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Thoughts from San Diego on Law, Politics, and Culture
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September 30, 2004
Psychopathic monsters By Tom Smith What kind of monsters blow children to pieces? These sick bastards have no claim to defend Iraq from anybody. Martians or the French have a better claim to govern Iraq than these psychopaths. This was no accident. The suicide bombers must have seen the kids, then decided to detonate their car bombs. And Zarqawi's Monotheism and Jihad took credit for the atrocity afterwards, calling their exploding terrorists "heros." There is no defense, no apology for the deliberate targeting of innocents. These monsters deserve no quarter, deserve no protection from the laws of war, and just need to be hunted down and killed for the rabid dogs they are. September 28, 2004
Inside blog humor By Tom Smith heh heh. Please note: the blog linked to above is frequently very funny. but also sometimes uses bad words and says mean things. VRWC update. Iranian nukes By Tom Smith Bush and friends had better stop the Iranians from getting nukes. Apparently the terrorist-supporting, nutcase mullahs are months away, by some estimates, anyway. Iran is a big supporter of Hamas; it displays nuclear capable missiles with "Jerusalem" painted on them. Swastikas would be more apt. Iran is the real deal. It is more important than Iraq, and more important than democracy in the Middle East. If it is now too late to stop Iran, then invading Iraq really was a mistake. Bush will have to act on this within a few months of being reelected. If Kerry is elected, then I think Iran will get its nukes, and Kerry will spend four years changing his mind about what to do. If Kerry gets elected, it's time to give some serious thought to things like go bags and MREs. You know what I'm talking about. And just to be fair, it won't just be Kerry's fault. It will be Bush's fault too for letting things get into such a state. People on the right should be honest enough to admit that it is a complete outrage that Bush and his team have allowed Iran to get as far along as they are. Kerry is hopeless, and no solution, but Bush will have a lot to answer for if Iran and Israel end up exchanging nuclear bombs because we were busy trying to bring democracy to Iraq. Jeff's War By Tom Smith Jeff McMahan, well-known philosopher, has written an essay about Iraq, that was sufficiently annoying that I went through the whole thing, injecting comments and asides intending to show that it was, at turns, silly, self-serving, false, and other bad things. I did this for twenty pages, and lost 90 minutes of my life, and I don't know why. Anyway, here it is, for my few, loyal fans out there. I now have to go to the grocery store and pick up various family supplies. Because Blogger is such a POS, you have to go to our backup Typepad site and download it. It's in WordPerfect, another bad decision on my part. Paul Campos on Iraq By Tom Smith Paul Campos has a point. He's a law professor at Colorado. I also heard a rumor he has taken up climbing 14'ers. September 26, 2004
This whole voter fraud thing is getting out of hand By Tom Smith We need some serious reform to put the fraudsters out of business. September 25, 2004
Debka reports assassination of top Al-Quaeda aid By Tom Smith Debka reports that US forces killed a top al-Quaeda aid in Baghdad in a missile attack. (Given that the mainstream US press both fabricates stories and ignores important news, it seems pedantic to point out that Debka's intelligence sources don't always prove out. At least they're trying to get the story, even if they sometimes tell all they know, and a little more.) A Jamul Moment By Tom Smith Yesterday, I stopped at the Mexican meat market to pick up some steaks. Great prices. I pointed to the ones that weren't brown. Also picked up a pint of the very hot "medium" salsa and chips. They may explain the failure of my recent Atkins attempt. Getting back onto the 94, I pause to let go by a large family unit. Mom is in her late 20's, but has a lot of miles on her. Deeply tanned, wearing clothes that could charitably be described as due for a wash, and/or the rag bin. She has on leash an enormous dog, maybe a Great Dane/English Mastiff cross or something. Huge. Behind her walk no fewer than six kids, varying in age from maybe 12 to 3. All attired in ragamuffin. A girl in the middle of the pack is crying her eyes out. Others look cheerful enough. Bringing up the rear is a small boy, maybe eight, who carries a gigantic snake. A python perhaps. They pass in front of my car. I infer they are heading toward the new vet's clinic on the corner. It sports a large banner: "We Have Rattlesnake Anti-Venom!" A half-mile from home I have to slow down to drive around the CHiPpie who is investigating an accident. A fellow Jamulian has plowed his pickup truck into a telephone pole. It's Friday night. Steyn on Kerry's no class act By Tom Smith I agree with Steyn the Kerry has ceased to be amusing. His criticisms of Allawi really were revolting. And the MSM isn't much better. Bush was right to come down on him hard for it. Doesn't Kerry have any advisors who are not completely tone-deaf? Here's what you say. You praise Allawi for being brave, you praise the Iraqi people, you thank the troops, then you say Bush is letting them all down. How hard is that? Part of Kerry's problem, as thousands of anecdotes illustrate, is that he is just a stone jerk -- never a line he doesn't cut, never a pose he doesn't strike, never a passing moment of humility or gratitude. He might be too much of an asshole even for the French, a risk I would be willing to take under other circumstances, true, but not in this case. M. Kerry is a walking advertisement against sending your kid to a fancy boarding school. I am beginning to credit the theory that Kerry is just a shill in the Clinton restoration conspiracy. I really hope the Democrats can come up with somebody vaguely admirable next time around. Is Joe Leiberman really all that bad? At least he has some mensch like qualities. But I fear it's going to be She Who Must Be Obeyed. She may be hair raising, but she is a smart pol. Oh well. Sufficient unto the day are the Democrats thereof. I HAD missed the comment by Kerry advisor Joe Lockhart. Bill Kristol: But Kerry's rudeness paled beside the comment of his senior adviser, Joe Lockhart, to the Los Angeles Times: "The last thing you want to be seen as is a puppet of the United States, and you can almost see the hand underneath the shirt today moving the lips." Interesting perspective. Yet can any reasonable person doubt that Lockhart is not one-tenth the man Allawi is? When was the last time Lockhart risked getting his limbs blown off trying to build a new nation? And what a damaging thing for our prospects in Iraq to say. As Kistrol notes, deeply irresponsible. But at least it answers the question, how big a disaster would a Kerry victory be for American national security. Bigger than is easy to imagine. September 23, 2004
The Leadership of the Presbyterian Church (USA) By Gail Heriot I am the only member of the Right Coast who is a duly ordained elder of the Presbyterian Church (USA), so I feel like I ought to say something about the shameful situation the Church has gotten itself into and respond in part Mike's question (immediately below). I haven't been active in the leadership for a while, but there was a time when I had a lot of exposure to church muckety-mucks, some of whom held national office. Many were fine (even extraordinary) people. Unfortunately, with a few of the others, you really had to watch your hat and coat. It's important to note, however, that I never I suspected any of them of being anti-Semitic. And I still don’t. The unattractive element of the Presbyterian Church isn’t anti-Semitic; it’s anti-Western. They don’t hate Israel because they consider it a Jewish state. They hate it because they consider it a Western imperial outpost in the Third World, and to them, the Third World is somehow more pure, more virtuous, and just plain more interesting than the world they inhabit. They would hate Israel just as much if it had been founded by Episcopalians (and more if it had been founded by fundamentalist Baptists, but that’s another story). I don't know how I could have missed this story By Tom Smith Stanford law grad repays loans working as call girl, and it goes on from there. I did manage to track down her site, and let's just say, discretion being the better part of valor, I decided not to link to it. It's quite a site, though, Brazilian music and everything. She charges about $700 per hour for her escort services. That's more than the vast majority of lawyers make, and they have to wear suits. Nor am I going to link to the site Glen Reynolds linked to of the photographer who publishes hundreds of pictures of his wife in her underwear. It may have been art, but it was not good art. A good rule of thumb for photographers is, if you're publishing pictures of your wife on the web in naughty little Bo Peep type outfits, you've taken a wrong turn somewhere. Not all roads less traveled lead somewhere you want to go. Nice underwear, though. We here at the RC have high standards to maintain. I'm not sure what the point is anymore, but what the heck. OOPS! My bad. I've disabled the link above because I meant to link to the story about the call girl, not the call girl's site. This was an accident, not a joke. I apologize to those of you who inadvertantly found yourself at a not work-safe site. More proof that bloggers are not afraid to admit when they're wrong. Also, I don't have the news story link anymore. Why not just forget the whole thing. It's best not to dwell on these things anyway. Shame on the Presbyterians By Tom Smith Mainline Protestant church joins the mainstream press in cluelessness. It is divesting itself of firms that do business with Israel. (via VC). I hope critics of the Catholic Church will remember this next time a hatchet job like Hitler's Pope comes out (you can find it yourself on Amazon; I'm not going to link to it) . You won't see the Catholics doing anything this stupid any time soon. September 22, 2004
Don't get cocky By Tom Smith To make a long story short, Bush has to win in Florida to win, and polls there still show Kerry within the (realistically speaking) margin of error. We could be in for another mess in Florida. At least Ohio looks pretty good. Go Buckeyes! September 21, 2004
Egypt with snow By Tom Smith That's the description this blogger, an anonymous foreign service officer, gives to Canada, which he says has become a third world country. Very funny post. Check out this blog before the security section in the State Department shuts him down. Got it by chicagoboyz, also a great blog. Now that's what I'm talkin' about. And check this out. What a hoot! On that euro-paradise you've been hearing about . . . Tedious Andrew By Tom Smith Is it just me, or is Andrew Sullivan really tedious lately? I don't just mean all the gay stuff. I skip that anyway. It just seems to me to spends too much time and linkage sucking up to other famous quasi-bloggers. Like this. Sullivan says this piece is an example of why Jonah Goldberg is the most brilliant conservative writing today. Well, it's fine. I agree with it. But what is brilliant about it eludes me. You can read better stuff any day on any number of conservative blogs. Is Jonah more consistent, or something? I don't know. I suspect Sullivan is just sucking up to him because he's a player at NRO, which is still a major player in conservative politics. Though frankly, I'm not sure its status is justified by its content, except for the presence of Victor Hanson, who can publish anywhere. In a world where bottlenecks and gatekeepers are disintegrating fast, I'm not sure I would buy their stock. But anyway. Also, all Sullivan's deep concern about everything just seems a little drippy to me. He's very concerned about Iraq, like what's-her-name in A Series of Unfortunate Events. Frankly, I would be relieved to discover there was something about which he did not give a shit. Many things fall into the category for me, but then, I'm no Andrew Sullivan. Something about which I am deeply concerned. Also, his linkage never seems to dip very deep into the BSE (that's 'Blogospheric Entity,' a lovely term I coined myself). I don't expect him to get as far down the power law distribution as the RC, but he just seems to read the other 50K plus hits a day sites. How narrow. How snooty. How unbloggeriffic. Well, that's it; that's as mean as I feel like being for now. I used to think his site was so great, but it doesn't work for me anymore. I've moved on, I guess. If you can't call a terrorist a terrorist By Tom Smith . . . then why should we believe anything you say? Steyn out-steyns himself By Tom Smith Goodness. Steyn does things to Kerry I'm not sure there are words for. Bush's UN speech By Tom Smith Here it is, at C-Span (via LGF). LGF is right; Bush got a very chilly reception at the UN General Assembly. I guess they're mad at him for poking his nose into the so-called "genocide" in Dafur, as we neo-colonialist hegemonic power elites have a way of doing. As everybody knows, Dafur is just [insert intelligence-insulting, amoral, self-serving, racist, jargon-ridden, psuedo-explanation here]. Hmmmm. There's this. Who would have guessed terrorists took an unenlightened attitude toward race? I have one question that has been bothering me a little that maybe some of our African Muslim friends could answer for us. Is it OK to kill African Christians because they're Christian or because they're black? Or is it maybe both? Perhaps in its grandeur, the UN General Assembly could enlighten us. AND an alert reader reminds me that most of the victims in Dafur are not Christian but Muslim. The Christians being killed are in another part of Sudan. I was, however, just involved in a general sort of rant, noting that the Islamic terrorists are racist, in addition to their other faults. The conflict in Dafur is primarily, I'm told, not religiously motivated. Lots of other killing nearby, however, is. Faster than a U-turning Swiftboat . . . By Tom Smith It's Professor Estrich, saying it's time to move on! Excuse me for a moment while I roll around on the floor and choke with laughter. So, I take it the dirty tricks is not such a good idea after all? Am I following you? It's not time for the wrath of Democrats who aren't going to take it anymore? Dare we ask how it got to be time to move on so quickly? Is this a case of "The Blogosphere--she has no memory" or what? For those of you just joining us, the good Professor only recently penned this now infamous (but still pretty obscure) screed, in which she revealed that she and her Democratic friends were out for blood, hoping to bribe tattlers to tell all about W's inglorious past, everything from AWOL antics to illegally procured abortions, not because it was easy, but because it was the right thing to do. We are mean Democrats, hear us roar. But suddenly, all has changed. Just like that! A new dawn has dawned, a new day has dayed. Now that the dirt from the memo-gate hand grenade has exploded, lodging shrapnel in, to extend a metaphor, the collective Democratic hind-quarters, it's time to move on. But Susan, I'm not ready to move on! Couldn't we please have the Democrats try again, just one more time! There must be other stories out there that could be so unbelievably, spectacularly mismanaged that they could bring a major media institution to its knees, and kick the remaining life out of a floundering campaign! In fact, you must hurry, or Kerry-Edwards might just die of its own. You owe it to your fans. We haven't had this much fun since watching the anchor-persons' faces as they read the result in Bush v. Gore. Why do Islamofascist terrorists want women freed? By Tom Smith Oh, that's right! Two of them were the leading biological weapons experts for the Hussein regime! But that can't be the reason, because, as we all know (all together now) there were no weapons of mass destruction, and, there is no connection between Saddam and terrorism. What a relief to keep remembering that. It's just that those Islamofascists have such tender feelings toward the weaker sex. If you can't use them to make anthrax or Son-of-Smallpox, you can always turn them into walking bombs. Mainstream media looks at bloggers By Tom Smith You can't make this stuff up. Read this interview over at Powerline. And guess what, Gloria, computers don't have little guys inside them, either. View from Iraq By Tom Smith You may have seen this already, but I think it's worth posting here in full. [Addendum: Andrew Sullivan, who I guess doesn't know a lot of Leathernecks, says he can't "authenticate" this email. Well, I can Andrew. It was forwarded to me by a good friend and Navy wife who knew the Marine when he was posted in Lima.] It's a letter from a Marine officer posted now in Iraq. I got the letter from the wife of a Navy MD, mother of my 13 year old's best friend, and our very generous hostess when we visited Lima two summers ago for rainforest and high Andean adventure. The military being a small world, she knew the Marine when he was posted in Lima. Anyway, here's what he has to say: 17 September 2004 Al-Nasar Complex (FKA Camp Victory), Iraq PLEASE PASS THIS ON TO AS MANY PEOPLE YOU KNOW WHO WILL APPRECIATE IT AND PASS IT ON TO OTHERS. THIS NEWS NEEDS TO GET OUT..... A thought from Iraq - "Doom & Gloom about Iraq's future....I don't see it from where I'm sitting." [For those of you who haven't gotten my "Thoughts" before, I'm a Major in the USMC on the Multi-National Corps staff in Baghdad. The analysts and pundits who don't see what I see on a daily basis, in my opinion, have very little credibility to talk about the situation - especially if they have yet to set foot in Iraq. Everything Americans believe about Iraq is simply perception filtered through one's latent prejudices until you are face-to-face with reality. If you haven't seen, or don't remember, the John Wayne movie, The Green Berets, you should watch it this weekend. Pay special attention to the character of the reporter, Mr. Beckwith. His experience is directly related to the situation here. You'll have a different perspective on Iraq after the movie is over.] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The US media is abuzz today with the news of an intelligence report that is very negative about the prospects for Iraq's future. CNN's website says, "[The] National Intelligence Estimate was sent to the White House in July with a classified warning predicting the best case for Iraq was 'tenuous stability' and the worst case was civil war." That report, along with the car bombings and kidnappings in Baghdad in the past couple days are being portrayed in the media as more proof of absolute chaos and the intransigence of the insurgency. From where I sit, at the Operational Headquarters in Baghdad, that just isn't the case. Let's lay out some background, first about the "National Intelligence Estimate." The most glaring issue with its relevance is the fact that it was delivered to the White House in July. That means that the information that was used to derive the intelligence was gathered in the Spring - in the immediate aftermath of the April battle for Fallujah, and other events. The report doesn't cover what has happened in July or August, let alone September. The naysayers will point to the recent battles in Najaf and draw parallels between that and what happened in Fallujah in April. They aren't even close. The bad guys did us a HUGE favor by gathering together in one place and trying to make a stand. It allowed us to focus on them and defeat them. Make no mistake, Al Sadr's troops were thoroughly smashed. The estimated enemy killed in action is huge. Before the battles, the residents of the city were afraid to walk the streets. Al Sadr's enforcers would seize people and bring them to his Islamic court where sentence was passed for religious or other violations. Long before the battles people were looking for their lost loved ones who had been taken to "court" and never seen again. Now Najafians can and do walk their streets in safety. Commerce has returned and the city is being rebuilt. Iraqi security forces and US troops are welcomed and smiled upon. That city was liberated again. It was not like Fallujah - the bad guys lost and are in hiding or dead. You may not have even heard about the city of Samarra. Two weeks ago, that Sunni Triangle city was a "No-go" area for US troops. But guess what? The locals got sick of living in fear from the insurgents and foreign fighters that were there and let them know they weren't welcome. They stopped hosting them in their houses and the mayor of the town brokered a deal with the US commander to return Iraqi government sovereignty to the city without a fight. The people saw what was on the horizon and decided they didn't want their city looking like Fallujah in April or Najaf in August. Boom, boom, just like that two major "hot spots" cool down in rapid succession. Does that mean that those towns are completely pacified? No. What it does mean is that we are learning how to do this the right way. The US commander in Samarra saw an opportunity and took it - probably the biggest victory of his military career and nary a shot was fired in anger. Things will still happen in those cities, and you can be sure that the bad guys really want to take them back. Those achievements, more than anything else in my opinion, account for the surge in violence in recent days - especially the violence directed at Iraqis by the insurgents. Both in Najaf and Samarra ordinary people stepped out and took sides with the Iraqi government against the insurgents, and the bad guys are hopping mad. They are trying to instill fear once again. The worst thing we could do now is pull back and let that scum back into people's homes and lives. So, you may hear analysts and prognosticators on CNN, ABC and the like in the next few days talking about how bleak the situation is here in Iraq, but from where I sit, it's looking significantly better now than when I got here. The momentum is moving in our favor, and all Americans need to know that, so please, please, pass this on to those who care and will pass it on to others. It is very demoralizing for us here in uniform to read & hear such negativity in our press. It is fodder for our enemies to use against us and against the vast majority of Iraqis who want their new government to succeed. It causes the American public to start thinking about the acceptability of "cutting our losses" and pulling out, which would be devastating for Iraq for generations to come, and Muslim militants would claim a huge victory, causing us to have to continue to fight them elsewhere (remember, in war "Away" games are always preferable to "Home" games). Reports like that also cause Iraqis begin to fear that we will pull out before we finish the job, and thus less willing to openly support their interim government and US/Coalition activities. We are realizing significant progress here - not propaganda progress, but real strides are being made. It's terrible to see our national morale, and support for what we're doing here, jeopardized by sensationalized stories hyped by media giants whose #1 priority is advertising income followed closely by their political agenda; getting the story straight falls much further down on their priority scale, as Dan Rather and CBS News have so aptly demonstrated in the last week. Thanks for listening. Feedback is always welcome, though I can't promise an immediate response.... ADDENDUM . . . At the Major's request, I've removed his email address -- he's getting too many responses. He says they were (mostly) wonderful, but too much of a good thing. Ouch-o-rama By Tom Smith The IEM price graph of the winner-take-all presidential vote tells a story. I still tend to think the GOP is overconfident. Remember how Bush coasted into the last two weeks of Campaign 2000? Maybe Laura should follow him everywhere with a cane. Greatest living military historian on Iraq By Tom Smith Sensible as usual. Keegan sees disbanding the Iraqi army and police force as a major blunder, but says things could be a lot worse, and that the UK and US should stay the course. (via realclearpolitics.) Rathergate etc etc By Tom Smith I'm officially tired of Rathergate, CBS, and pajamas. However, if you still care, read this. The plot thickens; Kerry evildoers may be behind the dirty tricks. (via instapundit.) Lovely wife Jeanne really wants one of those "I'd Rather Be Blogging" onesies (baby underwear for you uninitiated) for 11 month old Mark. I'll try to get some pics of him in it and post them on my family blog. By then, the b-sphere will have moved on, probably. Oh well. I might get interested again if the trail of incompetence leads back to Professor and former Dean Estrich, who had us all quaking with fear at the onslaught of devlish back stabs about the descend upon poor W because the Democrats were really mad. I restate my point, if the Democrats can't even pull off a moderately successful political sandbagging, how can they be trusted to crush networks of evil terrorists, who are not as stupid as one would wish? G-d help me, I'm getting sucked into this story again . . . read this. September 20, 2004
Schwarzenegger Speaks By Gail Heriot Muscle men are not usually my type (and, in fairness, I am usually not their type either). But I am starting to have warm feelings for California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. Over the weekend, for example, he vetoed a minimum wage bill. "Now is not the time to create barriers to our economic recovery or reverse the momentum we have generated," he said. "I want to create more jobs and make every California job more secure." Exactly, Arnold. Many politicians are afraid to do what they think is right in these situations for fear that they will be criticized as insensitive. In fact, I believe it's those who would raise minimum wage who are insensitive to the concerns of unskilled employees; they don't seem to care that unskilled jobs are lost when wages are artificially forced up. The minimum wage veto is not the only example of Schwarzengger's willingness to use his personal popularity to promote sound public policy. About a week ago, he endorsed Proposition 64, which, if passed, will restore the traditional common law requirement of standing to California unfair business practices law. The hallmark of a civil lawsuit is that it is a dispute in which a plaintiff asserts that the defendant has harmed him in some legally cognizable way. Ah .... but not in California. Alone among states, California allows anyone to sue a business, small or large, for unfair business practices; "standing" is no obstacle. A plaintiff need not be suing to protect his own interests; it's enough that he is seeking to protect some abstract interest of "the general public." In effect, every Californian is authorized to be a private attorney general roaming the state in search of wrongs that need righting. Who cares if he or anyone else has actually been hurt? That might have worked tolerably well back in the days when laws governing business were few in number and clearer in meaning. But in the modern regulatory state, it's difficult for anyone to be in perfect compliance with the law. Even lawyers don't know one-tenth of what's out there. California's freewheeling approach to standing has spawned a whole army of lawyers who specialize if finding some flaw (or arguable flaw) with some business's compliance and then shaking that business down for money. The Official California Voter Guide's Argument in Favor of Proposition 64 gives the following examples: "Hundreds of travel agents have been shaken down for not including their license number on their website. "Local homebuilders have been sued for using 'APR' in advertisements instead of spelling out 'Annual Percentage Rate.'" It also quotes from the following statement by Humberto Galvez of Santa Ana: "M y family came to this country to pursue the American Dream. We work hard to make sure our customers like the job we do. One day I got a letter from a law firm demanding $2,500. The letter didn't claim we broke the law, just that we might have and if we wanted to stop the lawsuit, we needed to send them $2,500. I called a lawyer who said it would cost even more to fight, so we sent money even though we'd done nothing wrong. It's just not right." I'm not familiar with Mr. Galvez's case in particular (or with the other cases cited in the argument), but it's consistent with the cases I have read and heard about. This a problem that needs fixing. I'll be interested in what California voters do in November. In the meantime, Schwarzenegger is looking more and more impressive. September 19, 2004
Left logic By Tom Smith Logic test of the day: Can you tell what makes this post at Crooked Timber silly? Time's up! The answer is, if a bunch of bloggers point out that documents are forgeries, and the documents really are forgeries, then that is not "spinning." That is pointing out a fact, which happens to be very embarrassing to CBS, and various other Democratic pundits who opined "Now we're really going to getcha!" after the world-historically, catastrophically mean Republican convention, the nastiest since the Big Bang. "Spin" is interpreting a fact in some more or less blatantly politicized way. You don't have to spin "Rathergate" or whatever you want to call it. Perhaps you'd like "the recent alleged forgery event involving CBS" better. Even if it is true (and in fine tradition, Crooked Timber does not even offer a rumor, merely that "Buckhead" is a well known Republican) that someone at the White House tipped off some guy in Atlanta (why him? Oh, no doubt there's some elaborate story for that. Stay tuned . . . ), so what? Is that what, cheating or something? It's an outrage, I tell you, an outrage! The White House dares tell bloggers that documents are fogeries! What's next? The Gestapo pounding on our doors in the middle of the night? Mind control? Flouridation? You've got to admire the logic, though. CBS does an attack story based on phony documents, and liberal bloggers accuse the White House of conspiring to defend the President. Well, I've got to go now. I see a big W projected by searchlight up on the clouds, so it's time to pick up my W-phone and get my secret instructions. Rathergate: The Aftermath By Gail Heriot NewsMax.com is reporting that the CBS Radio affiliate in Seattle has fired talk show host Brian Maloney for saying that Dan Rather should resign or be forced out on account of Rathergate. Ugly. (Hat tip: Ratherbiased). September 18, 2004
I knew it! By Tom Smith Beer is good for you. Even better than wine? Now this is part of why the UK is great. Of course, banning fox hunting is a disgrace. Just so you know, I lived in England from 1979-81 where I blah, blah, blah. Sometimes I really miss England intensely. What I miss are the pubs, where you can sit for hours, talk to strangers, read a book. It is also a nation of walkers. There are national trails with easements across private land, where you can follow Roman roads or get lost in endless heaths and hills. Then finally walk out and find a pub. The high cuisine is foreign but the low cuisine is great. Fried eggs, sausage, camp coffee, tea that could dissolve the paint off a battleship. English women are not unlike what you see in the WWII movies, smart, outspoken, feminine . . . I haven't been back to England in 20 years, and I'm due. My health comes first. Does the Electoral College Make Sense? (Part III) By Gail Heriot I got quite a few thoughtful responses to my earlier postings (Tuesday and Saturday) on the Electoral College. Thanks to everyone who wrote me. Here are some of the arguments and some of my responses. I'm not going to be able to deal with everything in this posting, so look for Part IV later. Some of my correspondents pointed out that the Electoral College was part of a fair bargain at the Constitutional Convention driven by delegates from small states, who were concerned about the potential dominance of Virginia and other large states in the national arena. Without such safeguards, those states might not have joined the Union. All that is true. But it is not an argument for the Electoral College's continuation if members of the current (or some future) generation undertake to abolish it pursuant to constitutionally approved procedures (not that I'm holding my breath). Article V, which permits amendments to the Constitution upon adoption of two-thirds of both houses of Congress and ratification of three-quarters of the states, is also part of the bargain struck between the delegates from small and large states. If they had considered the continuation of the Electoral College to be crucial, they could have exempted it from amendment. They did not. At this point, therefore, the debate over the Electoral College should be on its own merits. That's the system the framers put in motion. Another correpondent took the position that the Electoral College is a protection against mob rule. In the modern world, that kind of argument doesn't get made much (perhaps because the "mob" doesn't like to hear it!), but it is certainly a sentiment that would have resonated with many members of the founding generation, who frequently voiced concerns over the excesses of democracy. Those men surely would have had sympathy for a system in which Electors are chosen on account of their wisdom and experience and in turn those Electors employ their own best judgment in choosing the President. But the modern Electoral College does not function that way. Rather than exercise independent judgment, the Electors cast their votes for whomever the ordinary voters of their state have directed them to. (The so-called "Faithless Elector" is considered a scoff-law.) Hence, if mob rule is a problem, it is still a problem under the Electoral College system. Another suggested that the Electoral College insures that the winning candidate has widespread support, not just support in a particular geographic area. The problem I have with this argument is that I'm not sure it's really true (and if it is true, I am not sure it is an important enough consideration to deviate from our usual standard of election by a majority of popular votes). On the first point, it seems to me that both a straight popular vote system and the Electoral College system can elect a President whose support is concentrated in a particular region. Here are some hypotheticals that show both problems: (1) Suppose the country can be divided into four equal regions--North, East, South and West, each composed of 15 politically similar states. The Tory Party candidate has strong support(66 2/3%) in three regions, North East and South, but has no support whatever in the West. the Whig Party candidate can muster only 33 1/3% of the vote in the N0rth, East and South, but every man, woman and child in the West favors his candidacy. And by the way the populations (and the electoral votes) of our hypothetical regions are exactly equal except that the West has one more registered voter who makes it to the polls. The popular vote thus goes to the Whig Party candidate, while the Electoral vote goes overwhelmingly to the Tory Party candidate. I can certainly see why the Electoral College might be a good thing here. Widespread support may have some independent value in addition to popular vote. I am less sure that I would be enthused about the result yielded by the Electoral College if the Whig party candidate got 48% of the vote in the North, East, and South. (2) And here's another hypothetical that I think is a little closer the actual political landscape of our time. Suppose again the country can be divided into four regions--North, East, South and West--but this time the West has two more Electoral votes than the other regions, simply because it has more (and hence smaller) states in it. In addition, this time there are three candidates--a not uncommon occurrence these days. In the North and the South, the Tory Party candidate is favored over the Whig Party candidate and Ross Perot (who is commonly thought to take more votes from the Tory candidate than the Whig candidate) by a margin of 61% to 24% to 15%. In the East and West, the Whig Party narrowly defeats him with 40% of the vote going to the Tory, 41% to the the Whig Party and 9% to Ross Perot. Compared to Hypothetical #1, these numbers strike me a plausible--different candidates have different appeal in different regions, but not wildly different Yet they result in an Electoral College victory for the Whig Party candidate despite the fact (1) he seriously lost the popular vote and (2) his support is largely confined to two regions of the country. It's true that the Electoral College can, given the right circumstances, prevent a candidate whose support is largely confined to a particular region from winning the election even though he has won a majority of popular votes (though whether this is bad or good may depend on the degree to which the "regional favorite" carried the popular vote). But it can also have a far more pernicious effect--causing a candidate to win who has no substantial support in half the country and who came up massively short on the popular vote too. At least under the popular vote system you won't have that kind of massive legitimacy crisis. I'll mention some of the arguments that I find a little more persuasive next time. September 17, 2004
How to think like a terrorist By Tom Smith Juan Cole on documents found in 9/11 highjacker's luggage. SORRY! Here's the link. It really is worth reading. It suggests the terrorists are to Islam what the Branch Davidians are to Christianity, a crazy splinter group. I'm not sure I completely buy it, but interesting. Also, interesting insights into why the terrorists live dissolute lives (in addition to being scumbags, that is), how they use mysticism, and other such matters. Maybe Professor Cole should take a temporary gig with the CIA. September 16, 2004
You be the judge! By Tom Smith Here's your chance to be a judge and help out the moot court program at USD law school! OPPORTUNITY TO BE JUDGE AN APPELLATE ARGUMENT (TORTS PROBLEM) No need for experience in Torts. Any attorney or judge is welcome to volunteer. Volunteer Dates: Wed, Sept 22 and Thurs Sept 23 evening. Prior to the scheduled arguments, a board member will contact the volunteer judges to confirm participation in the tournament. Judges will then receive the tournament bench brief and detailed instructions to help prepare for the arguments. On the day of the arguments, judges need to arrive at the downtown Superior Courthouse by 4:45 pm. Dinner & refreshments will be provided. Prior to the start of oral arguments, we will host a brief judges meeting to highlight the relevant logistical details. Each judge will serve on a three judge panel and hear two rounds of oral arguments. The entire judging experience should not last more than three hours. If interested in judging, please fill out the interest form online at www.sandiego.edu/~mcourt and submit it to us via email or fax as soon as possible. Please feel free to sign up for more than one night of judging or more than one tournament. We will work to accommodate all preferences and will let you know which tournaments you have been selected for. Alumni Torts Tournament: This is our annual intramural tournament that gives individual competitors the opportunity to argue a case involving challenging issues in tort law. This year’s case, Ashley Mercer v Dennyland, Inc., arises from an alleged injury a guest of a local amusement park suffers after riding the park’s main roller coaster, the MindBender. The main issues involve whether common care liability should be the appropriate standard of care for amusement parks and whether the amusement park employees falsely imprisoned the guest. Yet more martial arts By Tom Smith My martial arts dojo has a new website, and here it is. This way when I bloviate on about jujitsu and the like, you'll know what I'm talking about. I feel this dojo is a real find. The most important form of self-defense you can practice in taking up the martial arts is financial self-defense. Martial arts schools typically want you to sign long term contracts that are models of one-sided, scary adhesion contracts. Often you actually contract with third party collection agencies. You get dinged with new fees and charges every time you turn around. More threats to your wallet than bad guys in a Jackie Chan movie. Not pretty. Soke Scott has no long term contracts, no testing fees, no uniform you are required to buy from him (though he'll sell you one if you want, at the Century catalog cost) and none of that other BS. That speaks more than lots of yak yak about the soul of the fist or the fist of the dragon or whatever. Honesty, value, all that good stuff. Also, there's no substitute for a deep knowledge of several arts, and he has that in spades. Almost every week, I am impressed by the subtlety and detail that he conveys in the techniques. He is a 7th degree black belt and has worked with several prominent grand masters, but beyond all that, which I'm not qualified to judge anyway, his knowledge comes through in his instruction. The dojo is Christian in philosophy, which is not oppressive or heavy-handed. You want to have some strong ethical foundation if you're studying ways to kill people, which is what a good part of it is, and Christianity is as good as any. Soke Scott is into applied psychology, so the vast majority of it is more psychology than religion. How to be disciplined, how to form good habits, break bad ones, etc. "7 habits of highly effective people," not fire and brimstone. There is a lecture every session while we stretch, which gives you something to think about besides how stiff you are. It's all extremely organized and structured, which is good. Now we've been studying knife and stick (or escrima) for some weeks. I'm not crazy about knives, but boy can you hurt with and be hurt by them. More on this later. For now, just remember, grasshopper, if someone has a knife, run away as fast as you can. September 15, 2004
If I may add . . . By Tom Smith Maimon, didn't those Irish Republicans not stab the government officials to death, but actually slice them to death with surgical scalpels? Our readers want to know these things. Or is that another famous Irish Republican atrocity I'm thinking of? September 14, 2004
Brian, oh Briaannnn! Don't go there! By Tom Smith Brian over a Crooked Timber is making a mistake. He is toeing the water at the edge of Rathergate, thinking about jumping in and defending the memos, uh, sort of. This is not a good time to join the argument. The memos' state most resembles a rotten apple that has been twirling around in the garbage disposal for a few minutes and is just about to slip down the drain. If you're going to use philosophy to defend them, some of the following arguments might be more promising: CBS does not really exist. Dan Rather has no mind. Nothing matters anyway, so who cares. The ends justify the means. Time is an illusion, so 1972 and 2004 are the same anyway, as are their typewriters. It's sad, but it's one of those things, like Alger Hiss really being a Communist spy. He was, you know. Sorry. And Hollywood. Just crawling with Reds. It was! And Lillian Hellman never went to Berlin. Adlai Stevenson was no intellectual either, just a snob. But I should stop. Now I'm just being mean. But those memos? We're talking 3 dollar bill and Groucho where the dead President should be. He who fights and runs away, etc. etc. Now that's some useful philosophy. What can I say? By Tom Smith I always liked that REM song: That's great, it starts with an earthquake, birds and snakes, an aeroplane -Lenny Bruce is not afraid. Eye of a hurricane, listen to yourself churn -world serves its own needs, don't misserve your own needs. Feed it up a knock,speed, grunt no, strength no. Ladder structure clatter with fear of height,down height. Wire in a fire, represent the seven games in a government forhire and a combat site. Left her, wasn't coming in a hurry with the furiesbreathing down your neck. Team by team reporters baffled, trump, tetheredcrop. Look at that low plane! Fine then. Uh oh, overflow, population,common group, but it'll do. Save yourself, serve yourself. World serves itsown needs, listen to your heart bleed. Tell me with the rapture and thereverent in the right - right. You vitriolic, patriotic, slam, fight, brightlight, feeling pretty psyched. It's the end of the world as we know it. It's the end of the world as we know it. It's the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine. Reading Cass Sunstein here made me think of it. Does the Electoral College Make Sense? (Part II) By Gail Heriot On Saturday, I posted an item critiquing the arguments for the Electoral College made in an OpinionJournal.com editorial entitled, “Electoral College Mischief: How to Make the 2000 Florida Brouhaha Look Like a Kerfuffle.” I continue to be unconvinced that the Electoral College is a good thing. I did, however, find OpinionJournal.com's view on whether the Electoral College will in fact be abolished interesting and plausible. “The effort to institute direct popular election of the President is also likely to go nowhere. That's because the Electoral College benefits two groups of states--sparsely populated ones, whose representation in the College is disproportionately high relative to their populations, and closely divided "swing" states like Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania, where both parties have a decent shot at winning. “Based on 2000 Census data and election results, only 11 states are both populous and politically monolithic enough that their influence would grow with popular election of the President: California, Texas, New Yo rk, Illinois, New Jersey, Georgia, North Carolina, Virginia, Massachusetts, Indiana and Maryland. Amending the Constitution to abolish the Electoral College would require the assent of 38 state legislatures, so at least 27 of them would have to vote against the interests of their own states.” I’m not sure that I agree with the point precisely, but it sounds close to right. Large swing states like Florida, Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania would indeed be acting against interest to give up the huge advantage they get in securing promises of pork and other favors from candidates. But as to small states, the issue may be a bit more mixed–at least if short-run interests dominate the political calculations. My suspicion is that only small Republican states (e.g. Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Utah and Wyoming) would have clear reason to support the Electoral College. Small Democratic states (e.g. Vermont and Hawaii) may have their vote count disproportionately vis-a-vis larger states, but their advantage is cancelled out by the advantage gained by the more numerous small Republican states, so they might well be willing to give up their advantage. But if I’m right on that, then larger Republican states like Georgia, North Carolina and Georgia would likely see the retention of the Electoral College as in their interest. Either way, it’s hard to muster the 38 states necessary to amend the Constitution. My hope, however, is that Republicans don’t convince themselves that the Electoral College is a good thing simply because it happens to give them a slight advantage given the current political landscape. As far as I can see, it isn’t. It’s just a historical oddity–nothing to be ashamed of, but nothing to be enamored of either, particularly given its unattractive tendency to produce pork for swing states. The time may come one day when the right thing to do is let it go–perhaps in trade for something that is more important. September 13, 2004
Why Rather is wrong By Tom Smith Here is RatherBiased.com 22 point rebuttal of Herr Rather's rather pathetic defense of his documents' authenticity. It's pretty crushing. By that I mean completely devastating. It has lots of those, make sure the other guy is dead moves, along the lines of "even if the Texas Guard happened to have a specialized type composing machine, it could still not have produced the documents for the following 7 reasons . . . " That is to say, they don't just kill Rather's argument, they do a King Edward on Braveheart thing to it. Not pretty. If you read the whole thing, you may need professional help. I did, and I may. On the other hand, you probably need it less than a certain leading news anchor person. This is starting to get ridiculous, I know. It's rather like the crop circles debate, where some scientists give 328 reasons why, no, the flattened crops could not have been caused by microwave lasers or ultrasonic energy bursts, but are more consistent with the lonely guy with a 2x4 and a rope hypothesis. But no matter. It's up to the scientists to prove it wasn't ET, and the Hampshire Extra-Terrestrial Fellowship isn't really listening. BTW when I was in college I met Edward R. Murrow's protege Charles Collingswood, whom some of you oldtimers may have heard of. He was a nice man and could certainly hold his liquor, but an astute observer of anything, he was not. I know Murrow was a brave man and said "This is London" in a thrilling way, but could we agree to stop saying "The tradition of Edward R. Murrow blah, blah, blah . . ." I'm not sure he would have performed any better than Rather under the circumstances. Just a cranky thought. Look at Walter Cronkite. AND you must read this very important essay that may explain the weirdness going on at CBS. It makes sense. At NRO. The Blogosphere as a Truth Detector By Mike Rappaport Lately, there has been a great deal written in the blogosphere about how it can detect inaccurate information. Witness not only the posts on Rathergate, but also this one from Andrew Sullivan about Shattered Glass. Part of the reason that the blogosphere is good at detecting inaccuracy is that there are a large number of bloggers who have access to disparate bits of information. The blogosphere then coordinates and transmits this information. It is a little like (not exactly like) Hayek's theory of a market as a information coordination mechanism. But there is another advantage of the blogosphere. Bloggers are generally required to link to their sources. Readers can then easily check to determine whether the source supports their claims. How could newspapers and networks provide the same accuracy check? Of course, editors are supposed to do that, but editors are, well, human. What if journalists were required by journalistic standards to have a link to their written notes from their interview with a source and were required to post an audio file of their recorded interviews? That would do much to stop fabrications before they occur. Which state has the biggest percentage saying they will vote for Nader? By Tom Smith My home state of Idaho, at 6 percent, at least according to this poll. No idea why. Maybe hight percentage of environmental tree-hugger sorts realizing there's no point voting for Kerry in Idaho? Democrats who would vote for Kerry, except they live in Sun Valley and know him? General Idaho weirdness? Also, Idaho's numbers seem to add up to much less than 100 percent than do other states. Why? Some places pollsters won't go? Beau Grits not on the response form? Curious. Glen Reynolds in a suit, sitting in tidy house By Tom Smith Here is Glen, in a suit, and sitting in a tidy house. I actually do frequently blog in my pajamas, which in fact are either nylon warm-up pants and/or boxer shorts, and T-shirts. And my house is clean, but quite untidy. This nothing for a blogger to be ashamed of. Is Professor Reynolds trying to imply that the rest of us are slobs? Provenance of Beslan monsters By Tom Smith Debka on Beslan. Interesting and important. Is it true? Hard to say, but they are least seem to know a lot more than the MSM who's too busy telling us whom not to blame to give us any facts. Debka on where the monsters of Beslan came from By Tom Smith According to debka.com, Islamofascist terrorism is rearing its ugly head in new places in the Caucuses. It's not just the Chechens anymore. It had to happen By Tom Smith Here it is. It's all Rathergate, all the time. A blog, devoted entirely to the evolving scandal at CBS. It's a good thing, because now that I am satisfied the docs are fake, it's time to move on, even as I hope CBS remains mired in it for a while. I heard a hint of a new line of defense that is particularly rich, that may raise its ugly and pathetic head soon. It goes, "yes, the documents are fake in a sense, but actually they are accurate transcriptions of other documents that are Out There Somewhere. Our Unnamed Source assures us they are accurate transscriptions." Hooookay. Ma, quick pluckin' that chicken and come to the wireless! CBS done got a new story for us, and it's summin'! All the way from New York City! September 12, 2004
Dowd speaks By Tom Smith It's sort of fascinating to watch a really medicore mind at work. Here's the Dowdette on Republicans as cowboys, again. Hugh Hewitt, journalist By Tom Smith Really good post over at HH's site. Excellent summary on the state of play on Rathergate, and very good reflections on the significance of the story for journalist in old and new forms. The link to the New York Times story should be followed. It looks like Kerry is putting his hopes on Ohio and Florida now; the map of battleground states has shrunk. Even NYT thinks so (I'm applying the admission against interest principle here). HH is also right about the North Korea explosion. I don't believe the line from the Pentagon that it's "no big deal." Maybe it is just a forest fire; I just mean the DOD statement adjusts my beliefs in neither direction. Maybe in the future bloggers (or whatever they/we are called then) will have the capability to second guess evaluations of sattelite imagery and not just typefaces. Today CBS, tomorrow the Pentagon. September 11, 2004
Yet more fontgate By Tom Smith This flash animation makes several points clearly. (disclosure: this is a pj post) In Memoriam By Tom Smith Poet Laureate of the United States Billy Collins wrote the following poem about 9/11: The Names Yesterday, I lay awake in the palm of the night. A soft rain stole in, unhelped by any breeze, And when I saw the silver glaze on the windows, I started with A, with Ackerman, as it happened, Then Baxter and Calabro, Davis and Eberling, names falling into place As droplets fell through the dark. Names printed on the ceiling of the night. Names slipping around a watery bend. Twenty-six willows on the banks of a stream. In the morning, I walked out barefoot Among thousands of flowers Heavy with dew like the eyes of tears, And each had a name — Fiori inscribed on a yellow petal Then Gonzalez and Han, Ishikawa and Jenkins. Names written in the air And stitched into the cloth of the day. A name under a photograph taped to a mailbox. Monogram on a torn shirt, I see you spelled out on storefront windows And on the bright unfurled awnings of this city. I say the syllables as I turn a corner — Kelly and Lee, Medina, Nardella, and O'Connor. When I peer into the woods, I see a thick tangle where letters are hidden As in a puzzle concocted for children. Parker and Quigley in the twigs of an ash, Rizzo, Schubert, Torres, and Upton, Secrets in the boughs of an ancient maple. Names written in the pale sky. Names rising in the updraft amid buildings. Names silent in stone Or cried out behind a door. Names blown over the earth and out to sea. In the evening — weakening light, the last swallows. A boy on a lake lifts his oars. A woman by a window puts a match to a candle, And the names are outlined on the rose clouds — Vanacore and Wallace, (let X stand, if it can, for the ones unfound) Then Young and Ziminsky, the final jolt of Z. Names etched on the head of a pin. One name spanning a bridge, another undergoing a tunnel. A blue name needled into the skin. Names of citizens, workers, mothers and fathers, The bright-eyed daughter, the quick son. Alphabet of names in a green field. Names in the small tracks of birds. Names lifted from a hat Or balanced on the tip of the tongue. Names wheeled into the dim warehouse of memory. So many names, there is barely room on the walls of the heart. Quotation of the day By Tom Smith ". . . thank God Al Gore invented the internet." Read the post and the links. This story is getting weirder and weirder, as the MSM throws more and more of its capital at defending a story that, it is getting clearer by the hour, is based on fake documents. I'm not sure if it is Karl Rove who is behind this, or the Big Guy, who is known for his perverse sense of humor. AND this. Does the Electoral College Make Sense? By Gail Heriot In a Wednesday editorial entitled "Electoral College Mischief: How to Make the 2000 Florida Brouhaha Look Like a Kerfuffle", OpinionJournal.com argued, among other things, that the Electoral College is a protection aganst voter fraud: "Direct popular election would ... vastly increase the risk of corruption and electoral disputes. With every vote competing directly against every other vote, dishonest politicians everywhere would have an incentive to engage in fraud on behalf of their parties. And a close race would make the Florida brouhaha look like a kerfuffle." I'm unconvinced. It seems to me that what the Electoral College does is increase the incentive to cheat in the so-called battleground states, since one can win the whole state by manufacturing just a few votes, while decreasing the incentive to cheat in the states that either party has a lock on, since it would take a huge number of manufactured votes to swing the state to the other party. The more votes that have to be manufactured, the more likely the fraud will be uncovered. By abolishing the Electoral College, we would decrease the massive incentive to cheat that currently exists in the battleground states while increasing the incentive in the locked-up states. The incentive would be uniform across the country but greatly reduced from what it was in Florida in 2000, where it appeared that the entire election could turn on the votes of Bob, Susie and Ethel. It's unclear which system is better; it may depend upon the circumstances of the particular election. The voter fraud argument is another is a long line of arguments I've heard from conservatives since the Electoral College came under scrutiny following the 2000 election. So far, none has convinced me that the system is worth retaining, although I'm still open to new arguments. I am not saying this as someone whose knee always jerks in favor of direct elections. For example, I believe that something was lost when the Seventeenth Amendment replaced the system under which United States Senators were appointed by the states with a system under which they are elected by popular vote. Up to that point, in 1913, Senators acted as the guardians of state interests in matters of federalism. After that, federal power exploded. I don't think for a second that there's any going back at this point, but it's worth understanding that the consequences have not been entirely positive. I am not certain, however, that the Electoral College serves any such good purpose, especially as practiced today with electors more or less being required to cast their ballots for the candidate who received the most popular votes in their state. In theory, it's a system that favors small states, since each state gets votes equal to the number of its congresional districts plus two. That's probably why Republicans tend to favor it now. There are more small safe states for Republican Presidential candidates (e.g., Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Utah, Wyoming) than there are small states safe for Democratic Presidential candidates (e.g., Hawaii, Vermont). Among the disfavored large states, two are considered safe for Democrats (California, New York), while one is safe for Repubicans (Texas). Other large states are battlegrounds (Florida, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Ohio). It's easy to see why Republicans would regard the Electoral College as an asset to the party--at least under current political circumstances. But that doesn't make it an asset to the nation. Rather than forcing Presidential candidates to pay more attention to small states, in practice it causes them to focus 98% of their attention on large battleground states. The Electoral College has become a pork-producing machine for those states. When George W. Bush realized he would need Pennsylvania to win re-election, what did he do? He threw them steel tariffs--great for Pennsylvania steelworkers, terrible for the nation. What about Florida? Bush realized that he needed more votes from the Florida geriatric set, so he threw then the new Medicare expansion in a conscious effort to win them over--again great for Florida retirees, terrible for the nation. I found the OpinionJournal.com editorial more persuasive on the issue of whether a constitutional amendment abolishing the Electoral College is likely to pass. More on that later. New Bush Memo found! By Tom Smith Sent to me anonymously from an email address at the University of Southern California Law School is this troubling memo, linked to here. (The link will take you to a link on the mock up of our forthcoming Typepad website, coming in a few weeks, God willing. And it will be a pleasure to leave Blogger behind, I tell you . . . ) I am not an expert on typefaces and the like, but I can say I think the memo would pass muster at CBS. It clearly shows Bush did not fulfil his military obligations and should not be reelected. Indeed, preciently, Killian observes, as you will see, that it would be a bad thing if Bush were ever to be President. I feel shaken, root and branch. IBM Selectric Composer By Tom Smith I wouldn't blame you for being sick of this story, but just in case you're wondering whether maybe it's just possible that Killian used a state of the art, $30,000 (2004 USD) type setting machine to type his personal files (which his wife said he didn't keep), there's this. September 10, 2004
New York Times does damage control By Tom Smith Here's the NYT on fontgate or whatever we're going to call it. Now we know what the MSM damage control line is going to be: "Experts disagree! Oh darn! I guess we'll never know! What a shame!" Oddly, the experts who think the CBS docs are transparently crude forgeries have names, while the other experts are well, just experts. Now shut up. At least the Times, ever so briefly, notes the role of weblogs. This story was just designed to drive any Republican who knows a little bit about computers, printers, fonts, etc. etc. Absolutely crazy. But I shall try to have faith. I just don't think they can hold out more than a few more days against the accumulating evidence that the docs are forgeries. The fact that they're already at the fallback position of "we'll never know" is telling. Particularly disgusting on this has been CNN. I just watched Aaron Brown, or whatever his name is, you know, the nauseatingly sensitive anchor guy, ask follow up questions along the lines of "Now, without the original documents, is it really possible to know for sure who is right?" "Oh, no, Aaron, we'll never know . . ." When of course, the right question is, is there any reason to believe they are authentic? Do they appear to be genuine or not? On which side is the weight of the evidence? If some one tells you something is a moon rock and it looks like pool tile, you infer he's full of it, even if all you have to go on is the appearance of the thing. The standard is not, can we be absolutely certain they are forgeries. Not only do they fake up documents, which by the way is probably criminal in addition to being dirty, they insult our intelligence at the same time. Now all we need is a Roger Rosenblatt "essay" on ambiguities, all the things we'll never know, getting lost in minutiae and missing the big picture . . . It's coming. You just wait. AND there's this on Hugh Hewitt's site: Hi Hugh, I am a Professor of Computer Science at Rice University who has followed the evolution of word processing technology over the past 30 years. A cursory glance at the "Killian documents" shows that they are forgeries, the product of a modern word processing system. Even the most powerful word processing systems available in the early 70's were not designed to produce propotionally spaced documents. . . . "A cursory glance" is all that it takes. It goes on from there. And guess what? The professor is right, and the dunderheads at CBS are wrong. Hanson is the man By Tom Smith When an evil, vicious ideology is threatening the world and everything we hold dear, it's always nice to have someone willing to fight against it. Professor Hanson, you da man. More Rathergate By Tom Smith The documents are fake. This explains it yet again. Maybe this is one of those things you have to be in your forties or older to understand. Do people remember what a monumental pain in the butt it was to type papers in college? Erasing? White out? Fiddling around with the carriage to squeeze in letters or lines? Anyone who ever typed can tell by visual inspection that the documents in question are word processed. (I learned to type in high school in a class taught by the basketball coach; a guy so mean even the other coaches hated him. He finally left and all sighed in relief. Learned how to type, though.) Some old guy who didn't even type (his wife says he couldn't type) could not have produced such a clean looking document using a normal typewriter. As to the IBM selectric, come on. I was in college from 1975 to 1979, and nobody, even rich kids who would have had one, had a selectric. A grad student I knew got one in 1977 or so, but they were very rare. And they were no huge bargain to work with by today's standards. And the couldn't produce the proportionally spaced documents like those in question. Maybe there were some memory versions around, but the old army reservist was supposed to have one of these in his den in 1972. Doesn't anybody remember 1972? Hardly anybody had an electric typewriter back then for personal use. All this makes this a weird story for me. I know enough about typing and such to know the documents are fake, I really don't have any doubt, but CBS apparently doesn't know that. But over the next week or so, it is just going to get clear beyond peradventure that the documents are forgeries. Then how will CBS defend not revealing where they came from? Very awkward for them. And I am used to the blogger news cycle, so it all seems to be happening in slow motion. Welcome to the new world, Kenneth. (The REM tune keeps going through my head.) AND take a look at this. Now, ask yourself, what are the odds that anything produced on a typewriter could fit a Microsoft Word document so exactly? Time for us grown-ups to think for ourselves. The docs are in Microsoft Word, ergo are forgeries, ergo Karl Rove really is Svengali or the Kerryites are bunch of bumbling doofuses. I know where my money is. And the metaphor is . . . By Tom Smith Scores of hunters swarm over the mammoth and hack it to pieces. Hundreds of Davids pummle Goliath into submission. Network of amateurs proves superior to pros. Whatever. It is an historical day for the blogospheroidal entity. Belmont Club provides a nice analysis of 60 minutes and Dino Dan getting pulled apart by the ants. Dino Dan's line apparently now is, he's sure the story on W is true because he has other sources in addition to the documents. Can you see why this is not a good argument?, the law professor asks. If somebody tells you a story S, and gives you some documents D to substantiate it, and D turns out be a bunch of crude forgeries, well, I'm afraid the credibility of your story S has also just been shot to hell. Give it up Dan. It time to head out to Jurrasic Park and chase children around, eat lawyers and play in other dino games. There are some important lessons to be learned from all this. First, don't listen to law professors advocating dirty tricks. Or perhaps this wasn't the sort of dirty trick Susan Estrich had in mind, the actually illegal kind. I should think it's a rather awkward time for Democratic dirty trick advocates. On the bright side, I guess she can be famous now for something besides the tank photo. Probably the Kerry campaign ginned up the fake memos on their own. Could they really be that stupid? Well, apparently. Hard to credit, I know. (It was Karl Rove! It was ETs!) If they had only spent as much money getting these documents forged as Kerry spends getting his hair cut, let alone buying a mountain bike, Bush would be in a lot of trouble today, instead of trying not to laugh in public. So there's a lesson for you: when it comes to faking evidence against people, go with quality product. Second, a party that cannot even conduct a competent smear campaign based on fraudulent evidence is not fit to run this great country. I mean, seriously. We're going to let the reform of the CIA, the tracking down of nuclear terrorists, and fighting Al Quaeda and various other sneaky bad guys be run by fools who can't recall that they didn't have PCs back in 1972? I don't think so. Third, if you are a Democrat, stick to intimidating witnesses of sexual improprieties into silence. The Clinton people know how to do that. Any Arkansas thug will pretty much do. It's a simple formula: scare poor woman to death and deny everything. (Remember: this is necessary to keep abortion safe and legal.) But forging documents requires a whole other level of sophistication. In dirty tricks, remember, simple is better. And bimbo eruption squad superstar does not a skilled forger make. It may be too early to tell, but it may be the addition of Clinton hardball players to the Kerry campaign is not working out that well. Any other bright ideas? September 09, 2004
Homework troubles By Tom Smith The textbooks we put in the hands of our school children are a disgrace. I'm trying to help Luke with his math homework, when Patrick, age 11, yells from the kitchen, "Dad, I need your help!" I am busy. I don't want to help. So I yell back, "Why? What is it?" Patrick says, "I need help taking notes!" Patrick is a good notetaker. I suspect shirking. "You know how to take notes!" I yell. He says, "I can't take notes on this stuff! It's just, just sap!" The conversation continued: Dad: What do you mean, sap? Patrick: You know. "People in the past lived on the same planet as we do and danced under the same sun . . . " That sort of sentimental crap. How I am supposed to take notes on that? It's too stupid! He had a point. I asked him to bring me his social studies book. Hmmm. It began with an extended quotation from a Greek source describing what a gentleman Attila the Hun was at a banquet. "Can't you almost see the tender expression on his face?" Atilla the Hun? He who laid waste to cities and put every man, woman and child to the sword? Wasn't he the one who built hills out of the skulls of his enemies? Now we have to be politically correct about the hun hordes? Why do you think they were called hordes? You think they got their evil reputation by being misunderstood? Meanwhile, grateful for the distraction from math, Luke comments "Dad, I think Atilla came as a conqueror, not a liberator," then cackles at his own wit. Then he adds, "I know: 'Vlad's Hospital for the Physically Impaled." More giggling. Jeanne gets home in time to listen to the ongoing dissection of PC history. "We've created monsters," she says, despairing. I suppose the book has its good points. It is trying to help kids understand the past is not that much different from today, in some respects. It is not a scary land inhabited by monsters, but a place that also had kids who liked games and so on. But really! Wouldn't history that was a little closer to the truth be more interesting and prepare kids better for the world? If the past is still present, then doesn't something like decency demand Atilla be treated as the mass murderer or at least the ruthless, bloody minded conqueror he was? He must have been responsible for the deaths of what, millions of children? The Romans saw Attila as a fierce warrior, but as this portrait shows, he was more than that. He was also a man with a unique personality and a family, just like people today. Well, except few people today can claim to have laid waste to continents, driving their enemies before them like cattle (his hordes, I think, thought of their victims exactly as cattle to be herded and slaughtered). It must have been some family. "Daddy, what ethnic sub-group are we going to wipe from the face of the earth today?" A fascinating family. He murdered his brother (as kings did often enough) and is said to have eaten two of his children. But maybe his angry wife killed them and fed them to him as an act of vengeance. Interesting family, in any event. So sorry. We are not going to cut the Hun Devil any slack in this household. There's going to be a little pocket of Western Civilization in Jamul if I have anything to do with it. Did CBS rely on forged documents for Bush National Guard story? By Tom Smith You have to be so careful these days. Well, you don't really have to. It's just that if you're not, some blogger or other internet bird dog will bite you where it hurts. Anyway, RatherBiased.com, dedicated to the noble cause of tracking Dan Rather's political biases, has some forensic, um, speculation that suggests CBS may have unwittingly relied on forged documents for its 60 Minutes story about Bush's unsatisfactory National Guard performance. Who could have done such a thing? It would be downright sleazy! My question is, does Susan Estrich have one of those old selectric typewriters? Maybe it's under her dogeared copies of Our Bodies, Our Selves and The Bell Jar.It G-d, I am so glad the 'seventies are over. But that's another story. MORE . . . Oh, dear. It looks like the docs might actually be forgery. How droll. I tell you, this blogosphere thing has gotten out of control. Men who have devoted their lives to public service are being blah, blah, blah! What right does some little pipsqeak have to question one of the great journalists blah, blah! If this story keeps developing, it promises to be the funniest thing since the blue dress. (Is that dress in the Clinton Library or something? It should be preserved somewhere . . . ) I don't care. Do you care? By Tom Smith Looks like the Democrat counter-attack has begun. I guess the gist of it is W skipped a physical and got his wings yanked, plus it's not clear that he showed up in Alabama, or maybe he did. I don't know. And I don't care. It would be a matter of concern if it told us something about Bush we didn't know already. We know he was an irresponsible youth. His Guard record seems adequate at best. But I suspect most Americans feel they know W pretty well. I doubt anything but really shattering new information will make much of a difference. Kerry, by contrast, is not well known, and was using the Vietnam service thing to brand himself with the public, better than NE liberal. That's partly why the Swiftboat ads hurt. They brand Kerry as a grown up sissy war protestor, and undercut the counter-narrative of war hero. It will be interesting to see how the polls react. I do agree, reluctantly, that the Democrats almost have to do this, though I object on grounds of morality and taste to super-sleazy attacks, like digging up old girlfriends' abortions and making them up if necessary. I just don't think the Guard attack will do much for the Dems beyond slowing their hemmorage. I get the feeling Kerry is really stalled, and attacks on W's Vietnam years won't change that. It may even be a rope-a-dope for Bush, enough to draw Kerry's fire, but all the while distracting him from his only winning issue, which is spreading false hope that a Democrat in the white house would somehow improve the economic picture. What happened to the good ol' days? By Tom Smith Gone are the days when reporters could just write up whatever popped into their heads over a few triple burbons. Now bloggers birddog their every little fabrication. It is unfair and inhumane. September 08, 2004
Another "New" Idea for UC Admissions By Gail Heriot The Los Angeles Daily News reports that State Senator Richard Alarcon and others are urging UCLA to give students who live within 15 miles of its Westwood campus a special preference in admission. UCLA Chancellor Albert Carnesale says the idea will be considered by the appropriate UC authority, but I suspect (and hope) it will die there. "Saying UCLA turns away too many talented minorities, Sen. Richard Alarcon called Wednesday for guaranteed admission for the top 4 percent of students from each high school within 15 miles of the Westwood campus. "Flanked by two dozen students and other community members, Alarcon marched to the Chancellor's Office at the University of California at Los Angeles to present more than 1,300 letters from people in the community. "'UCLA relies far too heavily on GPA (grade-point averages) and SAT (college entrance exam) scores,' said Alarcon, D-Van Nuys, who is running for mayor of Los Angeles. "He added that qualities necessary for success, such as organizational skills, 'can't be measured by the SAT; civic responsibility can't be measured by your GPA.'" Alarcon is only partly right on the last point. I suspect that high school GPA and the SAT are positively correlated with organizational skills and maybe even with a sense of civic responsibility. To be a good student it helps to be organized. Those with a sense of civic responsibility often also have a sense of individual responsibility for their own schoolwork and hence are often good students. But he is right that the correlation is probably loose and that some qualities that can lead to sucess are not measured by the SAT or by high school GPA. I might add, however, that UCLA is an academic institution, where academic skills always matter and that there are lots of routes to success in addition to attendance at a highly competitive academic institution. Alarcon's suggested remedy, however, has noting to do with the problem he claims to see. Living within 15 miles of the UCLA campus is no measure of "organizational skills" and "civic responsibility" at all. Zero. Zilch. Why would the location of one's residence help those applicants who have good organizational skills or a high degree of civic responsibility, but poor academic indicators? Alarcon's true aim is obvious. Many of the high schools around UCLA happen to have a fairly high minority population. Throughout the article he refers to the need to increase the number of minority students at UCLA. Evidently, he thinks this indirect way of raising minority enrollment will not violate California's Proposition 209 the way direct preferences would. This is error. Does he imagine that if the University of Alabama had been surrounded by white neighborhoods that Gov. George Wallace could have legally held down black enrollment by instituting preferences for neighborhood residents? It's not the silliest idea I ever heard concerning UCLA admissions. That prize would have to go to the proposal by a UCLA faculty member (made shortly after Proposition 209 passed) that juvenile delinquents be given preferences at UCLA as a means of achieving diversity. But it's close. September 07, 2004
How to be a loathsome New Yorker By Tom Smith Even funnier, James, is when kids drown in the tidal surge. What a hoot! And then there are those ghastly trailer homes that get blown away. Heee! Heee! They're so tacky, they deserve it. People losing everything, especially cherished, irreplaceable items like photo albums, is good for a chuckle or two. You go, Mother Nature! For just general, overall amusement, there are the marriages that break up because of stress, the kids whose lives never get all the way back to normal, and the jobs that get lost because of economic losses. There's nothing like massive human suffering for a good belly laugh. James, your penance is to go to Florida and help some people, whose feet you are not worthy to lick, clean up what remains of their lives, and then spend a week thinking of 100 ways to be less disgusting. And keep your next shameful admission to yourself. Remember that when people say they have a shameful admission, they are usually just kidding. September 06, 2004
More on Chechnya By Tom Smith A Russian journalist says it's the Russians' fault. At least one US journalist at a real newspaper gets it. Radical Muslim Depravity By Tom Smith This story is making the rounds of blogs (I got it via Polipundit). It's a grim account of the depraved behavior of the Chechen and Arab terrorists inside the school in Beslan. They bayonetted babies, raped 15 year old girls, and of course slaughtered children indiscrimately. This sort of depraved behavior is not unprecedented in the annals of war, but it is still rare enough to make an impression. One naturally asks, how could they be so evil? About a year ago, I shot a rabbit that was chewing on my lawn. The rabbit screamed piteously, and I ended up having to club it to death with the butt of my air rifle. I felt bad about it. Now, I pretty much let the rabbits eat. How could someone be physically able to bayonette an infant, to murder a boy for begging for water, to drag a terrified 15 year old girl from her parents, and rape her, while your friends videotaped it? The animals who did this were far gone in evil, off in a place few of us can imagine, let alone go. I think part of the explanation for the depravity of the terrorists lies in their ideology. That ideology is an offshoot of the Islamic religion, though it seems fair to acknowledge that hardly all, presumably not a majority, of Muslims would approve of such acts. Though, like many, I am taken aback that the condemnations of these atrocities from Muslim leaders have not been exactly deafening. One thing missing, or at least not acknowledged enough, in discussions of terrorism, has been that the war we are in is not really a war against terrorism, which is only a tactic, but a war against an idea, or set of ideas. Because of the influence of various materialist theories of history, and other reasons, I think educated people tend to give ideologies short shrift as powerful forces. German nationalism was brutal and problematic enough, but mixed with the poisonous stew of ideas that was Naziism, it became truly malignant. The same could be said for Russian national imperialism and Leninism/Stalinism. I think a mistake people often make is to underestimate the power of idea systems that are facially ridiculous, but for whatever strange reason, are able to exert strange power over minds. Radical Islam, for want of a better term, seems to be one of those ideologies. I am no expert on it, but I gather that Islamic terrorists believe that if they die as "martyrs," they will get a big supernatural reward. They apparently believe any amount of murdering and cruelty in the name of Allah is permissible. Anything like a normal conscience has apparently been swallowed up by a cultish worship of death. Children are apparently raised to think this way. Infidels are diminished to status less than human, or at any rate, to a level where they can be killed without mercy. These kinds of ideologies are memetic diseases ,that have nothing to recommend them, but their ability to spread. I think it is the duty of civilized countries to suppress them, as we did with the Nazis and and the British did with the Thuggee in India. The "thugs" were worshippers of the goddess of destruction Kali, and made a living by traveling with pilgrims, strangling them and taking their money. They had existed for centuries and had an elaborate cult of deceit, cruelty and death. They were a rich, "other" culture alright, and they were deeply evil. The British did the world a favor by wiping them out. If you want to learn about predatory Hindu death cults, now you have to read a book, and in the pages of a book is the only place they ought to be suffered to exist. American multi-culturalists encourage a view that the world is a big family, marvelously full of exotic belief systems, all deserving of our respect. A more realistic view is that belief systems routinely spring up that are rooted in, and dedicated to, evil, on a scale the bigger, the better, and that such systems are dangerous and need to be destroyed. The sooner we realize this is the case about Islamic death worship, or whatever you want to call it, the better off we will be. Both Christianity and Hinduism have also thrown off weird, ugly and dangerous movements the world is well rid of. Some of the pre-Columbian American cultures were no bargains, either. (Capturing, sexually torturing, then murdering captives by the thousand, for instance, uses up all your multi-culti credits in my book, for instance. The Spanish were brutes, but I wouldn't want to live in a world with nuclear armed Aztecs, either.) Yet for all the variety of evil, it has a familiar face. It enjoys the suffering it inflicts, it even glories in it. Hence the videotaping of the rapes. Children and young women are favorite victims. The power of sex to humiliate is used, as are other human vulnerabilities, such as the love of parents and children for each other, and that as mere humans, we need food, water and respite from heat and cold. The monsters of Beslan join a diabolical fraternity that includes the sadists of the SS, Stalin's henchmen, the Khemer Rouge fanatics, and thousands of others stretching back to the dawn of time. The monsters of Beslan are trying to tell us something, and so are their childish victims, and we should listen. They're telling us there is an evil ideology loose in the world. It has happened before, and now it has happened again. The monsters are saying "we are the ones who murder children in front of their parents, and parents in front of their children. We rape the girls and relish the torments we inflict on our victims, the more innocent, the better. We know who we are. Do you dare oppose us?" It's a good question. |