The Scrutinator

Selective Introspection Alert

2011-05-04T23:24:00.007-05:00

I came across this post and couldn't stay silent. Red Letter Christians: Whose Death Does God Cheer?

While I agree with much of what the author says, the side-bar juxtaposition speaks volumes.

I haven't heard a single Christian speak words like he relays, though I'm sure some do.

I believe it's wrong for a Christian to indulge hatred, even toward Osama bin Laden.

But one who "despises a vile person" seems to please God. I won't claim to know exactly what that means.

I believe there is such a thing as justice: it's completely different than hatred, and is even fundamental to God's character. Rejecting its existence or mis-labeling it as hatred distorts His image.

I believe justice was done.

Update: There's also the notion that he's been stopped from committing more evil--the same as any apprehended criminal. Should one feel happy about that? I say yes, and go so far as to say that's a very unselfish happiness, since (I think) I personally am pretty unlikely to be his next victim.

Obama Gets Osama

2011-05-04T06:13:00.001-05:00

Hat's off to President Obama.

Quote-of-the-Day

2011-04-16T17:57:00.003-05:00

To the point:

1. “You don’t burn the Koran, because if you do, Muslims might go on a killing spree.”
2 “You do burn the Bible, because if you don’t, Muslims might go on a killing spree.”

Wikipedia's Patriarchal Hegemony

2011-02-04T15:40:00.002-06:00

So it turns out that over 85% of Wikipedia contributors are male.

Patriarchal hegemony? Brutal oppression of women?

Of course not. But great fodder for those claims by those so inclined to make them.

For me, it's a good example of working backwards from a statistic.

How Facts Backfire

2010-07-12T13:50:00.003-05:00

A very interesting read, from the Boston Globe: How facts backfire:

“The general idea is that it’s absolutely threatening to admit you’re wrong,” says political scientist Brendan Nyhan, the lead researcher on the Michigan study. The phenomenon — known as “backfire” — is “a natural defense mechanism to avoid that cognitive dissonance.”

Human nature, sadly, is still human nature, whether you call it positive internal efficacy or whatever.

Update: Tom gives it some attention it deserves.

Peter Hitchens

2010-05-26T22:58:00.002-05:00

A very interesting read: How I found God and peace with my atheist brother: PETER HITCHENS traces his journey back to Christianity.

Read it all. No excerpt does it justice.

An incoherent ad

2010-04-07T06:58:00.002-05:00

Playing on the what-the-fat-cats-don't-want-you-to-know meme to the point of incoherency.

Guided by the liberal theory

2010-02-09T06:50:00.004-06:00

Quote of the day, from Tom:

The notion that [health care reform] can all be resolved in half a day is guided by the liberal theory that they have great ideas which have been poorly communicated to a confused public. Think about that - Dems have the most awesomest orator in the White House since forever, they can rely on the near-universal support of every prominent academic of every prominent university, they can rely on cheerleading from NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, and MSNBC as well as the NY Times, the LA Times, the Washington Post, but they can't get their message out on health care reform after talking abut it for a year. Why not? Because Glenn Beck has a television show, Rush Limbaugh has a radio show, and Sarah Palin has a Facebook page. Oh, yeah, and because the rest of us are stupid.

Well put.

Lloyd Marcus on Black History Month

2010-02-04T12:15:00.001-06:00

Lloyd Marcus:

Black History Month Should Be About Black History

Astroturfing

2010-01-25T08:11:00.003-06:00

Patterico summarizes it:

So now that you’ve seen the evidence, what should you do?

Simple. Don’t take anything at face value. Look at pro-Obama letters in your own local paper and search phrases on Google to see if they are examples of Astroturf.

Another lesson in dealing with trickery.

Paid Objectivity

2010-01-14T14:31:00.005-06:00

Hats off to Jane Hamsher for documenting Jonathan Gruber's conflict-of-interest scandal, which is really the Obama administration's conflict-of-interest scandal.

The essence: Gruber offered what was portrayed as objective analysis, even broad consensus, but he actually on the Obama administration's payroll.

Via Ace, amidst various bewildering references.

Via Instapundit.

Weather Cooking

2010-01-10T07:41:00.004-06:00

How to treat Weather Cooking Deniers?

Old superstitions and prejudices replaced by new superstitions and prejudices.

Coexist: I still like it

2010-01-07T08:48:00.001-06:00

There are mountains of worthless lefty bumper stickers our there. So when I find one I actually like, I take note. I really like the Coexist one.

So I also took note when this guy deconstructed it. (Note that his is more elaborate, too.)

His point deserves pondering: camps in many religions/ideologies use the message of tolerance and coexistence to keep the heat off while they try to gain power, fully intending no such tolerance of their own. Vigilence in calling this out is justified.

But I think he's painting with too broad a brush. Taking it at face value, I still like it.

I also hope its message pushes the less militant of each ideology away from the more militant, and gives traction to those calling them out.

Via Instapundit.

2010-01-05T17:28:00.003-06:00

A peek at life in the Democrats' Fiefdoms.

(From this, FYI.)

Jon Stewart on ClimateGate

2010-01-03T15:46:00.004-06:00

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart

Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c

Scientists Hide Global Warming Data

www.thedailyshow.com

Daily Show
Full Episodes

Political Humor

Health Care Crisis

From around 4:54 above:

Sen James Inhofe (R-OK): "The fact that this whole idea on the global warming, I'm glad that's over, gone, done. We won. you lost. Get a life." [Environment and Public Works Committee SD-406]

Jon Stewart: "By the way, that quote was from before he found out about the leaked e-mail story."

As though ClimateGate was the first evidence (Inhofe's attitude aside).

Not so: ClimateGate: 30 years in the making.

More, from Powerline. It didn't start with ClimateGate. Late Professor Frederick Seitz, 1996:

In my more than 60 years as a member of the American scientific community, including service as president of both the National Academy of Sciences and the American Physical Society, I have never witnessed a more disturbing corruption of the peer-review process than the events that led to this IPCC report.

Stewart's final point is an excellent one, um, kind of (profanity and ad hominem aside):

But that's the point: if you care about an issue and want to make it your life's work, don't cut corners! It's disheartening to people inclined towards the scientific method, and it's catnip to these guys...

I agree: don't cut corners. Also, don't commit outright fraud.

Interesting, though, that he phrases it "care about an issue..." What about "care about a field of study" or "care about a scientific discipline"? Innocent slip or deliberately confusing the two? You decide. And if the "issue" you care about is your predetermined conclusion about the science, how trustworthy should we consider you?

Strict empiricists, no?

2009-12-29T11:34:00.003-06:00

Wired Magazine: Accept Defeat: The Neuroscience of Screwing Up.

The reason we’re so resistant to anomalous information — the real reason researchers automatically assume that every unexpected result is a stupid mistake — is rooted in the way the human brain works. Over the past few decades, psychologists have dismantled the myth of objectivity. The fact is, we carefully edit our reality, searching for evidence that confirms what we already believe. Although we pretend we’re empiricists — our views dictated by nothing but the facts — we’re actually blinkered, especially when it comes to information that contradicts our theories. The problem with science, then, isn’t that most experiments fail — it’s that most failures are ignored.

Via Instapundit, with a very appropriate comment: "Wired Magazine unknowingly explains ClimateGate". At least the origins of ClimateGate (observer bias), if not the blatant fraud.

A closet Christian

2009-12-22T10:20:00.004-06:00

Via salon.com, "I am a closet Christian":

To [my cosmopolitan, progressive friends], my situation is far more sinister: I am the bane of their youth, the boogeyman of their politics, the very thing they left their small towns to escape. I am a Christian.

It's an open bigotry that would bring shame were it directed towards any other demographic. (At least that's one thing I took away. Read the whole thing for yours.) Another: courage is sorely in need. (I don't hold myself out as the model of courage, either.)

Stimulus to Dems

2009-12-18T09:12:00.002-06:00

The fifedoms' food lines are ordered by loyalty: Report: Democratic districts received nearly twice the amount of stimulus funds as GOP districts

Anita Moncrief's Story

2009-10-22T12:13:00.002-05:00

Here's the story of Anita Moncrief. As with every former liberal's story, it's unique but with common themes.

How This Ex-Liberal Found Fortitude and Her Way Home

Taxation Without Representation

2009-07-31T10:41:00.005-05:00

Tax Burden of Top 1% Now Exceeds That of Bottom 95%".

Full disclosure: I'm pretty sure I'm part of that bottom 95%, though I didn't find the cut-off.

Kissing up to the rich is wrong (and against my faith).

But so is demonizing the rich. Particularly in light of this.

Corollary: Like it or not, you're beholden to the rich. They're your benefactors. (Don't like that? Then pay more taxes yourself.)

Think about the teenager who continuously bad-mouths his parents, except when he's holding out his hand for his allowance. Want to be like that?

Corollary: What happens to these richest 1% has a hugely disproportionate effect on the government's income revenue. There's no Magic Money Fountain, despite what you've been led to believe. (That's its own future post.)

"Markets" need to experience pain (as feedback), or they become dysfunctional, anemic. This tax arrangement is very anemic, and it will likely have consequences. People don't appreciate what they don't pay for. Even poker has an ante. Not good.

But doesn't James 2 claim that the rich are exploiting me? You could read it that way, but the balance of Scripture doesn't roundly condemn being rich. James lists specific immoral actions, like exploitation, unjust lawsuits and even slandering Christ's name. Like greed, none of these things are unique to the rich, or apply to everyone. (I'm also convinced real exploitation--historically and globally--bears little resemblance to what goes on in the United States.)

Via Instapundit

Update: Tom Maguire is irritated by how the original article presents things, with more discussion in the comments.

Evaluate this claim

2009-07-07T16:03:00.004-05:00

You're a teacher. One of your students walks up to your desk, slaps down his last test, a D+ grade, and says, "you need to make this an A!"

You say, "Why?"

He says, "I got this D+ because you prayed to Satan against me. So change it."

You say, "No I didn't."

He says, "If you didn't do it consciously, you did it unconsciously. And this D+ is proof!"

Before you can answer, he pulls out a newspaper clipping and slaps it on your desk. It's a story about a teacher in your own state who claims to be a Satanist.

Then he pulls out a petition signed by many of the kids in his class, that states that they believe the same thing.

What do you say next, and why? How do you go about evaluating a claim like this?

2850 Times As Effective

2009-06-20T13:52:00.002-05:00

Compassion International just sponsored their one millionth child. They're a great organization, and I commend them for the progress they've made.

The global financial crisis has brought poverty to 100 million people around the world.

Think of the scale: 1 million in 57 years; 100 million in less than two years. That's 2850 times the effect. Three orders of magnitude.

If you could have started a non-profit that would have prevented this crisis, think of the good you would have done.

But even now are your beliefs about this crisis just a collection of convenient myths you've accumulated?

Dose of Perspective

2009-02-23T15:09:00.002-06:00

Seen this? Comedy, yet profound.

"Everything's Amazing, Everyone's Unhappy" (Can't embed it here, it seems.)

It's more a comment on the human condition, I think, than anything.

On flying, I'd say you're doing something no one in history had ever done until 100 or so years ago, and going faster than any human had ever traveled until maybe 60 years ago.

We take so much for granted.

Who Was Running That Scheme?

2008-12-17T09:41:00.002-06:00

Thomas Friedman:

I have no sympathy for Madoff. But the fact is, his alleged Ponzi scheme was only slightly more outrageous than the “legal” scheme that Wall Street was running, fueled by cheap credit, low standards and high greed. What do you call giving a worker who makes only $14,000 a year a nothing-down and nothing-to-pay-for-two-years mortgage to buy a $750,000 home, and then bundling that mortgage with 100 others into bonds — which Moody’s or Standard & Poors rate AAA — and then selling them to banks and pension funds the world over? That is what our financial industry was doing. If that isn’t a pyramid scheme, what is?

The SEC's description of Mortgage-Backed Securities (MBSs) (emphasis mine):

Mortgage loans are purchased from banks, mortgage companies, and other originators and then assembled into pools by a governmental, quasi-governmental, or private entity. ...

Most MBSs are issued by the Government National Mortgage Association (Ginnie Mae), a U.S. government agency, or the Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie Mae) and the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (Freddie Mac), U.S. government-sponsored enterprises. Ginnie Mae, backed by the full faith and credit of the U.S. government, guarantees that investors receive timely payments. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac also provide certain guarantees and, while not backed by the full faith and credit of the U.S. government, have special authority to borrow from the U.S. Treasury. Some private institutions, such as brokerage firms, banks, and homebuilders, also securitize mortgages, known as "private-label" mortgage securities.

So if most are from Ginnie, Fannie and Freddie, isn't it really those organizations' pyramid scheme? And if they come with "certain guarantees," why wouldn't they get high ratings?

It really does go back to the Community Reinvestment Act.

Needing an Explanation

2008-12-14T14:21:00.002-06:00

Zimababwe blames the west for their cholera:

Zimbabwe on Saturday accused the West of waging biological warfare to deliberately start a cholera epidemic that has killed hundreds of people and sickened thousands.

... Zimbabwean officials often blame their country's troubles on the West.

As one wise sage once said, "if the CIA didn't exist, the left would have to invent it" for something to pin their failures on. (This time they're blaming the British first.) Note that blame aimed at "western powers" goes back at least to Stalin.

Bush's Snub That Wasn't

2008-11-21T10:02:00.004-06:00

Via Breitbart: the "snub" that wasn't, even though Jon Stewart and your own eyes clearly tell you otherwise.

Maybe I sound like a broken record, but what would public opinion be if every falsehood and distortion like this could be completely undone in every person's mind?

The Hottest October on Record

2008-11-16T13:33:00.002-06:00

The backstory of October being declared (erroneously) the hottest on record: The world has never seen such freezing heat:

A surreal scientific blunder last week raised a huge question mark about the temperature records that underpin the worldwide alarm over global warming. On Monday, Nasa's Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), which is run by Al Gore's chief scientific ally, Dr James Hansen, and is one of four bodies responsible for monitoring global temperatures, announced that last month was the hottest October on record.

...

So what explained the anomaly? GISS's computerised temperature maps seemed to show readings across a large part of Russia had been up to 10 degrees higher than normal. But when expert readers of the two leading warming-sceptic blogs, Watts Up With That and Climate Audit, began detailed analysis of the GISS data they made an astonishing discovery. The reason for the freak figures was that scores of temperature records from Russia and elsewhere were not based on October readings at all. Figures from the previous month had simply been carried over and repeated two months running.

The error was so glaring that when it was reported on the two blogs - run by the US meteorologist Anthony Watts and Steve McIntyre, the Canadian computer analyst who won fame for his expert debunking of the notorious "hockey stick" graph - GISS began hastily revising its figures. This only made the confusion worse because, to compensate for the lowered temperatures in Russia, GISS claimed to have discovered a new "hotspot" in the Arctic - in a month when satellite images were showing Arctic sea-ice recovering so fast from its summer melt that three weeks ago it was 30 per cent more extensive than at the same time last year.

A GISS spokesman lamely explained that the reason for the error in the Russian figures was that they were obtained from another body, and that GISS did not have resources to exercise proper quality control over the data it was supplied with. This is an astonishing admission: the figures published by Dr Hansen's institute are not only one of the four data sets that the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) relies on to promote its case for global warming, but they are the most widely quoted, since they consistently show higher temperatures than the others.

Unbelievable. But how long will we be hearing that October 2008 was the hottest on record? Hats off to the skeptics willing to actually look at the data.

Where would public (or scientific) opinion be if we could perfectly unwind every scam, distortion and falsehood in each person's thinking?

Via Instapundit

Hats Off to Obama

2008-11-05T11:10:00.003-06:00

Hats off to our new President-elect Barack Obama. Though I have a lot to be troubled about, I think he has an historic opportunity to do good in ways our society needs.

More later, as time permits.

For me, part of blogging is going on record with what I think and believe, so you (and I) can hold me accountable for what I say in the future. So I'll revisit things I said earlier on.

Troll Logic and Eeyore Chow

2008-10-31T02:10:00.001-05:00

An excellent lesson on psychological warfare.

Obama/Ayers - More Evidence

2008-10-21T16:44:00.002-05:00

More evidence that Obama misled the public on his relationship with unrepentant terrorist Bill Ayers: their offices were on the same floor of the same building, for three years.

If anyone cares...

Via GatewayPundit

File under: Culture War

2008-10-11T06:14:00.003-05:00

An amazing piece of clarity, from Newsweek of all places: The Pornification Of A Generation:

And then, says Scott, an English professor at a small college in Georgia, "I realized porn culture and I were in a death match for my daughter's soul."

In a market that sells high heels for babies and thongs for tweens, it doesn't take a genius to see that sex, if not porn, has invaded our lives.

This would be one front of the "culture war" that many scoff at.

... the influence of porn on mainstream culture is affecting our self perceptions and behavior—in everything from fashion to body image to how we conceptualize our sexuality.

It's too early to know exactly how kids who grow up in this hypersexualized environment will be affected in the long term. But Scott and his coauthor say it's not too soon—or too prudish—to sound the alarm, and to look critically at the sexualized culture we're exposed to every day. ...

... porn themes have gone from adult entertainment to prime time, seeping into nearly every aspect of popular culture. Sarracino and Scott define "porning" as the way advertising and society in general have borrowed from the ideas and characteristics central to most American pornography: sex as commodity, sexuality as overt, narrow views of women and male-female relationships, bad girls and dirty boys, domination and submission.

In music, for instance, the progression is the same. First it's subtly sung between the lines, then more overtly, then with a smirk, then the pretense is dropped altogether, and we celebrate our "liberation." And when we we're dropping the pretense about one thing, we're starting the next down that same path. (Sex, promiscuity, sexual exploitation, sexual abuse, and now prostitution.)

The prevalence or porn leaves today's children with a lot of conflicting ideas and misconceptions, says Lyn Mikel Brown, the coauthor of "Packaging Girlhood," about marketers' influence on teen girls. "All this sex gives a misinformed notion of what it means to be grown-up." ... Kids are less likely to know when and how to express themselves sexually—or what behavior crosses the border into sexual harassment.

No kidding.

Last year, the American Psychological Association put out a compelling report that described the sexualization of young girls: a process that entails being stripped of all value except the sexual use to which they might be put. Once they subscribe to that belief, say some psychologists, those girls begin to self-objectify—with consequences ranging from cognitive problems to depression and eating disorders.

... Today, terms like slut and whore are commonplace among teens. ...

It's the porn ideal of sex as commodity in a competitive market—and to see rapper Nelly swipe a credit card through a young girl's backside in a music video only reaffirms that notion. It's artificiality as a replacement for authenticity ...

Whoever he is, I love him!

2008-10-08T17:24:00.004-05:00

This guy is a riot!

Here's his YouTube page.

Via Six Meat Buffet

Fanny, Freddie, and Obama

2008-09-15T07:33:00.002-05:00

From The American Spectator:

"You look at Obama's economic advisers, the guys he has counted on from day one and who have raised him a ton -- and I mean a ton -- of money: Franklin Raines and Jim Johnson, both of them are waist to neck deep in the mortgage debacle."

Both Raines and Johnson have served as CEO of Fannie Mae, with Raines taking over from Johnson. Both are key political and economic advisers to Obama.

"How can Obama go out with a straight face and [say] it was Republicans who made this mess, when it is his key advisers who ran the agencies that made the big mess what it is?" says a Democrat House member who supported Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton. "It's his people who are responsible for what may well be the single largest government bailout in history. And every single one of them made millions off the collapse that are lining Obama's campaign coffers. ..."

McCain can't use a computer!

2008-09-12T20:08:00.001-05:00

Ouch:

Obama: Ha, Ha, McCain Is Old, He Can't Use a Computer
North Vietnamese Captors: Yeah, Ha Ha, We Did That to Him; Pretty Good Gag, Eh?

Obama on the Surge

2008-09-05T05:07:00.002-05:00

Obama admits the surge succeeded:

so Obama opposed a surge that succeeded and advocated a policy that the NIE said at the time would lead to a disaster in Iraq. Troubling ...

And, taking Obama at his word now:

“I think that the surge has succeeded in ways that nobody anticipated,” is not really a political winner I suspect, especially given that the man he’s running against believed in the surge (as did those who planned it). Had they not, the charge Obama is making here is that the military was simply throwing away American lives on a strategy that they didn’t really think would work — and that they really just kinda lucked into success.

And speaking of Rezko...

2008-08-30T21:36:00.002-05:00

I'd missed this:

While [Obama] has released 94 pages of documents relating to the Rezko sale, they don't include the single most important one -- the settlement statement that shows the complete flow of funds that were part of the house sale. When asked why that last key document isn't being released, the Obama campaign issued a boilerplate statement saying, "we have released documents that reflect every one of the final terms of the senator's purchase of the home." But key data are still being withheld.

Much more. Read the whole thing.

Palin: the Anti-Obama

2008-08-30T07:25:00.002-05:00

Obama conformed to the dysfunction of his political culture. He considers attempted mass-murderers Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn "mainstream." He considered Rev. Wright his spiritual mentor, apparently not even noticing his racism or anti-American views. He considered favors from Tony Rezko a normal thing.

Martin Luther King, Jr., refused to share a stage with those advocating violence. That's courage. Obama seemed to lack it.

Palin rose up against the dysfunction of her political culture. That's good judgment.

Does Palin's lack of experience undercut McCain's argument about Obama's? To some extent, yes. But McCain's still on the ticket. And, experience-wise, how does her being one heartbeat away from the Presidency justify voting Obama zero heartbeats away?

More on Ayers/Obama

2008-08-28T08:08:00.003-05:00

On guilt by association.

Jim Lindgren:

Thus, guilt by association seems a particularly unfair tack to take in criticizing Obama for someone else’s violent acts. To the extent Obama’s contacts with Ayers are relevant at all, then it shouldn’t be as shared responsibility, but merely as a question of judgment and of candor if Obama were to be misleading in his statements.

Judgment and candor are the issues.

Another important issue is the extent to which that sub-culture, while being sincerely non-violent, also self-contradictorily romanticizes the Viet Cong, the Weathermen, the Black Panthers, the PLO, FARC, Che, Mao, etc. To what extent does Obama go with that flow?

On what basis does one treat some ideologically-motivated, attempted mass murderers differently than others?

If Obama or his campaign had ever denounced Ayers with the fervor that his campaign has now used in denouncing Kurtz, Obama wouldn’t be having trouble on his connection to Ayers. And I’m not suggesting that Obama should have denounced Ayers. I am just noting the grossly disproportionate responses of the Obama campaign to their differing offenses and the Obama campaign’s direct attack on Kurtz’s character, not just what he's done or said – including very explicitly using arguments of guilt by association against Kurtz (which of course are being used against Obama, despite the protestations to the contrary of his critics).

Steve Diamond: "Obama Campaign Harasses WGN Radio Host."

Caller after caller to WGN read off talking points provided them by the Obama campaign alleging that Dr. Kurtz, and by implication and sometimes directly, Milt Rosenberg, was "smearing" Barack Obama and finding Obama "guilty by association." They also accused Kurtz of lying.

Yet, when pressed for specifics, these callers had none.

...

But it suggests to me a whiff of panic inside the campaign. Sure, John Kerry should have gone after the swift boaters in the last election. But this is not swift boating. We are talking about a decade or more of close political activity involving Ayers and Obama.

Far from being a smear, the accusation made that Dr. Kurtz and Global Labor is engaged in "guilt by association" is really a form of McCarthyism.

LA Times:

Christenson also stressed that the Obama campaign was invited to send a representative to appear on the show to balance the discussion of the newly-opened documents. But the campaign headquarters just down Michigan Avenue from the station refused the request.

Did the NY Times Distort Ayers' Words?

2008-08-27T05:39:00.003-05:00

Background on Ayers here.

From Wikipedia's entry on Bill Ayers:

The [New York Times] reporter quoted him as saying "I don't regret setting bombs" and "I feel we didn't do enough", and, when asked if he would "do it all again" as saying "I don't want to discount the possibility."[10] Ayers has not denied the quotes, but he protested the interviewer's characterizations in a Letter to the Editor published September 15, 2001: "This is not a question of being misunderstood or 'taken out of context', but of deliberate distortion."[18]

I could find no such letter published in the New York Times.

The Times did publish this Ayers letter on September 14, 2001:

Re a Sept. 16 New York Times Magazine interview with me and your Sept. 11 Arts pages profile:

The barbarism unleashed against innocent human beings on Sept. 11 has in an instant transformed the complex landscape of American consciousness. I'm filled with horror and grief for those murdered and harmed, for their families and for all affected forever.

''Fugitive Days,'' the memoir I've written about my participation in the Weather Underground and the antiwar movement and the events of 30 years ago, is now receiving attention in a radically changed context.

My book is a condemnation of terrorism in all its forms. We are witnessing crimes against humanity. The intent of my book was and is to understand, to tell the truth and to heal.

BILL AYERS
Chicago, Sept. 14, 2001

So on September 14th, 2001, three days after the article, he makes no protest about deliberate distortion.

Just where was this 9/15 letter published? On Ayers' blog, on April 21, 2008. The post is titled "Clarifying the Facts— a letter to the New York Times, 9-15-2001". The text is taken verbatim from another post he made on 9/26/2006, titled "A Letter to the Times Found Five Years Later…".

Found it, eh?

The Obama/Ayers Connection

2008-08-25T22:39:00.004-05:00

Former leftist terrorist Bill Ayers in 2001:

"I don't regret setting bombs," Bill Ayers said. "I feel we didn't do enough."

In 2001, Obama was over 40 years old, had known Ayers for over ten years, and seems to have worked much more closely with him than he'd led the public to believe. More here and here.

Seems like radically poor judgment to me.

What if McCain had ties like this with, say, an unrepentant abortion-clinic bomber? Wouldn't you want every voter to be fully informed?

Update, 8/27: Well put:

the real troubling aspect of the Obama-Ayers relationship is that Obama comes from a political subculture in which Ayers is an accepted and unremarkable individual. Looking at Ayers, one is forced to ask exactly what kind of leftist extremism would be considered unacceptable by Obama and his cohorts.

RE: Georgia

2008-08-16T20:56:00.003-05:00

Victor Davis Hanson:

Russia knows the great truth about the West: it will pour a half-million people into the street to protest the United States removing a homicidal dictator to foster democracy, but not a half-dozen to object to Russia attempting to remove a democratic government to foster dictatorship.

Well put.

[8/21/2008] Corollary: If the only anti-war rallies you organize are for wars the U.S. is involved in, you're reinforcing the perception that "anti-war" is a code-word for "anti-American."

Alexander Solzhenitsyn R.I.P

2008-08-03T22:47:00.001-05:00

Alexander Solzhenitsyn died.

A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich is an important read. I'm grateful for his unflinching accounts of oppression in the USSR.

His address to Harvard University is another important one. The whole thing is worth a read, but here's some of what stood out for me. Eerily prescient.

Harvard's motto is "Veritas." Many of you have already found out and others will find out in the course of their lives that truth eludes us if we do not concentrate with total attention on its pursuit. And even while it eludes us, the illusion still lingers of knowing it and leads to many misunderstandings. Also, truth is seldom pleasant; it is almost invariably bitter. There is some bitterness in my speech today, too. But I want to stress that it comes not from an adversary but from a friend.

On courage...

A Decline in Courage may be the most striking feature which an outside observer notices in the West in our days. The Western world has lost its civil courage, both as a whole and separately, in each country, each government, each political party and of course in the United Nations. Such a decline in courage is particularly noticeable among the ruling groups and the intellectual elite, causing an impression of loss of courage by the entire society. Of course there are many courageous individuals but they have no determining influence on public life. Political and intellectual bureaucrats show depression, passivity and perplexity in their actions and in their statements and even more so in theoretical reflections to explain how realistic, reasonable as well as intellectually and even morally warranted it is to base state policies on weakness and cowardice.

This sounds familiar:

A statesman who wants to achieve something important and highly constructive for his country has to move cautiously and even timidly; there are thousands of hasty and irresponsible critics around him, parliament and the press keep rebuffing him. As he moves ahead, he has to prove that every single step of his is well-founded and absolutely flawless. Actually an outstanding and particularly gifted person who has unusual and unexpected initiatives in mind hardly gets a chance to assert himself; from the very beginning, dozens of traps will be set out for him. Thus mediocrity triumphs with the excuse of restrictions imposed by democracy.

...

It is time, in the West, to defend not so much human rights as human obligations.

On terrorism(recall this was 1978):

When a government starts an earnest fight against terrorism, public opinion immediately accuses it of violating the terrorists' civil rights. There are many such cases.

Such a tilt of freedom in the direction of evil has come about gradually but it was evidently born primarily out of a humanistic and benevolent concept according to which there is no evil inherent to human nature; the world belongs to mankind and all the defects of life are caused by wrong social systems which must be corrected. Strangely enough, though the best social conditions have been achieved in the West, there still is criminality and there even is considerably more of it than in the pauper and lawless Soviet society.

On the press:

The press too, of course, enjoys the widest freedom. (I shall be using the word press to include all media). But what sort of use does it make of this freedom?

... There is no moral responsibility for deformation or disproportion. What sort of responsibility does a journalist have to his readers, or to history? If they have misled public opinion or the government by inaccurate information or wrong conclusions, do we know of any cases of public recognition and rectification of such mistakes by the same journalist or the same newspaper? No, it does not happen, because it would damage sales. A nation may be the victim of such a mistake, but the journalist always gets away with it. ...

How many hasty, immature, superficial and misleading judgments are expressed every day, confusing readers, without any verification. The press can both simulate public opinion and miseducate it. Thus we may see terrorists heroized, or secret matters, pertaining to one's nation's defense, publicly revealed, ...

Hastiness and superficiality are the psychic disease of the 20th century and more than anywhere else this disease is reflected in the press. ...

Such as it is, however, the press has become the greatest power within the Western countries, more powerful than the legislature, the executive and the judiciary. One would then like to ask: by what law has it been elected and to whom is it responsible? In the communist East a journalist is frankly appointed as a state official. But who has granted Western journalists their power, for how long a time and with what prerogatives?

There is yet another surprise for someone coming from the East where the press is rigorously unified: one gradually discovers a common trend of preferences within the Western press as a whole. It is a fashion; there are generally accepted patterns of judgment and there may be common corporate interests, the sum effect being not competition but unification. Enormous freedom exists for the press, but not for the readership because newspapers mostly give enough stress and emphasis to those opinions which do not too openly contradict their own and the general trend.

He identifies political correctness long before it was named:

Without any censorship, in the West fashionable trends of thought and ideas are carefully separated from those which are not fashionable; nothing is forbidden, but what is not fashionable will hardly ever find its way into periodicals or books or be heard in colleges. Legally your researchers are free, but they are conditioned by the fashion of the day. ... This gives birth to strong mass prejudices, blindness, which is most dangerous in our dynamic era. There is, for instance, a self-deluding interpretation of the contemporary world situation. It works as a sort of petrified armor around people's minds. ... It will only be broken by the pitiless crowbar of events.

Read the whole thing.

via Instapundit

Saddam's Yellowcake

2008-07-07T08:44:00.003-05:00

How about that? Saddam had 550 metric tons of yellowcake uranium after all.

Wikipedia's On Climate Change

2008-04-17T11:12:00.005-05:00

Lawrence Solomon of the Financial Post:

If you have read a climate change article on Wikipedia -- or on any controversial subject that may have its own [zealous partisan Wikipedia editor] -- beware. Wikipedia is in the hands of the zealots.

Wikipedia's great for non-controversial issues, but for controversial ones you get this.

via IP

McCain, Clinton, Obama

2008-03-13T07:19:00.002-05:00

I've been meaning to comment on the Presidential race. I suppose I should.

The truth is, I haven't been following it very closely, especially early on. (Really, it's true!)

Not crazy about McCain. He has plenty of hyperbole on the record. McCain-Feingold does seem like it's against free speech. But he's the most experienced. (I was much less crazy about Huckabee. To the tiny extent I followed it, I liked Fred Thompson best, but he didn't stand a chance.)

I'm glad Clinton isn't inevitable. The corruption factor is pretty horrific: Bill Clinton breaking new ethical ground peddling access to the Whitehouse? Very, very bad.

I think Obama is the mirror of desire. It's a Harry Potter reference: each sees in him what (s)he most wants to see. Yes, he's a very well-spoken guy. I don't care what his middle name is. I do care about his voting record: most predictable liberal vote in the Senate." (And the corruption factor's right there, too.) He could potentially grow up in office, avoiding stupid decisions that would lead to an Iraqi genocide.

Whoever wins--McCain, Clinton or Obama: the Republic will survive. I feel compelled to say that in light of all the unhinged rhetoric over the last several years.

Of course, the Republic survived some very sad chapters in the past: John Kerry's friends in Congress, for instance, deliberately allowing the Cambodian genocide. Let's not repeat that.

We'll see.

Humanity v. Environment

2008-02-09T21:21:00.000-06:00

Hats off again to the NY Times John Tierney for this. Global warming discussions usually ignore the human suffering they might cause, or presume the alternative must be even worse. Here's a report, however:

Dr. Goklany accepts the Stern Review’s grim numbers and looks at the I.P.C.C.’s various scenarios, which project different levels of warming and sea-level rise depending on the the rate of economic growth, energy use and other factors.

“The surprising conclusion using the Stern Review’s own [harshly criticized] estimates,” Dr. Goklany writes, “is that future generations will be better off in the richest but warmest” of the I.P.C.C.’s scenarios. He concludes that cutting emissions will do much less good than encouraging sustainable development in poor countries and policies of “focused adaptation” to deal with disease and environmental problems like coastal flooding.

via Instapundit

Don't believe in Winston?

2008-02-05T08:57:00.000-06:00

This can't be good for civilization, if it's true:

Britons are losing their grip on reality, according to a poll out Monday which showed that nearly a quarter think Winston Churchill was a myth while the majority reckon Sherlock Holmes was real.

"Losing their grip on reality" about says it. Almost unbelievable, but I've seen people latch onto so many crazy things here, too.

Like superstition, false beliefs harm civilization.

The Race Card

2008-01-14T23:52:00.000-06:00

This sounds very interesting:

What do Katrina victims waiting for federal disaster relief, millionaire rappers buying vintage champagne, Ivy League professors waiting for taxis, and ghetto hustlers trying to find steady work have in common? All have claimed to be victims of racism. These days almost no one openly expresses racist beliefs or defends bigoted motives. So lots of people are victims of bigotry, but no one’s a bigot? What gives? Either a lot of people are lying about their true beliefs and motivations, or a lot of people are jumping to unwarranted conclusions—or just playing the race card.

As the label of “prejudice” is applied to more and more situations, it loses a clear and agreed-upon meaning. This makes it easy for self-serving individuals and political hacks to use accusations of racism, sexism, homophobia, and other types of “bias” to advance their own ends. Richard Thompson Ford, a Stanford Law School professor, brings sophisticated legal analysis, lively and eye-popping anecdotes, and plain old common sense to this heated topic. He offers ways to separate valid claims from bellyaching. Daring, entertaining, and incisive, The Race Card is a call for us to treat racism as a social problem that must be objectively understood and honestly evaluated.

It describes the book The Race Card: How Bluffing About Bias Makes Race Relations Worse, by Richard Thompson Ford.

HT: Instapundit

Lancing the Lancet's Iraqi Casualty Study

2008-01-05T07:15:00.000-06:00

National Journal takes a close look at the Lancet's Iraqi casualty study. The study asserts that from the start of the 2003 war to its conclusion in mid-2006, an estimated 654,965 Iraqis were killed. The study's results met little skepticism in the media and were embraced by folks like Ted Kennedy and Islamist groups.

The closer they look, the fishier it gets. Not only is its methodology flawed (following "a model that ensured that even minor components of the data, when extrapolated over the whole population, would yield huge differences in the death toll"), but the data itself is likely bogus, and the authors won't release it. Not to mention it was financed by the political left.

The Lancet, founded in 1823, is one of the world's most-cited medical journals, ... In recent years, however, the journal's reputation has suffered from charges of politicization and a few prominent instances of scientific fraud.

It's a long article, but worth the read if you're interested.

Via Instapundit

More, 1/12: Soros funded nearly half the study.

Availability Entrepreneurs

2008-01-01T12:20:00.000-06:00

Hats off to the NYT's John Tierney, for pointing out the selective reporting by the "availability entrepreneurs," and experts' reluctance to cross them: In 2008, a 100 Percent Chance of Alarm:

You’re in for very bad weather. In 2008, your television will bring you image after frightening image of natural havoc linked to global warming. You will be told that such bizarre weather must be a sign of dangerous climate change — and that these images are a mere preview of what’s in store unless we act quickly to cool the planet.

Unfortunately, I can’t be more specific. ...

But there’s bound to be some weird weather somewhere, and we will react like the sailors in the Book of Jonah. When a storm hit their ship, they didn’t ascribe it to a seasonal weather pattern. They quickly identified the cause (Jonah’s sinfulness) and agreed to an appropriate policy response (throw Jonah overboard).

Today’s interpreters of the weather are what social scientists call availability entrepreneurs: the activists, journalists and publicity-savvy scientists who selectively monitor the globe looking for newsworthy evidence of a new form of sinfulness, burning fossil fuels. ...

The availability cascade is a self-perpetuating process: the more attention a danger gets, the more worried people become, leading to more news coverage and more fear. ...

“Many people concerned about climate change,” Dr. Sunstein says, “want to create an availability cascade by fixing an incident in people’s minds. Hurricane Katrina is just an early example; there will be others. I don’t doubt that climate change is real and that it presents a serious threat, but there’s a danger that any ‘consensus’ on particular events or specific findings is, in part, a cascade.”

Once a cascade is under way, it becomes tough to sort out risks because experts become reluctant to dispute the popular wisdom, and are ignored if they do. Now that the melting Arctic has become the symbol of global warming, there’s not much interest in hearing other explanations of why the ice is melting — or why the globe’s other pole isn’t melting, too.

I'm skeptical of global warming because it seems mired in observer bias. In other areas of research, observer bias is presumed until disproven, as it should be. In climate science, models upon models obscure the fact that each model is another vehicle for more observer bias.

Via Instapundit

More, 1/12: Tierney, again (emphasis mine):

If scientists can’t even agree on what has happened in the past, imagine how much more difficult it is to figure out the future. I’m not suggesting that the global warming isn’t real, or that the uncertainties justify inaction — we take out insurance all the time against risks that are uncertain. I’d like to see a carbon tax. But I’d also like to see fewer dogmatists claiming that the scientific debate is over.

...

“Rather than select among predictions, why not verify them all? ... Once predictions are made, they should not be forgotten, but evaluated against experience. This is not skepticism at work, just the good old scientific method.”

Well put.

Tomorrow's Perspective Today

2007-11-21T15:54:00.000-06:00

James Taranto brings the perspective in "Science has Spoken, Now Shut Up".

"There was a tendency toward alarmism, and that fit perhaps a certain fundraising agenda..."

Around the Brunch Table

2007-11-16T10:40:00.000-06:00

Time with loved ones often turns into political debate. Really more like friction, generating more heat than light. With the written word you can take your time, think things through, develop your thoughts uninterrupted, state them clearly and concisely, and scrutinize things to your own satisfaction.

So let's replace heat with light over our brunch table discussion.

Waterboarding. It's very harsh treatment. I wouldn't want it done to me. (That's true of a lot of things.) I think it should be reserved for the toughest cases (and it seems to be). Torture or coercive interrogation? I say the latter. (For one thing, there seems to be no real risk of drowning.)

You seem to think it's obviously torture, but I didn't hear you articulate a definition. Give me one to scrutinize. Here's some of what I might ask:

Is incarceration torture?
What about yelling at someone? Doesn't that give the perception that you're about to do them harm?
What about subjecting someone, in egregious violation of their cherished beliefs, to be treated as a subordinate by an unveiled woman?

Real torture is illegal, and should be. We shouldn't do it for that reason alone.

I do have a lot of sympathy for people trying to stop terrorist attacks. Like police, there are limits to what they can do. But I think stopping terrorist attacks really is a valuable cause. Would you say you share that sympathy (even a little)?

Does it work? Here's ABC News' Brian Ross talking about coercive interrogation yielding valuable information. You seemed unaware of this. I need to see how you come to terms with this, as you seemed to dogmatically assert the opposite. (Of course we need to properly vet everything we receive.)

Will our enemies respect us? Will they treat our soldiers differently? Not a chance. Do you have evidence to the contrary? But that doesn't mean we torture.

How can Christians support it? The same way I support the concept of prison. I'm glad to expound, but maybe you should develop your question a bit more.

Organ failure. It took me a while to find the "organ failure" document. Here it is (PDF, 50 pages). You're right: page 1 does say, "Physical pain amounting to torture must be equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death."

It wasn't written by Gonzales, but to him by Jay S. Bybee (an Assistant Attorney General). So it's not the Whitehouse's assertion, but a response to the Whitehouse seeking legal opinion.

The authors are seeking interpretation for a phrase in the torture law, aka 18 USC 2340: "severe physical [] pain." We see at the top of page 6 that they're looking at other US law for that meaning, which seems reasonable. (Where else should they look?). That's where the offending phrase originates.

It's a very aggressive stance, but best I can tell (including waterboarding) they haven't gone that far. (And isn't liver failure painless?)

The end of the document (p 47ff) lists cases in which US courts have concluded torture occurred. Very interesting, as it brings some much-needed perspective.

To answer my own question, I think the existing torture law provides as good a definition as any, and any definition is subjective.

Cuba's health care. Fred Thompson talks about it here. More, with photos here. "Apartheid" is an apt description.

Know that I consider carefully everything you say. Let me know if I've skipped something you think is important.

CBS' "Curve Ball" Segment Smells Fishy

2007-11-04T01:01:00.000-05:00

CBS' 60 Minutes looks into the CIA's Curve Ball source.

In the process, they throw this astonishing falsehood into the mix (emphasis mine):

More than a hundred summaries of his debriefings were sent to the CIA, which then became a pillar - along with the now-disproved Iraqi quest for uranium for nuclear weapons - for the U.S. decision to bomb and then invade Iraq. The CIA-director George Tenet gave Alwan’s information to Secretary of State Colin Powell to use at the U.N. in his speech justifying military action against Iraq.

"Now-disproved?" Do they have a careful rebuttal of London's Financial Times report:

The Financial Times revealed last week that a key part of the UK's intelligence on the uranium came from a European intelligence service that undertook a three-year surveillance of an alleged clandestine uranium-smuggling operation of which Iraq was a part.

Or are they just pushing another meme?

Further, under the CBS news video link it reads:

See exclusive video of the Iraqi defector known as "Curve Ball," whose tall tale of mobile biological weapons drove the U.S. argument for invading Iraq.

But to this day, the CIA still claims that the mobile units they found were, in fact, biological weapons plants. Their analysis refutes suggestions that they were for other purposes. (See this.)

Does CBS news mention this part of the CIA's report (emphasis mine):

The majority of our information on Iraq's mobile program was obtained from a chemical engineer that managed one of the plants. Three other sources, however, corroborated information related to the mobile BW project.

* The second source was a civil engineer who reported on the existence of at least one truck-transportable facility in December 2000 at the Karbala ammunition depot.
* The third source reported in 2002 that Iraq had manufactured mobile systems for the production of single-cell protein on trailers and railcars but admitted that they could be used for BW agent production.
* The fourth source, a defector from the Iraq Intelligence Service, reported that Baghdad manufactured mobile facilities that we assess could be used for the research of BW agents, vice production.

Hat-tip: The Sundries Shack

P.S.: FWIW, the two sources named in the CBS segment, Tyler Drumheller and Margaret Henoch, seem to have donated money only to Democrats. [OpenSecrets.org links broken, but you can reproduce the search yourself.]

Jena 6 Media Myths

2007-10-26T08:02:00.000-05:00

With Hurricane Katrina, one might concede that the chaos played a role in all the astonishingly false reporting that went on.

But now, sans natural disaster, we have the Jena 6. Like Katrina, events that occurred on U.S. soil, recently, reported by people we're expected to trust. And the press generally got it disgracefully wrong.

Craig Franklin: Media Myths About the Jena 6

The media got most of the basics wrong. In fact, I have never before witnessed such a disgrace in professional journalism. Myths replaced facts, and journalists abdicated their solemn duty to investigate every claim because they were seduced by a powerfully appealing but false narrative of racial injustice. ...

The reason the Jena cases have been propelled into the world spotlight is two-fold: First, because local officials did not speak publicly early on about the true events of the past year, the media simply formed their stories based on one-side's statements – the Jena 6. Second, the media were downright lazy in their efforts to find the truth. Often, they simply reported what they'd read on blogs, which expressed only one side of the issue.

The real story of Jena and the Jena 6 is quite different from what the national media presented. It's time to set the record straight.

Via Instapundit

Hats Off to Bill Cosby

2007-10-24T00:32:00.000-05:00

Hats off to Bill Cosby, Dr. Alvin Poussaint, and the New York Times' Bob Herbert for giving voice to some "brutal truths:"

Mr. Cosby ... has spent the last few years hammering home some brutal truths about self-destructive behavior within the African-American community. ...

For three years, Mr. Cosby and Dr. Poussaint have been traveling the country, meeting with as many people as possible to explore the problems facing the black community.

There is a sense of deep sadness and loss — grief — evident in both men over the tragedy that has befallen so many blacks in America. ...

Speaking about the epidemic of fatherlessness in black families, Mr. Cosby imagined a young fatherless child thinking: “Somewhere in my life a person called my father has not shown up, and I feel very sad about this because I don’t know if I’m ugly — I don’t know what the reason is.”

Dr. Poussaint, referring to boys who get into trouble, added: “I think a lot of these males kind of have a father hunger and actually grieve that they don’t have a father. And I think later a lot of that turns into anger. ‘Why aren’t you with me? Why don’t you care about me?’ ”

The absence of fathers, and the resultant feelings of abandonment felt by boys and girls, inevitably affect the children’s sense of self-worth, he said.

Sounds like one of my favorite bloggers.

Their book is here.

Hat-tip: K

Who's in the bubble?

2007-10-09T22:44:00.000-05:00

Doonesbury, 8/19/2007:

"Still, if military folks are starting to think [the war is lost] ... and so does the public and congress and the media ... Well, who's left? Only the fanatical or delusional!"

Or both. [Pan to the Whitehouse in a bubble.]

Daily Telegraph's Damien McElroy's on-the-ground reports (via Powerline):

The popular uprising against al-Qa'eda by residents of Anbar Province turned former enemies into American allies earlier this year. The result was a dramatic restoration of stability across Iraq's Sunni heartland.
...
In the advanced field combat hospitals run by the Navy in Anbar province, there is suddenly nothing to do. Equipped to handle sudden rushes of dozens of gravely injured troops, the hospitals are empty.

Who's in the bubble?

10/14: Said another way, Who's the fanatical or delusional?

Chicago Sight: God Bless America

2007-10-09T22:17:00.001-05:00

"God Bless America," in neon, on the side of a 50's-style apartment building.

Dissent as Patriotism

2007-10-06T23:05:00.000-05:00

From the Corner:

[H]ere's the problem I have all too often with the "dissent is the highest form of patriotism" line.
...
[I]t's a very subjective standard. You're dissenting on whatever the h*** problem is your own hobby horse. Feminist A is upset about the state of women and is patriotically "dissenting"; Klansman B is upset about the state of white folk, and in his mind, he's equally patriotic in his "dissent." There isn't a h*** of a lot in the "dissent" principle that can distinguish the two. ... The former may be offering a constructive criticism, the other clearly is proposing a destructive one, but both are equally ideological and neither is expressing a love of America qua America, but rather a love of what they think America should be.

Well put.

The El País Bush-Aznar Memo

2007-09-30T23:46:00.000-05:00

I pondered spending time on Colin McMahon's skewed perspective.

But here's a much better analysis of the original memo, with the full translation.

Chicago Sight: Building High

2007-09-25T13:09:00.000-05:00

A crane punctures the sky in downtown Chicago.

419 Scam

2007-09-18T21:45:00.001-05:00

This 419 scam made it through my junk-mail filters. It has a couple unique features: an Iraqi general, and a bank in Hong Kong. I'd mess with them, but who has the time? So instead I'll just post it here--of course, "endeavor[ing] to observe atmost discretion in all matters concerning this issue."

Read about 149 scams, otherwise known as "Advance Fee Frauds," here.

Subject: Compliments of the Day

I am Mr. Ming Yang director of operations of the Hang Seng Bank Ltd.
I have an obscured business suggestion for you.Before the U.S and Iraqi war our client Gen. Aadel Akgaal Bastaan who was with the Iraqi forces and also businessman made a numbered fixed deposit for 18 calendar months, with a value of Twenty Four million Five Hundred Thousand United State Dollars only in my branch.Upon maturity several notices was sent to him, even during the war which began in 2003.Again after the war another notification was sent and still no response came from him. We later find out that the General along with his wife and only daughter had been killed during the war in a bomb blast that hit their home.

After further investigation it was also discovered that Gen. Aadel Akgaal Bastaan did not declare any next of kin in his official papers including the paper work of his bank deposit.
And he also confided in me the last time he was at my office that no one except me knew of his deposit in my bank So, Twenty Four million Five Hundred Thousand United State Dollars is still lying in my bank and no one will ever come forward to claim it.What bothers me most is that according to the laws of my country at the expiration 5 years the funds will revert to the ownership of the Hong Kong Government if nobody applies to claim the funds. Against this backdrop,my suggestion to you is that I will like you as a foreigner to stand as the next of kin to Gen. Aadel Akgaal Bastaan so that you will be able to receive his funds.
MODALITIES:
I want you to know that I have had everything planned out so that we shall come out successful. I have an attorney that will prepare the necessary document that will back you up as the next of kin to Gen.Aadel Akgaal Bastaan, all that is required from you at this stage is for you to provide me with your Full Names and Address so that the attorney can commence his job. After you have been made the next of kin, the attorney will also fill in for claims on your behalf and secure the necessary approval and of probate in your favour for the move of the funds to an account that will be provided by you.There is no risk involved at all in this matter,as we are going to adopt a legalized method and the attorney will prepare all the necessary documents.
Please endeavor to observe atmost discretion in all matters concerning this issue. Once the funds have been transferred to your nominated bank account we shall then share in the ratio of 70% for me, 25% for you. Should you be interested please reply to me urgently via this email address:redacted@yahoo.com.hk so that i can forward more details to you.

Your earliest response to this letter will be appreciated.
Kind Regards,
Mr. Ming Yang
(Director of Operations HSB Hong Kong)

Joliet Sight: Blues Brothers really get around

2007-09-17T22:47:00.000-05:00

Came across another set of Blues Brothers, and had to add it to my growing collection.

I was in Joliet (a bit south of Chicago) and found them on an ice cream place's roof.

I think the Blues Brothers movie was about them making their way from Joliet to Chicago. (A much less eventful drive for me.)

Islamic Slave Trade

2007-09-10T21:59:00.000-05:00

It's rare that a Today Show piece catches my eye. This one did: Alek Wek, a British super-model, is from southern Sudan.

She talks about the Muslim slave trade--a topic that hasn't gotten nearly the attention it deserves.

In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, slave traders came through this territory, capturing Dinkas and others and taking them north to be sold in the Arab countries. It is said that even in the twenty-first century, children from the south have been enslaved and sold.

The Muslim slave trade redefined brutality. Captured slaves were marched across the desert. Most died in transit. According to African Echo:

While the mortality rate for slaves being transported across the Atlantic was as high as 10%, the percentage of slaves dying in transit in the Transsahara and East African slave trade was between 80 and 90%! ...

While most slaves who went to the Americas could marry and have families, most of the male slaves destined for the Middle East were castrated, and most of the children born to the women were killed at birth. ...

While Christian Reformers spearheaded the antislavery abolitionist movements in Europe and North America, and Great Britain mobilized her Navy, throughout most of the 19th Century, to intercept slave ships and set the captives free, there was no comparable opposition to slavery within the Muslim world.

Alek Wek's story brings to light a point I didn't know: the north and south parts of Sudan were united due to pressure from the Islamic north. It was their plan to brutalize south Sudan right from the beginning. Emphasis mine:

The main thing to understand about my country is that it has always been split between the Islamic Arab north and the animist and Christian south. They don't ever seem to mix that well and the north has always tried to dominate the south. The British, who ruled Sudan from the late nineteenth century until the 1950s, governed the north and south separately, but in the 1940s, just before independence, the British gave in to pressure from the Islamic leaders in the north to unite the country. The northern government then proceeded to impose Islamic culture on the southern people, most of whom weren't Muslim or Arab.

Those who portray this as a consequence of British imperialism are just wrong. Truth is, British colonialism/imperialism helped southern Sudan as long as it lasted.

Who said it?

2007-09-08T00:16:00.000-05:00

Rep. Lynn Woolsey, California Democrat and co-founder of the antiwar Out of Iraq Caucus:

We need bolder steps from the Democrats[.] The people of this country are waiting for some leadership — some bold leadership — from the people that they elected to be the majority of the House and the Senate.

Osama bin Laden:

Thus, you elected the Democratic Party for this purpose, but the Democrats haven't made a move worth mentioning. On the contrary, ...

Hmmmm...

Movies dumbing down (but not just science)

2007-08-19T18:58:00.000-05:00

From Ars Technica:

[Though] the US educational system does not do a good job of producing scientifically-literate adults, ... the media isn't a force for clarity in the sciences either. Two physicists from the University of Central Florida are now saying the combination of the two makes everything that much worse. They claim that as Hollywood mixes realistic special effects with the physically absurd, they're leaving a scientifically-illiterate public completely bewildered about what's actually possible here in the real world.

I agree, though movies' stretches of physics bother me least. As the author mentions:

Let's face it: most movies require a certain suspension of disbelief. But we're constantly bombarded by discussions of movie plotlines stretching that ability past its breaking point. I can't say I've ever seen an equivalent discussion of how ignoring the basic properties of reality can do the same.

Pointing out how something in a movie could never happen in real life is an awkward thing. It makes one come across a little, um, what? Geeky? Maybe. Of course we're suspending disbelief. It's just fiction, after all.

But I think the authors are onto something, too. I think lots of people uncritically internalize too much of what they see in movies--every kind of fiction--to their own detriment.

Happy 7/7/7!

2007-07-07T10:52:00.000-05:00

Today is July 7th, 2007: 7/7/7.

Chicago Sights: Interactive Skyline Tour

2007-07-05T11:05:00.000-05:00

For those interested in Chicago's downtown, there's a pretty cool interactive skyline tour at Crain's magazine. Click on "Interactive skyline tour."

Speech Suppression

2007-06-25T11:50:00.000-05:00

I was on campus at Depaul the other day, and saw posters proclaiming very noble campus ideals. The first said hate-speech has no place there. The second said they embraced diversity.

Wonderful. Except that those in charge can dispose of anything they really disagree with by casting it as hate speech.

George Will says it better than I could:

And it was predictable that speech suppression would become an instrument of cultural combat, used to settle ideological scores and advance political agendas by silencing adversaries.

Here's the "hate speech" he cites:

Marriage is the foundation of the natural family and sustains family values.

With every bit of authority comes the ability--and willingness--to abuse it. Speech codes included.

Via Instapundit

Todd Agnew's My Jesus

2007-06-23T23:55:00.000-05:00

I love Todd Agnew's music. I love his voice.

I love his lyrics...mostly.

In his song, My Jesus, I appreciate his challenging my image of Jesus.

But I kind of have a problem with this:

Cause my Jesus would never be accepted in my church
The blood and dirt on His feet might stain the carpet

I'd like to ask his church's leaders if they'd agree with that.

Or maybe he's talking about "my church" as in, you know, my church, not his church. But that means he's asserting things about a church he doesn't know. Seems pretty unfair.

A lot of churches need reproof for a lot of things, mine included. But reproof is specific and constructive, not assertions like this. This seems more like a cheap-shot than a reproof.

I want--need--to have my conscience pricked. But I don't think church-bashing is the way to do it.

Hopefully, everybody but me just goes away thinking, "Jesus matters more than my church's (or my) carpet." (He does matter more.)

Chicago Sight: Marina City

2007-06-22T18:27:00.000-05:00

The distinctive round towers of the Marina City Parking Garage.

The first dozen or so levels are parking, with (I think) condos above.

They were just featured in some TV ad. A car races through one then crashes out and falls into the river.

Ephesians 4:14-15

2007-06-14T21:26:00.000-05:00

Ephesians 4:14-15:

Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ.

These verses imply:

"Waves" and "winds" of false teaching, and "deceitful scheming" exist.
We should expect to encounter them.
We should expect to see others "tossed back and forth" by them.
An all-powerful God allows them.
God calls us to counter these things by "speaking the truth in love."

Trolling

2007-05-31T10:24:00.000-05:00

The author of drewspeak describes his days trolling USENET. Emphasis mine:

... the truth is, I was once an Internet troll, “back in the day” when I was an angry, atheist teenager on an AOL account. You know the type, I’m sure. Let me tell you: I trolled pretty hard. That’s all behind me, of course, and I don’t regret having outgrown the adrenaline rush of just rolling out and pissing off some Christian group, a WebTV board or a wrestling forum.

I appreciate the inside look. I commend him, too, for coming out of it.

I do not necessarily wish to excessively extol the virtues and powers of the Internet troll; these persons are typically not quite so epic as they are a nuisance. They are readily the bane of many close-knit Internet communities, descending like a swarm of ethereal locusts from cursed heaven - a fantasy plague of boors eradicating established social orders with malice and confusion.

"Malice and confusion" are a bit more than "a nuisance," in my humble opinion. And I think he agrees, as he looks at the vile trolling done to Kathy Sierra.

Horrifying, sociopath behavior like this constitutes one of the potentialities of the troll: the individual who is truly vicious, twisted, obsessed and angry, an ugly, anonymous, dark-minded person with a hellbound will to do you pain. I imagine this image might stir some atavistic archetype: is this not the type of creature nightmares are made of? This, certainly, should be seen as an aspect of the devil.

Interesting, coming from a (former?) atheist.

But I see trolling (as with much of human nature) as degrees of the same dysfunction. If "malice and confusion" are cool, why not maximum malice and confusion? (Putting it another way, if Ozzy was cool for biting heads off bats, isn't the next more gruesome act--Rob Zombie, Marilyn Manson--even cooler?)

Comment 7 after the post, apparently by the author, is also very interesting:

That wasn’t my only tactic; demolishing arguments and ideas I didn’t find to my preference my diluting debates with a veritable army of meatpuppets, sock-puppets and multiple identites was one way to go about things; another one of my trademark techniques was using a “false flag” and using it to devalue standpoints I disagreed with. For years, I had an “alternate persona” as a right-wing Christian that I trolled out to attack anime, video game, sci-fi fantasy, and political groups - this was enough to shift otherwise rational people into spewing their bile and vitriol against the Christian right, just as was intended.

I'd love to omnisciently go back and follow each reader, how he skewed their view of Christians (and everything), and how that deception propagated. And for that matter, what deception (perhaps from other trolls?) influenced his thinking?

The defenders of trolling make some revealing comments. Kyle says:

The “good” troll–let’s call him the “principled” troll–is really just seeking honesty.

The problem is, it's completely self-referential. Completely relative. The troll who harrasses Kathy Sierra considers himself the "good" troll, better than the wimpy half-trolls like Kyle who won't go all the way. And if he doubts it, he just has to ask himself.

See the problem?

Via BoingBoing

*******

Another thought: The trollers' motto: "I'm exactly as emotionally and psychologically healthy as I decide I am. My techniques (deception, confusion, malice) are exactly as appropriate as I decide they are."

Chicago Sight: Pet Blessing?

2007-05-24T18:12:00.000-05:00

I saw this at the entrance to Foster beach. I've never heard of a Pet Blessing ceremony.

I didn't make it to the event.

Atonement is the Church of the Atonement at that address. And, apparently, the pet blessing service was a hit (photos here).

I want to be open-minded, but I think they're straying a bit from the Scripture.

Stop Snitching, Keep Self-Destructing

2007-05-16T21:57:00.000-05:00

The Daily Show makes light of it, but it's an incredibly vile trend. The latest rage in messed up urban culture. "Stop snitching." Stay quiet about the crimes you see, even those perpetrated on you.

America's Most Wanted calls it "Perpetuating A Culture Of Violence:"

From Louisville to Boston, there is a culture of intimidation and fear pervading crime-infested inner cities, and it's being perpetuated through an unlikely source: fashion. An increasingly popular slogan --"Stop Snitching"-- is being slapped across T-shirts everywhere, encouraging silence and reinforcing a cycle of violence.

Here's CNN's excellent report in two parts:

It's amazingly self-destructive. And I guess self-destructive behavior has been cool and rebellious for a long time.

It's the next step in losing perspective: trust the perpetrators, distrust the police. Harm yourself to stick it to the Man.

It's hip-hop poisoning its own fans for a buck.

What's the reward? To be cool? Talk about a slave to fashion. (Of course, more crime is the real reward.)

Hat-tip: Jon Stewart

Qassam Rockets' Intentions

2007-05-15T17:56:00.000-05:00

1,914 attempts at indiscriminate civilian mass murder as of the end of 2006. Palestinian militants attempting to mass-murder Israelis.

The visual: this video shows rockets by the pile.

Barbarity.

Hat tip: LGF

Chicago Sight: Smurfit-Stone Building

2007-05-08T22:53:00.000-05:00

Two views of the Smurfit-Stone Building, one of the most distinctive features of Chicago's skyline.

This is the view from Millenium Park (Randolph and Michigan).

The first was taken this week. The second last fall. I love the bold blue sky in each.

Cede to al Qaeda butchers?

2007-05-07T21:48:00.000-05:00

Look evil in the face once again. Al Qaeda planned to butcher school girls:

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- American soldiers discovered a girls school being built north of Baghdad had become an explosives-rigged "death trap," the U.S. military said Thursday.

The plot at the Huda Girls' school in Tarmiya was a "sophisticated and premeditated attempt to inflict massive casualties on our most innocent victims," military spokesman Maj. Gen. William Caldwell said.

The military suspects the plot was the work of al Qaeda, because of its nature and sophistication ...

"It was truly just an incredibly ugly, dirty kind of vicious killing that would have gone on here," Caldwell said.

Sickening evil. Maybe, instead of turning Iraq over to this evil, we should destroy it every chance we get.

via OpinionJournal

Speak the name al Qaeda

2007-04-29T18:03:00.000-05:00

An excellent analysis:

Perhaps Americans will slowly wake up to the fact that the sectarian violence they lament was not a spontaneous result of the removal of Saddam Hussein. Instead, it was deliberately engineered by the very terrorist organization that attacked us on 9/11.You can pretend that it is a different al Qaeda if it makes you feel better (many will do that as they awaken to what is going on), but I'm not sure why you would. Denial is irrational, even if it is understandable.

Awareness of al Qaeda is slowly growing in the minds of mainstream media reporters who have been hamstrung by the civil war schema that they simply cannot get out of their heads. Even so, there is not the slightest mention of the fact that al Qaeda was probably behind yesterday's bombing. Millions upon millions of readers of countless stories like this all over the world will read about that bombing and then shake their heads at the escalating "civil war" in Iraq.

HT: Instapundit

Chicago Sight: Blues Brothers get around

2007-04-24T10:17:00.000-05:00

Another sighting of the Blues Brothers, this time at the Celebrity Salon in Evanston. These same, um, statues are at Midway Airport.

Diplomacy or Failure?

2007-04-12T11:36:00.000-05:00

The NY Times' Michael R. Gordon and Mark Mazzetti on Sunday:

Three months after the United States successfully pressed the United Nations to impose strict sanctions on North Korea because of the country’s nuclear test, Bush administration officials allowed Ethiopia to complete a secret arms purchase from the North, in what appears to be a violation of the restrictions, according to senior American officials.

Not good. But let's look closer.

Between the lines. We see that the U.N. is unable to "impose" anything. Like, for instance, blocking this shipment. It's up to the member states, the coalition of the willing.

The situation. Ethiopia asked that this shipment be grandfathered. We're pressuring them to quit buying from North Korea, and they seem responsive. One American official, apparently in the know, is confident that "the issue had been handled properly."

Ethiopia approached us, not trying to hide it. Buying stuff at super-low margin puts less money in Kim Jong Il's pocket than just giving him cash.

In paragraph 1 we learn that it "appears to be a violation of the restrictions" because (from paragraph 9) it "was probably carrying tank parts and other military equipment." But in paragraph 18 we learn that China and Russia blocked the U.N. resolution from requiring inspections of ships leaving North Korea. Thanks to Russia and China, perhaps we'll never know.

Gordon and Mazzetti patiently instruct us how to interpret this:

But the arms deal is an example of the compromises that result from the clash of two foreign policy absolutes: the Bush administration’s commitment to fighting Islamic radicalism and its effort to starve the North Korean government of money it could use to build up its nuclear weapons program.

So we're told that the the Bush administration is absolutist while showing us evidence to the contrary.

Idle speculation. Under a Kerry Presidency, wouldn't this be called nuance? A difficult trade-off? Being patient vs. demanding with an ally? But under a Kerry presidency, the sanctions probably wouldn't be there to begin with: that would make the world a better place.

It recalls the agonizing trade-offs we made during the cold war, making friends with unsavory characters to keep monsters like Stalin and Mao at bay. And like the left in the cold war, we see Stalinist North Korea mentioned only in passing.

Looks like it was the State Department advising the Bush Administration to allow it:

“Never underestimate the strength of ‘clientitis’ at the State Department,” said Mr. Bolton, using Washington jargon for a situation in which State Department officials are deemed to be overly sympathetic to the countries they conduct diplomacy with.

So (it seems) the Bush administration took the State Department's advice. I thought they didn't listen to anyone?

The U.N. security council resolution is S/RES/1718 (2006) (found here). Section 8.a.i describes what's banned.

Any battle tanks, armoured combat vehicles, large calibre artillery systems, combat aircraft, attack helicopters, warships, missiles or missile systems as defined for the purpose of the United Nations Register on Conventional Arms, or related materiel including spare parts, or items as determined by the Security Council or the Committee established by paragraph 12 below (the Committee);

Small arms and ammunition aren't on this list (oddly), so the shipment might not have violated it.

via Chicago Tribune

Another blatant, not-so-secret violation: apparently today we just unfroze some of North Korea's funds. That's a clear violation of 1718's section 8.(d), by the way (and a huge disappointment to me). But will the Times report it that way?

Update, 4/14: The more I think and read, the more I put our lax treatment of North Korea sqarely in the "Failure" category, but I stand by my original comments.

Proxy War Update

2007-04-11T11:19:00.000-05:00

From the AP:

Iranian intelligence operatives have been training Iraqi fighters inside Iran on how to use and assemble deadly roadside bombs known as EFPs, the U.S. military spokesman said Wednesday.

Commanders of a splinter group inside the Shiite Mahdi Army militia have told The Associated Press that there are as many as 4,000 members of their organization that were trained in Iran and that they have stockpiles of EFPs, a weapon that causes great uneasiness among U.S. forces here because they penetrate heavily armored vehicles.

Note that the headline is still tentative: "Iran May Be Helping Iraqis Build Bombs" (emphasis mine)

Old news in the blogosphere, but good that it's getting more exposure.

Relevant Books

2007-04-10T23:12:00.000-05:00

These books seem relevant to current discussions about blogger harassment and civility.

"How to Behave and Why"
"How to Speak Politely and Why"
"Manners Can Be Fun"

They're from Chicago's Sweden Shop on Foster Avenue (their picture caught these same books). See reviews here and here.

Failing the Nazi Test

2007-04-10T16:54:00.000-05:00

Ryan Singel responds to law professor Walter F. Murphy's claim:

Woe be it for this blog to defend the country's foolish watchlist system, but after having spent more than four years reporting on watchlists, filing Freedom of Information Act requests, and talking with persons flagged by the lists, I have never seen a single case of a person being put on the list for activities protected by the First Amendment. Feel free to drop any proof you might have via email or in the comments.
[...]
I'm open to any evidence that the government has watchlisted American citizens for exercising their Constitutional rights, but I've never seen it.

Not one? But what about the crushing jackboot of Bushitler's minions?

Hat-tip: Patterico

File Under "Taken in Vain"

2007-03-31T13:02:00.000-05:00

A stray moment finds me on YouTube. Across the top I see "Imitation of Christ Feature."

Wow! Cool! Thomas à Kempis classic work, eh?

Ah, no. A fashon show with goth models walking over bones ("road-kill looking") and texting on their phones. And crosses in the background.

Not to, um, stifle anyone's creativity, but "Distortion of Christ" is a little more appropriate.

The designer: "...might be the mood of what's happening in the world, what's happening politically ... and a little bit of hope."

In a free country, anyone can abuse Christ's name. Sad, but I won't riot or threaten anyone with death. (If we Christians are anything, it's predictable.)

Video here.

Amazing Grace (Movie)

2007-03-25T15:30:00.000-05:00

Watched the movie Amazing Grace last night.

Excellent in every respect. I recommend it very highly.

Different things stand out to different people. Here's what stood out to me.

William Wilberforce, early on, stands up in Britain's House of Commons and speaks. He knows he'll make everybody there furious with him. He knows they'll shout him down. And they do. I envy that courage.

Inside ANSWER's Defeatist Rally

2007-03-23T16:13:00.000-05:00

The Indepundit takes us inside last weekend's defeatist rally, infiltrating the ANSWER crowd. Caution: some strong language.

A fascinating up-close look at the far left. If all you read were the media reports, you owe it to yourself to read this.

As one person said, this sure isn't 1968. (Or maybe it's 1968, but under a bit more scrutiny.) He mentions SDS, which recalls 1968, but this time they're on the anarchist side.

If you have more time and interest than I do, check out parts one, two and three.

via Instapundit.

Pamela Hess

2007-03-20T22:56:00.000-05:00

United Press International Defense Correspondent Pamela Hess (no raving neo-con) describes what she saw in Iraq. Worth your time to watch, but beware: she describes some pretty horrific violence.

Some of what she says...

I found incredible idealism and incredible humanity over there...

I don't think Americans understand the incredible savagery and the violence that American military officers are seeing every day over there and ... I think that is really centrally the key to why they're so confident and so determined and so optimistic.

One officer, Captain Matt Tracey, ... said ... "Every morning I wake up and I feel like I'm pushing a little girl out of the way of a bus. And I pick her up and I bring her to the other side of the road, and I've saved that little girl." He said, "Every day I feel like that." And, in fact, that is what's happening there. ...

It's real evil, and that's a hard word I think for people here to hear, ... but I'm just not sure ... what other word there can be for people who are shooting kids in the face.

There were a whole class of people there who are professionally violent, who worked for Saddam Hussein. ...

She gets choked up and says, "this is very unprofessional..." No apology necessary. I'm glad she cares enough about civilization over barbarity.

Keep in mind that what she's describing is really Saddam's brand of Stalinism: systematic, brutal oppression. He perpetrated it for decades, with hundreds of thousands dying with no voice.

Hat-tip Hot Air.

Chicago Sight: Chase Bank Building

2007-03-19T10:05:00.000-05:00

The distinctive curves of Chicago's Chase Bank building.

Dihydrogen Monoxide

2007-03-16T22:58:00.000-05:00

Hats off to Penn and Teller for this excellent piece. They gather signatures to ban "dihydrogen monoxide." That is, water.

In their own words...

Is passion supposed to replace common sense? We understand the desire to join up and do something important ... but you gotta spend a couple minutes to find out if you're really saving the world and not just being herded around...

Man there were a lot of people who signed the petition. ... we're talking hundreds. Even the head organizer of this rally signed this petition eagerly.

We set these folks up. But it does show that maybe they're not so much environmentalists as they are joiners...of anything.

What a great lesson in looking closer and thinking harder.

This mindset is everywhere. By neglecting to look closer, to gain your own basic understanding, you begin to treat science like a religion (particularly your "sect"), and scientists like high priests.

I believe that the common person can and must understand his/her world, at least well enough to avoid being herded like cattle. You don't need a Ph.D., just an inquistive mind, a little healthy skepticism, and the guts to ask a few pointed questions to apparent experts.

Fortunately this time it's just a little humiliation.

Don't be paranoid. Do be wary. Expect misleading claims. Expect specious arguments. Presented confidently. Maybe every single day.

Hat-tip: PJM.

P.S.: Nothing against Ph.D.'s.

The "Political Profiling" Study

2007-03-15T22:26:00.000-05:00

This political profiling study was quoted by NYT's Paul Krugman:

Data* indicate that the offices of the U.S. Attorneys across the nation investigate seven (7) times as many Democratic officials as they investigate Republican officials, a number that exceeds even the racial profiling of African Americans in traffic stops. ...The current Bush Republican Administration appears to be the first to have engaged in political profiling.

To which Tom Maguire replies:

Well, if you don't even look at data from earlier Administrations you aren't likely to find anything, now are you?

Good point. The study's authors didn't study other administrations, yet claim "The current Bush Republican Administration appears to be the first to have engaged in political profiling."

Pat at Stubborn Facts calls it fatally flawed:

Just a few Google searches found several instances of Republican elected officials who were investigated by the Department of Justice but which were not included in the authors' data set. ...

These omissions are a result of one or more types of statistical bias. The theoretical biases were obvious simply from reading the paper. The concrete examples prove that the study is worthless. Just that quick sample increased the number of Republican officials and candidates investigated by the Bush Administration by about 10%. ...

When an hour of Google searching can increase a crucial data point in a 6-year-long study by 10%, the authors should be deeply embarrassed.

Ouch. Read the whole thing if you're interested.

There's an interesting comment or two, too:

[J]ust from a glance at their data and only their data, the "bias" they claim exists is simply not present in federal investigations of federal and state-wide elected officials, where the "count" is what you would expect from random selection by party numbers. So the "overweighting" of Dem officials "investigated" is limited ENTIRELY to the data on municipal/county officials. No such bias is shown in the federal/statewide data offered by the authors. NONE.

I'd also be interested to look closer at what kicks off an investigation.

Hat Tip: Maguire.

3/31: Still being used.

What They Said

2007-03-10T22:20:00.000-06:00

Don't let the memory hole swallow these...

Via Pat Dollard via Instapundit

Cheney v. Pelosi

2007-02-24T10:56:00.000-06:00

Cheney's clarity and backbone vs. Pelosi's feel-good rhetoric and dodging:

Vice President Dick Cheney refused Friday to take back his charge that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's opposition to President Bush's Iraq war buildup is playing into the hands of the al-Qaida terrorist network.

"If you're going to advocate a course of action that basically is withdrawal of our forces from Iraq, then you don't get to just do the fun part of that, that says, 'We'll, we're going to get out,' and appeal to your constituents on that basis," Cheney said.

Cheney (emphasis mine):

"She accused me of questioning her patriotism. I didn't question her patriotism. I questioned her judgment."

"You also have to be accountable for the results. What are the consequences of that? What happens if we withdraw from Iraq?," he said. "And the point I made and I'll make it again is that al-Qaida functions on the basis that they think they can break our will. That's their fundamental underlying strategy, that if they can kill enough Americans or cause enough havoc, create enough chaos in Iraq, then we'll quit and go home. And my statement was that if we adopt the Pelosi policy, that then we will validate the strategy of al-Qaida. I said it and I meant it."

Asked if he was willing to take back his criticism of Pelosi, Cheney replied, "I'm not backing down."

Well put.

Hat-tip: Powerline

Feith's "Inappropriate" Activities

2007-02-15T12:24:00.000-06:00

Douglas Feith, undersecretary of Defense, after 9/11 reanalyzed the raw intel regarding the relationship between Iraq and al Qaida. Recently, the DoD's Inspector General issued a report critical of Feith. Though not violating laws or policies, it considered his office's activities "inappropriate."

The Washington Post confused Democrat Carl Levin's quotes with the report itself and had to heavily correct it.

Best summary: "They Were For Dissent And Alternative Analysis Before They Were Against It."

Powerline:

So tomorrow, the Pentagon's own Inspector General will present a report to the Senate Armed Services Committee on whether--I'm not kidding--it was illegal for the Defense Department to independently analyze the data gathered by the intelligence agencies.

Now the report itself gets a rebuttal. Hugh Hewitt tracks it (caution: long). Via Powerline:

The Under Secretary notes:

It is puzzling...that the Draft Report fails to discuss some of the most authoritative articulations of the [intelligence community's] analysis on Iraq and al Qaeda--the vetted, coordinated correspondence and testimony by the [Director of Central Intelligence] himself to the Congress.

So the Under Secretary retrieves from the memory hole what the CIA said about contacts between Iraq and al Qaeda during 2002 and 2003. On October 7, 2002, the Director of Central Intelligence wrote to Congress:

*Our understanding of the relationship between Iraq and al Qaida is evolving and is based on sources of varying reliability. Some of the information we have received comes from detainees, including some of high rank.
*We have solid reporting of senior level contacts between Iraq and al Qaida going back a decade.

*Credible information indicates that Iraq and al Qaida have discussed safe haven and reciprocal non-aggression.

*Since Operation Enduring Freedom, we have solid evidence of the presence in Iraq of al Qaida members, including some that have been in Baghdad.

*We have credible reporting that al Qaida leaders sought contacts in Iraq who could help them acquire WMD capabilities. The reporting also stated that Iraq has provided training to al Qaida members in the areas of poisons and gases and making conventional bombs.

*Iraq's increasing support to extremist Palestinians, coupled with growing indications of a relationship with al Qaida, suggest that Baghdad's links to terrorists will increase, even absent military action.

In a statement to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on February 11, 2003, the Director of Central Intelligence stated:

Iraq has in the past provided training in document forgery and bomb-making to al Qaida. It also provided training in poisons and gases to two al Qaida associates; one of these associates characterized the relationship he forged with Iraqi officials as successful. Mr. Chairman, this information is based on a sold foundation of intelligence. It comes to us from credible and reliable sources.

At a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on February 12, 2003, the DCI stated:

[W]e also know from very reliable information that there's been some transfer of training in chemical and biologicals [sic] from the Iraqis to al Qaeda.

Happy Valentines

2007-02-14T07:38:00.000-06:00

...and a Chicago sight, um, sort of.

I saw these and had to laugh. Finally they're marketing Valentines Day to guys!

Yes, those are heart-shaped pizzas!

GiveABetterWay.org

2007-02-08T10:30:00.000-06:00

I saw this on a bus-stop brochure in Denver. It got my attention. Their web-site is GiveABetterWay.org.

Hats off to these folks, trying to make a real difference.

When I first came to Chicago, I was out and about more often, and approached by panhandlers. I had a little time on my hands, so I tried to verify the stories I was told.

"My car broke down a couple blocks over: could I get a couple bucks for gas?"

"Ok! Let's go get some gas and put it in. Where is it?"

"Well, it's, um, COME ON, MAN! Just a couple bucks!"

Every single one lied to me. Maybe a dozen or so of these situations aren't statistically significant. But organizations like this (and Evanston's) show the same trend.

I'm convinced that knowledge is power. One corollary: informed compassion is more effective than uninformed compassion, and therefore more compassionate.

Chicago Sight: St. Peter's in the Loop

2007-01-16T08:50:00.000-06:00

Dwarfed by skyscrapers, St. Peter's in the Loop stands in marked contrast to its surroundings.

They're targeting you

2007-01-12T11:53:00.000-06:00

Amir Taheri in the London Times (via Austin Bay):

Those familiar with Iraq know that the real war for its future is waged in the United States and, to a lesser extent, Britain. The terrorists have no hope of riding in triumph into Baghdad, but they continue to fight to persuade US and British opinion that the war is lost and that new Iraq does not deserve further support.

In other words, when terrorists murder a group of civilians, they're really targeting you.

I'd be surprised if they didn't study U.S. opinion polls like generals study enemy troop movements, and measure the effect of everything they do against them.

As one person put it, "terrorism is an information war disguised as a military conflict."

Another sad observation:

Too many Democrats have invested too much in the hope that Iraq fails for them to agree to help Mr Bush to ensure success.

The whole thing is worth a read.

Betraying Our Allies, Phase 1

2007-01-06T13:46:00.000-06:00

Thanks for risking your lives to try for a representative government. Bye!

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif. and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., shot down the suggestion of more troops within a day of gaining control of Congress.

But they're consulting military experts!

"Based on the advice of current and former military leaders, we believe this tactic would be a serious mistake," Reid said in the Democratic radio address Saturday.

What are their experts' strategy?

Instead, Reid and Pelosi want Bush to begin pulling troops out in four to six months.

Also apparently missing from Reid and Pelosi's statements:

Their commitment to a representative government in Iraq.
Their opposition to (or even assessment of) Iran's subversion. Or Syria's.

Avoiding the Truth

2007-01-05T10:28:00.000-06:00

Arnold Kling writes:

I am going to suggest that democratic politics is a very poor information-processing mechanism. The great mass of people form their political beliefs with little regard for facts or logic. However, the elites also have a strategy for avoiding truth. Elites form their political beliefs dogmatically, using their cleverness to organize facts to fit preconceived prejudices. The masses' strategy for avoiding truth is to make a low investment in understanding; the elites' strategy is to make a large investment in selectively choosing which facts and arguments to emphasize or ignore.
...
Ignorance is Blissfully Cost-Effective

...there is no particular reason for citizens to make a large investment in learning facts or forming coherent beliefs about political issues. The low probability that your vote will make a difference makes for an adverse cost-benefit calculation from obtaining information.

He goes on to look at the idea that in spite of all this, there's the tendancy for crowds to have a collective wisdom. He doesn't reject that outright (that I can tell), but seems kind of down on the idea.

David Zucker on the Iraq Study Group

2006-12-21T09:35:00.000-06:00

Ouch!

Hat-tip: RCP