-related content in public forums.
o Army Regulation 530-1 simply lays out measures to help ensure operations security issues are not published in public forums (i.e., blogs) by Army personnel.

• Soldiers do not have to seek permission from a supervisor to send personal E-mails. Personal E-mails are considered private communication. However, AR 530-1 does mention if someone later posts an E-mail in a public forum containing information sensitive to OPSEC considerations, an issue may then arise.

What does this mean? It means that bloggers will get trained in OpSec rules and regulations, and then allowed to police their own conduct. The key word here is "trust". The Army got this right today.

Now, the question is whether Wired got it wrong in the first place.

CQ Radio - Robert Bluey

Today on CQ Radio, we will be talking with Robert Bluey of the Heritage Foundation and also of Bluey Blog in the second half of the show. We'll talk about his new efforts at Heritage and discuss the GOP primary race ahead of tonight's debate. We will also cover other topics in the first half, as well as take calls from you the entire hour. Be sure to call 646-652-4889 to join the conversation!

UPDATE: You can be sure that we will be discussing Robert Novak's unbelievably despicable column in the first part of the show today. See below.

Novak's Despicable Column

Robert Novak has a long career in punditry, so perhaps he has written a more despicable column than today's effort to link Mitt Romney to a massacre -- in 1857. Novak uses the release of a film that depicts the early Western atrocity conducted by Mormons on a band of travelers that coincidentally happened on September 11th, 150 years ago:

Opening Friday, a motion picture called "September Dawn" depicts a brutal American massacre that has been forgotten. On Sept. 11, 1857, in Utah Territory, Mormons slaughtered more than 120 California-bound settlers from Arkansas. Retelling at this time the Sept. 11 carnage of 150 years ago does not help Mormon Mitt Romney's presidential campaign.

The basic facts of the Mountain Meadows Massacre are not in dispute. Mormons mobilized Paiute Indians, accompanied by Mormons disguised as Indians, to attack a peaceful wagon train. The settlers beat back the attack but were left short of food and ammunition. They disarmed at the request of the Mormons, who said they would lead the settlers to safety but instead turned on them, murdering every man, woman and child above age 8. All that is in doubt historically is whether this was ordered by Brigham Young, president of the Mormon Church and territorial governor of Utah. "September Dawn" says he was responsible; the church denies it.

Today's Mormons, including Romney, cannot be blamed for those events. Nevertheless, the candidate has followed the church's example and ignored the movie. Romney will not comment on "September Dawn" and indeed will not watch it. That follows his decision not to defend his faith or actively fight religious bias that has impeded his candidacy.

I attended an April 11 screening of the movie at the Motion Picture Association of America headquarters in Washington hosted by its lead actor: Academy Award-winner Jon Voight (who plays a fictional Mormon bishop). A conservative, Voight said this was no hit on Romney. "I didn't even know he was running when we began this," he told viewers after the screening. But he said this terrible story is important considering America's war against terrorists.

It most certainly is not important in light of our war against terrorists, whatever that means. It has nothing more to do with Romney than the Inquisition did with John F. Kennedy, or the genocide of Native Americans do to today's political leadership. It took place 150 years ago, and everyone involved in the atrocity died decades ago, at the least. If Novak now takes his political direction from Jon Voight, that says more about Novak than Romney.

Novak's entire column wants to place historical blame for all ills of the Mormon church squarely on the shoulders of Mitt Romney. Novak, at the end of his piece, notes that Romney wouldn't discuss the movie with Novak, and apparently that annoyed the columnist to no end. I don't blame Mitt one bit. The movie has nothing to do with Mitt and nothing to do with the campaign -- and that's even if one could rely on Hollywood to handle history with any accuracy at all.

This is nothing more than an attempt to use a fear of Mormons to smear Mitt Romney, with all the subtlety of a brick blackjack. It's the worst kind of religious bigotry wrapped up in Novak's dire language that it relates to the current war against Islamofascist terrorism, a charge that Novak never even bothers to support in his column. It's designed to force Romney to start conducting Mormon apologetics on the campaign trail instead of talking about public policy and national security.

Novak should be ashamed of himself, and the Post should consider a retraction or at least an apology to Romney. This is one column that should have been deep-sixed by those series of editorial checks about which bloggers keep hearing whenever the national press wants to prove its superiority.

UPDATE: Be sure to read Hugh Hewitt's take on this as well.

Quinnipiac Poll Shows Rudy Coming Back To The Pack

On the eve of the first televised debate for the Republican presidential contenders, Quinnipiac shows that the race continues to fluctuate in the early primary season. Rudy Giuliani has lost significant ground over the last month to the undeclared Fred Thompson, but neither John McCain nor Mitt Romney has taken advantage:

Giuliani leads the Republican field with 27 percent, down from 40 percent, followed by 19 percent for Arizona Sen. John McCain, 14 percent for former Sen. Fred Thompson and 8 percent each for former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney.

The Democrats have not changed positions much at all. Hillary Clinton leads the pack with a substantial 14-point lead over Barack Obama (32%-18%), despite other polling that indicated Obama had caught up to Hillary. Al Gore comes in third with 14%, meaning that the #3 person in both parties is an undeclared candidate -- not exactly an endorsement of the current slate for either side.

Giuliani still wins the matchups with Democrats, however. He beats Obama within the margin of error (44-41), but more substantially beats Hillary (49-40) and Gore (48-41). McCain also beats Hillary and Gore by 5 and 6 points respectively, but comes up in a dead heat against Obama. The Democrats continue to have problems beating Republicans in a head-to-head race, and that comes from the thin or nonexistent favorablity ratings for the different candidates. Hillary has a negative favorability of -2% overall, while Gore has a razor-thin +8. Obama does better with a +30, but Giuliani's got a majority of people (53%) who like him, as opposed to Obama's 46%. McCain has a +23 favorability, and Fred Thompson hasn't made enough of an impact yet to get a good number.

Ryan Sager sees this poll as good news for McCain:

While Mr. McCain's favorable-unfavorable ratings have deteriorated slightly with the public at large, he's gained among white Evangelicals while Mr. Giuliani has seen an erosion. In February, Mr. McCain's fav-unfav with white Evangelicals was 53%-24%; now, it's 58%-15%. Among the same group, Mr. Giuliani went from 62%-16% in February to 57%-19% today.

These aren't huge jumps on either side. But they are evidence that Mr. Giuliani's liberal social views are catching up with him, while Mr. McCain is having some success reminding social conservatives that, though he's had some spats with the religious right, his views aren't that far out of the Republican mainstream.

I'd agree; McCain has stopped the bleeding. He needs a great performance tonight, though, to get the wheels completely back on the bus. The pending Fred Thompson bid has everyone re-evaluating their position, and that gives McCain an opening to start changing minds.

Time: Bush Less Influential Than ... Queen Elizabeth

You have to love the American media and its love of lists. They feel compelled to categorize the top 100 most, least, biggest, most beautiful of just about anything that talks, walks, or crawls -- and they almost always manage to get it completely wrong when doing so. Time Magazine has just published its list of the 100 Most Influential People In The World, and guess who got left out? Just the leader of the Free World, that's all (via Mac at Heading Right):

Heartthrob Leonardo DiCaprio and envelope-pushers Rosie O'Donnell and Sacha Baron Cohen are among the entertainment newsmakers on Time magazine's list of 100 people who shape the world.

The list of 100 most influential, on newsstands Friday, also includes Queen Elizabeth II, presidential hopefuls Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, YouTube founders Steve Chen and Chad Hurley, director Martin Scorsese and model Kate Moss. It does not include President Bush.

Let's see if we can make sense of this. Two Senators who want to win a nomination for the next presidential election are more influential than the man who currently holds the position? I'm not saying that Hillary and Obama do not have influence -- after all, they are the frontrunners for the Democrats. However, arguing that they have more influence than George Bush is simply unrealistic, and it betrays the bias of Time in its attempt to sell their list. Bush just demonstrated that he has equal influence as the entirety of Congress in vetoing the supplemental bill.

Love him, hate him, or feel indifferent, but one cannot deny that the President of the United States has a great deal of influence. This one in particular has toppled two brutal dictatorships and currently runs a controversial war in Iraq. He has worked with four other nations to isolate North Korea and pushed the UN Security Council to isolate Iran. Bush has, for better or worse, negotiated free-trade agreements with most of the rest of the world during his six years in office, and has even begun to attract nations like Canada to his policy on greenhouse gases.

So who does Time consider more influential than that? Queen Elizabeth II. That's right, the figurehead monarch that has no political power at all, and whose family forms the basis of a sneering wing of the global media, has more influence than the President. Why? Apparently, according to Catherine Mayer, because she's cut back on family expenses.

Who else? The Anglican Archbishop of Nigeria. Don't know his name? Perhaps that's a measure of his influence.

What about Condoleezza Rice? I agree that she is tremendously influential, but more so than the man who sets the policy she implements? Don't get me wrong -- I believe she should be on the list, but there is a logical error that Time's editors seem to have missed. Rice is the envoy of Bush's policy, and as such she acts as a proxy for Bush, just as any Secretary of State does for any President. Reagan knew the difference, as his sharp-tongued diary entry regarding Alexander Haig proved.

Any list from Time would not be complete without a sop to a Communist, and Time helpfully provides Raul Castro. Not Fidel, but his younger brother and chief toady, a man so uninteresting that he went weeks without a public appearance following Fidel's illness and the media barely noticed it.

All of these people, Time would have you believe, have more influence than a sitting President of the US during a time of war. Maybe Time wanted to dent Bush's credibility, but they torpedoed their own instead.

CORRECTION: Six years in office, not six terms. No, that's not wishful thinking either; eight years is enough for anyone, including Ronald Reagan. Thanks to CQ commenter Faith1.

LAT: Early Withdrawal Would Be A Disaster

Yesterday, CNN reported on the disastrous consequences that a precipitate American withdrawal would create for Iraq. Today, the Los Angeles Times follows suit, describing the delicate process of training a national army from scratch, and the collapse that would ensue if America bugs out:

For almost three years, training the Iraqi army has been among the top priorities for the U.S. military. And for nearly that long, U.S. officials have considered it among their chief frustrations.

Now, with President Bush under steady pressure to begin pulling U.S. troops from Iraq, the administration once again is emphasizing the need to train Iraqi forces to take over the country's security.

But despite some signs of progress, both Iraqis and their American advisors at this training range are blunt about how much work remains: If a U.S. pullout comes anytime soon, most say, the Iraqi army will collase.

"Honestly put, I think Iraq would be challenged to remain a unified country," said Marine Lt. Col. William Redman, the senior advisor at the range.

"I've seen anarchy, and we're right on the brink of it right now. If we go in a year or two years, it's going to be a complete mess," said retired Army 1st Sgt. Jerry Massey, a 21-year veteran who trains Iraqis in how to spot and respond to threats. "We can't leave here for another five years, minimum."

Problems abound in the Iraqi security forces. The recruits have little experience, belonging mostly to the oppressed class under Saddam Hussein. Most of them assumed they would have postings near home, but the new efforts to secure Baghdad and Anbar have many of them far away from their tribes. The Iraqi government has not distributed pay efficiently, so many of them desert while on leave. The uptick in sectarian violence has tested the loyalties of many in the armed services.

The Iraqis have to overcome all of these problems in order to have a stable security force that can keep Iraq in one piece. They have made progress in most of these issues, but only stabilization will solve them all -- and they need training and discipline to being stabilization. The US employed the surge strategy to dial down the distractions and to give the Maliki government time to resolve some of the political issues while we focus on training.

And progress has been made. The army now has 10 divisions, with new recruits showing an enthusiasm even beyond the first few rounds of enlistments. The newer recruits are much less likely to desert. That's a big improvement over two years ago, when the Iraqi Army struggled to put two divisions in the field, and then struggled to perform once there. We have grown their army by a factor of five in two years, and we continue to add divisions and trained men to the force.

What's most interesting, though, is the sudden media interest in the consequences of withdrawal. That topic got very little coverage, or if it did get attention, it always came in the context of "it could hardly be worse than what we have now". Suddenly, CNN's analyst says that a withdrawal "would hurt America's image and hand al Qaeda and other terror groups a propaganda victory that the United States is only a paper tiger ... It would also play into their strategy, which is to create a mini-state somewhere in the Middle East where they can reorganize along the lines of what they did in Afghanistan in the late '90s." The LA Times includes this analysis from Iraqi Col. Abbas Fadhil:

If the United States were to leave, Iran would move in and devour Iraq, he said. "Without America? Fighting alone? Just Iraqi army fighting? That's not good," Fadhil said, his eyes widening at the thought. "We need time for training, for supplies. We need at least seven years." Even better, he said, 50 years.

Fifty years? Who does Fadhil think he is -- a German or a Japanese liberated by American troops? Does he think that Iraq has the same strategic implications as either of those two countries in the post-WWII world?

If he's smart, he does. Apparently, CNN and the Los Angeles Times have belatedly concluded as much.

Jumping The Snark

Atlantic Monthly's Andrew Sullivan has spent the last few years raging about the Bush administration and its predilection for torture. He has also written extensively on the supposedly degrading effect the television show “24″ has on the nation, and how it fits into a Fox/neocon mentality and to desensitize us to the horror of torture. Unfortunately, this predisposed Andrew to fall for a rather obvious hoax at a website devoted to entertainment satire. Has Andrew jumped the snark? Join us at Heading Right to discuss!

Groping For Agreement

Democrats and Republicans began the process of reaching a compromise on funding the military operations in Iraq yesterday, with Democrats apparently making the first big concession. The Washington Post reports that the demand for withdrawal timelines will be dropped -- and in return, the Republicans will back benchmarks tied to non-military aid for Iraq:

President Bush and congressional leaders began negotiating a second war funding bill yesterday, with Democrats offering the first major concession: an agreement to drop their demand for a timeline to bring troops home from Iraq.

Democrats backed off after the House failed, on a vote of 222 to 203, to override the president's veto of a $124 billion measure that would have required U.S. forces to begin withdrawing as early as July. But party leaders made it clear that the next bill will have to include language that influences war policy. Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (Nev.) outlined a second measure that would step up Iraqi accountability, "transition" the U.S. military role and show "a reasonable way to end this war." ...

But a new dynamic also is at work, with some Republicans now saying that funding further military operations in Iraq with no strings attached does not make practical or political sense. Rep. Bob Inglis (S.C.), a conservative who opposed the first funding bill, said, "The hallway talk is very different from the podium talk."

While deadlines for troop withdrawals had to be dropped from the spending bill, such language is likely to appear in a defense policy measure that is expected to reach the House floor in two weeks, just when a second war funding bill could be ready for a House vote. Democrats want the next spending measure to pass before Congress recesses on May 25 for Memorial Day weekend.

The outline for this compromise could have been seen for weeks. After unanimously confirming General David Petraeus in what obviously portended a significant shift of strategy and tactics, Congress should have allowed at least six months before assessing the impact of his efforts. Instead, they decided to push for the political victory and attempted to force President Bush to back down -- and they failed to budge him. They also wasted a lot of time doing so, almost 90 days after the White House asked for the necessary funds for Petraeus and our military operations.

That puts Congress on the defensive. After laughably failing to override the veto yesterday -- a foregone conclusion for months -- they now have to start over again, 90 days later, while the Pentagon has already run out of money for some of its operations. The supplemental has to get passed and signed as quickly as possible, and that reduces the leverage of Congressional leadership. If they fail to produce an acceptable compromise bill by the time they leave for Memorial Day, the outrage will get directed at Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi. The nation will wonder what they have been doing since the beginning of the year, since nothing much else has passed Congress since the Democrats took control in January.

Had the Democrats really wanted to put Bush in a corner, they would have started out with this compromise from the beginning. They could have garnered Republican support and taken leadership of the direction of the war. As the Post reports, many Republicans have deep concerns about the Iraqi government and the pace of reform. They do not want to give Nouri al-Maliki a blank check, either. That kind of politicking would have given momentum and a sense of reality to the Democrats.

Instead, they decided to get into a pissing match, and deliberately rejected reasonable compromises for extremism. They lost the sympathy of all but four Republicans in Congress; the rest will not vote to surrender to terrorists by naming dates for our retreat. Reid and Pelosi enabled Bush to look tough, presidential, and relevant -- and now they have belatedly discovered that since they don't have the testicular fortitude to yank the funding altogether, they have to find some way to accommodate the White House.

Welcome to the big leagues, Harry and Nancy. This time, try to keep up.

Al-Baghdadi Reaching Room Temperature (Update: Jabouri?)

The Iraqis have announced another big takedown from al-Qaeda, and this time it looks like the US military will confirm the kill. Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, the self-proclaimed leader of the Islamic State of Iraq, has gone to meet his 72 virgins, courtesy of a joint US-Iraq operation:

U.S. and Iraqi forces have killed the head of the self-styled Islamic State in Iraq, an al Qaeda-led militant group that has claimed many major attacks in the country, Iraq's deputy interior minister said on Thursday.

Hussein Kamal said Abu Omar al-Baghdadi had been killed in a battle north of Baghdad. He declined to say when but said authorities had recovered Baghdadi's body.

"Abu Omar al-Baghdadi was killed north of Baghdad by Iraqi and American forces. He died as a result of wounds sustained in clashes. The Interior Ministry has his body to carry out further checks," Kamal told Reuters by telephone.

U.S. military spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Christopher Garver declined to comment but said a news conference would be held later on Thursday to announce the "success" of an operation against Sunni Islamist al Qaeda.

That goes a lot farther than the US was willing to go earlier this week, when the Iraqis announced that Abu Ayyub al-Masri was really, really dead this time. American commanders have thus far declined to confirm al-Masri's death, which leaves the status of al-Qaeda in Iraq's leadership somewhat murky. AQI claims that al-Masri is alive, but have released no audio or video of him since the Iraqi Interior Ministry claimed he was killed in some internecine insurgent fighting.

Al-Baghdadi, however, would be even better than al-Masri. He had placed himself at the head of an umbrella organization of insurgent groups affiliated with al-Qaeda; al-Masri was his "war minister". Baghdadi wanted to try to organize outside of AQ and create an alliance with other Sunni insurgent groups in order to build strength against the elected government of Iraq and the US forces operating there. One of his main objectives was to mend the rift with native Iraqis over the indiscriminate target selection of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and especially al-Masri.

Now it looks like al-Baghdadi won't get that chance, if US forces confirm his death. It won't end the fighting, but any time we can take out senior leadership of terrorist networks, it helps.

UPDATE: The US will not confirm al-Baghdadi's death, but they announced that Muharib Abdul Latif al-Jubouri, AQI's "senior minister of information", had been killed:

The U.S. military said on Thursday it had killed a senior al Qaeda official in Iraq who it accused of involvement in the kidnapping of Americans Jill Carroll and Tom Fox and other foreigners.

But the military said it had no information to support claims by Iraq's Interior Ministry that Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, another senior al Qaeda figure in Iraq, had been killed.

Chief military spokesman Major-General William Caldwell identified Muharib Abdul Latif al-Jubouri, the "senior minister of information" for al Qaeda in Iraq, as a key figure in the separate abductions of Carroll and Fox.

"We killed him ... west of Taji on the first day of May," Caldwell told a news conference, referring to a town north of the capital Baghdad.

If we got all three of these terrorists, that would be wonderful, but Jabouri would be a victory under any circumstances. The momentum continues to favor the bold and the determined. If AQI leaves its senior officials out in the open like this, the network will eventually fall apart.

Russia Tries Its Usual Extortion Against Estonia

Estonia angered the Russians by recently removing a monument to the Red Army which occupied the Baltic state for decades. Vladimir Putin has poured gasoline on the fire of the controversy, demanding the restoral of the monument, and threatening Estonia if they fail to do so. Estonia's ambassador to Russia got assaulted by mobs, as did Sweden's, and the EU scolded Russia for not providing the proper security to diplomats in Moscow.

Putin responded by escalating the tensions even further. Just as he did with Ukraine and Belarus, Putin has cut off energy supplies to the Estonians, presumably until they restore the memorial:

Russia’s conflict with Estonia over the removal of a monument to the Red Army escalated yesterday after pro-Kremlin activists in Moscow tried to assault the Baltic republic’s ambassador.

The EU entered the confrontation, calling on Russia to uphold commitments to protect foreign diplomats. A mob also attacked a car carrying Sweden’s representative in Moscow as it left the Estonian Embassy.

Andrus Ansip, the Estonian Prime Minister, appealed to the EU for support, saying that his nation’s sovereignty was under “heavy” attack. President Ilves told Russia to “remain civilised”.

Russia blamed Estonia for tensions that followed the removal on Friday of the statue of the Bronze Soldier from the centre of Tallinn to a military cemetery.

In a development that echoed Moscow’s disputes with Ukraine and Belarus, the state-owned Russian Railways suddenly halted oil deliveries to Estonian ports. It claimed that it needed to carry out maintenance work and denied that it was imposing sanctions. Russia ships around 25 million tonnes of fuel oil, gas oil and petrol through Estonian ports.

We knew that Putin has wanted to consolidate power in Eastern Europe to recreate a Russian empire that the Soviets let slip from their hands. Now we can also see that Putin and the Russians have indulged an immature petulance that threatens to blow up Euro-Russian relations. Withholding energy deliveries because of a statue may not be the stupidest reason to ruin diplomatic reasons, but it certainly qualifies for the finals.

Europe has moved quickly to support the Estonians. They will send a mission to Moscow to protest the Russian actions, and also to demand an end to Putins blockade of Estonia. Russia denies blockading Estonia, but blames the kerfuffle on the Estonians for removing the statue in the first place and bringing passions "to the boil."

Hogwash. The Red Army didn't just beat the Nazis, but also ilelgally occupied Estonia for over forty years. The Soviets were supposed to leave the Baltic states after the end of World War II but refused to do so. The US and most of Europe never recognized the occupation governments of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania until after the collapse of the Soviet Union freed the Baltic states of the Red Army.

That history is bad enough. Having Putin insist that the Estonians continue to pay homage to their oppressors refreshes the outrage anew over the long Soviet occupation, which actually predates the Nazi invasion of the Baltic. Moving to a Red Army cemetery from the center of Talinn was more gracious than the Red Army, Russia, and Putin deserved. They should have either shipped it back to Moscow or thrown it on the trash heap.

Was Mousavian A Western Mole?

The arrest of former nuclear negotiator Hossein Mousavian has people scratching their heads, as I noted yesterday. Now the Guardian reports that Iranian authorities have charged Mousavian with leaking secrets from the Iranian nuclear program to the West:

A senior Iranian diplomat who played a prominent role in negotiations on the country's nuclear programme was arrested in Tehran on security charges, it was reported yesterday.

Hossein Mousavian was taken from his home on Monday by security officials and charged with passing on information on Iran's nuclear industry, the news agency IRNA reported, without saying who allegedly received the information.

Mr Mousavian had served as the deputy head of the Iranian delegation in talks with the west on Tehran's nuclear ambitions, and had also been ambassador to Germany. Since the election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad he had left the government, and was working at a Tehran thinktank at the time of his detention.

The West has received better intel on the Iranian program over the last few years, ever since the extent of the Iranian deception has been revealed. A former negotiator would make a good source, but not necessarily a great one. The failure of the EU-3 to make any headway in negotiations would argue against Mousavian as a mole at that time (or demonstrate a level of incompetence in the European effort), and he would have even less to say about the nuclear program after he left the diplomatic service.

It's more likely that Mousavian is a pawn in a power struggle between two factions of Iranians. Mousavian is a protege of Hashemi Rafsanjani, whom rumors have attempting to form a coalition among the ruling elite against Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Rafsanjani has one of the largest fortunes in Iran, and his son already has some problems surrounding the acceptance of bribes from the West in the oil business. Ahmadinejad and his allies may be looking to show that Rafsanjani has ties to traitors as well as corruption, and Mousavian would make a fairly safe patsy for the ruling clique under Ahmadinejad.

Why now? So-called centrists in Teheran, for whom Rafsanjani provides leadership, want Iran to engage with the US at the Sharm el-Sheikh conference this week. Arresting Mousavian may relieve the pressure on Ahmadinejad by discrediting the centrists ahead of the meeting. It allows Ahmedinejad and the mullahs who prop him up as president to continue their policy of provocation with the West.

If so, then Mousavian had better hope for a change of government very soon. Otherwise, he's probably a dead man.

A Right To Adult Incest?

When I first wrote about the Supreme Court's decision to strike down a sodomy law in the case of Lawrence v Texas, I warned that the basis of the decision -- a privacy right to sexual conduct between consenting adults -- would produce a wide range of mischief in subsequent decisions. I noted that polygamy, prostitution, and adult incest could be justified under such reasoning, and that although the law in question in Lawrence was indeed foolish and unwise, it did not violate the Constitution. Many CQ readers initially scoffed at this warning -- which is OK, because I actually enjoy scoffing -- but in November, polygamists began organizing challenges to the legal ban using Lawrence as a template.

Today, Jeff Jacoby reports at the Boston Globe that we should prepare ourselves for cases involving adult incest, too:

When the justices, voting 6-3, did in fact declare it unconstitutional for any state to punish consensual gay sex, the dissenters echoed [former Senator Rick] Santorum's point. "State laws against bigamy, same-sex marriage, adult incest, prostitution, masturbation, adultery, fornication, bestiality, and obscenity are . . . called into question by today's decision," Justice Antonin Scalia wrote for the minority. Now, Time magazine acknowledges: "It turns out the critics were right."

Time's attention, like the BBC's, has been caught by the legal battles underway to decriminalize incest between consenting adults. An article last month by Time reporter Michael Lindenberger titled "Should Incest Be Legal?" highlights the case of Paul Lowe, an Ohio man convicted of incest for having sex with his 22-year-old stepdaughter. Lowe has appealed his conviction to the Supreme Court, making Lawrence the basis of his argument. In Lawrence, the court had ruled that people "are entitled to respect for their private lives" and that under the 14th Amendment, "the state cannot demean their existence or control their destiny by making their private sexual conduct a crime." If that was true for the adult homosexual behavior in Lawrence, why not for the adult incestuous behavior in the Ohio case? ...

Your reaction to the prospect of lawful incest may be "Ugh, gross." But personal repugnance is no replacement for moral standards. For more than 3,000 years, a code of conduct stretching back to Sinai has kept incest unconditionally beyond the pale. If sexual morality is jettisoned as a legitimate basis for legislation, personal opinion and cultural fashion are all that will remain. "Should Incest Be Legal?" Time asks. Expect more and more people to answer yes.

Time Magazine reported in the article linked above that

It turns out the critics were right. Plaintiffs have made the decision the centerpiece of attempts to defeat state bans on the sale of sex toys in Alabama, polygamy in Utah and adoptions by gay couples in Florida. So far the challenges have been unsuccessful. But plaintiffs are still trying, even using Lawrence to challenge laws against incest.

The trick will be to get the Supreme Court to apply the Lawrence standard at all. They may avoid it by declaring that the state has a legitimate interest in keeping siblings or other close blood relations from conceiving -- but in that case, would the sterility of one partner void the law banning incest? That state interest would not apply in one of the pending cases in which a man had a sexual relationship with his adult stepdaughter, someone outside the limits of consanguinuity.

That state interest -- avoiding strange genetic variations -- would also not apply to polygamy and polyamory among adults. Polygamy and polyamory as practiced in secret have plenty of other social ills tied to it, but openly practiced among adults, those would not necessarily follow. The same would be true of prostitution, although the state could argue that it has a valid interest in controlling the spread of venereal diseases. Where prostitution is legal, however, the state and the industry require frequent health screens to avoid it and also require "safe sex" in all instances.

In the end, the honest and real community interest in these laws are moral -- and Lawrence removed that as a basis for law.

The dissenters were right. Based on the logic of their reasoning, the Supreme Court in Lawrence opened the floodgates for these challenges, and until the Court allows that law can validly reflect a moral consensus of the community without violating an emanation of a penumbra of the Constitution, eventually those challenges will succeed. At some point, this court or a future one will have to overrule Lawrence or have us forego any limitations on sexual practices in our society, regardless of legitimate state interests.

UPDATE: David Schraub notes a curious exception to incest laws in Rhode Island, and takes issue with Jacoby's Sinai reference. In Jacoby's defense, I believe he meant it in a general sense to reflect on the long tradition of legal sanctions against incest, and not that we should continue them just because they appear in the Bible.

CQ Radio: Follow The Veto

Today on CQ Radio, we will speak with Josh Holmes, the spokesman for the Senate Republican Communication Office, to talk about the veto, the Iraq war funding, and what we can expect over the next few days. You can speak with Josh and myself by calling 646-652-4889 between 2-3 pm CT this afternoon!

UPDATE AND BUMP: The House failed to override the veto. I'll post the final vote. If Nancy Pelosi couldn't hold the original 218 votes, that will be a significant defeat for her.

UPDATE II: Pelosi actually picked up four votes. The House voted 222-203 to override the veto, far short of the two-thirds necessary.

Feinstein Revisited

I'm getting some e-mail and comments about the David Keene essay in The Hill regarding Dianne Feinstein regarding the multiple conflicts of interest between her Appropriations subcommittee assignment and her husband's businesses. Two days ago, Keene noted that her status as a "Cardinal" in the Appropriations process, combined with her position on the Senate Rules committee, left her able to oversee the issuance of contracts to businesses that enriched her family:

California Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D) chairs the Senate Rules Committee, but she’s also a Cardinal. She is currently chairwoman of the Interior, Environment and Related Agencies subcommittee, but until last year was for six years the top Democrat on the Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies (or “Milcon”) sub-committee, where she may have directed more than $1 billion to companies controlled by her husband.

If the inferences finally coming out about what she did while on Milcon prove true, she may be on the way to morphing from a respected senior Democrat into another poster child for congressional corruption.

The problems stem from her subcommittee activities from 2001 to late 2005, when she quit. During that period the public record suggests she knowingly took part in decisions that eventually put millions of dollars into her husband’s pocket — the classic conflict of interest that exploited her position and power to channel money to her husband’s companies.

In other words, it appears Sen. Feinstein was up to her ears in the same sort of shenanigans that landed California Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham (R) in the slammer. Indeed, it may be that the primary difference between the two is basically that Cunningham was a minor leaguer and a lot dumber than his state’s senior senator.

I'm glad Keene gives this some sunlight -- but I first wrote about this last month. As Keene notes, not much has changed in the interim -- but I have posted my original at Heading Right to highlight just how disinterested the media seems in Congressional corruption when practiced by Democrats.

An Unconservative Stand

The debate over gun rights has taken an interesting and complex twist in Texas. Governor Rick Perry, in reaction to the massacre in the "gun-free zone" of Virginia Tech, now says that Texas state law should allow licensed gun carriers to bring their firearms everywhere -- churches, schools, and businesses. Perry's initiative would render moot signs on buildings forbidding entry to those who carry concealed weapons, as long as a permit had been issued (via Hot Air):

Texans who have concealed-weapon permits should be allowed to carry their guns anywhere in the state, including churches, courthouses and bars, Gov. Rick Perry said Monday.

Currently, state law prohibits concealed weapons in certain places, including private property where signs are posted disallowing the guns.

But after meetings with U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt about the rampage at Virginia Tech, Mr. Perry took issue with the idea of barring weapons from campuses. ...

The governor said deranged individuals don't pay any attention to signs that bar guns on certain premises and that citizens ought "to be able to protect themselves from that standpoint."

Asked whether such a wide- open weapons policy would include bars and courthouses, Mr. Perry said: "A person ought to be able to carry their weapon with them anywhere in the state if they are licensed and they have gone through the training.

"The idea that you're going to exempt them from a particular place is nonsense."

This would make sense for state property. After all, the government of Texas owns it, and can set the rules as it sees fit. That would have applied to Virginia Tech as well, a public university, whose state created the gun-free zone that failed to deter Seung-hui Cho, the mass murderer who killed 32 unarmed people. If the people of Texas want to allow licensed carriers onto their public property with their firearms, more power to them.

However, the state of Texas does not have the right to impose that on private property owners. A bar, restaurant, church, or private school should be allowed to determine whether they want to allow guns on their own property. Churches, for instance, might have a religious objection to the use of firearms. Perry advocates the same argument that activists for smoking bans use -- that private businesses are a public accommodation, and that the safety of the public overrules the wishes of the property owners.

I tend to sympathize with the notion that so-called "gun-free zones" work in practice to identify large groups of law-abiding, disarmed citizens who can easily be victimized by violent lawbreakers. That doesn't give the state the right to tell me, as a church pastor or a bar owner or a private-school headmaster that I must allow guns onto my property. I should be able to set that policy for myself.

Conservatives who applaud Governor Perry's approach should think twice about the ramifications for private property. Let Texas set the policy for its public property, and leave churches, businesses, and homes to the people who own them.

Army To Milbloggers: About Face

The US Army has promulgated a new set of rules for operational security that puts restrictions on the ability of soldiers to write about their experiences in combat theaters. In fact, the change will be so restrictive as to have the practical effect of eliminating active-duty milbloggers, and silencing the voices from the front who have most actively promoted the war effort (via Michelle Malkin):

The U.S. Army has ordered soldiers to stop posting to blogs or sending personal e-mail messages, without first clearing the content with a superior officer, Wired News has learned. The directive, issued April 19, is the sharpest restriction on troops' online activities since the start of the Iraq war. And it could mean the end of military blogs, observers say.

Military officials have been wrestling for years with how to handle troops who publish blogs. Officers have weighed the need for wartime discretion against the opportunities for the public to personally connect with some of the most effective advocates for the operations in Afghanistan and Iraq -- the troops themselves. The secret-keepers have generally won the argument, and the once-permissive atmosphere has slowly grown more tightly regulated. Soldier-bloggers have dropped offline as a result. ...

"This is the final nail in the coffin for combat blogging," said retired paratrooper Matthew Burden, editor of The Blog of War anthology. "No more military bloggers writing about their experiences in the combat zone. This is the best PR the military has -- it's most honest voice out of the war zone. And it's being silenced."

The Army gets paid to protect operational security. In this war, more than any other, the enemies of our troops use the Internet to their advantage, both in their own communications and to scope out their enemies -- the American military and government. If troops have leaked classified information either deliberately or inadvertently through their on-line communications, this would be a large area of concern to the Pentagon.

However, no one has any evidence that milbloggers have violated Opsec orders in their communications. The one example offered in Wired is an old story about how people noticed a lot of parked cars and an uptick in pizza deliveries to the Pentagon on January 16, 1991, which presaged the imminent activation of Operation Desert Storm. That seems rather picayune, not to mention outdated.

If that's the extent of their concern and the extent of the violations, then they have sacrificed a powerful voice of support for the Army and the mission in favor of an almost-useless silence. The author of the new rules, Major Ray Ceralde, claims that it won't kill milblogging, but the regulations make it so cumbersome that it will be impossible to maintain blogs -- or even e-mail. Here's the relevant section:

g. Consult with their immediate supervisor and their OPSEC Officer for an OPSEC review prior to publishing or posting information in a public forum.

(1) This includes, but is not limited to letters, resumes, articles for publication, electronic mail (e-mail), Web site
postings, web log (blog) postings, discussion in Internet information forums, discussion in Internet message boards or other forms of dissemination or documentation.

(2) Supervisors will advise personnel to ensure that sensitive and critical information is not to be disclosed. Each
unit or organization’s OPSEC Officer will advise supervisors on means to prevent the disclosure of sensitive and
critical information.

In practical terms, a commanding officer would have to approve every blog post, every e-mail, and every forum post before the soldier could complete it. With the prodigious red tape of the military and the other duties of commanding officers, that means it could take days, weeks, or even forever before those requests get addressed. The immediacy of the information will be lost, and so will interest in it.

Milbloggers have provided a vital voice in this war, reporting from vantage points unattainable elsewhere. We have learned about the successes in this war, such as rebuilding efforts and the enthusiasm of Iraqis in neighborhoods protected by American forces, that we do not get in our mainstream media since the embed program ended. Nothing appears ready to replace it except for official Pentagon statements, which carry less weight with the reading public than the soldiers on the front line.

The Army should be concerned about the operational security of the mission -- but without those voices engaging the American public, the mission may be lost here at home.

Addendum: I almost missed the most humorous part of the new rules. Many of the contractors bound by them can't get access to the new Opsec document:

But, while the regulations may apply to a broad swath of people, not everybody affected can actually read them. In a Kafka-esque turn, the guidelines are kept on the military's restricted Army Knowledge Online intranet. Many Army contractors -- and many family members -- don't have access to the site. Even those able to get in are finding their access is blocked to that particular file.

"Even though it is supposedly rewritten to include rules for contractors (i.e., me) I am not allowed to download it," e-mails Perry Jeffries, an Iraq war veteran now working as a contractor to the Armed Services Blood Program.

Does this remind anyone else of Catch-22?

UPDATE: Be sure to read the post and the comments at Blackfive, and also at Mudville Gazette.

Heading Right And BTR Team Coverage Of Republican Debate

The first Republican presidential primary debate airs tomorrow night at 7 pm CT -- and Blog Talk Radio and Heading Right will team up to cover it. The entire team at Heading Right will be posting live at the site, offering a running conversation as the 90-minute debate progresses. Over a dozen top conservative BTR hosts will debate the debate, live, at the site. Some will also live-blog the debate on their home blogs.

At 9 pm CT, about thirty minutes after the end of the event, we will launch Debate Central, a new debate forum for BTR. I will moderate a post-debate roundtable with a number of BTR hosts for 30 minutes. We'll talk about the highs and lows, who gained and who lost ground, and the impact on the early primary efforts. We can even take your calls, live, to address how you felt about the debates -- so be sure to remember to call 646-478-4565 during the live broadcast. As always, you can download the show as a podcast minutes after the completion of the show.

We hope you will join the conversation at both Heading Right and Debate Central!

UPDATE: My good friends at Power Line have a new electoral effort in their forums called Candidates Forum. It gives readers an aggregate site for communications from several of the presidential candidates. Video, audio, and press releases can now all be found in one convenient location. Be sure to bookmark it througgh 2008.

A Look Back At Reagan

Ronald Reagan inspired many analyses of his performance, from historically brilliant to accidentally successful, and worse. Journalists used him as a blank canvas for the most part, projecting their own biases and agendas onto Reagan and missing the essence of the man. Fortunately, Reagan faithfully kept up his diaries until the end of his presidency, and Harper Collins will publish extracts by historian Douglas Brinkley in The Reagan Diaries later this month.

I've posted some excerpts at Heading Right from Howard Kurtz' article in the Washington Post, and we find out that Reagan is as we essentially knew him: witty, honest, passionate, and intelligent. In a front-page story, the placement of which speaks volumes about Reagan’s legacy, the wisdom of the 40th president remains trenchant and compelling today.

Now What?

With George Bush delivering only the second veto of his presidency, the question of funding the mission in Iraq became even more acute. Eighty-six days after the start of the 110th Congress, the military still has not received funding for operations in Iraq this year, and the process has to start from Square One while the Pentagon has to start juggling the books:

President Bush vetoed a $124 billion measure yesterday that would have funded overseas military operations but required him to begin withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq as early as July, escalating the most serious confrontation between the White House and Congress over war policy in a generation.

Bush carried through on his veto threat just after the legislation arrived at the White House, calling the timetable a "prescription for chaos and confusion" that would undercut generals. "Setting a deadline for withdrawal would demoralize the Iraqi people, would encourage killers across the broader Middle East and send a signal that America will not keep its commitments," he said last night. "Setting a deadline for withdrawal is setting a date for failure."

Democratic congressional leaders cast the veto as willful defiance of the American people. "The president wants a blank check," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) said just minutes after Bush's statement. "The Congress is not going to give it to him." Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (Nev.) said that "if the president thinks that by vetoing this bill he will stop us from trying to change the direction of this war, he is mistaken."

At some point, a compromise has to be reached -- but it cannot take the form of mandated timetables for withdrawal. The British did that in Basra, and the result has been the formation of militias and internecine fighting in a region homogenous to Shi'ites. Imagine what would happen in the melting pot of Baghdad, let alone the al-Qaeda theater of operations in Baghdad. Announcing withdrawal dates only emboldens those who oppose the democratically-elected government of Iraq and encourages the rest to choose the least-egregious warlord to obey.

One point raised in the Washington Post article that might provide an opening is the question of aid to the Iraqi government. That aid which works for issues other than security could get suspended if the National Assembly doesn't get busy passing the necessary reforms in oil revenue and de/re-Baathification. That would allow us to continue pressing forward on our security strategies while holding Baghdad accountable for lack of progress on political reform. In the past three years, we have spent more that $5 billion in non-military aid in Iraq. That kind of money should give us some leverage with the politicians.

Pressuring the Iraqi government makes sense. It forces them to focus on the tasks at hand and pushes them towards reconciliation amongst the ethicities, rather than triumphalism and vengeance. An approach which does that without hampering our ability to stabilize Baghdad and kill al-Qaeda terrorists in Anbar and Diyala should be strongly considered.

But we cannot allow Congress to dictate the terms of surrender to the American armed forces engaged with the enemy. We cannot withdraw from Iraq -- again -- only to be forced to return later to finish what we started in 1991. We cannot allow al-Qaeda and its affiliates to create a base of operations in Iraq the way they did in Afghanistan, unless we want a repeat of 9/11. Bush has to remain strong on those principles while finding ways to pressure the Iraqi government for reform in the manner Democrats want. That should be the basis of any compromise on the issue.

Immigration Protests Fail To Impress

Last year, millions of people marched in the streets to push for comprehensive immigration reform. Holding signs that demanded open borders, telling Southwestern cities that the land underneath them was really Mexican, and flying Mexican flags, the demonstrations had the short term effect of publicizing their agendas -- which had the long-term effect of strengthening anti-immigration hardliners. Congress never passed the comprehensive reform they demanded, and instead passed a border fence intended to restrict illegal immigration.

Not surprisingly, the immigration rallies this year did not come close to the scale seen last year:

Waving U.S. flags and demanding citizenship for undocumented immigrants, tens of thousands of jubilant protesters marched through the streets of Los Angeles on Tuesday during a mostly peaceful day that ended with clashes between police and demonstrators in MacArthur Park.

Fifteen police officers were among those hurt. About 10 people were taken from MacArthur Park by ambulance to hospitals for treatment, said d'Lisa Davies, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles Fire Department. She said the injuries mainly were cuts, including head and neck wounds. None of the injuries were believed to be serious. Police reported that one demonstrator was arrested.

About 35,000 people turned out at two Los Angeles rallies, far fewer than the combined 115,000 that organizers had anticipated and greatly fewer than the roughly 650,000 who turned out at rallies last year.

Turnouts were light across the country compared to last year, when millions of marchers in 150 cities took to the streets.

It wasn't light enough to keep the Los Angeles event from turning into a small riot. It's unclear how it started, but protestors began throwing bottles and other items at police. The police responded by attempting to clear the park, and then escalating to foam bullets and gas. After the Rodney King riots, the LAPD has a strong inclination to respond early and in force when it sees a demonstration getting out of hand, and Chief William Bratton now has to see whether they acted too quickly and with too much force.

People had a number of theories for the lack of turnout yesterday. Two of the more hilarious explanations were that (1) people feared deportation, and (2) there were too many events and they diluted the response. The first is patently absurd; nothing has changed in the year since the huge rallies, except that amnesty-favoring Democrats control Congress. They were more at risk for arrest and deportation last year than this year, and even then it was highly remote, as events proved. As for the number of events, there may possibly have been more yesterday, but millions of people didn't show up for them.

The best explanation is probably that Congress hasn't tackled illegal immigration yet. In fact, they haven't tackled much of anything so far, preferring to posture for almost three months on funding the troops in Iraq. John McCain has dropped out of leadership on this issue, and Republicans look less inclined to support normalization before border security than they were last year. Without a bill pending in Congress, they have no inspiration for massive protests.

And, just perhaps, illegal immigrants may have realized that they did themselves no favors with their arrogant demonstrations last year. The McCain-Kennedy bill may have passed if they hadn't shouted their reconquista slogans on every news channel in America. That display cost them the moderates, and the immigration bill they wanted died on the vine of the pushback from hardliners. This year, they may have just decided that quiet lobbying works a lot better for their aims.

Iran Arrests Former Nuclear Negotiator

Iranian security officials arrested former nuclear negotiator Hossein Mousavian, a political ally of former president Hashemi Rafsanjani. Replaced by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Mousavian had extensive contacts in Europe while fending off any attempts to put an end to Iran's nuclear program:

A top Iranian former nuclear negotiator Hossein Mousavian has been detained, according to sources in Iran who did not want to be named.

It is not clear why Mr Mousavian, who has also served as Iran's ambassador to Germany, was arrested.

Eight security officials reportedly took him from his house on Monday.

The inner workings of the Iranian political elite are as murky as ever, and this is no exception. Mousavian apparently works at a government-run think tank, so he had not fallen from favor. Despite his electoral defeat two years ago, Rafsanjani had remained influential; he's one of the richest men in Iran.

Those riches could be part of the problem. Rafsanjani's son Mehdi Hashemi faces charges that he accepted $80 million in bribes from the French oil company Total. The CEO of Total faces a French investigation into the bribery, and it's possible that Rafsanjani's protege became involved during his years in Europe. The timing of the bribe corresponds to Rafsanjani's tenure as president (1997). No one expects Mehdi Hashemi to face charges -- he's too well connected -- but Mousavian could be the patsy.

Or it's possible that the arrest is completely unrelated to Rafsanjani. The Iranians thus far have not even announced his arrest. The one safe conclusion is that Mousavian or his patron has done something significant to anger the ruling mullahcracy, and that's enough to have eight men break into an Iranian's house and haul him off.

Hamas Official: Kill All Americans

Pam at Atlas Shrugged had this earlier, but the Jerusalem Post has a fresh report on the latest threat from Palestinians against the West. The Speaker of the Palestinian Authority parliament has called Palestinians to the task of murdering all Americans, in addition to the mission of wiping Jews off the face of the Earth:

Sheik Ahmad Bahr, acting Speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council, declared during a Friday sermon at a Sudan mosque that America and Israel will be annihilated and called upon Allah to kill Jews and Americans "to the very Last One". Following are excerpts from the sermon that took place last month, courtesy of MEMRI.

Ahmad Bahr began: "You will be victorious" on the face of this planet. You are the masters of the world on the face of this planet. Yes, [the Koran says that] "you will be victorious," but only "if you are believers." Allah willing, "you will be victorious," while America and Israel will be annihilated. I guarantee you that the power of belief and faith is greater than the power of America and Israel. They are cowards, who are eager for life, while we are eager for death for the sake of Allah. That is why America's nose was rubbed in the mud in Iraq, in Afghanistan, in Somalia, and everywhere.

Bahr continued and said that America will be annihilated, while Islam will remain. The Muslims "will be victorious, if you are believers." Oh Muslims, I guarantee you that the power of Allah is greater than America, by whom many are blinded today. Some people are blinded by the power of America. We say to them that with the might of Allah, with the might of His Messenger, and with the power of Allah, we are stronger than America and Israel.

The Hamas spokesperson concluded with a prayer, saying: "Oh Allah, vanquish the Jews and their supporters. Oh Allah, count their numbers, and kill them all, down to the very last one. Oh Allah, show them a day of darkness. Oh Allah, who sent down His Book, the mover of the clouds, who defeated the enemies of the Prophet defeat the Jews and the Americans, and bring us victory over them."

This speech took place in April. Coincidentally, that was the same month that we sent $59 million in aid -- to the same Palestinian Authority in which this lunatic serves as Speaker. The US has provided the Palestinians with more than $1.6 billion in aid since Oslo. This is what our money buys.

Military Already Feels The Consequences Of Delayed Funding

One of the points in dispute about the Iraq war supplemental bill about to get vetoed by the President is whether the delay has affected military operations. Harry Reid said that the current funding will cover operations until mid-July, while the White House insists that it has already begun degrading operations and readiness. A Congressional Research Service analysis supports the Democrats -- but only by saying that robbing Peter to pay Paul will still have impact on a broad range of activities (emphases mine):

If the Army temporarily tapped all this transfer authority, it could have a total of $60.1 billion available rather than $52.6 billion. Based on projections of monthly obligations rates, the Army could finance the O&M costs of both its baseline and war program for almost two additional months or through most of July 2007, if it tapped all of this transfer authority (see Table 2). It would be $1.4 billion short of meeting total July obligations. If DOD used only some of its transfer authority, the Army could last through the end of June 2007.

The Army has suggested that these actions would disrupt its programs including facilities repair, depot maintenance, and training. In order to ensure that funding is available for the later months of the year, the Army may very well decide that it must slow down its non-war-related operations before money would run out by, for example, limiting facility maintenance and repairs, delaying equipment overhauls, restricting travel and meetings, and, perhaps, slowing down training. Although it is true that a delay in passage of the FY2007 supplemental could require additional management actions, Congress has given DOD flexibility by providing transfer authority so that funds can be moved to meet more urgent requirements. In this case, because the transfers would presumably be temporary, the disruptions might also be less onerous.

In other words, not passing a serious supplemental and getting the money to the Army by May 1 will cause some disruptions -- depending on where the Army wants to have them. This differs from Harry Reid's assertion that there is no haste in approving the supplemental.

The Senate Republican Policy Committee put out its own analysis today, relying on military officials to state clearly the impact the delay in funding has had:

“At the current moment, because of this lack of funding, MNSTC-I [Multi-National Security Transition Command-Iraq] is unable to continue at the pace [it had in developing] . . . Iraqi security forces. . . . [This lack of funding] is starting to have some impact today, and will only have more of an impact over time.” -- Maj. Gen. William Caldwell, MNF-Iraq

The President requested $1.83 billion for procurement and outfitting of Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles (MRAP), which the Senate Appropriations Committee fully funded. Senator Biden then took to the floor to provide an additional $1.5 billion to the Procurement chapter of the supplemental bill for the procurement of MRAPs, because, citing military commanders, “MRAP could reduce the casualties in vehicles due to IED [Improvised Explosive Device] attack by as much as 80 percent.” The Amendment was approved by a vote of 98-0.

Now, the failure to provide a war supplemental in a timely manner means that neither funds in the President’s request, nor the plus-up provided by amendment, is currently available for a vehicle pointed out to be “the best available vehicle for force protection.”

The Army has already responded to the notion of reprogramming funding for the war effort, which the SRPC notes:

First and foremost, reprogramming requests are generally inefficient and certainly much less optimal than actually receiving the funds up-front. In a letter signed by the Chief of Staff of each of the Services, the Generals noted that “reprogramming is a short-term, cost-inefficient solution that wastes our limited resources.”

Next, reprogramming is itself not without cost. Since reprogramming is essentially robbing Peter to pay Paul, when the Department takes funds to support one program over another, that action must come at the expense of the program from which the funds are taken. As General Schoomaker notes, “These [reprogramming] actions can disrupt and desynchronize our next-todeploy units as they prepare for war, possibly compromising future readiness and strategic depth.

It should be fairly obvious to anyone who has worked in a large organization -- and especially in government and the DoD -- that money can't just be shifted around overnight. It takes a great deal of accounting and oversight to manage the funds, and moving it around requires freezing spening until the money gets transferred to where it is needed. It will cost a fortune to accomplish this, degrading our readiness and halting projects all across the board.

It's a Mickey Mouse solution to a problem that Congress created, and all the Democrats can do is to tell the Army to blow millions of dollars while it plays politics with the war.

UPDATE: Bush has made his speech, and it wasn't bad. I wish he had spent more time talking about the pork projects -- pick a few to show the ridiculous nature of the way they sold this bill to the one-vote majorities in both chambers. He also kept giving that annoying half-smile of his, a tic that undercuts his credibility. However, other than that, he sounded firm and clear on the reasons for rejecting the timetables, including the way the bill hamstrings commanders in the field.

They Weren't Paying Attention

Today is the fourth anniversary of George Bush's speech on the USS Abraham Lincoln -- the one Democrats and anti-war activists call the "Mission Accomplished" speech. The crew of the carrier flew the banner because their mission had indeed been accomplished -- they had successfully supported the invasion of Iraq and the fall of Saddam Hussein's government, and were returning to the United States. Instead, everyone has attributed the banner's message to George Bush.

All that proves is that they didn't listen to what he had to say four years ago. As A Better Where To Find points out, Bush hardly communicated anything remotely like "the war is over":

We have difficult work to do in Iraq. We're bringing order to parts of that country that remain dangerous. We're pursuing and finding leaders of the old regime, who will be held to account for their crimes. We've begun the search for hidden chemical and biological weapons and already know of hundreds of sites that will be investigated. We're helping to rebuild Iraq, where the dictator built palaces for himself, instead of hospitals and schools. And we will stand with the new leaders of Iraq as they establish a government of, by, and for the Iraqi people.

The transition from dictatorship to democracy will take time, but it is worth every effort. Our coalition will stay until our work is done. Then we will leave, and we will leave behind a free Iraq.

Nowhere in this speech did Bush declare that the war was over, nor that we could leave Iraq. In fact, he made it plain that we would stick by the Iraqi people and remain in place until they could establish a democratic government that could secure the nation.

Not everyone on the Left was fooled by the banner. Hillary Clinton, in a speech that preceded Bush's, also made it clear that the overall mission was far from over:

Tonight President Bush will address our Nation and will tell the world that Operation Iraqi Freedom's military action is over, at least insofar as major military engagements may be required. We know we will have continuing problems, like those we have seen in the last few days. But it is true we are now moving toward the second phase, which is the rebuilding of Iraq. So this colloquy we are having today is especially timely because of the President's announcement this evening.

And that much has been true. We have not had major military operations in the same sense as the invasion. We have been engaged in police actions intended on securing portions of cities against attacks, not major military maneuvers such as the opening days of the conflict. Those police actions are still deadly, but they represent the traditional role of stabilization for an allied government.

This meme has all sorts of holes in it, mostly involving a refusal to engage in an intellectually honest manner about what was said and done four years ago today. The same people who complain that the pre-war intel of two administrations and most of the world's spy agencies wasn't perfect seem to have no issue using half-truths and less in a weak attempt to score points four years later.

CQ Radio: Debate Coverage (Updated)

In today's installment of CQ Radio, I will be reviewing a blogger conference call with the White House and Tony Snow. I'll review the hot stories of day, and announcing the Heading Right debate coverage for Thursday. I may have a couple of surprise guests as well, so tune in! Join the conversation by calling 646-652-4889.

BREAKING: The President will make a statement today at 6:10 PM ET today explaining why he will veto the supplemental. The White House will transmit the veto to Congress tomorrow, and the House will vote to override in the morning. They'll lose, and the White House will meet the Congressional leadership later that day to determine how to proceed.

Levinson To Be Freed?

Unconfirmed reports from Iran say that the Iranian government has freed former FBI agent Robert Levinson and will deport him to either Frankfurt or Dubai today. Levinson had gone to Iran to conduct a private investigation into the murder of a former Iranian official in Washington:

Friends of the former FBI agent believed to be in custody in Iran, Robert Levinson, say he could be released as early as today based on what they describe as two unconfirmed reports from Tehran.

"We have received a call that he is free, and we have people at airports in Frankfurt and Dubai where we have been told he could show up," one of Levinson's friends told The Blotter on ABCNews.com.

U.S. officials could not confirm the report, but FBI spokesman John Miller said, "We are hearing the same thing, but we have no way to judge the credibility of that information."

Levinson disappeared almost two months ago after traveling to the Iranian island of Kish to meet with an American fugitive accused of murdering a former Iranian official in suburban Washington in 1980.

The release is apparently timed to coincide with the meeting of foreign ministers regarding the status of Iraq. Both the Iranian FM and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will attend the meeting, and the regional governments have pressured both countries to begin a dialogue at the summit. Levinson's release seems aimed at smoothing the road to talks between the US and Iran.

Nothing is certain yet, but people are standing by in the airports of both cities to watch for Levinson.

Dude, Where's My Bill?

Congress passed its Iraq war supplemental bill last week, but the White House still has not received it. The holdup, according to Congressional Quarterly (via National Review), is that Nancy Pelosi has not yet signed the bill. And the reason for the delay? Apparently, Pelosi has no idea what Congress passed:

The conference report on the bill (HR 1591 - H Rept 110-107) was adopted by the House and cleared by the Senate last week, but Pelosi, D-Calif., wanted time to personally read it and sign it before sending it to Pennsylvania Avenue.

"It's a major piece of legislation and you have to go through it word for word and line by line," Pelosi spokesman Nadeam Elshami said Monday. "She believes this is very important legislation, which she will sign and the president will receive Tuesday."

The White House had wanted to get the bill and send it back, complete with the president's veto message, before the weekend.

John Boehner wants everyone to know just how ridiculous this is:

Now we've heard everything. The Speaker recommended the conference report on the war funding bill last week, voted for it last week, and could have sent it to the President as early as last Thursday when the Senate passed it (the House was in session). But NOW she wants to read it?? Wow.

Once again, the Democrats want to play political games with the troops while twisting themselves into contortions to deny it. They planned all along to time the arrival of the bill with the anniversary of the so-called "Mission Accomplished" speech on the carrier USS Abraham LIncoln:

Democratic leaders in Congress are planning a special ceremony on Tuesday afternoon to send President Bush a bill that sets timetables for troop withdrawal from Iraq.

The timing is no accident. It comes on the fourth anniversary of the day Mr. Bush stood on an aircraft carrier under the banner “Mission Accomplished” and declared that major combat operations in Iraq had ended.

The Democrats’ ceremony, featuring the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, and the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, is part of the elaborate political theater at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue surrounding the Iraq spending bill, which is destined to produce only the second veto of Mr. Bush’s presidency.

But with Mr. Bush planning to spend Tuesday in Florida talking with military commanders, the White House was being coy on Monday about what kind of theatrics of his own — if any — he might stage. Democrats, however, said they expected the veto to come Wednesday.

I guess Nancy Pelosi would rather be thought idiotic than cynically manipulative.

Newspapers Continue Decline, At Least In Print

Editor & Publisher has released the latest circulation numbers for the newspaper industry -- and they show that the decline in hard-copy readership continues. Almost all major metropolitan broadsheets lost significant ground in the last year, including the New York Times, the Washington Post, and my local Minneapolis Star-Tribune:

Blame the big metro papers -- again. The Audit Bureau of Circulations released the spring numbers this morning, revealing more plunges in daily and Sunday circulation.

As in the past, the losses are steep while gains are minimal. This is the fifth consecutive reporting period that overall newspaper circulation experienced big drops, despite easing comparisons. For all papers reporting daily circulation, the Newspaper Association of America said that daily circ fell 2.1% while Sunday tumbled 3.1%.

All daily averages reported are for Monday through Friday. The comparisons are based on the six-month period ending March 2007 and the six-month period ending March 2006.

In a growing economy, entire industries should not show such consistent decline. In the case of newspapers, though, they have never benefitted from the economic boom that started in 2003 and continues to this day. Perhaps that might account for the coverage, or lack thereof, that the expansion has received.

How badly have newspapers declined? The Dallas Morning News suffered a catastrophic collapse, losing more than 14% of its subscribers during the reporting period. The Miami Herald lost 10% of its Sunday subscribers and 5.5% of its daily readers. Its competitor, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel in Ft. Lauderdale, didn't fare any better, losing 8.6% of its subscribers. Many newspapers found themselves in the 4-5% loss range, including the LA Times and its chief competitor, the Orange County Register; the Minneapolis Star-Tribune; the San Jose Mercury News; and the Washington Post lost 3.4%.

The big question is why? Many of these newspapers have no real metropolitan competition, but those that did didn't send readers to the enemy paper. Only the New York Post appears to have fed off the failure of the New York Daily News. The problem appears to be a move away from print versions of the paper, across the board, rather than a decline in interest. In fact, the rise of the blogosphere shows that people have a heightened sense of interest in news and the inclination to use several sources to satisfy their curiosity.

What we need is statistics that include on-line readership and ad revenue. It's entirely possible that the newspaper business is thriving, and that these numbers shows a paradigm shift on delivery. At the least, the picture given by ABC and E&P is incomplete, and difficult to analyze as a result. And given that so many of us in the New Media rely on traditional media outlets for source material, a decline in fortunes -- and therefore eventually investment and product -- is nothing to cheer. (via Howard Kurtz)

Bummer Of A Side Effect, Pal

Two new studies on marijuana may provide a stumbling block for legalization activists. ABC News reports that British and American researchers have found evidence that THC, one of the two active ingredients in cannabis, provoke psychotic reactions even in healthy people. How will this impact the legalization argument? I discuss that at Heading Right this morning, and with any luck, my co-bloggers and I will give new meaning to the term "talking heads" as we debate this topic.

Newsflash: Gonzales Delegated Authority

As CQ readers know, I think Alberto Gonzales has proven himself an incompetent Attorney General, and would do this administration a huge favor by resigning -- especially after his disastrous testimony before Congress in April. His continued presence enables every new significant detail in the firings of eight US Attorneys to become a major media sensation. That said, I'm hard pressed to find the scandal in the latest revelation by the National Journal's Murray Waas, who breathlessly informs us that Gonzales delegated hiring and firing decisions for non-civil service positions to his aides (via Memeorandum):

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales signed a highly confidential order in March 2006 delegating to two of his top aides -- who have since resigned because of their central roles in the firings of eight U.S. attorneys -- extraordinary authority over the hiring and firing of most non-civil-service employees of the Justice Department. A copy of the order and other Justice Department records related to the conception and implementation of the order were provided to National Journal.

In the order, Gonzales delegated to his then-chief of staff, D. Kyle Sampson, and his White House liaison "the authority, with the approval of the Attorney General, to take final action in matters pertaining to the appointment, employment, pay, separation, and general administration" of virtually all non-civil-service employees of the Justice Department, including all of the department's political appointees who do not require Senate confirmation. Monica Goodling became White House liaison in April 2006, the month after Gonzales signed the order.

The existence of the order suggests that a broad effort was under way by the White House to place politically and ideologically loyal appointees throughout the Justice Department, not just at the U.S.-attorney level. Department records show that the personnel authority was delegated to the two aides at about the same time they were working with the White House in planning the firings of a dozen U.S. attorneys, eight of whom were, in fact, later dismissed.

It's important to note that the authority to hire and fire did not apply to careerists at Justice. The order specified that Sampson and Goodling only had that authority over non-civil service positions -- essentially, the political appointees, which would include the USAs. Somehow, Waas wants to make a scandal that politically-connected senior staff members directly serving the AG could have hired and fired people in political positions, but that hardly rates as a scandal.

That authority already rests with the Attorney General. No one really believes that the AG makes all these decisions personally. Even without such an order, Cabinet officials delegate the nuts and bolts of those decisions to senior staff members. Even the President does this with his own appointees. Does anyone really believe that George Bush or Bill Clinton personally vetted each appointee or conducted his own personnel evaluations for all of his staff members?

The order as executed required Sampson and Goodling to get the approval of Gonzales for any terminations or hiring. That makes the order a non-issue, regardless of how many ways Waas can describe its "confidential" nature. Should Gonzales have mentioned this order during the Congressional hearings? Yes, and that's perhaps the only valid criticism of the piece, but I'd challenge each of the Senators to swear under oath that they conduct all of the hiring and firing of non-civil service employees in their own offices before enabling their outrage.

Robert Litt confirms to Waas that the Clinton White House made most of the hiring decisions of non-civil service jobs at Justice during their term. He criticizes Gonzales for allowing two unqualified people to make those decisions in this case, but not the process itself, which is what Waas wants to make the issue. If Sampson and Goodling didn't have the experience or the expertise for this responsibility, that speaks to competence, not to scandal, however.

I have no problem with criticism about Gonzales' competence. Waas wants to make this into another accusation of near law-breaking, which is laughable.

Fred Doesn't Chase The Gray Ladies, Though

The New York Times finally weighs in on Fred Thompson, the conservative hope for the 2008 Republican presidential primaries, and they hit below the belt. Actually, that's true literally but not figuratively, as their profile actually remains balanced and positive, with the one exception about discussing his personal life between marriages:

Making speeches at carefully chosen appearances, doing an occasional interview and fielding questions from Republican congressmen, Mr. Thompson, 64, is running something of a guerrilla exploratory effort. He even weighed in recently on a conservative blog to offer a detailed defense of his ideas on federalism.

Behind the scenes, Mr. Thompson has been consulting with his inner circle — including former Senators Bill Frist and Howard H. Baker Jr. of Tennessee and experienced Washington aides like Mark Corallo, a former Justice Department official — about how he could pull together the money and staff he would need to run. ...

Mr. Thompson’s disclosure that he was treated for lymphoma was seen as more evidence of presidential preparation. And at a private meeting a few weeks ago with House Republicans, he answered questions about his reputation as a man about town during his eight years in the Senate, a period when he was single after his divorce from his first wife. Mr. Thompson was asked bluntly if any activities from his first marriage or his time in the Senate would come back to haunt him or his backers.

According to those attending, Mr. Thompson assured them there were no problems, but conceded that when he was single, “I chased girls and girls chased me.” Mr. Thompson is since remarried, and he and his wife, Jeri, have two young children.

That seems like a perfunctory question, especially in this primary race, where the only man in the top tier with one wife is the Mormon. The frontrunner spent part of his time as Mayor of New York as the unabashed star of a domestic soap opera, changing wives in a relentlessly covered story. The other Great Conservative Hope, Newt Gingrich, also has a notable problem with his marital status and fidelity issues.

Still, Fred managed to make it an opportunity to continue his charm offensive. A straightforward answer like, "I chased the girls and the girls chased me," will appeal to everyone except ardent feminists who recoil at his use of the word "girls". It's honest and blunt without being ungentlemanly -- a courtly way of saying that he enjoyed his years of middle-aged bachelorhood.

Some of this report gets sillier, though. The New York Times asks in all earnestness whether Thompson's appearances on "Law & Order" re-runs will create "equal time issues" in the coming campaign. That's quite a reach. No one demanded that television stations embargo Bedtime for Bonzo or Cattle Queen of Montana during his run for the presidency, just as no stations refrained from airing The Last Action Hero when Arnold Schwarzenegger ran for Governator. (We may have hoped they'd embargo them, but no such luck.) "Equal time" refers to actual campaign coverage, not entertainment shows, and one would think that the New York Times would understand that.

Other than that, the report takes a good lool at Thompson's assets and liabilities. For the latter, they mention but do not dwell on his reputation for preferring investigations to legislation, not surprising given his background as an reforming investigative attorney. The Times also mentions Thompson's support for McCain-Feingold, which has some conservatives concerned about Fred. He has indicated that he's rethinking that support; potential backers will want to hear more. Some also question Thompson's draw outside the South, but as the boomlet has shown, that seems to be much less of a worry now.

Fred won't be included in Thursday's debate, but his shadow will loom large over it. Even the Gray Lady looks willing to chase Thompson for a while, even if Fred doesn't have an inclination to return the favor.

AQI Leader Killed?

That's right, put a big fat question mark at the end of that sentence, because so far the only source on record for that assertion comes from the Iraqi Interior Ministry, which has a track record of overenthusiasm with kill reports. Abu Ayyub al-Masri, the successor to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, reportedly died in a battle today with other insurgents:

The leader of al Qaeda in Iraq, Abu Ayyub al-Masri, was killed on Tuesday in an internal fight between insurgents, the Interior Ministry spokesman said, but the U.S. military said it could not confirm the report.

Spokesman Brigadier-General Abdul Kareem Khalaf told Reuters: "We have definite intelligence reports that al Masri was killed today." He said the battle happened near a bridge in the small town of al-Nibayi, north of Baghdad.

Another source in the ministry said Masri had been killed in what he described as "probably score-settling within al Qaeda itself."

Both Khalaf and the ministry source said the authorities did not have Masri's body, but the source added "our people had seen the body."

They've seen the body, but they haven't performed the DNA check yet. That recalls the situation in February, when the Iraqi Interior Ministry claimed to have captured al-Masri, and later turned out to be wrong. Presumably, someone saw a live "body" that time, too.

When will we know for sure? When the American military announces it, we can rely on the information, and not before. However, if it turns out to be true, it will show just how badly the tables have turned on AQI. We captured the man who would have replaced al-Masri last year, captured 17 of their people just three days ago, and now possibly have found the body of al-Masri himself. The means of his death will send a message to AQI from the Iraqi people, and I guarantee the last word will be Off.

That's if this is al-Masri. I'm willing to wait for the official scorer to count the goal.

Chavez Bails Out Of The World Banking System

Hugo Chavez announced last night that Venezuela would withdraw from both the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Claiming that Western financial assistance prolongs poverty rather than relieve it, he demanded that the two organizations return Venezuelan assets. At the same time, Chavez has proceeded to seize oil-production facilities from Western corporations, primarily those based in the US:

President Hugo Chavez announced Monday he would formally pull Venezuela out of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, a largely symbolic move because the nation has already paid off its debts to the lending institutions.

"We will no longer have to go to Washington nor to the IMF nor to the World Bank, not to anyone," said the leftist leader, who has long railed against the Washington-based lending institutions.

Chavez said he wanted to formalize Venezuela's exit from the two bodies "tonight and ask them to return what they owe us."

Chavez aims to pressure the US out of Latin America -- and he has a partner in mind for that project. His seizure of oil-production assets is part of his plan to isolate the US economically, and Chavez wants China to take our place. The Wall Street Journal reports that the self-proclaimed Venezuelan "Maoist" plans to use the seized projects to create a partnership with China to exploit the Orinoco River region (subscription required):

Since becoming president in 1999, Mr. Chávez has tried to use oil as a political weapon against the U.S. In recent years, he has doled out cut-rate supplies to dozens of Latin American countries to buy support. Increasingly, he is using oil to support the U.S.'s economic rivals like China and political rivals like Iran.

In late March, Mr. Chávez unveiled a raft of proposed oil-related deals with China valued at about $13 billion. Under terms of the prospective deals, China National Petroleum Corp. would develop, together with state oil company Petroleos de Venezuela SA, the biggest chunk yet of Venezuela's Orinoco River region -- the same area where Mr. Chávez is nationalizing the Western companies' projects. Oil produced there would then be ferried to China in a new, joint "super fleet" of tankers, and processed there at three new refineries built to handle Orinoco heavy crude.

The Venezuelan leader's goal is to supply China with one million barrels a day by 2012, up from 150,000 barrels a day. While many analysts doubt Mr. Chávez's ability to deliver on his promises, Venezuela's exports to China have grown quickly, from 12,000 barrels a day in 2003. Meanwhile, with oil production falling and China's share rising, exports to the U.S. fell 8.2% in 2006 from 2005, and Nigeria has replaced Venezuela as the U.S.'s fourth biggest source of crude oil after Canada, Mexico and Saudi Arabia.

Some analysts believe that Chavez may have reserves in Orinoco that rival Saudi Arabia's fields. If so, the Chinese have made a valuable partner, and not just strategically. They need a heavy and immediate infusion of oil in order to keep their economic growth, and the capital that the Chinese create with it will benefit Chavez. It could make him the most powerful man in the southern hemisphere and realize his dream of providing an opposite pole from the US in Latin America.

If so, Chavez will have to become more adept at actual production, and these recent moves will not help. With his seizures, he has effectively removed Exxon, Conoco-Phillips, Mobil, Britain's BP, France's Total, and Norway's Statoil -- a bit of a surprise, as Norway seems socialist enough to satify Chavez. In their place will come partnerships between Venezuela's PVDSA and Vietnam, Iran, Brazil, and China as mentioned earlier. He will need the help. Since 1999, production has dropped almost 25% in Venezuela, and unless Chavez can restore production, the Orinoco fields won't do him or China much good.

PVDSA, in the words of the WSJ, functions more as a poverty-alleviating bureaucracy than an oil-production company. Chavez keeps promising new refineries at home and abroad, but they have yet to materialize. Now that he has chased the proven production capabilities of Western companies out of Venezuela, he may be hard pressed to even meet his current level of production. Chavez also faces another kind of problem in production costs; his oil is more expensive to pump and to refine than Saudi and African oil. If oil prices remain high, Chavez will have money to burn -- but if they fall, he will lose his shirt to the Saudis.

Perhaps the US should consider more domestic development simply as a financial cushion against the mercurial Chavez. The more oil we leave on the market, the lower the prices will go -- and the quicker Chavez will have to account for his new socialist policies and inadequate talents.

UPDATE: Has even Hollywood given up on Chavez?

McCain Ditching The UN?

File this one under Conservative Red Meat -- John McCain wants to form a League of Democracies to take action when the UN fails to do so. Warning that the US has to find a global structure for its security policies, McCain told a Stanford University audience that lasting peace comes from spreading freedom:

Republican presidential candidate John McCain envisions a "League of Democracies" as part of a more cooperative foreign policy with U.S. allies.

The Arizona senator will call for such an organization to be "the core of an international order of peace based on freedom" in a speech Tuesday at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University in Palo Alto, Calif.

"We Americans must be willing to listen to the views and respect the collective will of our democratic allies," McCain says, according to excerpts his campaign provided. "Our great power does not mean we can do whatever we want whenever we want, nor should we assume we have all the wisdom, knowledge and resources necessary to succeed."

"To be a good leader, America must be a good ally," he adds in the speech, another in a series of policy addresses as he seeks the Republican presidential nomination.

McCain apparently did not say that his League would replace the UN; in fact, he said that the League would act when the UN would not. That would mean an end to the UN in all practical terms, however, since a parallel League of Democracies that actually acted in defense of freedom and liberty would get most of the political attention from its members.

If McCain didn't explicitly argue that the League would replace the UN, it sounded as though it would have the same missions as Turtle Bay. He envisioned the League as handling the Darfur crisis, helping with AIDS abatement in Africa, and free trade for democratic nations, especially struggling new democracies. He also pointed out that it would not require the approval of Moscow or China to impose economic sanctions on nations like Iran, a point that conservatives would no doubt appreciate.

It sounds like a good idea, but in reality would go almost nowhere. Our democratic allies unfortunately still prefer the UN, although nations like Australia might prefer an Anglosphere alliance instead. France, Germany, and even Britain would not leave Turtle Bay. They might consider joining a League of Democracies, but they would not put the League above the UN, which they consider the highest global authority.

Let's face it -- even if we could convince France and Germany to join such an organization, would it do any good? Both nations violated the sanctions regime against Saddam Hussein, and France participated in the Oil for Food corruption scandal almost as much as Russia. The biggest problems in the UN relate to the kleptocracies and dictatorships that comprise the majority of its membership, but some of the democracies don't behave, either. And a sanctions regime that didn't include Moscow and China, and relied on the constancy and honor of the French, would have no hope of succeeding against Iran, North Korea, or anyone else.

The problem that McCain rightly perceives isn't just the UN itself, but the composition of the global community. The UN is a corrupt, unresponsive, and impotent bureaucracy because it reflects the character of its membership. The notion that we should consider this a super-sovereign parliament is absurd, as is the notion of replacing it with another of the same kind. If McCain wants to truly do something radical, he should jettison the entire notion of global organizations and simply pledge to form coalitions based on mutual goals and approaches based on shared interests on particular issues -- which is how nations conducted diplomacy for millenia prior to 1945.

UPDATE: Jules Crittenden calls it A League That Could Meet In A Broom Closet. Well, okay, if you want to use technical terms ...

Broder Sticks To His Guns

David Broder took Democrats to task for allowing an incompetent like Harry Reid to rise to party leadership, pointing out several of the Senator's foolish foibles as examples. This column sent the netroots into a tizzy, with many of them declaring Broder as irrelevant and past his expiration date. The Senate Democratic caucus even sent him a letter, signed by all 50 members, extolling the virtues of Reid and lauding his "straight talk" -- apparently all endorsing the notion that we have lost the war in Iraq.

Today, Editor & Publisher caught up Broder, who has no intention of retracting his remarks:

David Broder said he wouldn't change anything in his April 26 column, which angered many readers and caused 50 members of the Senate Democratic Caucus to write a letter criticizing Broder in Friday's Washington Post.

In that Thursday piece, Broder criticized Harry Reid for saying the Iraq War is lost militarily, compared Reid to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, and concluded: "The Democrats deserve better, and the country needs more, than Harry Reid has offered as Senate majority leader."

"I still think the Democrats can do better, and should do better," said Broder, when reached today by E&P. ... Broder told E&P that he was "astonished and delighted" that 50 Democratic senators "spontaneously" came up with the letter (adding that he was being "tongue-in-cheek").

The letter was something of a non-sequitur. His criticism wasn't that Reid spoke his mind, but that he put his foot in his mouth when he did. Declaring a war "lost" while American troops are still fighting -- and making progress -- reveals a hysterical streak that doesn't reflect well on leadership. As Broder pointed out in the column, not even the people who signed the letter would defend what Reid said, instead trying to use Clintonian word parsing to make it appear that Harry Reid had not just capitulated to terrorists in Anbar and Baghdad. Calling the President a "loser" may make the netroots swoon with delight, but it hardly makes for a professional atmosphere between Congress and the White House.

Also, the final argument that Democrats made in defending Reid is simply hilarious. They applaud the fact that he passed a budget bill, and noted only that "great strides" had been taken on everything else. Granted, the Republicans refused to do it themselves after the midterms, preferring to let the Democrats deal with it, but every Congress passes budget bills; the 109th did it, too. If that's the threshold for excellence in Washington, then there can be no such thing as mediocrity. Talk about the soft bigotry of low expectations!

Broder had to have laughed himself silly at that letter, and the Democrats had to be silly to write it. Is the Senate Democratic Caucus so sensitive that it must write group letters every time they receive criticism? No wonder these people want to run away from the terrorists in Iraq. They can't even abide David Broder and the Washington Post opinion section.

UPDATE: It's "The soft bigotry of low expectations." I didn't quote it properly, but thanks to CQ reader Susan, I've corrected it now.

She's Baaa-aaack!

Guess who's blogging again? The Anchoress has recovered enough to resume blogging, although she may still want to take it easy for a while to regain her strength. In the meantime, be sure to check out her post on her latest bout of song poison, as well as her take on Al Gore and Democratic openness to media coverage.

Addendum: Guess who else is (almost) back? Our neighbor, Senator Tim Johnson (D-SD). Congressional Quarterly -- the other CQ -- has the story:

Sen. Tim Johnson, who suffered a debilitating brain hemorrhage in December, has left a rehabilitation center to continue his recovery at his home in northern Virginia.

The transition from a full-time rehabilitation facility to outpatient and home care puts Johnson, D-S.D., one step closer to returning to full-time Senate duties. While Johnson has started to handle paperwork, cosponsor legislation and receive briefings, his staff and his doctors have refused to speculate on when he might be able to return to the Capitol.

“He’s at a point where rehab is the focus . . . five days a week,” said Julianne Fisher, Johnson’s press secretary.

Senator Johnson, we hope that you return to full health as quickly as possible. We may not agree on much, but we'd rather you are hale and healthy for the debate. This is good news indeed.

GOP Straw Poll (Update & Bump)

It's time again for another GOP straw poll from our friends at GOP Bloggers. Actually, it's past due; I haven't kept up with the monthly polls. In the meantime, they've added a couple of new options, including Fred Thompson and Jim Gilmore. As always, the poll will count the selections for Captain's Quarters readers separately, allowing us to take the temperature of the CQ community.

Tomorrow, I'll report on the results from the first day of polling.

UPDATE & BUMP, 4:20 PM CT: Once again, CQ has generated the largest number of straw-poll votes on the first full day, and it's a runaway for Fred Thompson. He has 55.9% of the first-choice CQ vote, followed by Rudy Giuliani at 20.9%. Mitt Romney comes in third at 8.7%, while McCain trails (None) with only 2.2%.

Acceptability ratings gives Rudy better news. Sixty-one percent of CQ readers thus far consider Rudy acceptable, behind Thompson's 77%, but only barely. If Thompson doesn't run, it looks like a lot of his support goes back to Rudy, and probably due to potential war leadership. Romney is also very close behind at 55% acceptability. Duncan Hunter has a surprisingly low level -- still positive, but only at 15%, pretty low for such a reliably conservative candidate. Newt Gingrich also comes in low at 20%, but he does better than John McCain, who comes in at a -16%.

Considering that 62% of CQ readers rate their conservatism at an 8 or higher, these are somewhat surprising numbers for acceptability. We'll see if the numbers change at all overnight.

CQ Radio Today: Victory Caucus

Today's installment of CQ Radio (2 pm CT) welcomes NZ Bear from the Victory Caucus to discuss the developments yesterday in the Senate. We'll talk about Joe Lieberman, the two Republican defections, what we can expect from the President and when, and what we can do to make a difference. NZ's been able to reschedule for today, and we'll get an update on the progress of the Iraq supplemental as well as discuss Sam Brownback's alliance with Joe Biden to split Iraq into three proto-states.

Be sure to join us at 646-652-4889! We'd love to get you into the conversation. And make sure you're keeping up with the conversation at Heading Right!

The Unfairness Doctrine

George Will takes aim at the effort led by Dennis Kucinich to reimpose the Fairness Doctrine on the broadcast industry -- and its ultimate aim to destroy talk radio. He points out that the heart of this effort is a mistrust by "illiberals" to trust the marketplace and a failure of left-wing radio to appeal to the American broadcast market:

Some illiberal liberals are trying to restore the luridly misnamed Fairness Doctrine, which until 1987 required broadcasters to devote a reasonable amount of time to presenting fairly each side of a controversial issue. The government was empowered to decide how many sides there were, how much time was reasonable and what was fair.

By trying to again empower the government to regulate broadcasting, illiberals reveal their lack of confidence in their ability to compete in the marketplace of ideas, and their disdain for consumer sovereignty—and hence for the public.

The illiberals' transparent, and often proclaimed, objective is to silence talk radio. Liberals strenuously and unsuccessfully attempted to compete in that medium—witness the anemia of their Air America. Talk radio barely existed in 1980, when there were fewer than 100 talk shows nationwide. The Fairness Doctrine was scrapped in 1987, and today more than 1,400 stations are entirely devoted to talk formats. Conservatives dominate talk radio—although no more thoroughly than liberals dominate Hollywood, academia and much of the mainstream media.

The Left blames talk radio for many of the nation's ills. After the Oklahoma City bombing, Bill Clinton and other Democrats openly accused conservative talkers of complicity in generating the hate behind the attack -- even before the Clinton administration had fully investigated the terrorist attack. Tom Daschle, then Senate Majority Leader, said that Rush Limbaugh indirectly encouraged people to threaten public officials by stirring up anger.

But that's not the reason they want to slam the lid on talk radio. The most compelling reason is their inability to compete in the field. With the exception of a couple of national talkers like Ed Schultz and Michael Jackson, they have built no market. Part of that is because the mainstream media has done a much better job disseminating liberal punditry than conservative. That market also gets served on the radio waves by NPR, which normally has good signal coverage in every major market, and which cares little about competition because of its government support. Conservatives turned to talk radio because the mainstream media didn't meet the market need, and the explosion of growth stunned those who thought that conservatism had petered out in the second term of Ronald Reagan.

Instead of offering a compelling product, liberals want to shut down the market. They want to put government in charge of deciding what comprises each side of an argument, how much time each gets allocated, and so on. In practice, it's completely unworkable. Radio stations don't have the time and resources for that kind of accounting, and their already-thin profit margins will disappear entirely if they are forced to air broadcasting that interests no one -- as Air America has proven over the last few years. Stations will either go off the air or offer informercials, sports talk, or more top-40 broadcasting.

That's apparently what people like Kucinich want -- an end to debate that operates outside the control of the government. The fact that they complain about their lack of success in a free market for opinions and debate should inform the debate over the Fairness Doctrine. And if not, I expect business to get very brisk at Blog Talk Radio.

A Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy?

Hillary Clinton has complained for years that her critics come from a vast right-wing conspiracy to discredit and defame her and her husband. Will she now add Carl Bernstein to the conservative cabal out to get her? Bernstein will soon release an extensively-researched biography of the Democratic front-runner, and the Watergate reporter apparently has discovered a number of discrepancies between her official biography and the records he found.

I posted about this at Heading Right, the group blog of the conservative talk show hosts at Blog Talk Radio. Given the solidly liberal background of Bernstein, Hillary will have a difficult time escaping the impact of an exposé.

Ledeen Responds To Tenet

Michael Ledeen found himself in the middle of a controversy regarding the new book by former CIA chief George Tenet, and unexpectedly so. According to Ledeen, he had not been contacted by Tenet or his co-author for the book for his input. Nevertheless, Ledeen found Tenet's scorn for him and his efforts to assist the intel community on Iran on the front page of the New York Times this past weekend. Now Ledeen responds at National Review Online, and he accuses Tenet of misrepresenting Ledeen's efforts:

In December, 2001, I participated in discussions between two Pentagon officials and Iranians who claimed knowledge of Iranian-sponsored efforts to kill Americans in Afghanistan. We met in Rome, Italy over several days. The discussions were approved by Stephen Hadley, the deputy national-security adviser, and the two Defense department officials’ travel was approved by their superiors. The American ambassador in Rome was fully informed in advance, and fully briefed afterwards. The conversations produced detailed information about the identities, locations, and plans of Iranian-trained terrorists in Afghanistan. This was passed on to the proper authorities at the DoD, and I was later told by military officers that the information likely saved American lives.

Now comes the former director of central intelligence, George Tenet, with several pages about the meeting in his new book. He does not mention that American lives were saved, nor does he seem at all interested to learn that there were well-informed sources who were willing to help the American government. Nor, for that matter, is he much interested in the facts at all. His account is repeatedly wrong. He is wrong about the Iranians, wrong about the Americans, wrong about what was discussed, and wrong about the official status of the meeting. He misdescribes the Iranians as “dissidents” living overseas. He misidentifies the two Pentagon officials as subordinates of Under Secretary Douglas Feith (one of Tenet’s many betes noirs), but only one of them was in Feith’s shop. He says it “sounded like an off-the-books covert-action program trying to destabilize the Iranian government,” when the discussion was about Iranians in Afghanistan, not overthrowing the mullahs, and the meeting had been formally approved by the deputy national-security adviser (knowing Stephen Hadley, I presume he had the approval of his boss, Condoleezza Rice). Tenet calls it “Son of Iran-contra,” with which it had nothing in common save for the marginal involvement of Manoucher Ghorbanifar, who helped bring the Iranians to Italy, but was not a source of information. Someone might have reminded Tenet that Iran-Contra had to do with providing weapons to Iran in exchange for hostages, while the Rome meeting was about Iranian efforts to kill Americans in Afghanistan. Some parentage! He’s wrong about other things as well, some of which Ed Morrissey and Bill Kristol have pointed out.

Kristol pointed out a rather egregious error in Tenet's post-9/11 narrative involving Richard Perle. Perle has acquired a Machiavellian reputation thanks to assertions like Tenet's, only this time Tenet gets sloppy. He describes a conversation with Perle on 9/12 that supposedly shows the neocons in the Bush administration had determined from the first to use 9/11 as an excuse to attack Iraq -- only the conversation could not possibly have happened:

On the day after 9/11, he [Tenet] adds, he ran into Richard Perle, a leading neoconservative and the head of the Defense Policy Board, coming out of the White House. He says Mr. Perle turned to him and said: "Iraq has to pay a price for what happened yesterday. They bear responsibility."

Here's the problem: Richard Perle was in France on that day, unable to fly back after September 11. In fact Perle did not return to the United State until September 15. Did Tenet perhaps merely get the date of this encounter wrong? Well, the quote Tenet ascribes to Perle hinges on the encounter taking place September 12: "Iraq has to pay a price for what happened yesterday." And Perle in any case categorically denies to THE WEEKLY STANDARD ever having said any such thing to Tenet, while coming out of the White House or anywhere else.

Tenet has yet to see his book hit the stores, and it already has serious credibility issues. He misidentifies a Defense Department analyst as a "naval reservist" in an attempt to belittle her credentials. Tenet can't seem to understand that Iran-Contra involved arming the mullahs, not the dissidents. It's a great display of why the CIA seems to have been rather incompetent during the years of his leadership. If the boss can't get his facts straight, how can he have advised two presidents with any degree of competence at all?

Fortunately, Michael Ledeen had a few minutes to spare on Saturday afternoon for Mitch and me to interview him I've podcasted the main part of the interview here, where he rebuts Tenet and talks to us about Iran.

Olmert Faces Pressure To Resign After War Analysis

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert faces new pressure to resign after an extensive investigation into the war in Lebanon last summer accused his administration of incompetence. Olmert has called for a Kadima party conference to address his opposition while the Winograd report gets released this afternoon:

The Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, and defence minister, Amir Peretz, faced further calls for their resignation yesterday after leaks of a report into their management of last summer's Lebanon war which suggests they made a series of errors.

The Winograd report, to be published today, directs strong criticism at the government's conduct in the first days of the war, according to leaks in the Israeli media yesterday. In particular, Mr Olmert and Mr Peretz are rebuked for not seeking proper consultation and for accepting the army's recommendations without question. The politicians' lack of experience in military matters, the report says, meant they accepted the belief of Dan Halutz, the former chief of staff, that the war could be won by air power alone.

The report also criticises Mr Olmert for setting out his war aims - which were broadly to free two captured Israeli soldiers and expel Hizbullah from southern Lebanon - without checking to find if they were attainable. Aides of both men said they had no intention of resigning but the lack of confidence in the politicians may leave them no choice.

For a war of choice, Israel had shockingly poor preparations. The government, according to the Winograd report, had not prepared air raid shelters, despite knowing that Hezbollah would attack primarily with missiles and rockets. Their tanks were not properly fitted to repel anti-tank missiles. Food and other necessities for the IDF had not been sufficiently stocked. The Israelis were unprepared for war in a land of hostility, and that will surprise many Israelis who see no higher role for their government.

The Winograd committee will apparently call Olmert a "failure", but he hasn't played out the string yet. In the first place, this is an interim report. The final report will come in July, and it is expected to be even more critical, and in more detail, than the summary being released today. All of Olmert's opponents, even within Kadima, have an interest in waiting until then to make a move on the Prime Minister. Both Olmert and Peretz have publicly stated that they will not resign their posts, at least not now, and both hope to show dramatic improvements in the deficiencies that Winograd will expose. (Peretz has admitted that he shouldn't have accepted the position of Defense Minister, and will try to take the Treasury portfolio instead.)

By July, though, Olmert may have no choice. The Winograd committee will recommend sanctions on those who failed in their duty, and as PM, Olmert cannot hope to escape that. Also, the interim report will only focus on the events leading up to the war and the first six days of fighting, while the July final report will be much more wide-ranging. Among the questions will be why Olmert and Peretz did not act more aggressively in the sub-Litani region from the beginning and, hopefully, why they directed the attack against Beirut instead of Damascus, which supplies and supports Hezbollah.

In any case, Olmert is running on fumes, his political fuel exhausted. His opponents, such as Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, aren't going easy on him as much as they await the most propitious moment to finish him.

UPDATE: Here is the summary of the Winograd report. It appears harsher than analysts expected, and it rakes both Olmert and Peretz over the coals, as well as the Chief of Staff. Here's the "ouch::

11. The primary responsibility for these serious failings rests with the Prime Minister, the minister of defense and the (outgoing) Chief of Staff. We single out these three because it is likely that had any of them acted better - the decisions in the relevant period and the ways they were made, as well as the outcome of the war, would have been significantly better.

Brownback Supports The Biden Initiative On Iraq

Joe Biden has tried selling his plan to split Iraq into three protostates for at least the last two years, with not much success. First, the Turks would likely have a Kurdish insurrection on their hands, and more importantly, the Iraqis don't seem particularly keen on the idea. However, Biden has won over one convert:

It would be an unusual pairing, but two presidential hopefuls from opposite sides of the political spectrum, Senator Brownback and Senator Biden, could team up on a proposal for Iraq that splits the country into three loosely federated states.

Mr. Brownback, a Republican known for his social conservatism, suggested yesterday that the bipartisan proposal could follow President Bush's veto this week of legislation tying war funding to a timetable for withdrawal of American troops. The Kansas senator voted against the Democratic bill, but he has occasionally veered away from his party's base on the war, and he initially opposed the president's decision to send more than 20,000 additional troops to Iraq earlier this year.

He has advocated a more aggressive diplomatic effort, and he even suggested yesterday, in an appearance on ABC's "This Week," that Secretary of State Rice should lead reconciliation talks among Sunni, Shiite, and Kurdish leaders in Iraq.

Like Mr. Biden, a Democrat of Delaware, Mr. Brownback is a long shot for his party's nomination in 2008, but they share common ground in advocating a "three-state solution" in Iraq that sets them apart from their rivals on either side in the presidential campaign.

I would venture to guess that neither Biden nor Brownback have ever engaged the Iraqis in a discussion about how much they would like to see their country hacked to pieces. Nor, to my knowledge, have they made an argument that explains how the United States Senate has the sovereignty to split Iraq into three new self-autonomous regions. The Iraqi people, under its democratic processes, elected a parliament that drew up and approved a constitution, and neither Brownback nor Biden have an explanation as to why that document shouldn't be honored by the US.

That's because there is no argument or explanation for the proposal. It's haughty, arrogant, and in the end a rather stupid plan. That, coincidentally, accurately describes its principal author, but it is disappointing to see Brownback rise to support such a foolish and pretentious proposal.

A split of Iraq into three protostates would be a disaster, which even the Iraq study group acknowledged. It ceded all of southern Iraq to Iran, for all practical purposes, and creates an even bigger problem of access in the Persian Gulf. The Kurds in Turkey would amplify their demands for their own autonomy or to join with Iraqi Kurdistan, further destabilizing secular Turkey and creating an impetus for either civil war or a war against Iraqi Kurds, or both. Finally, without oil revenes, the Sunnis of the rump Iraq would wind up radicalized and more inclined to support Islamist terror groups like al-Qaeda, not move away from them as the Sunnis are doing now in Anbar and Diyala.

It's hard to see how Brownback can think he gains politically by allying himself with Joe Biden, so it must be presumed that he really believes in this plan. If so, it shows that he cannot be seriously taken for a presidential contender. if Brownback would seriously follow this policy as President, then we need to make sure he doesn't get there -- or else we will have a regional catastrophe that could take decades to resolve.

Edwards: Clinton Tax Levels Are Just The Beginning

John Edwards has a refreshing strategy in the presidential primaries: pretend the center doesn't exist. He wants to win the Democratic nomination by running hard to the left, especially on economics. In that vein, he told California Democrats at their state convention that not only will he raise taxes on high-income families, he considers that just a starting point:

Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards said yesterday raising taxes for higher-income families back to their levels under the Clinton administration is a floor, not a ceiling, and he would consider even higher tax increases.

"What I believe is the starting place is to go back to the Clinton levels," Mr. Edwards told reporters after addressing the 2,000 delegates to California's state Democratic Party convention. ...

"I believe it is more important to bring about the transformation," he said, pointing to his universal health care plan, achieving independence from foreign energy and reducing global warming emissions. "Some people believe it's more important to push those things off and reduce the deficit -- the deficit's the priority."

So Edwards won't raise taxes to eliminate the federal deficit, which would disappear entirely under the present economic policy in the next few years anyway. Unlike his fellow Democrats who want to drain more money out of the economy ostensibly to address government overspending, he wants to continue overspending, and pull even more money out of the pockets of Americans to fund it. The deficit? Ha! Edwards laughs in the face of the deficit!

The "transformation" Edwards wants is nothing more than a return to the same failed policies of the Great Society. We already have an entitlement burden that Washington has shown little courage in addressing. The Democrats won't discuss reforming the basis of Social Security, claiming that it's fiscally sound, when it will collapse within the lifetimes of almost half the people who currently pay into the system. Medicare, which is at least eight times the problem of Social Security, hasn't even come under discussion. Yet Edwards wants to push a "transformation" that will add to the entitlement burden such activities as universal health care and global warming.

At least Edwards doesn't pretend to be a centrist, unlike some of his competitors for the Democratic nomination. He's running on the confiscate-and-spend, government-program platform that passed out of style during the Carter administration. A vote for Edwards is really an explicit vote for an overwhelming, European-style nanny state that we cannot afford. A vote for the other Democrats probably amounts to the same thing, but they're either more clever or less honest than John Edwards.

Good News In Anbar

Just as the Democrats have raised the white flag on Iraq, the New York Times reports that the surge strategy has started paying off in Anbar. Shops have reopened, people have moved back, and everyone's challenging the insurgents except Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi (via Memeorandum):

Anbar Province, long the lawless heartland of the tenacious Sunni Arab resistance, is undergoing a surprising transformation. Violence is ebbing in many areas, shops and schools are reopening, police forces are growing and the insurgency appears to be in retreat.

“Many people are challenging the insurgents,” said the governor of Anbar, Maamoon S. Rahid, though he quickly added, “We know we haven’t eliminated the threat 100 percent.”

Many Sunni tribal leaders, once openly hostile to the American presence, have formed a united front with American and Iraqi government forces against Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia. With the tribal leaders’ encouragement, thousands of local residents have joined the police force. About 10,000 police officers are now in Anbar, up from several thousand a year ago. During the same period, the police force here in Ramadi, the provincial capital, has grown from fewer than 200 to about 4,500, American military officials say.

At the same time, American and Iraqi forces have been conducting sweeps of insurgent strongholds, particularly in and around Ramadi, leaving behind a network of police stations and military garrisons, a strategy that is also being used in Baghdad, Iraq’s capital, as part of its new security plan.

Life has not yet returned to normal, nor even close to it. Infrastructure still has yet to be rebuilt, and the loyalty of America's new allies still remains uncertain. What does appear certain is that this former stronghold of Ba'athist resentment no longer wants to exist in a cycle of oppression, liberation, and destruction. They want to end the fighting by eliminating the insurgents.

The question will be whether they stick with that in the face of an imminent American withdrawal. It has taken four years for Anbar to understand that Sunni domination in Iraq has ended and will not return, neither in the guise of Saddam Hussein nor in a military junta ruled by Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, the chief Ba'athist dead-ender. Now that they have finally pulled together with the US to oppose the increasingly lunatic al-Qaeda terrorists, we have lost the will to fight the insurgents ourselves -- or at least Congress has.

Government buildings and hotels are being rebuilt in Ramadi. Even the New York Times reports that violence has swiftly fallen in the region. Last summer, Ramadi had 25 terrorist attacks a day, and now it has dropped to four -- still too many, but with the expanded police force holding territory for the first time since the liberation, the momentum has clearly shifted. American troops have turned to civil-affairs work, trying to kick-start the rebuilding effort that will secure some semblance of peace among the Sunnis.

The growing security forces rely on the Americans to assist them in getting the terrorists that everyone wants driven out of Iraq. Without us, they would have to sue for terms with the AQI lunatics that would have them divided and fighting amongst themselves. If we leave now, we will destroy all of the work we have done to reach this point -- when even the Times acknowledges that we have finally begun to set the stage for success in Anbar and elsewhere in Iraq.

Welcoming Snow In The Spring

No, I'm not talking about the notoriously fickle Minnesota weather, which at the moment is 84 degrees, muggy, and cloudy. I'm talking about the return of Tony Snow to the White House after weeks of cancer treatments:

White House Press Secretary Tony Snow, who will soon begin chemotherapy to fight a cancer recurrence, told fellow alumni at Davidson College that he feels great and plans to return to work Monday.

Snow, 51, has been on medical leave since announcing March 27 that a growth in his abdominal area was cancerous and had metastasized, or spread, to the liver.

"No, it doesn't mean I'm going to be gray, shriveled and in the fetal position," he told about 600 alumni and family members at a 30-year reunion Saturday. "To my classmates who think I'm going to lose my great hair, forget about it."

Welcome back, Tony. Glad to have you at the podium again.

Obama, The Neocon (Updated)

Is Barack Obama an interventionist neocon in sheep's clothing? Robert Kagan apparently thinks so, and makes his case in today's Washington Post. I provide an answer at Heading Right, and note that one speech does not a hawk make.

UPDATE: With Democrats howling over the supposedly unprecedented politicization of the Bush White House -- as if they'd forgotten all about James Carville and Vernon Jordan -- Newsweek reminds them that Democrats hardly qualify as ethics scolds:

Sen. Barack Obama vows to bring a "new kind of politics" to Washington. But a copy of a 36-page fax from Obama's Senate office, obtained by NEWSWEEK, shows that the rookie presidential candidate, riding the biggest wave this side of his native Hawaii, needs to keep a sharp eye on the details of his own campaign. Senate ethics rules allow senators with active campaigns to "split" the work time and salary of official schedulers such as Obama's Molly Buford.

According to Obama's campaign spokesman, Robert Gibbs, she in fact is paid by both entities. But Senate rules and federal law forbid the use of official equipment—such as faxes and phone lines—to conduct campaign business, which was what Buford was doing last Thursday when she faxed Obama's political "call list" to the senator's personal aide at a Columbia, S.C., hotel. "These are the call sheets for tomorrow's call time," she wrote on the official cover page, emblazoned with the seal of the U.S. Senate. ...

The fax itself shows the campaign working to round up endorsements from established party leaders. In the "talking points" for a call to Rep. William Clay of St. Louis, Obama is advised by his Chicago political team to say: "Your endorsement is important to me and I hope that you will join the movement supporting my campaign. I would like you to take an official leadership role for my campaign in Missouri."

Should we call for a special prosecutor to look into Obama's ethics, too? I'd actually be more interested in the identity of the person who shoved the fax under the door of Newsweek. I'd bet that question has crossed Obama's mind, too.

'The Effect On The Taliban Has Been Dramatic'

The London Telegraph reports on a new tactical aggressiveness from American troops in Afghanistan which has the Taliban rocked back on its heels and unable to press forward with its expect spring offensive. The new tactics involve the heavy use of helicopter gunships and a merciless push to finish engagements. A senior Taliban commander has found exactly what that means (via Hot Air):

Caught in the middle of the Helmand river, the fleeing Taliban were paddling their boat back to shore for dear life.

Smoke from the ambush they had just sprung on American special forces still hung in the air, but their attention was fixed on the two helicopter gunships that had appeared above them as their leader, the tallest man in the group, struggled to pull what appeared to be a burqa over his head.

As the boat reached the shore, Captain Larry Staley tilted the nose of the lead Apache gunship downwards into a dive. One of the men turned to face the helicopter and sank to his knees. Capt Staley's gunner pressed the trigger and the man disappeared in a cloud of smoke and dust.

By the time the gunships had finished, 21 minutes later, military officials say 14 Taliban were confirmed dead, including one of their key commanders in Helmand.

The mission is typical of a new, aggressive, approach adopted by American forces in southern Afghanistan and particularly in Helmand, where British troops last year bore the brunt of some of the heaviest fighting since the fall of the Taliban in 2001.

The Teleghraph includes a video presentation that should be seen as a companion to the article. In it, the narrator says that "the effect on the Taliban has been dramatic," and it certainly was in this case. The commander who died in this engagement was Mul;ah Najibullah, a commander in the original Taliban who eluded us in 2001. He had been an official in Mullah Omar's government in Afghanistan prior to getting ejected in the American invasion after 9/11.

American troops no longer break off engagements when Taliban guerillas start to flee. The British had been hard pressed in Helmand up to now, but as the Telegraph reports, they partly caused their own problems. British commanders had offered cease-fires in Helmand to allow for the Taliban to end the fighting and work with the Coalition, but all it did was to allow the Taliban to regroup and seize positions. The new American commander has put an end to all cease-fires, and has ordered constant pressure on the terrorists.

As a result, the Taliban have found it impossible to mount an offensive. They have tried raids and ambushes, but the superior firepower and the ability to get into the air makes ambushes a trap for the attackers. As this raid demonstrates, any gains made in raids last for moments, and the raiders and their commanders pay with their lives -- and gain nothing.

The reporter says that the success or failure of the Taliban depends on their response to the gunships. However, it goes deeper than that. The success or failure of the Taliban depends on the commitment to fight to the last on the part of the Coalition. Now that we have started to do that, the Taliban cannot possibly hope to dislodge American and British forces. One cannot be merciful to terrorists and hope to prevail, and the Coalition may finally have learned that lesson.

Scheuer: Don't Buy Tenet

Michael Scheuer, the CIA chief of the now-defunct Osama bin Laden unit, wrote a book recounting his frustrations spanning more than a decade of counterterrorism work for Langley. The author of such books as Imperial Hubris and Through Our Enemies' Eyes has spent the last few years detailing how senior intelligence officials have failed several administrations and the nation. Now he responds to George Tenet and his new memoirs, and warns Americans that Tenet has not told the truth:

At a time when clear direction and moral courage were needed, Tenet shifted course to follow the prevailing winds, under President Bill Clinton and then President Bush -- and he provided distraught officers at Langley a shoulder to cry on when his politically expedient tacking sailed the United States into disaster.

At the CIA, Tenet will be remembered for some badly needed morale-building. But he will also be recalled for fudging the central role he played in the decline of America's clandestine service -- the brave field officers who run covert missions that make us all safer. The decline began in the late 1980s, when the impending end of the Cold War meant smaller budgets and fewer hires, and it continued through Sept. 11, 2001. When Tenet and his bungling operations chief, James Pavitt, described this slow-motion disaster in testimony after the terrorist attacks, they tried to blame the clandestine service's weaknesses on congressional cuts. But Tenet had helped preside over every step of the service's decline during three consecutive administrations -- Bush, Clinton, Bush -- in a series of key intelligence jobs for the Senate, the National Security Council and the CIA. Only 9/11, it seems, convinced Tenet of the importance of a large, aggressive clandestine service to U.S. security. ...

But what troubles me most is Tenet's handling of the opportunities that CIA officers gave the Clinton administration to capture or kill bin Laden between May 1998 and May 1999. Each time we had intelligence about bin Laden's whereabouts, Tenet was briefed by senior CIA officers at Langley and by operatives in the field. He would nod and assure his anxious subordinates that he would stress to Clinton and his national security team that the chances of capturing bin Laden were solid and that the intelligence was not going to get better. Later, he would insist that he had kept up his end of the bargain, but that the NSC had decided not to strike.

Since 2001, however, several key Clinton counterterrorism insiders (including NSC staffers Richard A. Clarke, Daniel Benjamin and Steven Simon) have reported that Tenet consistently denigrated the targeting data on bin Laden, causing the president and his team to lose confidence in the hard-won intelligence. "We could never get over the critical hurdle of being able to corroborate Bin Ladin's whereabouts," Tenet now writes. That of course is untrue, but it spared him from ever having to explain the awkward fallout if an attempt to get bin Laden failed. None of this excuses Clinton's disinterest in protecting Americans, but it does show Tenet's easy willingness to play for patsies the CIA officers who risked their lives to garner intelligence and then to undercut their work to avoid censure if an attack went wrong.

In fact, what Scheuer describes here is only a hair short of cowardice. Tenet willingly went along with the flow, regardless of who was in charge. With Clinton, he was only too happy to undermine the intelligence for a pre-emptive strike on bin Laden, because he sensed that Clinton didn't want to take any risks. With Bush, he went along with the strongest possible analysis of the intelligence because he sensed that Bush would take action anyway. And if Tenet really means what he says in this book -- Scheuer gives examples of his accusations against Condoleezza Rice, Dick Cheney, and the "neocon" cabal -- Tenet never bothered to mention it to Congress or the 9/11 Commission, years after the fact.

Scheuer says that Tenet wants to get back into the good graces of the Democrats, his first political home. He well might. Some in Congress have already mentioned Tenet's name on witness lists for their investigation, and Scheuer sees that as a rehabilitation opportunity that Tenet will not allow to pass. Tenet apparently lets Bush off the hook, as well as Colin Powell, but seems willing to throw everyone else under the bus to protect himself.

Don't think that Scheuer is defending the decision to go into Iraq: far from it. Scheuer believes it to have been a huge mistake, which he also states forcefully in his column. He also says that the CIA warned Tenet of the problems, and that Tenet never acted on their analysis. Now Tenet says he tried, but this is the first time he's made that assertion, and he has had a number of opportunities to tell that story between 2002 and now.

Scheuer offers this contemptuous evaluation of Tenet as CIA chief:

Still, he may have been the ideal CIA leader for Clinton and Bush -- denigrating good intelligence to sate the former's cowardly pacifism and accepting bad intelligence to please the latter's Wilsonian militarism.

And now Tenet can sell the American public what it wants to hear.

Turkish Secularism Lives

Turkey has reached a crisis over radical Islam, as their recent elections have created a precarious position for the tradtionally secular democracy. Abdullah Gul, the candidate for the leading party, will become Turkey's next president despite his history of supporting Islamists. The army has announced its intention to defend secularism, a most decidedly blunt warning to the Parliament not to elect Gul. The situation looks ripe for a civil war or a coup d'etat.

Today, though, Turks have rallied in force to express their own support for secularism:

Hundreds of thousands of people are rallying in Istanbul in support of secularism in Turkey, amid a row over a vote for the country's next president.

The protesters are concerned that the ruling party's candidate for the post remains loyal to his Islamic roots.

The candidate, Abdullah Gul, earlier said he would not quit despite growing criticism from opponents and the army.

Mr Gul failed to win election in a first round vote in parliament as opposition MPs boycotted the vote.

Gul would replace another Islamist, Tayyip Erdogan, who won the presidency on a promise to remain secular in his approach to leadership. Gul, on the other hand, appears more tied to Islamist thinking. His wife would be the first to wear a hijab. Gul's party would also control parliament, the presidency, and the governments, and Gul could act as a Trojan horse to impose a more Islamist rule over Turkey.

That has many Turks worried and upset, and today they have gathered by the hundreds of thousands to express their concern. They do not want a coup, although the army appears poised to conduct one. Turks want a free, open, and secular democracy, where mosque and state stay separated. Islamists believe in shari'a and the Qur'an teachings that make Islam the basic form of temporal government. It is a conflict that many Arab nations either have or will approach in the near future, but the Turks had thought this conflict settled long ago.

The army conducted its last coup in 1997, to remove Islamist president Necmettin Erkaban from power. Its statement shook up the Turks, who see it as a message to the Turkish constitutional court to dissolve parliament and declare the elections invalid. The army sees itself as the defender of the legacy of Mustafa Kemal, the man who established the modern state of Turkey after World War I as a relentlessly secular democracy, and they will not allow Gul to move them backwards towards Islamist theocracy. The court has until Wednesday to stop the second round of voting, and the army's readiness to overrule them will certainly be part of their considerations.

The New Reagan?

Fred Thompson has captured the imagination of conservatives who find themselves dissatisfied with the current crop of presidential contenders. They want to find a nominee who combines the charisma of Rudy Giuliani, the firmness on the war of John McCain, and the conservative domestic policies of Duncant Hunter and Mike Huckabee. In short, conservatives want another Ronald Reagan.

According to some of those who worked for Ronald Reagan, they may have it in Thompson:

Ronald Reagan's closest allies are throwing their weight behind the White House bid by the late president's fellow actor, Fred Thompson.

The film star and former Republican senator from Tennessee will this week use a speech in the heart of Reagan country, in southern California, to woo party bigwigs in what insiders say is the next step in his coming out as a candidate.

A key figure in the Reagan inner circle has now given his seal of approval to Mr Thompson, best known as a star of the television crime drama Law and Order.

As deputy chief of staff, Michael Deaver was a key member of the "troika" of aides who kept the Reagan White House on track. With the chief of staff James Baker and special assistant Ed Meese, he was the master of image and presentation.

Deaver has remained at the forefront of the Reagan legacy, and has close contacts with Nancy Reagan. Clark Judge, one of Reagan's speechwriters, also supports Thompson, calling Thompson "a man of tremendous substance". Roger Stone, a Reagan campaign strategist, notes that Thompson has Reagan's self-assurance without the cockiness of George W Bush, and that he communicates wisdom and deliberation.

With this team forming, it's obvious that Thompson will join the race. If that wasn't enough, his upcoming appearance at the Lincoln Club this Friday should make it clear. It has worked for Republican electoral success since it helped inspire Reagan to run for governor, and it made history when it assisted Arnold Schwarzenegger and pushed the recall effort that made him a successor to Reagan in California. If Thompson can bring the Lincoln Club behind him, he will have a force in political fundraising on his team -- and will have gotten a jump on the other Republicans that have conservatives pining for Fred as the new Reagan.

All of this is true, and yet Thompson is both less and more than Ronald Reagan. Thompson has a long record of political reform from the ground up, first with Watergate and then in Tennessee. His acting career followed his political career, while Reagan did it the other way around. Reagan spent years grooming himself for higher office by speaking on the dinner circuit, building his rhetorical repetoire for a long-shot run at the California governor's office, followed by two attempts to win the Republican presidential nomination.

In contrast, Thompson has not appeared to seek high office, nor has Thompson worked on what looked to be in retrospect a grand plan for a political career. That lack of ego may work to Thompson's advantage in an era of deep skepticism. It's not Reagan, but it's Thompson, and Thompson might sell as the reluctant philosopher, drafted out of necessity.