* * political doodle * *

Yeah, it's been a long time. . .

. . . but I had to post this as an addendum to my last post, where my counterpart insisted (in his comments) that the US never tortured. (See comments under Lucille: Another Terrorist Attack? January 24, 2009)

Back in February 2004, the International Committee of the Red Cross gave Bush administration officials a confidential report, in which they reported that US occupation forces subjected Iraqis (that they had arrested without good reason, according to the ICRC) to abuse and humiliation that sometimes was "tantamount to torture" in violation of the Geneva Conventions. Some of this excessive violence even led to 7 deaths, according to the report.

    "[...]persons deprived of their liberty under supervision of the Military Intelligence were at high risk of being subjected to a variety of harsh treatments ranging from insults, threats and humiliations to both physical and psychological coercion, which in some cases was tantamount to torture, in order to force cooperation with their interrogators."

So, John Ennis, I guess not EVERYBODY believed that the US didn't torture. And, since on January 15, 2004, Red Cross President Jakob Kellenberger expressed his concern to Secretary of State Colin Powell about this torture, he - as a member of the Administration - knew as well.

How to Lose a Re-Election [John Ennis]

This is how presidents lose their re-election bids, when their administration does stuff like this:

The Environmental Protection Agency has moved to declare that greenhouse gases are pollutants that pose a danger to the public’s health and welfare. That determination, once made final, will pave the way for federal regulation of carbon dioxide, methane and other heat-trapping gases linked to global warming.

[...]

The agency sent the finding on Friday to the Office of Management and Budget for review, according to a Web site that lists pending federal rules. Once the budget office clears the finding, it can be signed by Ms. Jackson.

The action, known as an endangerment finding, would allow federal regulation of motor vehicle emissions of greenhouse gases. If further action is taken by the E.P.A., it could open the door to regulatory controls over power plants, oil refineries, cement plants and other factories that emit such gases.

As we all know, if there were too little CO2 in the atmosphere, it would certainly be a health risk to the public. As for how much is too much, I can't wait to see how they determined where to draw the line. I look forward to viewing their scientific procedures, and whether they can survive even a modest amount of scrutiny. It's time for the warming alarmists to put their money where their mouth is. The EPA procedures will be the subject of much debate and litigation. I'm hoping the judiciary will be able to sniff out the bull in the EPA's case.

Blatant Conservative Deception

Here's a case of Fox News blatantly lying and deceiving their viewers: @MediaMatters

That's modern conservatism for ya.  All you conservatives out there, don't bother claiming that this is some kind of isolated incident.  The very existence of conservapedia.org runs counter to that argument.  Here's a site that has the sole and quite candid purpose of being a place where conservatives can go to stick their heads in the sand.

Party of Lincoln to the party of Limbaugh.  What a joke.

The AP's Cognitive Dissonance [John Ennis]

President Obama just broke another campaign promise. Here's a brief clip of candidate Obama criticizing Bush's use of signing statements and promising that he is "not going to use signing statements as a way of doing an end run around Congress." (He also explains what they are for those unfamiliar with the practice).

Here's an AP report from yesterday concerning Obama's signing of the $410 billion omnibus spending bill:

He also issued a "signing statement" in which he objected to provisions of the bill that he said the Justice Department had advised "raise constitutional concerns."

The AP doesn't mention Obama's campaign promise or quote any critics of Obama's signing statement, but they did have time to mention critics of the previous administration:

Bush often issued statements when he signed bills, objecting to parts of the legislation. Critics said the statements often showed government officials how to get around a law if Bush disagreed with it on constitutional grounds.

So, when Obama does something which was controversial for Bush, the AP will sidestep any criticism of Obama, and instead, attack Bush.

This is extraordinarily dangerous; the AP will not hold Obama to any account.

I don't think there has ever been a president who hadn't broken a campaign promise or two. But, we've never had a president whose top qualification for the office was his campaign. Under such circumstances, the broken promises take on additional significance. 

What Spending? [John Ennis]

President Obama has released his first budget and the Times editorial board is thrilled, for it "recognizes what most of Washington has been too scared or ideologically blind to admit: to recover from George W. Bush’s reckless economic policies, taxes must go up."

Why were Bush's economic policies reckless? The deficit was too high, as the Times explains:

Mr. Obama’s blueprint, released on Thursday, commits to cutting by more than two-thirds, by 2013, the $1.75 trillion budget deficit that Mr. Bush dumped on the nation.

A credible pledge to reduce the deficit is imperative. Without it, foreign lenders — who financed the Bush-era deficits and are now paying for the stimulus and bailouts — could lose faith in the nation’s ability or willingness to repay in anything other than rapidly depreciating dollars. That would send interest rates up and the economy down, the worst-case scenario. Controlling the deficit is also necessary to sustain a recovery — when it comes.

Bush didn't dump all $1.75 trillion of the current deficit on the nation. The recently signed stimulus package will contribute a significant chunk to that figure. But, I won't spend too long quibbling over who is responsible for hundreds of billions in deficit spending. Let's assume Obama meets his startling unambitious goal of cutting the deficit by two thirds in 2013. That would still leave a shortfall greater than all of the Bush years except for 2009. So, Obama's goal would be Bush's second worst year.

How can this be if deficit reduction is so important and Obama has pledged to raise taxes? The answer is because Obama's proposed spending increases are enormous. Deficits are a two-figured equation: revenues minus expenses. If you only look at one half, as the Times has, you miss the bigger picture. The Times praises Obama for raising revenues, and ignores the explosion in spending.

This year's deficit was an aberration due to the recession, the bank bailout, and the stimulus. Obama is turning the aberration into a permanent expansion of spending that the tax hikes won't even begin to cover. The Times is willfully ignoring this by focusing on this year's deficit and not what the norm was earlier in the Bush years (average deficits of $250 billion).

When you get into this sort of doublespeak, you have a tendency to outright contradict yourself, as the Times does:

The collapse of the Bush-era economy is ample and awful evidence of the folly of unconstrained debt-fueled growth. The Obama administration has acknowledged the need for deficit spending to stimulate the economy but has vowed that unpaid-for government will not become the norm. Judging from the blueprint, Mr. Obama is not just talking the talk.

Obama's blueprint ends in 2019 and pledges increasing deficits starting in 2014. There is not a single projected surplus. If that's not "unpaid-for government" becoming the norm, what is?

Furthermore, the ten year projections are exceedingly optimistic. They assume economic recovery in 2010 and growth significantly higher than the Bush years despite a carbon cap being imposed, which is itself a hidden tax increase.  

Back to the Times on income taxes:

The proposed increases signal a serious attempt to tame deficits in a way that restores fairness to a tax code that has for too long been tilted in favor of the wealthiest Americans, resulting in budget shortfalls that disproportionately burden everyone else.

Forty percent of Americans don't pay any income taxes. Would any rational person describe our tax code as "tilted in favor of the wealthiest"? 

The Times concludes:

No one who really believes in fiscal responsibility could object to the proposed tax increases. And yet, each one presages a political fight. At issue is not only the tax burden on the wealthiest Americans or election-year debates, but the real-life difficulty of weaning people hooked on unsustainable debt — whether it is unpaid-for tax breaks or over-leveraged buyouts or junk mortgages. It’s a challenge avoided for too long.

If the Times truly believes what it wrote in this paragraph, why won't it look at the spending increases being proposed? The answer, of course, is that the Times does not believe what it wrote. Neither reducing the deficit nor exercising fiscal responsibility are its true priorities.

More Than Fit To Print [John Ennis]

There are legitimate environmental issues, and then there is fluff. When you advocate for less fluff in toilet paper, you are undermining other important concerns, which the New York Times fails to realize:

Americans like their toilet tissue soft: exotic confections that are silken, thick and hot-air-fluffed.

The national obsession with soft paper has driven the growth of brands like Cottonelle Ultra, Quilted Northern Ultra and Charmin Ultra — which in 2008 alone increased its sales by 40 percent in some markets, according to Information Resources, Inc., a marketing research firm.

But fluffiness comes at a price: millions of trees harvested in North America and in Latin American countries, including some percentage of trees from rare old-growth forests in Canada. Although toilet tissue can be made at similar cost from recycled material, it is the fiber taken from standing trees that help give it that plush feel, and most large manufacturers rely on them.

[...]

The country’s soft-tissue habit — call it the Charmin effect — has not escaped the notice of environmentalists, who are increasingly making toilet tissue manufacturers the targets of campaigns. Greenpeace on Monday for the first time issued a national guide for American consumers that rates toilet tissue brands on their environmental soundness.

[...]

“No forest of any kind should be used to make toilet paper,” said Dr. Allen Hershkowitz, a senior scientist and waste expert with the Natural Resource Defense Council.

It sounds like it is the environmentalists, not Americans who have an "obsession with soft paper". But, really, what is the problem here? Aren't trees a renewable resource? If you cut one tree down, can't you plant a replacement? After all, North American forests are growing.

You would think a newspaper would understand this concept, yet the article laments:

But people who buy toilet tissue for their homes — even those who identify themselves as concerned about the environment — are resistant to toilet tissue made from recycled paper.

Maybe those "concerned about the environment" realize this isn't an environmental concern. Not every environmentalist crusade trumpeted by Greenpeace is about the environment. Some causes are simply aimed at training the masses to do without luxury. Today you forego soft t.p., tomorrow they ask you to ditch your car. 

But, if the Times is still worried about this crisis, let's put two and two together. The Times wants Americans to use more recycled toilet paper. Meanwhile, the Times is printed on recycled paper. Hmmmmmm......

Zeitgeist Update: Debates Are Over [John Ennis]

Several Republican governors are voicing concerns about the unemployment insurance portion of the newly signed "stimulus" bill. In an editorial, the New York Times opines that "(t)his behavior reinforces the disturbing conclusion that the Republican Party seems more interested in ideological warfare than in working on policies that get the country back on track."

The Times explains what the bill would require of the states:

States that accept the stimulus money aimed at the unemployed are required to abide by new federal rules that extend unemployment protections to low-income workers and others who were often shorted or shut out of compensation. This law did not just materialize out of nowhere. It codified positive changes that have already taken place in at least half the states.

To qualify for the first one-third of federal aid, the states need to fix arcane eligibility requirements that exclude far too many low-income workers. To qualify for the rest of the aid, states have to choose from a menu of options that include extending benefits to part-time workers or those who leave their jobs for urgent family reasons, like domestic violence or gravely ill children.

Basically, if you accept the federal money, you have to change your "arcane" laws. But, if you protest and decline the money, you are engaged in "ideological warfare." These governors don't realize the laws of their state are no longer their responsibility - it is now the business of Washington and the New York Times. Saying "no thanks" is not an option.

The governors are worried that the new standards will require the states to raise taxes in the future when the stimulus money runs out. Here is how the Times came to reject this thinking (emphasis added):

The governors are blowing smoke when they suggest that the federal unemployment aid would lead directly to new state taxes. No one knows what the economic climate will be when the federal aid has been used up several years from now. But by dumping billions of dollars into shrinking state unemployment funds, which puts money into the hands of people who spend it immediately on food and shelter, the stimulus could help the states through the recession and into a time when unemployment trust funds can be replenished. In other words, the stimulus could make a tax increase less likely.

Did you follow that? I'll restate it: because future tax increases "could" be "less likely", the governors are merely "blowing smoke." This is the Times' idea of taking a chunk out of the governors argument that accepting the federal money is in reality a coerced tax hike in the future.

I'm not sure how much the stimulus is going to help end the recession. The Times says "the stimulus could help their states", so they're not sure either. Why then is it wrong for governors to reject the part of the stimulus that could force future tax hikes? Well, because the Times actually doesn't care about raising taxes:

But even if new taxes are required at some point, the new federal standards would protect more unemployed workers than ever before and bring states like Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas into the 21st century.

For the Times, it was about expanding government all along. These states need to get in tune with the 21st Century models like California - you know, the ones that are about to go bankrupt and need a bailout from the solvent states.

The Times concludes:

Governors like Mr. Jindal should be worrying about how to end this recession while helping constituents feed and house their families — not about finding ways to revive tired election-year arguments about big spending versus small government.

Doesn't Jindal know that the size of government can only be debated in election years? Didn't he realize that when Obama won last November it meant his Administration had the right to set Louisiana's tax policies? 

Only the Times could spend an entire editorial arguing for the expansion of government in Louisiana and then end by criticizing that state's governor for having made a rebuttal. But, who could blame the Times, Obama made the same argument in his inaugural. It's the current liberal zeitgeist. Ideas regarding larger government could work, while Republican ideas shouldn't even be mentioned. Another debate has been declared over. 

UPDATE (2/25/09): It seems a Democratic governor might decline the unemployment section of the "stimulus" package.

Normal for the Times [John Ennis]

A Baghdad museum which was looted during the fall of Saddam, has just partially reopened. The New York Times notes that only eight of the 26 galleries are available to visitors, while offering this nugget:

Yet the museum is only one institution in a place where little — not electricity or even sewerage — functions as it should, nearly six years after the beginning of the war that toppled Saddam Hussein. The museum, like life here, may be more secure than at any other time since then, but it is not normal.

Was life under Hussein's fascist regime "normal"? That's the Times' implication. The museum was normal in 2003, isn't now, and nor is life in Baghdad. 

I'm sorry the museum isn't functioning as it should. I must confess, though, that the fact that Saddam's rape rooms are no longer operating, nor his dictatorship, is of more importance. I guess that makes me a 'glass is half-full' type of guy.

The Times can be opposed to the Iraq invasion, but please don't write pieces about a looted museum to argue life was normal under Saddam.

Liberal Creationism [John Ennis]

I received a comment earlier this week that deserves a full rebuttal in a new post. In a discussion about global warming and evolution, the reader wrote:

Everything in the natural world seeks equilibrium. It absolutely is a balancing act. When one part of a given ecosystem goes out of whack, it effects everything else because the equilibrium is disrupted. This is why when certain plants and animals are introduced into an environment where they did not evolve, it causes chaos. But when there's equilibrium, or balance, the ecosystem thrives. This is a fundamental concept of nature that apparently you missed in 7th grade science class.

[...]

Now, Natural Selection is a process which is both related and unrelated to the equilibrium concept. In one case, when there is an imbalance, or a niche, it leaves room for the evolution of new species to fill that niche. But in other cases, such as humans, species can create their own niche and introduce imbalance into the system. From there the system seeks to balance itself out again, but it's a slow process that takes hundreds or thousands of years.

The natural world cannot "seek" anything. It cannot "seek" order, balance or equilibrium. If you believe it does, and want to impute higher motives onto the natural world - then you are making a religious argument.

If one accepts the Theory of Evolution - you have to accept all of it. You can not cherry-pick when evolution applies and when it does not. There is nothing in the theory that would suggest a goal of balance or equilibrium. 

If a lioness gives birth to a vastly faster lion that can destroy all of the gazelles on the Serengeti, and that lion's genes come to dominate the gene pool, and the gazelles go extinct because they did not gain an adaptation themselves - nature doesn't care that the equilibrium between lion and gazelle was broken. The lioness would not kill her cub before this could happen. Similarly, if a superbug caused the lions to die off through disease, nature doesn't seek to repopulate the lion to restore balance before the gazelles can run amok.

The vast majority of all species that have ever existed are now extinct. Extinctions don't just occur in mass cataclysms live meteor strikes, or climate change. They occur all the time. Evolution does not stop its processes when there is a supposed equilibrium, and an environment where extinctions are constantly occuring should not be described as "balanced".

The reader is making the same mistake the early naturalists did. They saw a snapshot of nature, and mistook it for equilibrium. They thought an ordered natural world was evidence of the work of a creator. But, the picture they saw was incomplete. Evolution demands that the balance is an illusion. Creatures evolve. Some thrive, others die off. New species develop and extinction destroys others. If you take a snapshot you don't see this. But, over time, it's obvious.

Species do not fill niches. The equilibrium cannot be "unrelated" to natural selection. Natural selection does not stop because there is balance. Natural selection is always operating. That's why the concept of equilibrium is false. The reader notes that if all bees died, the ecosystem would collapse. It's because the ecosystem evolved and adapted to the presence of bees. It's symbiotic, and the sudden removal of bees would cause a collapse for those who can't adapt. But natural selection could bring upon such a collapse and not care. Natural selection doesn't care if ecosystems thrive. Natural selection could drive an entire ecosystem into extinction if it produced a disease that blocked photosynthesis. Wouldn't that introduce imbalance into the system? But the Theory of Evolution dicates that it could happen.

Evolution doesn't always take hundreds of thousands of years. It can operate more quickly when there are massive impacts or when species make a leap. 

The natural world was constantly changing before there were humans, and would continue to change regardless of human influence. There was no Eden. There was no static creation that climate change would undermine. If the Earth were to warm this century (or cool), as it has done many times in the past, no Eden-like balance will have been overthrown. It would be just another environmental change the natural world would adapt to.

Of course, this evolutionary truth undermines the global warming alarmists claims. It's much easier to argue the "balanced" ecosystem will be overturned by a two degree temperature rise if we rely on a more static view of nature. Apparently, that is the view the reader was learning in the seventh grade, but it contradicts Darwinism. It's a rejection of the Theory of Evolution in order to advance the theory of anthropogenic global warming. It's the liberals' version of creationism.  

I've Seen The Future Of Liberalism [John Ennis]

One thing I had hoped to see after the 2008 election was a decrease in some of the more unsupportable slanders of the outgoing Bush Administration. I thought the decrease in its political utility after Obama's victory might allow some of the more fair-minded varieties on the left to revisit certain controversies in a new light and drop from their repertoire baseless criticisms. Slate, though home to its share of Bush haters, often demonstrates an ability to rise above the foolishness (but not today).

K. Anthony Appiah has posted a review of Alan Wolfe's The Future of Liberalism. The first half is a decent intellectual exercise; the second: Bush bashing (emphasis added): 

The last of Wolfe's most original trio of temperaments—the taste for realism—can also be traced back to Kant. We have just lived through an anti-liberal administration hostile to science, one that fantasized we could load the atmosphere with carbon while keeping the Earth's ecology in balance and asserted, against all the evidence, that urging sexual abstinence would stop the spread of AIDS. Wolfe argues that it is liberals, not conservatives, who dare to know.

(...)

... and that it is the (Republican) party's hostility to realism that explains the unwillingness to accept scientific arguments about global warming.

If this is true, how do you explain the unwillingness of many scientists to accept the global warming argument? Furthermore, how do you explain liberals' hostility to scientific arguments criticizing global warming alarmism? They exist and are not merely the product of Exxon-funded crackpots, as liberals would have you believe.

As for keeping the Earth's ecology in "balance", that's a completely inappropriate way to describe the environment, but explains Appiah's readiness to view carbon dioxide increases as a danger. Nature is constantly changing - it is not a balancing act. Perhaps Appiah has heard of the theory of evolution? How does that theory mesh with a view of a balanced environment? If nature is balanced - how does natural selection fit in? 

It's probably better to keep evolution, and toss out ideas of "balance."

More canards from Wolfe:

Wolfe argues, for example, that it is the modern Republican Party's distaste for governance that explains the stunning incompetence of the federal government's response to Hurricane Katrina or of its occupation of Iraq...

The federal government did not occupy Iraq, the military did, and I've never heard anyone refer to the army as a federal government program or that Republicans have an aversion towards it.

As for Katrina, Appiah thinks Wolfe is wrong about that anyway:

The failures of FEMA in New Orleans look to me as much like the results of cronyism as of a bad theory.

New Orleans wasn't the only American city to flood due to a natural disaster during the Bush years. However, the federal response to the second incident avoided criticism. Was it because Republicans suddenly lost their distaste for government (Wolfe) or because Bush ended cronyism (Appiah) or because the local response in Cedar Rapids, prevented the collapse of law and order which FEMA needs to operate? FEMA is not a police force - it can't hand out bottled water and write checks when there is anarchy. If liberals want to prevent another Katrina, they'd better honestly evaluate what went wrong or we're doomed to repeat the mistakes. Bush is gone, and there's nothing more to be gained by continuing to repeat dubious arguments as to who is responsible for the slow response to Katrina. 

Near the end of the piece, Appiah offers a further critique of Wolfe:  

The argument against conservatism lies in what the world would look like if conservatives carried out their policies competently. On that issue, the Bush years may offer less insight than Wolfe believes.

Want to know what the world would look like if liberals had their way? California, which is in a free fall. Twenty years of liberal dominance has turned the envy of the world into a fiscal basket case. California used to have a conservative streak to it, but tipped solidly to the left a generation ago. Its geography, climate, resources and wealth should make it one of the pillars of the country. Instead, it's going to the solvent states, cap in hand, looking for a massive bailout. I think that deserves mention in any analysis of the future of liberalism. 

Battle of Basra Already Forgotten? [John Ennis]

Today's Washington Post has a cautious and rather pessimistic opinion piece about the state of Iraq. While it raises several valid points, it reaches its gloomy conclusions by omitting key data. For example, here's what is said about Moqtada al-Sadr:

One of the least understood of those "shady guys" is also one of the most prominent -- Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. The U.S. government has consistently underestimated him, first in going into Iraq and then in 2004, when he violently confronted the American superpower. He not only survived those encounters but also emerged more powerful and was brought into the U.S.-created Iraqi government. If he can stay alive, more power is likely to flow to him.

Nowhere in the piece does the writer mention that last year, al-Maliki sent the Iraqi Army into Basra to dislodge militants loyal to Sadr. After this defeat of the Sadrists, the Iraq Army was able to enter Sadr City, the Shia dominated slum of Baghdad which had heretofore been a 'no go' zone. Sadr might have been more powerful in 2004 after encountering the superpower - but it's not the case now, and neither did the candidates he supported fare well in the recent elections.

The piece goes on to overestimate Iran's influence in Iraq, further laying the foundations for its unduly negative conclusions. 

The First 100 Days? [John Ennis]

Last Election Day the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed at 9625. Yesterday, it closed at 7850. That's an 18 percent decline in 100 days.

The Obama Sales Pitch [John Ennis]

Obama went into campaign mode this week in an attempt to sell his "stimulus" plan to the American people. His efforts reaped some rewards, as Rasmussen reports that public support increased to 44 percent from last week's 37.

Obama's main tactic was to terrify the citizenry, as The Economist reports:

FOR a man whose bumper stickers promised “Hope not Fear”, Barack Obama knows how to scare people. “If we don’t act immediately,” he told the citizens of Elkhart, Indiana on February 9th, “our nation will sink into a crisis that, at some point, we may be unable to reverse.”

No one doubts that America’s economy is in a bad way. But the notion that it might never recover was previously entertained only by bearded survivalists stockpiling beans and ammunition in remote log cabins. Queried by a reporter about his “dire language”, he could have admitted that he exaggerated a bit. Instead, he launched a waffly attack—three times longer than the Gettysburg address—on all those who doubted his warnings.

These tactics, straight from Al Gore's playbook, might increase public support for the "stimulus", but they serve a second, more important function. The more Obama insists the economy with tank without the stimulus, the more he can crow when the economy recovers, regardless of whether the stimulus was the cause. In fact, the "stimulus" could do more harm than good and still be seen as a success if the 2010 economy is compared to Obama's dire warning (smoething most of the media will be happy to do). The Economist, though not convinced of the merits of the "stimulus", realizes that Obama can't lose:

One thing is certain, though. When the economy recovers, which it surely will, he will get the credit.

That's why Obama wants this "stimulus":

• It will vastly increase government spending. Once the benchmark is raised, Obama can replace "stimulus" spending with a "universal" health plan circa 2011.
• There is no scenario where Obama will be blamed for making the economy worse.

Obama has argued that the plan will create or save four million jobs. When one considers how difficult it will be to identify which jobs were saved by the stimulus, you should expect the President's claim to become more grandiose over the coming months. If 100 million Americans are still working a year from now, this plan will be credited with saving all those jobs. Who would be able to prove otherwise?

As the United States consumer retrenches after a binge of debt-driven spending, Obama's solution is more of what got us here. After all, there is not a single example of a stimulus bill ending a recession, yet he's about to borrow a trillion dollars to fund a plan where 70% of the spending is useless. If anyone thinks this bill is going to build an infrastructure for the 21st Century, I've got a bridge to sell you.

The Left Needs Better Ideas Regarding Iran [John Ennis]

Are you worried about Iran's nuclear weapons program and what can be done to stop it? The New York Times' Roger Cohen is in Tehran and advises against air strikes, because "(a)ny U.S. attack would... lock in an America-hating Islamic Republic for the next half-century." I guess the argument he is making to the hawks is that if you hate the Iranian regime, an attack would guarantee its survival without accomplishing much, which is "unthinkable."

After blaming the current troubles on Bush who had "undermined European diplomacy", Cohen acknowledges that it will be harder for Israel to be as relaxed with Iran's nuclear aspirations as he suggests Washington should be. But, Cohen spoke to a former commander in Iran's Revolutionary Guard who thinks an Israeli attack "'would be one of its stupidest decisions.'" I guess one's enemy would know better than anyone else about the wisdom of attacking them, so Israel should take their adversary's counsel seriously even if it was given with Iranian (and not Israeli) interests in mind.

Nevertheless, Cohen has concrete ideas for solving the problem. First, additional sanctions "are a bad idea." Instead, Biden should meet with the Iranians, and then, Obama (emphasis added):

... must break with the Bush years in more than words. That requires a solemn declaration that the United States recognizes and no longer seeks to destabilize the Islamic Republic — an implicit renunciation of force.

How is a "solemn declaration" that includes an "implicit renunciation of force" a break that is "more than words"? All it is are words.

But, alas, words are the only advice Cohen has. He acknowledges that "Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader and ultimate arbiter, will not easily be swayed from a course that would shred the nuclear nonproliferation treaty, of which Iran is a signatory, among other disasters." Luckily, however, other ayatollahs have changed their minds in the past. After all, Cohen notes, it was only twenty years ago that "Khomeini changed his mind" about "prosecuting the war against Iraq until victory" because if the bloodbath didn't end "disaster would follow". Thankfully, he did, and "(p)eace came." So, Iranian leadership can change its behavior after fighting an eight year war that had killed half a million of its own people. Because of this precedent, Cohen concludes that:

Khamenei’s ultimate duty is to preserve the revolution by being true to Khomeini’s example. Obama might, obliquely, remind him of that.

Somehow, I don't think Khamenei shares Cohen's view that violating the nonproliferation treaty would be a disaster that requires a change of course similar to the peace agreement that ended the Iran-Iraq debacle. How is going nuclear a threat to the Islamic revolution? Cohen started out by saying airstrikes would strengthen the regime. Cohen is against sanctions, and an Israeli attack would be "stupid." So, what scenario leads to a disaster for Iran that threatens the revolution? What exactly would Obama be reminding him of?

Is this the best the anti-war left has to offer regarding Iranian nukes? Cohen acknowledges, quoting Benjamin Netanyahu, that this "is 'the greatest challenge' now facing 21st-century leaders", yet his solution is to send Biden to tell Khamenei to follow his predecessor's example and simply change his mind on this one. 

Is this what is meant by smart power?

Rich's Belligerent SOS [John Ennis]

One gets the feeling that Frank Rich doesn't have much faith in the Democrats' "stimulus" plan. Today's column was the usual 20 paragraphs of bashing Republicans, so that's not new. But, it's what he bashed Republicans for that's worth noting:

The House stimulus bill is an inevitably imperfect hodgepodge-in-progress... No one should expect the Republicans to give the new president carte blanche, fall blindly into lock step or be “post-partisan.” (Though that’s exactly what the G.O.P. demanded of Democrats with Bush: You were either with him or with the terrorists.)

But you might think that a loyal opposition would want to pitch in and play a serious role at a time of national peril. Not by singing “Kumbaya” but by collaborating on possible solutions and advancing a policy debate that many Americans’ lives depend on. 

The Republicans have yet to obstruct the passage of the stimulus bill, they just haven't voted for it. Nor do they have to vote for it, for it to pass. For this, or any other solution, the President does not need the GOP.  Why does Rich want Republicans more involved now? I never knew him to suggest that Republicans have brilliant ideas? In fact, he spends most of this piece bashing them for having none on this issue (except for tax cuts, which he rejects). So, why does Rich want Republican help?

It is clear Rich thinks the stimulus is a dud of a plan. His defense of it is sparing. Republican involvement might not make it better, but would certainly give Democrats political cover (something Rich does care about).

The Democrats have not held the Presidency for eight years, something which Rich has screamed about at length. His party finally gets in the big chair and their first major legislative action makes him squeamish. Rich is finding out it's easier to criticize than to rule.

It is a strange piece: 20 paragraphs of GOP bashing, but the author is actually asking for their aid.

 

Reporting Double Standards [John Ennis]

David Sanger has a "news analysis" in today's New York Times. His topic: the Democrat's "stimulus" plan. In paragraph 19, he gets around to Republican concerns that this plan is a massive waste of resources:

Republicans see a chance to do something they could do only quietly, and rarely, until former President George W. Bush flew out of the city 11 days ago: protest huge deficit spending. Now, they are freer to complain — as Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky did on Saturday in the Republican response to Mr. Obama’s address, when he argued that “permanent spending would be expanded by about $240 billion” in the House of Representatives, which would “lock in bigger and bigger deficits every year.”

(Mr. McConnell was less vocal in his opposition when President Bush declared that the combination of 9/11, a downturn and the expansion of the military budget required deficit spending.)

Mr. McConnell might have been less vocal regarding Bush's deficits, but if memory serves, certain Democrats had quite a bit to say at the time. However, don't expect Sanger to address their about face on deficit spending now that Bush is gone. After all, this is a Democratic paper masquerading as journalism.

However, what makes Sanger's bias truly glaring is the equivalence he's assumed without any hint of differentiation. Sanger assumes that all deficit spending is the same. Bush argued the nation "required deficit spending" while the Republicans never protested "huge deficit spending" under Bush, so their complaints about Obama's plan to increase the deficit are hypocritical.

Of course, deficits are not all the same, and there is a big difference between a $300 billion shortfall, and a $1.3 trillion one. Can't a politician draw a line without being accused of a double standard? When thought in those terms, the Democrats' criticism of their opponents' smaller deficits is the real about face. Alas, that didn't make it into Sanger's piece. We know why. 

Opposition Mounting [John Ennis]

Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight is a talented political analyst and his coverage of last year's election was excellent. However, I think he's missing the boat with this take on Republican opposition to Obama's trillion dollar stimulus plan:

As I have opined before, the Democratic message will essentially be one of two things in 2010:

1. Obama's accomplished X, Y and Z and showed the country the way forward, let's give him leaders in Congress who can continue to deliver for the middle class, or,

2. Obama accomplished X, but he couldn't accomplish Y and Z because the Republicans obstructed those measures to protect the special interests ... let's put partisanship behind us and elect leaders in Congress who can represent the common good.

How important will partisanship be in 2010 after a couple of years of Democratic control of both Congress and the Presidency? It's very difficult for the ruling party to make additional gains under those circumstances, so Republicans should have some momentum by default.

More importantly, there's a third option that Silver doesn't mention - one where Obama accomplishes X, and it's deemed a disaster. In that scenario, Republicans would be better served to have opposed X (Obama's misnamed stimulus plan, in this case). After all, Obama was elected in large part because he opposed the Iraq War from the beginning (which the public grew to view as a serious mistake).

Furthermore, there is growing indications that the public is seeing the wisdom of opposing the "stimulus plan". The latest Rasmussen poll shows 42 percent in favor, with 39 percent opposed. More interestingly, independent voters who supported the plan last week 37-36, are now opposed 50-27. Even though the mainstream media solidly supports the plan, opposition arguments are reaching voters (that, and when Pelosi has tried justifying the "stimulus" in the plan, it's been disastrous).

This plan is a major policy mistake. Republican opposition is not only justified as a matter of principle, there is less and less political downside, seeing as almost all public support for the plan now comes from registered Democrats.

 

The Pragmatist [John Ennis]

Now that we are entering a supposed era of pragmatism, not ideology, we can expect the media to play its role of spinning things the correct way. Hence, we have the double talk of the Boston Globe when Obama does something that might be considered controversial (emphasis added):

President Obama didn't do it symbolically on the 36th anniversary Thursday of the Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion in the United States.

But yesterday, he quietly signed an executive order ending the ban on federal funds for international groups that promote or perform abortions. In contrast to his orders earlier this week, including banning torture, reporters were not invited to record the moment.

First, Roe didn't legalize abortion. It was legal in plenty of states before the decision. Roe made abortion a constitutional right. It barred the states from criminalizing abortion.

More importantly, another way of saying "ending the ban" is 'ordered the funding.' But, I can see why the Globe chose the more passive wording. Abortion, one of the most controversial issues of our time, is going to be subsidized internationally with taxpayer money. That sounds pretty controversial to me, but apparently not to the White House, who argue that the move helps end a divisive debate:

Last night, the White House issued a statement from Obama saying that the rule had "undermined efforts to promote safe and effective voluntary family planning in developing countries." "For too long, international family planning assistance has been used as a political wedge issue, the subject of a back and forth debate that has served only to divide us. I have no desire to continue this stale and fruitless debate," he said.

If abortion is a wedge issue, isn't forcing opponents of the procedure to pay for it with their tax dollars probably the most divisive thing one can do? Isn't that the reason the order was signed "quietly"?

Of course, none of this will stop the media from continuing to hail Obama as a pragmatic unifier.

LUCILLE: Another Terrorist Attack?

"Another terrorist attack is going to happen. We feel certain of that." - Ret. General James P. Cullen

That's what retired General James P. Cullen believes. He and about 40 retired military people have been meeting since 2004 to discuss policies directed by the civilian leadership in this country. This group of rear admirals, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs and four-star generals are not likely to be accused of being soft on terrorists. It includes Gen. Harry E Soyster, the former director of the Defense Intelligence Agency and Rear Adm. John D. Houston.

You'd be in good company if you thought this group has grave reservations about the new Obama presidency.

But you would be wrong.

According to Jim Dwyer in the New York Times, Gen. Cullen has spent the last four years trying to get the secret CIA prisons and the Guantanamo Bay detention camp closed and for the civilian leadership to ban the use of torture in "pursuit of intelligence."

What?

Back in early 2004, Cullen believed that the abuse in Iraq at Abu Ghraib was "the aberrant acts of a few twisted individuals, and a failure of their commanders." But he grew to believe that Dick Cheney's announcement that 9/11 would force the U.S to "work through, sort of the dark side, if you will" was the equivalent of a wink and a nod from the Administration to torture and humiliate at will.

""We knew this was not the military we left. . . people were in the services because they wanted. . . to better themselves and serve their country."

General Cullen and many of his fellow generals and admirals met with every candidate during the last election cycle, with a policy that they wouldn't make any endorsements or publicly support any candidate. Instead, they were determined to convince them that humane treatment of prisoners would not weaken our defense, "but strengthen it."  They know - as we would if the previous administration hadn't so blatantly lied to us - that a real terrorist in detention could quite easily mislead us with intentionally false information or, more likely, say anything under torture just to make it stop.

So, if Ret. General Cullen and his compatriots think another attack is inevitable, why are they against torture (and in favor of President Obama's ban)?

"Another terrorist attack is going to happen. We feel certain of that. It's not going to be because we ended torture. We will get better intelligence without it. And we keep our values."

Better intelligence. That's what we have to look forward to.

Amen to that.

If You Can't Find Some, Make It Up [John Ennis]

The Washington Post went fishing for sexism and put the catch on its front page:

Does a Glass Ceiling Persist in Politics?

Kennedy's Withdrawal Illustrates a Double Standard, Some Say

By Anne E. Kornblut

Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, January 23, 2009; Page A01

With her abrupt exit this week from consideration for the Senate, Caroline Kennedy added her name to a growing list: women who have sought the nation's highest offices only to face insurmountable hurdles.

Caroline Kennedy sought a seat that was previously occupied by a woman. The seat was vacant because the woman who held it had been appointed to a higher office. Instead of Kennedy, a different woman will replace the earlier occupant.

How can the "insurmountable hurdles" faced by Kennedy have anything to do with her gender? Not only is it inconceivable, an argument can be made that her gender actually helped her. (I suspect Governor Paterson was under pressure to fill Hillary Clinton's seat with a woman).

So, the thesis of the article is unsupportable. How did it make it onto the front page of a national paper? Is it because even the most spurious claim of discrimination will receive earnest attention from the mainstream media?

Ironically, when the Post publishes unsupportable charges, they undermine the cause of decreasing discrimination by adopting the role of the 'boy who cried wolf'. If the Post were to find actual discrimination, their credibility would be undermined by this piece.

Why would they unwittingly diminish their credibility on sexual discrimination issues? Is it because actual cases of discrimination are harder to find, so they're reduced to blowing the whistle on false claims? Does this piece, by using a ridiculous example to charge that there is a glass ceiling, inadvertently serve as evidence that actual sexual discrimination is almost non-existent?

LUCILLE: Yes, I Did!

  Tell me: where can you go where two million screaming, ecstatic people of all races, religions, ethnic groups and ages can inhabit a fairly constricted area without pushing, anger or unkindness? I'll tell you, because I was there - President Barack Obama's inauguration.

Here's what I saw and heard: people, incredibly happy to see George Bush leaving, to see America begin to return to the world. People were smiling, shaking hands. helping each other. They were raptly listening, anxious to not miss a word. They were even willing to let George Bush and Dick Cheney take the stage without giving them the old Bronx cheer. Instead, they cheered - glad to see you go, George! Nah nah nah nah, nah nah nah nah, hey hey hey,  goodbye.

And when our new President spoke, you could hear a pin drop. He spoke to everyone, Christian, Jew, Muslim, Hindu, non-believer, reminding us that this country is for all of us, not just followers of Christ. He repudiated Bush's policies - like torture and go-it-alone aggression - and promised that we would rejoin the community of countries. And he told us it wasn't only up to him - that we all had to accept responsibility for where this country will go. Ah! Yes, we were happy to be asked to share the sacrifice - isn't that what being part of America is all about? And, yes, we were all proud - more proud than we'd been in years - to be Americans. We waved our flags, we sang our songs.

And, even with 2 million people and a total of 40,000 troops and police, not one arrest happened.

I went to Washington and saw Barack Obama and the American people make history

Yes, I did.

   

 

 

     

Feminism v. Fox [John Ennis]

Fox has a new crime drama, "Lie to Me", debuting tonight. The New York Times review of it is an ode to political correctness. Here's the first graph:

During the past decade, Fox has rarely been the place to go looking for the lessons in collectivism manifest on series like “The Unit” and “Lost” and “Law & Order,” all of which pay tribute to collaborative problem-solving on networks not owned by Rupert Murdoch. Fox doesn’t smell like team spirit. It is a Randian territory of lone saviors (Jack Bauer, John Connor, Gregory House) bushwhacking through impending catastrophe with the weaponry of a singular genius.

Similarly, the review has only one name on the byline, suggesting it wasn't a collectivist effort either, but the work of a single genius (especially for sneaking in the verb "bushwhacking").

The program is about a Dr. Cal Lightman, who specializes in criminal lie detection. Considering the number of police procedurals on the air, the show changes things up by having Lightman work in the private sector, ruffling the reviewer's feathers:

The show further embeds the network’s individualist ideologies with a view that suggests private industry can always go the government suits one better. No line item for the Office of Management and Budget, Lightman operates under the auspices of his own consulting firm, the Washington-based Lightman Group, which the feds reluctantly seek out when they are tripped up, presumably by their own inexorable incompetence.

Presumably there are other industries the government can do a better job running. Are state-owned newspapers better than private ones like the Times?

But, there's a deeper problem than Lightman's for-profit motives, one that goes straight to the nature of the character himself. Lightman should be female:

Nancy Drew was pretty good at breaking down deception strategies, too. So was Reese Witherspoon in “Legally Blonde.” Throughout the history of modern popular culture we’ve gone in and out of defining female intelligence in terms of intuitive displays. I’m not sure what it means that television’s reigning intuitionists are now male (Lightman joins the strike force of Adrian Monk and “The Mentalist’s” Patrick Jane). And I’m not sure whether the regendering is a democratizing net positive for feminism or whether we should take offense that women’s intuition translates somewhere along the spectrum of cute while its male counterpart is meant to suggest the power of a mind brilliantly deducing.

Indeed. The culture is sick. But, is the latent misogyny and anti-collectivism tolerable if it's wrapped in what is still an entertaining show? Alas, the author has found questions, but not answers:

Against my better judgment, I suspect I’ll keep watching “Lie to Me” until I figure it out.

I guess modern feminists need to pick and choose their battles.

When Analogies Are Tested [John Ennis]

Former New York Governor Mario Cuomo has written a piece comparing Obama to Lincoln. This generated the most ridiculous headline I've seen in quite some time, courtesy of New York Newsday:

Abraham Lincoln may well have had it easier

At the time of Lincoln's inauguration, seven Southern states had already seceded. The first shots of the Civil War would be fired six weeks later. The War would be the costliest in our nation's history, leaving 600,000 Americans dead. Lincoln lost one of his son's while in office, and was assassinated at the start of his second term. Does anyone truly think Obama's term will be more difficult?

Here's my favorite graph from the analysis:

Lincoln knew, as Obama surely does, that we cannot end terror here, in the Middle East or anywhere in the world just by having the world's most powerful weapons and the best fighting force. We have to add to this force whatever is needed to provide the realistic hope for opportunity and dignity that quiets rage and produces peace here at home and across the globe.

Is that what Lincoln was thinking when he unleashed Sherman on the South? Or, was he thinking that after years of bloody conflict, it was the only way to finally crush the spirit of the rebellion? I'm not dismissing the vague concept of "whatever is needed to provide" hope that will produce world peace, I just don't know what it has to do with Lincoln.

Liberals Destroy The University And Blame Capitalists [John Ennis]

The New York Times' Stanley Fish is not the first to worry about the state of today's universities, but must his assignment of blame be so predictable? In this week's column, the professor is reviewing a former student's book on the decline of liberal arts education:

How has this happened? According to Donoghue, it’s been happening for a long time, at least since 1891, when Andrew Carnegie congratulated the graduates of the Pierce College of Business for being “ fully occupied in obtaining a knowledge of shorthand and typewriting” rather than wasting time “upon dead languages.”

Industrialist Richard Teller Crane was even more pointed in his 1911 dismissal of what humanists call the “life of the mind.” No one who has “a taste for literature has the right to be happy” because “the only men entitled to happiness . . . are those who are useful.”

[snip]

What is happening in traditional universities where the ethos of the liberal arts is still given lip service is the forthright policy of for-profit universities, which make no pretense of valuing what used to be called the “higher learning.” John Sperling, founder of the group that gave us Phoenix University, is refreshingly blunt: “Coming here is not a rite of passage. We are not trying to develop value systems or go in for that ‘expand their minds’” nonsense.

The for-profit university is the logical end of a shift from a model of education centered in an individual professor who delivers insight and inspiration to a model that begins and ends with the imperative to deliver the information and skills necessary to gain employment.

Don't you see: industrialists and capitalists are destroying the university! Of course, only capitalist societies have ever produced great universities, but we'll ignore that chicken/egg quandary for now. Fish continues:

Those ideas have now triumphed (Carnegie and Crane are victorious), and this means, Donoghue concludes, “that all fields deemed impractical, such as philosophy, art history, and literature, will henceforth face a constant danger of being deemed unnecessary.” And as a corollary “professors will come to be seen by everyone (not just those outside the academy) as unaffordable anomalies.”

Here's the problem with Fish & Donoghue's argument: rich societies are the only ones that can afford to focus on the fields they argue are evaporating. So, capitalism is essential for a healthy university system, for such affluence allows large swathes of the population to study fields that aren't directly engaged in wealth creation.

I can understand why Phoenix University is not the professor's cup of tea. But, does its rise signal the demise of all institutions? Far fewer students were enrolled in college 50 years ago, do all the additional students we now see choosing non-liberal arts courses necessarily mean those studies are dying? It's true that today's universities are more likely to have a focus on job training, but there are many more schools to begin with. The reasons are manifold, but it stands to reason that more varieties of educational experiences should allow the liberal arts to maintain a niche. The fact that liberal arts is now a small fish in a big pond rather than a big fish in a small pond, doesn't mean the fish is endangered.

But, there's a deeper problem with Fish's contentions. He makes no mention of the massive changes to the liberal arts themselves that have occurred since the upheavals of the 1960s. Fish focuses on a 'Great Books' approach to the liberal arts in his piece, but many aspects of that approach came under attack from liberal arts professors already in the university system (not from capitalist outsiders). The curriculum was questioned as too Eurocentric, sexist, imperialist and homophobic. New departments arose devoted to oppression studies and the like. Out of this came multiculturalism and political correctness.

Now is not the time for a lengthy explanation of the problems with multiculturalism and p.c., but, they make finding the truth very difficult, because the truth becomes subordinate to what is politically correct. Fish laments the devaluing of the liberal arts, but anything that ignores truth is bound to decline in stature.

Liberal arts wasn't diminished by capitalists, it was devalued by liberals.

Here's A First [John Ennis]

The fallout from California's passage of Proposition 8 continues to be felt. The New York Times reports:

SAN FRANCISCO — In many ways it is a typical map, showing states, highways, cities and streets.

But also dotting the online display are thousands of red arrows, marking spots from Bryn Mawr, Pa., to Jamacha, Calif., identifying the addresses of donors who supported Proposition 8, which outlawed same-sex marriage in California.

It is exactly those arrows that concern supporters of the measure, who say they have been regularly harassed since the election — with threatening e-mail messages and sometimes boycotts of their businesses.

“Some gay activists have organized Web sites to actively encourage people to go after supporters of Proposition 8,” said Frank Schubert, the campaign manager for Protect Marriage, the leading group behind the proposition. “And giving these people a map to your home or office leaves supporters of Proposition 8 feeling especially vulnerable. Really, it is chilling.”

So chilling, apparently, that supporters have filed suit in Federal District Court in Sacramento seeking a preliminary injunction of a state election law that requires donors of $100 or more to disclose their names, addresses, occupations and other personal information.

The piece goes on for another dozen paragraphs discussing the ins and outs of the suit and ends with this quote from Jennifer Pizer of Lamda Legal, a gay rights organization (emphasis added):

Opponents of Proposition 8 have condemned any attacks on supporters, but noted that those claiming harassment are already protected by laws. “Violence and vandalism are illegal, and those laws should be enforced,” Ms. Pizer said. “And sadly people on both sides of this issue have experienced some of that.”

Isn't that one of the key arguments opponents of hate crime legislation make? I never thought I'd hear it coming from a gay rights attorney.

 

Assessing the Assessors [John Ennis]

This week's Economist assesses the Bush years. It should come as no surprise that it's not positive, seeing as it spent as many sentences discussing the troop surge in Iraq as it does Karen Hughes (one each). But, what really caught my eye was this analysis:

Relentless partisanship led to the politicisation of almost everything Mr Bush did. He used his first televised address to justify putting strict limits on federal funding for stem-cell research, and used the first veto of his presidency to prevent the expansion of that funding. He appointed two “strict constructionist” judges to the Supreme Court, John Roberts and Samuel Alito, turned his back on the Kyoto protocol, dismissed several international treaties, particularly the anti-ballistic-missile treaty, loosened regulations on firearms and campaigned against gay marriage.

Now's not the time to re-debate stem cell research, but if it is a partisan issue, I don't see how keeping taxpayer money out of it is considered a particularly contentious resolution. As for the appointments of Roberts and Alito, they passed the Senate 78-22 and 58-42, respectively. You might argue Alito was close to a party-line vote, but Roberts was not. The idea that Roberts' nomination was an example of undue partisanship is implausible.

Bush "turned his back on the Kyoto protocol" after the Senate had voted 95-0 that they would not ratify it. Is the Economist complaining that only a 100-0 vote would justify Bush's actions?

As for Bush being opposed to gay marriage, so is Barack Obama. Their list of "relentless partisanship" is excessively weak.

The Economist's 3800 word analysis has time for all of the failures, but omits many of the successes. Michael Brown earns inclusion, but Petraeus and Gates don't. It is not a fair assessment.

Clarity, But Not Truth [John Ennis]

Sometimes it’s quite easy to figure out why there’s a disagreement. I had such a moment of clarity while reading Dahlia Lithwick’s latest piece in Slate. After criticizing the opinions of previous attorney generals, Lithwick writes about the senate hearings for Obama’s nominee:

When Barack Obama's nominee for attorney general, Eric Holder, is asked the same question today, the response is this: "Water-boarding is torture. … It would violate the international obligations that all civilized nations have agreed to—the Geneva Conventions."

[snip]

When John Cornyn, R-Texas, asks multiple times whether Holder would agree to water-board terrorists if it meant preventing the deaths of tens of thousands of innocents (and if Jack Bauer would sign his yearbook): Holder replies, "It's hard for me to answer your hypothetical without accepting your premise," explaining that from his discussions with experts, he believes people who are tortured do not yield valuable intelligence. "The premise that underlies that, I'm not willing to accept." When Cornyn tells him that he must accept the false hypothetical, Holder insists he in fact must not.

If I truly believed all the assumptions Lithwick has made in this passage, I’d be as opposed to waterboarding as she is. Unfortunately, there are certain facts I can’t dismiss:

• Lithwick can dismiss Crornyn’s hypothetical as a Jack Bauer-type fantasy, but the United States was faced with a real situation when Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM) was captured. He was the mastermind of the September 11th attacks, which killed thousands, and unless he had retired, must have had knowledge of ongoing plots. Getting any information from him was sure to save many lives. This is a fact Lithwick completely ignores. She prefers the myth. 
• Lithwick relies on the assumption that waterboarding is of no informational value, but those who interrogated KSM said it did. I don't know with certainty which group is right, but there is an opposing side to this debate which Lithwick ignores.
• Lithwick assumes terrorists are prisoners of war and fall under the Geneva Conventions. This assumption is not universal. KSM wasn’t a uniformed soldier, nor is he a civilian. A third way (“enemy combatant”) always made more sense than putting terrorists in the criminal justice system. Again, Lithwick assumes their POW status.

Enemy combatant or not, the U.S. is still a signatory of the Convention Against Torture which prohibits the infliction of “severe pain or suffering.” Is waterboarding “severe”? I don’t know, but I’ve never heard a liberal willing to debate it. The standard practice is to scream over and over that waterboarding is torture as if that ends the debate. Holder stated waterboarding is torture, but not why. Of course, that’s good enough for Lithwick to shriek: “Wait! Who is that knocking on the courthouse doors? Hello, legal clarity. I think I recognize you from the late '80s.” Holder’s opinion, if law, would indeed provide clarity, but, nothing else. 

Lithwick is entitled to her own opinions, but her opinions were formed after omitting facts. It’s not a crime, but it’s not a model for drawing conclusions or making good law.

The Crawford Standard Is Now Law? [John Ennis]

What is torture? The dictionary defines it as “anguish of body or mind: AGONY.” Unfortunately, there are still a lot of vague terms stuffed in there (anguish, agony, etc.). When does unpleasantness become agony? A legal definition might be more specific. The 1984 Convention Against Torture, which the U.S. signed, defines it as follows:

For the purposes of this Convention, the term "torture" means any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession...

Under this parameter torture doesn’t have to be physical, but the pain or suffering must be “severe.” Obviously, if the definition hinges on the word “severe”, different people will have different opinions of what constitutes torture.  There is judgment involved. But, how should the United States legal system judge what is severe? Should it be left to the judiciary? Congress? The President? Our concept of judicial review suggests it would be up to the United States Supreme Court. However, the legal scholars at Slate have come up with a fascinating theory. They believe the definition of torture falls to…. Susan Crawford.

Now, I’m not objecting to anyone having an opinion of what constitutes torture, and Ms. Crawford is just as entitled as anyone.  But, why does Slate make this specific military lawyer  the final arbiter? (Slate even claims "the Susan Crawford interview changes everything we know about torture"). Here's their explanation:

What changes as a result of Crawford expressly using the word torture? First, the administration can no longer hide behind parsing the language of the Geneva Conventions and the torture statute. Whether or not Michael Mukasey is willing to call water-boarding torture—as the president-elect did on Sunday—a reputable senior military official has put that label on conduct that is arguably not as bad and has been widespread in Afghanistan and Iraq. In her interview, Crawford acknowledges that it was "the combination of the interrogation techniques, their duration and the impact on Qahtani's health that led to her conclusion. 'The techniques they used were all authorized, but the manner in which they applied them was overly aggressive and too persistent. … This was not any one particular act; this was just a combination of things that had a medical impact on him. … It was that medical impact that pushed me over the edge' to call it torture." What Crawford has done here is astounding. She has repudiated the formalistic (and perennially shifting) definitions of torture as whatever-it-is-we-don't-do. She has admitted that there is a medical and legal definition for torture and also that we have crossed the line into it.

As you can tell from this paragraph, the previous debate between liberals and the Bush Administration has gone something like this:

Liberal:  You committed torture!

Bush official:  No, we didn’t.

Liberal: Yes, you did!

Clearly, this goes nowhere. Slate is excited, though, because they have found a government official who agrees with them. Of course, the official came to her conclusion by looking at the medical impact of the interrogation rather than whether the suffering was severe, but you can’t have everything. The fact that the official “admitted that there is a medical and legal definition for torture and also that we have crossed the line into it” is “astounding” and good enough for Slate. Whether it might not be the right definition or standard is hair-splitting. The fact that it wasn’t any specific act that led Crawford to her conclusion, but a combination of things, emphasizing that this is merely one person’s opinion, is irrelevant for Slate.

Crawford’s opinions, which were made in an interview with Bob Woodward, are so definitive that Slate concludes the following (emphasis added):

Whatever her reasons for speaking now—the fact that she chose to do so with a journalist whose name resonates around the globe and is indelibly associated with presidential criminality—itself changes the terms of the debate. Whether torture occurred and who was responsible will no longer be issues behind which senior members of the administration and their lawyers and policymakers can hide. The only real issue now is: What happens next?

[snip]

Her clear words have been picked up around the world. And that takes the prospects of accountability and criminal investigation onto another level. For the Obama administration, the door to the do-nothing option is now closed. That is why today may come to be seen as the turning point.

You got that all you hot-shot DC lawyers? When you're defending Cheney & Co., you can forget about making your simplistic legal arguments, because what constitutes torture is no longer an issue. Crawford has spoken!

Sarcasm aside, I believe in the rule of law. When people claim interrogation techniques rise to the level of torture, I take the accusation seriously. When critics merely label techniques as "torturious" without defining torture, I lose interest. But, when the so-called defenders of the rule of law use the opinion of one person as the definer of said law, I grow hostile, for they are undermining the law itself. Cheney earned his position through a national election - why on Earth should Crawford's definition trump his?

Green Ink [John Ennis]

Get ready for a more activist New York Times. Executive editor Bill Keller has organized a new environmental reporting unit under the tutelage of Glenn Kramon, who recently spoke to the Columbia Journalism Review:

That means more investigative work, he added, and sifting through reporting and storytelling approaches that resonate with readers. “My goal is to make ‘em angry enough to do something,” Kramon said.

I thought the goal of newspapers was to report the news? If the Times wants to pursue environmental advocacy, could they stop pretending to be an unbiased paper? There's nothing wrong with having an agenda as long as it's disclosed.

When the newspaper industry finally collapses sometime in the coming decade, former journalists will gather at symposiums, conferences and universities to discuss the menu of causes of the disaster. And, I can predict with some confidence that few will identify the most prominent of roots. Namely, the newspaper industry's insistence that the liberal bias of the editorial page was kept out of the newsroom. It is a lie that no one believes, but the media insists on repeating.    

When Has This Worked? [John Ennis]

As the recession continues to cause jitters, and Obama plans trillion dollar deficits, the media chorus for more government spending increases. Paul Krugman thinks Obama's $775 billion stimulus package is too weak:

The bottom line is that the Obama plan is unlikely to close more than half of the looming output gap, and could easily end up doing less than a third of the job.

Why isn’t Mr. Obama trying to do more?

Is the plan being limited by fear of debt?

The New Republic agrees, echoing the meme that the Great Depression dragged on because government spending wasn't aggressive enough until the start of WWII (emphasis added):

There's much to like in Obama's plan. But there are two important ways he may have to go further. Most economists agree that what finally pulled the U.S. out of the Great Depression was military spending for World War II. Some liberals argue that if the Roosevelt administration had not abandoned a Keynesian stimulus strategy in 1937-38, the U.S. might have gotten out of the depression without a war. But in 1936, unemployment was still at 16.9 percent; by 1942, after two years of war spending, it was 4.7 percent, strongly indicating that it was war spending that did it. I am not suggesting that the United States start a world war in order to solve the world's economic problem. But I am suggesting a strategy that could be called the fiscal equivalent of war.

Mass conscription, which was implemented in World War II, also has an impact on unemployment. An argument can be made that adding millions of men to the military might have influenced unemployment rates more than spending did. But, what's more interesting is that TNR chose to compare present circumstances to the Great Depression in the first place. After all, the United States has experienced plenty of recessions in the past. Wouldn't a comparison to those spells offer a larger sample size and more relevant information? 

One gets the feeling that comparing 2009 to previous recessions won't help the argument Krugman & TNR advances. David Brooks makes this observation (emphasis added):

Christina Romer is Barack Obama’s choice to lead his Council of Economic Advisers. In 1994, Romer and her husband, David, wrote an essay entitled “What Ends Recessions?” In the first paragraph, the Romers noted that “economists seem strangely unsure about what to tell policy makers to do to end recessions.”

The Romers surveyed the recessions of the previous 50 years to try to reach some conclusions about what works. “Our central conclusion is that monetary policy alone is a sufficiently powerful and flexible tool to end recessions,” they wrote. Automatic spending policies like unemployment insurance have sometimes helped. Discretionary policies, like tax cuts and stimulus plans, have not been of much use. As they put it: “Discretionary fiscal policy, in contrast, does not appear to have had an important role in generating recoveries.”

This analysis is devastating to the Obama plan. Hence, the advocates of a massive expansion of government ignore recessions and point to the Great Depression for guidance and perversely argue that the 1930s stimulus failed because it wasn't big enough. This is the only foundation for the current idea to borrow close to a trillion dollars to finance this stimulus. Proponents of the Obama plan can't find a single recession where a stimulus generated a recovery (otherwise, they'd be pointing to it).

Of course, for Obama, his proposal has no downside. If the stimulus fails, and the recession continues, it will still be blamed on Bush while the media praises Obama for trying. If the stimulus fails, but the recession ends on its own, Obama will still be credited. So, there's no political reason for Obama not to do it. Doing nothing would generate more criticism. We're entering a scary period in American politics - one in which the sitting president won't be accountable for anything.

LUCILLE: Honor and Integrity

Dear Lucille, For the last eight years, President Bush has led our country with firm determination and a steady hand in the face of numerous challenges and crises. He restored honor and integrity to the White House and protected America from another terrorist attack.

I just got this email - with a request for a donation "to keep the Party strong." (Yes, I'm on the GOP email list. It's really been amusing reading their messages throughout the campaign.) So, let's see: that's what we call lack of planning, stubborn dismisal of any facts that contradicted his barely-considered decisions, and abysmal response to the country's worst natural disaster in decades.

Restored honor and integrity? Ask Muhammad Saad Iqbal and the other tortured individuals how "honorable" they think the administration is. And, do they even know the definition of integrity? It's "adherence to moral and ethical principles."

Are they kidding?

Notice, they didn't say that he protected us from any terrorist attacks. If I remember, the US experienced the worst terrorist attack ever on American soil under his leadership. But, gee, give the guy a break.