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Saturday, January 06, 2007
Editorializing Disguised As NewsFrom our old whipping boy, Greg Mitchell. As a critical turning point in America’s role in the nearly four-year-old Iraq war nears, the editorial pages of the largest U.S. newspapers have been surprisingly – even, appallingly – silent on President Bush’s likely decision to send thousands of more troops to the country.
It follows a long pattern, however, of the editorial pages strongly criticizing the conduct of the war without advocating a major change in direction. Now it comes at what appears to be a crucial point, with Democrats in Congress, overcoming their own timidity on the issue, finally emerging Friday with opposition to the buildup -- setting up a possible battle royal in the days ahead. Mitchell, of course, has been against the war for a very long time. He called for a pullout of the troops way back in May of 2004, and complained that no newspapers were editorializing for such a withdrawal. Now, of course, the old Irish saying is that when everybody says you're drunk, sit down, but Mitchell is still singing the same old tune, albeit with a few more people harmonizing with him. An E&P survey of major papers’ editorial pages this past week, however, finds that very few have said much of anything about the well-publicized “surge” idea, pro or con. They may finally declare themselves Sunday – much too late, given that the president seems to have made up his mind and just shook up his cast of commanders to assemble a more sympathetic crew.
The liberal editorial page of The New York Times has said nothing this week, beyond noting the "bleak realities" in Iraq, even as its regular columnists Bob Herbert, Thomas Friedman, Maureen Dowd and (this Sunday) Frank Rich, across the page, are ripping the idea.When Bob Herbert, Slow-Mo and Frank Rich agree on something, you can pretty much take it to the bank that it's a terrible idea. And when Greg Mitchell agrees....
John Kerry Eating Alone Photo Turns Out Not to Show Snub By MilitaryYes, our soldiers are too classy to avoid sitting down with Le Fraude. It turns out that actually it was Kerry who didn't want to sit with the troops! Greg Sargent (who I pwned on the bogus Jack Abramoff story) has the details: Specifically, it turns out that Kerry was at that table to conduct an off-the-record breakfast discussion with two reporters, so there would have been no reason whatsover for troops to be sitting with them. In fact, Kerry and the reporters even sought out empty seats, I'm told.The funny thing is that Sargent thinks this makes Kerry look better!
Friday, January 05, 2007
Fearless NFL Predictions for Wild Card WeekendKansas City at Indianapolis. Indy should win this game, but given their struggles in the postseason the last few years, it would not shock me at all if the Chiefs pull off the upset. Certainly with Larry Johnson toting the rock, the Chiefs should be able to salt the game away if they can take the lead. Dallas at Seattle. Both teams staggered to the finish line. Both have proven coaches, but only Seattle has a proven QB in the playoffs. I'll pick Seattle. NY Jets at New England. Not too much doubt as to whom to pick in this game. Chad Pennington won the comeback player of the year award, but really it was the rest of the team. I like Pennington a lot, but not over Tom Brady in the postseason. NY Giants at Philadelphia. The Giants seemed to be headed to the Super Bowl early this season, but a 2-6 record in the second half has everybody doubting them. Jeff Garcia, after some initial struggles, guided the Eagles masterfully down the stretch, to the point where there might be a QB controversy in Philly next year. The Eagles should win this one handily.
Moonbat Hamsher CrowsOn the supposed surfacing of Jamil Hussein. But get this bit about conservative bloggers: They can't raise money. They can't organize. They can't even acknowledge that they've been beating a dead story into the ground because like their fearless leader, they equate admitting they are wrong with failure. Yet they are wrong, almost all the time and about almost everything. Gee, reading that, you'd think that the liberal blogs have had an unbroken string of success in the last several elections. Whom did you support that won in 2002, or 2004, Jane? Don't let this one successful election (in which, by the way, the main candidate you raised money for and organized for, Ned Lamont, got his butt whipped) go to your head. The Democrats won this time around, but it was despite the efforts of the liberal blogosphere, no mistake. And it's not like they don't know it; the Democratic leadership has steadfastly refused to take up the causes that many Lefty bloggers are pushing, like impeachment.
Thursday, January 04, 2007
John Feal, American HeroI'm blown away by this story: John Feal knows a lot about suffering. Permanently disabled during rescue efforts at the World Trade Center, he dedicated his life to helping others. Now he is giving even more than money or time - he is donating a precious kidney to a former Queens man he met over the Internet.
"He went to my Web site, fealgoodfoundation.com, and told me what good work I was doing," said Feal of Paul Grossfeld, a former Sunnyside resident who now lives in Marlboro, N.J. After Grossfeld told him he needed a kidney, Feal didn't think twice. "I told him, I'll do it. "
Down Goes Lampley's Girlfriend! Down Goes Lampley's Girlfriend!Our least-favorite boxing announcer tried a little sparring with his lover: Sports announcer Jim Lampley was arrested Wednesday for investigation of domestic violence.
Lampley, 57, also was booked for investigation of violating a restraining order and dissuading a witness, said Capt. Glenn Revell of the San Diego County Sheriff's Department. Lampley was released after posting $35,000 baiSome of you may remember Lampley's buffoonish attempts at being a liberal blogger over at the Huffpo. After getting schooled by Byron York and others ( including yours truly) on his claims that the 2004 election had been stolen (because exit polls are never wrong), he retreated to blogging about something he actually knows about, boxing. Here's a picture of Lampley, his former (?) wife, and Brad from the Bradblog, who describes Lampley as "a terrific hero". May want to revise that, Brad!  According to gossip maven TMZ, this incident does not appear to involve Bree Walker, the woman shown above, and Lampley's former spouse. Sources say that because of previous complaints, Lampley was arrested by an investigative team at his girlfriend's home in Encinitas, CA.
Lampley was once married to anchorwoman Bree Walker.
This Is Actually FunnyIn a nutbar revenge kind of way. The party Sen. Joe Lieberman created to mount his independent re-election campaign has been seized by one of his critics, and the secretary of state's office said Wednesday that it won't challenge the takeover.
After the senator's Nov. 7 victory under the Connecticut for Lieberman Party banner, John Orman switched his party affiliation from Democrat to Connecticut for Lieberman and voted himself chairman.As I commented last year, the liberal bloggers seemed more interested in defeating one Democrat than they were in defeating the Republicans. In an unfortunate twist, they succeeded in the latter and failed in the former. But I do gotta wonder about Orman's political savvy even though he's a poly sci professor: Orman said he hopes to keep the Connecticut for Lieberman party active and endorse a Senate candidate in 2010.Uh, you know that Lieberman won't be running for reelection in 2010, right? His next test before the voters is 2012 (assuming he doesn't mount another quixotic campaign for the presidency in 2008).
Wednesday, January 03, 2007
Duh ContenduhsRCP pointed the way this morning to a series of articles on the top contenders for the Democratic nomination for the presidency. Steve Kornacki says Hillary can win the nomination by doing what Gore did. Translation: Smack her opponents around. But the main explanation for Mr. Gore’s comeback is simply that he took the gloves off, dusting off his notorious attack-dog act and shamelessly slandering Mr. Bradley with conventional (and yet maddeningly effective) scare tactics, warning that his opponent’s programs would, essentially, kill old people. It helped, too, that Mr. Bradley showed all the eagerness to fight back of Michael Dukakis.I remain in the "They've gotta be kidding about Obama" camp, but Dick Morris appears to like his chances. So we wait for Barack Obama to define himself. If he runs to the left, he will be a worthy successor to Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. If he runs to the center, he might be a successor to Bill Clinton and George W. Bush. He might just make it to the White House.I don't see how he gets to the right of Hillary, which is surely where the center is. He still strikes me as the Mario Cuomo of his time; somebody who struck the right chords with the party's base in a keynote address, but who doesn't really have the staying power for a bare-knuckles brawl. Update: This article talks about Obama's use of drugs (as disclosed in an autobiography) while in high school and college and ponders whether he will be able to overcome it. Considering that the media made almost no mention of Kerry's use of pot, I doubt it will become a significant issue. If he were a Republican, though.... John Edwards is the candidate who seems to have the best chance of knocking off Hillary. He's got money, looks and an established base in the party (trial lawyers). He can argue that as a Southerner, he might pick up a few states in the old Confederacy, without which a Democrat victory looks increasingly improbable. Kathleen Parker wants us all to remember that his daddy was a millworker. No one, Republican or Democrat, has worked harder on his resume or more carefully calculated the timing of his announcement than Edwards, who, by the way, may be the son of a millworker. Could just be a rumor.
Nearly every time we've seen Edwards in the past year, he's been dripping with sweat from raising roof beams and digging out muck in New Orleans, where he and a corps of volunteer youths have been rebuilding the city that George Bush ignored.
Tuesday, January 02, 2007
Here's An Unfortunate HeadlineMcGreevey Portrait Hung at StatehouseAnd here's the portrait itself:  Note the wedding ring. Ironic, because as the article points out: He was joined for the unveiling by his male partner, his parents and Corzine. McGreevey is separated from his wife and lives with his partner.
Why the Defeatist Syndrome?The AP looks at the question in a surprisingly balanced essay. The country largely kept the faith during World War II, even as about 400,000 U.S. forces died - 20,000 just in the month long Battle of the Bulge. Before turning against the wars in Korea and Vietnam, Americans tolerated thousands more deaths than in Iraq.
Has something changed? Do Americans somehow place higher value on the lives of their soldiers now? Do they expect success at lower cost? Or do most simply dismiss this particular war as the wrong one - hard to understand and harder to win - and so not worth the losses? However, the number of deaths is the wrong focus. It's the time factor. The Iraq war started almost four years ago, and four years of war under a Republican president is all the American people, as prodded by the anti-Republican media, can handle. World War II was over in less time. Vietnam lasted longer, but was essentially over after four years of Republican control. Many of the people at the top of the media food chain were active in the antiwar movement during the 1960s--even some of today's conservatives. It took them awhile to bring the rest of the country around to their way of thinking, but while the wheels of the media grind slowly, they grind exceedingly fine. Indeed, this time around they almost toppled a war presidency during rosy economic times, something they were notably unable to do in 1972. Note the current media fascination with 3000 US soldiers killed in the war on terror. Supposedly this somehow balances the scales with the 3000 dead on 9-11. Of course, any sensible person would say that the 3000 soldiers who died should be added to the 9-11 toll, not subtracted from it. Of course the question raised in the title of the article, "Why So Many Upset by Iraq Death Toll?" is pretty easily answered. Because it's a convenient club.
Monday, January 01, 2007
Tears for SaddamThe New York Times continues its questioning of the execution of Saddam Hussein. Yesterday it was how pitiable Saddam was in his last days, today the argument is why the hurry? The American role extended beyond providing the helicopter that carried Mr. Hussein home. Iraqi and American officials who have discussed the intrigue and confusion that preceded the decision late on Friday to rush Mr. Hussein to the gallows have said that it was the Americans who questioned the political wisdom — and justice — of expediting the execution, in ways that required Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki to override constitutional and religious precepts that might have assured Mr. Hussein a more dignified passage to his end.Yes, the New York Times thinks the Iraqis should have given him a more dignified death. Never mind that Saddam himself seldom did the same for his own condemned. Elsewhere the Times says that Saddam's end was "degrading". “Yes, he was a dictator, but he was killed by a death squad,” said a Sunni Arab woman in western Baghdad who was too afraid to give her name. “What’s the difference between him and them?”
There was, of course, a difference. Mr. Hussein was a brutal dictator, while the Shiite organizers of the execution are members of the popularly elected Iraqi government that the United States helped put in place as an attempt to implant a democracy.Although the Times is obviously being a little facetious there, the difference is important. Saddam didn't follow any kind of due process; although the Maliki regime may have meted out rough justice, it was justice nonetheless.
Stonewalling At The TimesAs the old saying goes, choose your enemies carefully, because you will come to resemble them. The New York Times is in full Nixon cover-up mode on this story. Quick synopsis: The New York Times Magazine ran a cover story about a woman in El Salvador who had been sentenced to 30 years for having an abortion. The liberal media ate it up. One problem: the baby had actually been born, and was killed afterwards. But rather than admit it had screwed up, the NY Times is refusing to correct the story under the "fake but accurate" standard of Dan Ra ther.
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