After reading Ryan Lizza's article, The Outsiders, about the process by which Dean is almost assured DNC chairman, I can't help but be reminded of the scene in Hitler's bunker in the final days of the war. He and his few remaining generals were plotting the defense of Berlin, moving phantom divisions that didn't exist in response to Russian divisions that did.

(Note: given the whole Churchill affair, and my writings on the subject, the aforementioned reference is purely for historical, nay, hysterical reference. There is absolutely no intention whatsoever to in the slightestr equate the democrats and facism. It just seems so applicable an allegory.)

Most interesting about the whole affair is that there is absolutely no agenda, save beating the Republicans.

In the pro-Dean blogosphere, the coolest thing to do is to declare oneself "a reform Democrat." What the Deaniacs mean by that is anyone's guess, but they speak in apocalyptic terms.
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But reform is also the new buzzword in the party's idea factories and among its elite as well. Much of the Democratic Leadership Council's recent advice for the party is to retake the mantle of political reform from Republicans using issues like redistricting, ethics, and electoral reform. Similarly, Carville tells anyone who will listen that Democrats must embrace the label of reform. But they are not talking about party-wide revolution. (Carville, after all, was appalled by the open process of the DNC chair's race.) They are talking about issues Democrats can use to defeat Republicans

If they were simply reshuffling and repackaging the old worn out ideas of yesteryear, that'd be one thing. Dick Gephardt rode that horse to death. No, they are simply a party bereft of ideas, moving and shuffling people to represent ideas that don't exist against the Republicans and their ideas that do.

Without ideas or an agenda to promote, they fall victim to the cult of personality. Dean offers them hope from eternal damnation, like some 19th century traveling preacher. Then it was Satan, today, it's the Republicans. "I hate the Republicans and everything they stand for, but I admire their discipline and their organization,".

We do not know what the democratic party stands for, but we do know what they stand against. Everything.

Paul Campos writes:

But while the question of whether a brilliant scholar with a fascist streak ought to be considered for a place on a university faculty retains at least some academic interest, it has nothing to do with Churchill, whose writings and speeches feature an incoherent farrago of boundless paranoia, wildly implausible theories, obscene celebrations of murder, and atrocious prose.

The question of whether a serious research university ought to hire someone like Churchill is laughable on its face. What's not so funny is the question of exactly how someone like him got hired in the first place, and then tenured and named the head of a department.

That, in the end, is a more important question than what will or ought to happen to Churchill now. Churchill is a pathetic buffoon, but the University of Colorado is far from alone in having allowed itself to toss intellectual integrity and human decency overboard in the pursuit of worthy goals.

Campos raises a great point on the Churchill situation, that the overarching problem is beyond just him, but the entire hiring, tenuring, and staffing process. However, are we to consider that if that process is flawed, the resulting flaws need not addressed? Unlike say in a democracy, where the voters have an opportunity to rectify results, there is no such option under the faculty tenure system. Unless of course the administration is willing to act to fix a serious error in judgement.

Bruce Fien writes:

Churchill's wild likening of the 9/11 victims to Adolf Eichmann's complicity in genocide and moral defense of the terrorist wretches are reasonably likely to impair faculty harmony, alumni support, recruitment of students, community relations, and sacred scholastic standards that teach students to cherish reason and to repudiate propaganda reminiscent of arch-Nazi Joseph Goebbels. These prospective evils are sufficient to justify denying Churchill the state university's platform and prestige to amplify his ravings with public resources. Freedom of speech does not shoulder the state with an obligation to subsidize. (emphasis mine)

That is exactly what I said here:

...Had he been just some nutcase with a blog, he'd be ignored or linked to by about three people. (Well, on that account, we'd have something in common!!) However, it is precisely his status as professor of ethnic studies that elevates his discourse to a higher level of inspection.

More importantly, his status is a result of taxpayer dollars. Likewise, assume for a moment that I was a member of a racial supremacist group. Assume that after several years of teaching, not one student could offer even one instance where my racial supremacist views could be evidenced. And assume for a moment that my membership in said group was discovered by accident, and when asked, I acknowledged membership. How long would I still be teaching?

The truth is that Churchill represents the University, and this is the key, when his status as professor is used. So yes, he represents the university, and thus, the taxpayers of Colorado. This truly isn't a free speech moment. He's not being arrested, not being fined, he's simply being given leave of a public job for which he used to promote his private views. And in abusing that job status, he voided any "protections" he might otherwise have enjoyed.

And here:

If Churchill had said these things prior, he'd most likely never have gotten the job. Think of the hassle that Larry Summers is getting. Why? He speaks for the university. He claimed to be speaking off the record, and only bringing up a topic for discussion, etc. Now, is a university president any more culpable for words than a professor? I don't think so. Both represent the university. What if churchill was a member of the nazi party? Would he still be employed? You know, I know, everyone knows the answer to that one.

He was representing CU, a public university. As I said, he was using his publicly granted position of authority to convey his own personal views. He can't do that. I know that's a fine line, but it's not splitting hairs. As a silly example, what if he said he thinks the Eagles will win because Belichick is a terrible coach. Fine. He's not a professor of football, nor is that reflective of the university. It represents his personal opinion about an unrelated topic. But he specifically used his professor status in a way he was unauthorized to do. His professor status gives him credibility so to speak, to discuss issues such as that. Remember, without his professorship, nobody would care what he had to say. Thus, A begets B.

Mr. Fein also reminds of precedent:

In Waters v. Churchill (1994), the Supreme Court declared that when the government acts as an employer, its employees may be discharged for speech reasonably likely to confound the government enterprise. Applying the Waters test, the United States Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit in Jeffries v. Harleston (1995) upheld the truncation of a professor's chairmanship of the Black Studies Department at the City College of New York because of an off-campus anti-Semitic polemic. The professor, Leonard Jeffries, asserted that Jews sported a history of oppressing blacks, that "rich Jews" had financed the slave trade, and that Jews and Mafia figures in Hollywood had conspired to "put together a system of destruction of black people" by negative film portrayals. The court of appeals reasoned that the jury correctly found that CUNY reasonably believed that Jeffries' calumny about Jews would disrupt faculty relations, stigmatize the university, or dissuade benefactors from contributing. Accordingly, the professor's academic demotion was untroubling to the First Amendment.

The University of Colorado's corresponding case for dismissing Churchill is much more compelling, even though the sanction would be more severe than in Jeffries. He has indicted the thousands who died on 9/11 at the World Trade Center as guilty of crimes akin to Eichmann's transporting Jews to extermination camps and who deserved their gruesome deaths. He has condoned the 9/11 abominations as desperate acts of self-defense in a war initiated by the United States against Iraq with its no-fly zones in the north and south to protect millions of Kurds and Shiites from Saddam Hussein's chemical weapons and brutalities. He has denied that the 9/11 terrorism was "evil," a term he reserves for Madeline Albright and Norman Schwartz- kopf, who helped to liberate millions from the yoke of Saddam and Slobodan Milosevic. According to Churchill, "Had it not been for these evils, the counterattacks of Sept. 11 would never have occurred."

Eugene Volokh disagrees:

If the Ward Churchills of the world are fired for their speech, disgusting as it is, that would be a perfect precedent for broader speech suppression in the future. Left-wing faculties and university administrations would find it much easier to fire right-wing professors for far less offensive statements, for instance for serious and valuable (even if sometimes misguided) challenges to the orthodox views on sexual orientation, sex or race. Given the political complexion of universities these days, this will end up happening to conservative professors more often than to liberals.

There seems to be a distinct difference of opinion between the professorial and lay views. With all due respect, there are several degrees of separation between the perfect, eternal forms of the intelligible world of the ivory towers of academia and the visible world outside.

Has the age of moral relativism and equivalency completely saturated university thought? The problem I think is actually a relaitvely simple and clear one: Churchill abused his publicly appointed position of authority. Period. And for that, he has absolutely no defense.

Some have missed the point of my previous post about firing Ward Churchill.

As a public servant, as a member of the university faculty, and in speaking under pretenses of such "authority", his statements belong not only to him, but to his employer, who has judged him worthy of, and conferred upon him, such status. Now, had he been simply an author, done his work independently, and gained prominence through his competing in the free market for ideas, and his audience was there to hear him as author, etc., not university professor, than it wouldn't even be an issue. In fact, it'd be analogous to having Michael Moore come in to speak at a university. They can clearly say up front, "He doesn't represent OUR perspective", we are entertaining him for debate purposes. Moore, for all his faults and stupidity, has oddly enough succeeded in the free market. His status comes solely through his independent efforts, and as such represents him, and him alone.

If Churchill had said these things prior, he'd most likely never have gotten the job. Think of the hassle that Larry Summers is getting. Why? He speaks for the university. He claimed to be speaking off the record, and only bringing up a topic for discussion, etc. Now, is a university president any more culpable for words than a professor? I don't think so. Both represent the university. What if churchill was a member of the nazi party? Would he still be employed? You know, I know, everyone knows the answer to that one.

He was representing CU, a public university. As I said, he was using his publicly granted position of authority to convey his own personal views. He can't do that. I know that's a fine line, but it's not splitting hairs. As a silly example, what if he said he thinks the Eagles will win because Belichick is a terrible coach. Fine. He's not a professor of football, nor is that reflective of the university. It represents his personal opinion about an unrelated topic. But he specifically used his professor status in a way he was unauthorized to do. His professor status gives him credibility so to speak, to discuss issues such as that. Remember, without his professorship, nobody would care what he had to say. Thus, A begets B.

If it was scholarly research, fine. But clearly it wasn't. Is it realistic to think any university today would fund research into eugenics? Hardly. Alot of the people who disagree with me do so for several reasons: one, profs like Reynolds, Volokh, et al, get a twinge because even though they find him deplorable, they also share a commonality with him. So there's collegialism, and they fear a similar fate. Remember a while ago, there was a flap about Reynolds using UT servers for instapundit, which he doesn't. He makes very clear to keep his professional professor status separate from his blog, that he speaks for himself only, and blogs about what interests him. And he isn't paid for it. Here's the difference. When he does comment on the law, he is a law prof offering legal opinion. And even when he offers his legal opinion, on gay marriage for instance, that is one side of a legal argument, of what the law could or should allow.

Recall what I said in the previous post:

It is not a thin line between debate and diatribe. It is a chasm. If the supposedely most enlightened and educated can't see that, then they surely lose that claim.

And posting legal opinions is entirely dissimilar to a prof of ethnic studies calling 9/11 victims nazis. If that is hard to differentiate, than we're finished as a free society. As for others, like powerline, they want him to be spotlighted, because it highlights the Howard Dean wing of the democratic party, and it's good for us politically. Which I can completely sympahtize with.

He can't hide under that banner of free speech and intellectual freedom. Again, if he'd gotten his phd in ethnic studies and written books and worked from some think tank organization, fine. But he didn't because the only people who'd have him are universities, and IF, IF, they use tax payer dollars, they are accountable to us, the public. What if I used my position as a public school teacher to say, " you know, black kids don't do as well because they can't, etc..."?

When I go to Border's and use my teacher discount card, I represent the district. In fact, there are times when I've bought kids books and a book for myself, and actually had them do two separate sales because using it for Barney says please and thank you AND Carnage and Culture, is abuse. And if I give a speech, specifically because I am a history teacher, let's say to discuss what's essential for high school kids to know historically, which I'd be qualified to do, and I also happen to say that the US should nuke the world and send the Arabs to hell, guess what, I am representing the people who conveyed the position of status. And guess what, if they don't like it, then I'm history.

I can quit my job and say, I taught high school for ten years, here's what kids should know, and oh, by the way, I think we should nuke em all. Fine. There, I'd be speaking for myself only. What if the head of MTA (Los Angeles Municipal Bus System) said it's all those blacks and mexicans causing us problems on the buses? Eh?

Robert Kagan and William Kristol ask:

Is it so hard for Democrats, with the next presidential election still almost four years off, to overcome their Bush-hatred just for a moment in order to join in supporting the cause of freedom and democracy?

Then you already know the answer.

Many are weighing in on the employment staus of Ward Churchill, the (in)famous professor of ethnic studies at Colorado University. And when you disagree with Eugene Volokh, Prof. Bainbridge, and the supreme blogger himself, you have to be crazy. But, I think the university is right to fire Professor Churchill, and I think they should.

First, I am a public high school history teacher. Imagine if I had said such things. How long would I still be instructing teenagers? Would "free speech" be a defense? Now, it isn't that simple as college students are adults, and high school kids are just that, kids. But, there are also many similarties. To illustrate, here's a case in point.

I have only two links to previous articles, one on why Europe hates America, and the other on abortion. I am clearly, undeniably in the pro-life camp. So, assume for a moment, I attend a pro-life rally and one of my students sees me there.

You could make a stretch, abortion->laws->government->history, etc. but it is still a stretch. And, I was not there as a teacher, or there becasue I was a teacher, but simply as a citizen. In this instance, the political and professional are separated from other. I was not offering an "expert" opinion, nor using my status as a teacher to convey any special insight.

In Mr. Churchill's case, this I assume is not necessarily the case. Had he been just some nutcase with a blog, he'd be ignored or linked to by about three people. (Well, on that account, we'd have something in common!!) However, it is precisely his status as professor of ethnic studies that elevates his discourse to a higher level of inspection.

More importantly, his status is a result of taxpayer dollars. Likewise, assume for a moment that I was a member of a racial supremacist group. Assume that after several years of teaching, not one student could offer even one instance where my racial supremacist views could be evidenced. And assume for a moment that my membership in said group was discovered by accident, and when asked, I acknowledged membership. How long would I still be teaching?

The truth is that Churchill represents the University, and this is the key, when his status as professor is used. So yes, he represents the university, and thus, the taxpayers of Colorado. This truly isn't a free speech moment. He's not being arrested, not being fined, he's simply being given leave of a public job for which he used to promote his private views. And in abusing that job status, he voided any "protections" he might otherwise have enjoyed.

Does this stifle free dialogue and expression and the open exchange of ideas? Hardly. Private universities are free to hire him, and I'm sure many would. Does he void his right to write books, publish articles and sell them. (I'm sure he would if he weren't a Marxist!!) No. Does this mean that educators can't take positions on subjects, even controversial ones? Hardly.

Let's separate for a moment, the notion of opinion from position. This blog, for instance has a decidely conservative tone, and discusses many issues primarily the historical and political. Doesn't this meet the previous criteria of using my job status to espouse personal opinion? No.

Let's not confuse positions on issues and personal opinion. One of my favorite authors, Professor Victor Davis Hanson, has proufoundly influenced this administration's policy regarding the spread of democracy. His position is that the spread of democracy is the best defense against extremism and terrorism. That is his historical evaluation and a position he develops. You can dispute it, argue against it, even think it preposterous.

Had Churchill argued that US policy had motivated the terrorists to view us as in such a way as he sees us, then he'd have a position to defend. He could even have argued that as a professor of ethnic studies, his professional opinion is that they were motivated by some cultural grievances towards us. Fine. Make the case. I'll listen. I'll disagree, vehemently.

It is ludicrous to assume that he can say whatever he wants, as a professor, and be granted immunity. When he uses that position to declare his authority on a subject, his views by extension become the views of the source of that authority.

It is not a thin line between debate and diatribe. It is a chasm. If the supposedely most enlightened and educated can't see that, then they surely lose that claim. If Churchill wants to publish books and articles, and desires to be hired on the basis of his personal professional work, then he has every right to espouse his opinions, whatever form they take. He however cannot be free to use his publicly accorded status to do so.

Funny that the University of Colorado is having this debate. I thought they settled such problems with the Barnett debacle.

Dean Bennet has a good piece at the Weekly Standard called Taking Kos Seriously, regarding the leftist blog dailykos.com. Perhaps you've not heard of kos? His notoriety came last April when her referred to the four contractors killed in Fallujah as mercenaries.

The Daily Kos (rhymes with rose, based on Moulitsas' old army nickname) is far and away the most popular blog on the Internet: Kos averages over 400,000 page views a day. By comparison, the second most popular blog, right leaning law professor Glenn Reynolds's Instapundit, averages barely 200,000 page views a day.
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Kos outwardly and unambiguously defines his role differently. He has proudly assumed the task of getting Democrats elected and never denies that he is an activist, not an objective commentator. He has built the Daily Kos community to further that activism with painstaking care. And while Kos is certainly not the finest writer in the blogosphere, he is amongst its shrewdest operators. And by almost any measure, he is the most successful blogger in the business.

I personally think that too much is being made of Kos. I admire anyone who can generate that many hits per day, but we have to ask how much influence the guy really has.

First, let's assume that the 400,000 hits per day are unique, and that they represent but 1/5th of the total kos cimmunity. Okay, that's 2 million people. In fact, let's be generous, say it's 1/10th the total. That's a whopping 4 million. Last November, 121,000,000 people voted in the presidential elections. That would put Kos' community around 2-3 percent of the electorate.

So, in terms of overall impact, I'd hardly consider them a sizable block. As for what motivates them, it is hatred of the president and his policies. Last time I checked, hate wasn't a great long term strategy. They represent a variety of left to far-left wing causes, the environment, abortion, gay rights, anti-war/peace activists, anti-captialists, etc. It isn't as if there's 4 million tree-huggers, 4 million baby-killers, etc., all over the country, and a small handful have found each other on Kos.

They also represent ideas that are wholly rejected by the vast majority of Americans. Every candidate Kos endorsed and worked for lost. In most cases, by a large margin. Hardly what I'd call a great track record. In fact, they are so outside the mainstream of American politics, they are trying to recruit someone to run against Senaotr Lieberman.

For an example of what passes for enlightened thought on Kos, here's a smpling of comments regarding the Bush-Lieberman embrace during the SOTU.
WARNING!!! Not suitable for the easily offended

Later tonight, Lieberman's going to give Bush head, and then once Bush is hard, he is going to let Bush mount him from behind.
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As I recall, from the fishing days of my youth, that it's actually illegal to throw them in the drink...toss 'em on shore and let 'em die. Sounds perfect for Joementum.
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What too few people appreciate is that as people age many start to think more kindly of the GOP. Watch out for those people because it's a one way path and probably early signs of Alzhiemers or some other form of mental deterioration. Joe had it by at least 2001
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If Joe wants to kiss Satan than he has to do it from the other side of the aisle and stop stinking up our side.
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Um...

Bush and Lieberman...

Uh...

You don't think they're... uh...

That would explain Bush's gay hatred.
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When it comes to Democratic Party Unity, there are the victims of circular firing squads... and there are people who need the ministrations of a political sniper.

This here situation, m'dear, falls into the latter category.
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Joe is a selfish shit, and playing both sides to the detriment of the Party.
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believe that motherfucking turncoat actually thought he could get the nomination.
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I have nothing left to say except that he is a traitorous backstabber.
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should be tared and feathered and run out of the country!
But who would have him?
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I liked that Michael never explicitly had Fredo whacked, but just told an aide, "I don't want anything to happen to him while our mother is still alive."

Shortly after her funeral, the deed was done.
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But the point is that we have an incredibly dangerous man in the White House, and Joe has been completely unable or unwilling to fight back against him.
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Lieberman is a disloyal, Bush-kissing torture-loving asshole who hasn't done shit for CT in years.
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I hope Joedas got his 30 pieces of silver.
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Because the important thing isn't having a Democratic Party that lives our beliefs -- the important thing is holding onto power whatever the cost. The important thing is to get that majority and reward Party operatives and funders.

Because it's all about power for the sake of power.

Homophobia, asassination, mocking alzheimers, and attacking his patriotism.

I'd like to know exactly why we fear these people. They are exactly why the democrats lost, and will continue to lose, national elections. In fact, I'd hope that people made a bigger deal of Kos, and more people were exposed to the stupidity and hatred that passes for intellectual insight.

Most recently, Babs Boxer has joined the Kos community and thanked them for support in fighting the nomination of the first black woman to be Secretary of State. So, we have the Howard Dean, Babs Boxer, Ted Kennedy crowd as our biggest political threat. I'll take that any day of the week. Happily too.

Mortone (McGloughlin reference) Kondracke writes in Democrats Look Weak Calling For Iraq 'Exit':

Kennedy went so far as to say that "our military and the insurgents are fighting for the same thing - the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people." And, he strongly implied, the insurgents are winning.

It's shocking that a distinguished Senator could imply a moral equivalency between U.S. forces working for democracy and hideous killers trying to destroy it. Kennedy does not speak for the Democratic Party, but neither is anyone repudiating him.

Yes he does speak for the democratic party. Who is their "spiritual leader", their standard bearer. If nobody repudiates him, then it is their position, especially considering how Kerry, Boxer, Pelosi, Reid, et al. have recently essentially concurred.

And didn't I see this somewhere earlier about the "hearts and minds":

Words cannot describe the vileness and dishonesty of this statement. The people blowing up mosques and schools and killing election workers are trying to reimpose a reign of terror and fear upon millions. Would Kennedy rather that a minority of a Sunni minority begin to fill up the mass graves again. Of all the disgusting things he said, this has to be the foulest. And do you suppose that Zarkawi would be holding elections?

Just discovered at democratic congressional headquarters: (click image for larger version)

Whenever the classroom discussion turns to bin Laden, I always joke that I'd prefer him to spend the rest of his life in prison watching American television. Imagine, he'd spend his days watching mindless materialism, sexuality, and secular pursuits. Imagine all the daytime talk shows, the sitcoms, the dramas. Give him the entire season of Sex in the City followed by Queer Eye. Then, when he's pleading for death, give him South Park.

Oh, and for good measure, I'd give him a healthy dose of History Channel to remind him that he should've known who he was dealing with.

But right now, there is a small part of me that hopes he's alive. I hope he saw Afghanistan and Iraq hold elections. I hope he sees that his followers are impotent to stop them. But most of all, I hope he saw the "hostage" picture.

That in itself is a living hell, far better than the hell he will enter later.

A few days ago, I asked if the "insurgents" were A spent force.

Given that the elections are a fait accompli, it might be fair to conclude that the "insurgency" is a spent force. This does not mean that there will be no more killings, but what sustains a military force of any size, regardless their goals, is the hope of victory. And as every day passes, the hope victory slips farther and farther into the horizon, never to return.
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They won't go away completely, but if the elections go off with any level of success, the insurgency will have been proven to be a spent force. They had a run where it looked like they could influence the outcome, but no longer.

It is now obvious, they are actually a $9.99 spent force. That is about what a GI Joe doll costs. If I was Zarkawi, I just as soon kill myself. Going from the most wanted man in Iraq, the man seemingly capable of defeating the US, to now an object of derision and ridicule.

There's one more:

"Your failure to leave Iraq has left us no choice. Here is your beloved Mr. Potato Head."

No not that one, the other one, the one who didn't throw his medals over a fence and call his fellow veterans war criminals. His article in the Wall Street Journal, Pride and Prejudice, is a shot across the bow to the liberals opposing social security reform. The problem is that he is speaking to an increasingly shrinking audience.

Sadly there are few liberals left anymore. They are now leftists. And there is a huge difference between the two. For example:

Liberals believe the state can help people take care of themselves. Leftists believe people incapable of doing so.

Liberals believe that when people do better, society as a whole does better. Leftists believe that when people do better, necesarily someone is doing worse.

Liberals believe that freedom means accepting that which you despise. Leftists crush opposition at any chance.

Liberals believe there is a God, and that he is a kind and just God. Leftists believe God is a relic of unenlightened thought.

Liberals believe that ownership begets responsibility and therefore must be encouraged. Leftists believe ownership is greed, and therefore must be prevented.

Liberals believe equality of opportunity. Leftists believe in equal outcomes. And yes, there is a huge differernce.

Liberals believe the family is the heart and soul of strong community. Leftists believe families are a social construct, an oppressive one at that.

Liberals believe in basic comon sense, that boys and girls are different and have unique gifts and abilities. Leftists beleve that gender roles are imposed on people by cultural mores.

Liberals believe welfare, state sponsored charity, has a moral foundation. Its role to uplift the downtrodden that they too might find individual dignity. Leftists believe welfare is simply the means of controlling people.

Liberals believe that people are special, and that the laws must always reflect that. Leftists believe that people are not special, that they are equal to other creatures and the laws should reflect that.

Liberals believe in the legal and political process. Leftists will circumvent the legal process through whatever means necessary.

Liberals recognize there is good and bad. Leftists believe no such distinction exists, it depends on what one believes.

Liberals believe in America, believe her to be the greatest of nations, that America must be the "arsenal of democracy" and "bear any burden, pay any price" to defend liberty. Leftists believe that America is the sorce of evil in the world, that America deserves her comeuppance.

Liberals believe that all life is precious. Leftists believe that the unborn, the infirm, the aged all have a "right" to die.

Liberals believe that war is hell, that might doesn't make right, but that sometimes you must goto war. Leftists believe that war is always wrong, that it is always based on venality and hegemony.

Liberals belive people to be inherently good and thus the laws reflect it by protecting freedom. Leftists believe people to be inherently evil, thus laws must suppress freedom.

Liberalism has had a long and glorious tradition in America. One could argue that Jefferson and Lincoln were the country's two greatest liberals. Americans have always had an independent streak, and a rebellious, anti-authoritarian one as well. Yet, the country has never been libertine. Americans have always been mindful of mixing faith and politics, yet never shy about profressing their faith, or distrustful of politicians who profess theirs.

Liberalism has certainly been behind many programs created out of good faith, only to have them become unmanagable or inefficent. When Bill Clinton "ended welfare as we know it", he was actually acting in the best tradition of liberalism, yet it took "conservatives" in congress to accomplish the legislation. Liberalism was also been behind the civil rights movement, a place it shared eqaully with people of faith.

Liberalism was also the greatet defender of liberty in freedom's darkest hour. Sadly the great liberal tradition that once existed, the torch carried by the democratic party, no longer exists. It has been replaced by leftism, a neo-marxist philosophy of the coercive state, supression of faith, destruction of morals and values, punishment of achievement, and in general the yielding of national sovereignty to international organizations.

Where do the great liberals of today fit inside the democratic party. Where does William Jennings Bryan fit? Where does Woodrow Wilson fit? How about FDR or Truman, or Jack Kennedy? Would Hubert Humphrey or Scoop Jackson recognize their party today? Their liberalism was part fo the great tradition of America. It was the great tradition of liberalism that brought a young boy from Illinois to the democratic party, to support FDR for president, to help the war effrot, to fight communism. And it is was the same tradition that his party betrayed that caused him to join the Republican party, and one day become president. Reagan was called a conservaitve, and in many ways he was. But he was also the son of the great liberal tradition of America.

Bush is often called a conservative, but he couldn't be any further from that. He is Wilsonian in his internationalism, and Rooseveltian in his government expansion. Yet, what is it about him that enrages his opponents? It is his traditional values, values that were shared by democrat and Republican alike for a century.

Traditionally conservatives favored smaller government, liberals expanded government, but both with the same goals of improving society and individual opportunity and freedom. And in that sense, America is more liberal, in general desiring a larger role of government in promoting a better society.

While I would prefer a much reduced federal government, that isn't the majority opinion. However, there are precious few places left politically for true liberals anymore. I guess Joe Lieberman has to keep the fire lit, for surely liberals wouldn't cause America great harm, while leftists most assuredly would.

As for those Senator Kerrey (the good one) is addressing, please just call them leftists. They don't deserve the title of liberal.

Thomas Oliphant's column today US military is the big threat now would be funny if it wasn't so serious. You read his articles and really, you have to ask yourself, how do these people keep their jobs.

In what must be the apogee of irony, Oliphant dismisses the most strident arguments of the loudest critics.

The biggest threat is not an Iran-style theocracy ruthlessly imposed by the majority Shi'ites and triggering civil war. US officials who are involved in the grunt work of trying to help a democratic Iraq emerge confided over the weekend that they have had more than enough dealings with people from the majority community to be positive on that score. It will take hard work, but officials note that too many Iraqi Shi'ites have spent too many years in exile in Iran to see that mess as a workable model for progress.

We were told that sectarian civil war was inevitable, that the country would descend into chaos, and then fall under prey of the mullahs in Tehran. Now, we are told that the Iraqis are too pragmatic and conscious of the consequences of that. Oh no, now, with the very successful Iraqi elections just past, apaprently there is a new threat in Iraq: the US military.

The biggest threat stems from the huge, omnipresent, overwhelming presence of the US military as an occupying force -- assisted by an American embassy with the largest staff of any such mission in the world.
This immense American footprint has already become the major reason for the insurgency's continued existence and recent growth. What is at issue now is whether this footprint will interfere with the emergence of an independent Iraqi government once the genuine thrill of Sunday's election inevitably dissipates.

Immense american footprint? What has been the biggest charge against Bush's war effort? Too few troops. Apparently Oliphant wasn't reading his memos. Maybe the emabssy staff is there to help train Iraqis with the intricacies of democracy and self government. You know, it is awfully hard to take control of one's country after thirty years of being shot for not following the dictator's decrees.

We are to assume that the former Ba'athists and fedayeen would have just melted back into society had we just picked up and left. Oliphant apparently missed the fact that Saddam orchestrated the insurgency and prepared his minions for the guerilla war afterwards. But that would have required Oliphant to read his own paper.

The best clue to its danger is what happened to the latest Iraqi "leader" who was seen by many if not most Iraqis as little more than a puppet -- interim prime minister Iyad Allawi. Quite apart from his checkered past -- whether the Ba'athist part or the CIA-funded part -- his installation atop a technically sovereign government was inconsequential initially and ultimately counterproductive.

The only people who thought him to be a puppet were Zarkawi and the Kerry campaign.

The risk now is that as leadership emerges within the new national assembly, its independence will be compromised by US heavy-handedness. The problem could emerge symbolically, out of the enormous security system demanded by the necessity of helping 275 people meet safely and regularly in the same place. Or it could emerge because of too much "guidance" from the Bush administration to a process that from this moment on has simply got to be Iraqi. What the insurgency is capable of doing is making Iraq nearly ungovernable -- through a combination of attacks on the 150,000 armed Americans still in the country and on the country's already battered infrastructure.

Unless I missed something, how many candidates did the administration support? How many parties did they endorse? I think the fact that Iraqis elected Iraqis pretty much guarantees that the new government will have an Iraqi face to it. And the insurgents could still make Iraq ungeovernable, just as they made the election impossible.

Of all the bits of information with which Kerry returned, none is more disturbing than his reports that Egypt and Jordan are prepared to train far more officers and police leaders than they have to date, but that US officials have rebuffed them.

It is disturbing that countries with abysmal human rights records led by unelected oligarchies shouldn't be allowed to train Iraq's police force? I hear Bull Connor offered to help as well? And "John Kerry meeting with foreign leaders" sounds like a bad rerun.

Iraq still has a long way to go with forces arrayed against them both internally and externally. But if the recent elections are any indication, things are improving, not degrading. Oliphant and his ilk are facing a serious conundrum. How do you still oppose the war, still ridicule the president, and still claim we're less safe when anyone with a kindergarten education can see otherwise.

Sadly, he is emblematic of millions of people. Whatever happens in Iraq matters less than that Bush is humiliated and defeated. People like this would be funny if the times weren't so serious. And it still leaves unanswered the question how they keep their jobs. This isn't simply a contrarian opinion, it's simply poor journalism.

If a blog is available for nothing else, it's to make sure you have a record when you are right.

Don't delay the elections

What does it mean if we delay the Iraqi elections? It means that violence and terror are effective means at achieving a desired outcome. The terror will be emboldened and violence will only escalate and worsen if they discover that will deligitamize the elections. This puts the control of Iraq's future in the hands of the terrorists.
For the Shia and the Kurds, it means that once again, the 20% of the population can control the other 80% through violence and intimidation. The surest way to lose the support and the faith of the Shia and the Kurd will be to delay elections.
...
We must hold the elections January 30th. Whatever the outcome, the UN and their cronies are going to claim it's invalid. The Iraqi people will know better.

President Bush has been heaavily criticized for not listening to the "experts", military and political, before invading Iraq. And again the experts were out in force before the election. Thankfully the president paid them no heed. Maybe he was reading my blog.

Good thing I'm not president. What I wouldn't give to give his next speech.

As I wrote a few days ago:

We cannot know, nor even pretend to know, what the outcome of Iraq will be. While the armchair historians and psuedo intellectualls pontificate about Bush errors, deficiencies, and hubris, we have only to look back to the last great undertaking of a previous generation. Who would have, could have, predicted that the carnage on Okinawa was the last. Who would have, could have predicted, that as we still struggled in the Philippines in the summer of 1945, prepared for Operation Coronet, and comtemplated a million casualties, that in a few short weeks, they'd be dancing in streets throughout America.

We assumed were as far from victory in 1945 as we were in 1942, a victory hastened only by dramatic series of unforeseen events.

And then, worst of all, after the greatest struggle in history, we were immediately faced with an equally dire struggle, against an equally evil empire, the direct result of poor planning, failed dimplomacy, and bad decisions at Pottsdam. We didn't know hw that struggle would end either. Yet, when the Berlin Wall came down, all the critics said it was simply inevitable.

And so in ten years, if cradle of civilization, Mesopotamia, is the cradle of a new age of demcocracy, or the pit of Islamic jihadism, we can credit or fault Bush. Doing so now is simply sophistry.

So too is it with the Iraqi elections, that millions of words have been written the past days and weeks predicting everything from sheer disaster to complete success. Pundits right and left, on both sides of the war, have posited every possible outcome.

Sadly, those most vocal about disenfranchisement of Ohioans and Floridians are muted regarding the violent attempts to disenfranchise a whole country by terrorists. They would prefer utter chaos and failure simply to score cheap political points against the hated president. And even more sadly, this isn't the domain of the lunatic fringe, but the view of the wisest council, the lion of the senate, the eldest statesman of the democratic party.

It is far easier to be wrong on the side of caution. Predicting disaster then expressing surprise at success is the pattern of much of the commentariat. Much of this is due to a lack of historical perspective. While historical knowledge is easy to attain by reading a few books, perspective is far harder to acquire. For example, one needs to understand far more than Versailles to understand the rise of Nazism in Germany.

One needs to understand almost two millennia of German angst towards a continual battle against the recurring attempts at Romanization and denial of Germany unity and destiny. Varus' legions crossing the Rhine, papal interference among Charlemagne's heirs, papal prompting of Lombard league independence against Fredericks I and II, papal led wars against the Northern Lutheran states, and a litany of other transgressions whether real or perceived all concluding with Versailles. Nothing better illustrates this than the residents of Hamburg raising money to build a statue to the German tribal leader Herrman, who united Germans and defeated the Romans in 9AD at Tuetoberg Forest. They did this in 1875, nearly two thousand years after his stunning victory. That's perspective.

Today, information comes too fast, to voluminous to keep pace. Perspective today is limited today by how fast the web page reloads. We forget that we are living in the middle of an historic era, one that has been playing out for decades, and one that will continue for decades after. Thus, so many today are imbued with the hubris of grand prediction. We expect a definitive outcome, and we expect it in the near future. Thus, the only successful outcome in Iraq is an immediate outbreak of Jeffersonian democracy, anything less an abject failure. Being wrong simply means that you just aren't right, yet.

It's been nearly a decade and a half since the Soviet Union collapsed, putting it, in the perspective of many students, nary a shade less ancient than Pericles' Golden Age. Too often, far too many people see this age as the end of history. Yet, following the lack of perspective, is the lack of understanding that history neither fits into neat phases nor is nicely ordered, no matter how diligent the attempts to portray it as such.

The end of the Roman empire, and thus the end of antiquity, is traditionally marked in text books from the sack of Rome in 476 by Oadacer. Certainly one needn't stop there, as the sack in 406 by Alaric, the defeat of Valens at Adrianople, or even the moving of the capital to Constatinople all could mark the end. Yet, one could very well mark the end of the Roman empire from the time the first Romans began to leave the cities and head to the hills, so to speak.

Rome, beset by political corruption, urban decay, loss of trade, and military infighting, was led from the late second century on by a series of emperors whose greatest skill was maintaining a pulse. At one point, the life expectancy of emperor was months, and often, just weeks. At about the same time, massive immigration from across the Rhine led to large communities that had no connection to the empire they inhabited, save geography. These Germans, pushed westward by Hunnic expansion, inundated the Roman empire so thoroughly, that by the mid fourth century, the Roman legion was as much non-Roman as Roman. Yet, as this was happening, no historian could fully grasp what was happening. The response to the declining empire for many was simply to leave the urban centers.

As with the Roman empire, the Medieval period has traditional textbook endpoints, usually some date in the early to mid fifteenth century. But the medieval world began to change far sooner, and far more dramatically. Sometime in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, a number of peasants, who broke free from their feudal obligations or won them on crusade, moved to town or village to seek a better life. This unheralded demographic shift begat the growth of craftsmen and merchants, the rise of trade and commerce, and most importantly, the decline of the feudal system. As the economy began to shift, the old world became modern, and thus the transition was trans-generational.

That brings us to today, in what might rightly be called the multi-polar world. Who predicted the defeat of the Soviet Union or the world the followed? The cold war was the age of bipolarity, democracy versus communism, freedom versus totalitarianism, east versus west. Wherever a conflict arose, there'd be both American and Soviet influence. That was both the downside and the upside as conflict was marked as much by a sense of stability.

Would anyone today think that Pakistan and India would rattle nuclear sabers, China and Taiwan play chicken, or North Korea play "guess what's behind door number three?" if the Soviet bear was alive and well? As the decrepit Cuba, led by an aging relic of a bygine era loses her benefactor, the petro-fueled criminal Chavez takes control of Venezuela, and seeks to supplant his mentor. But without the Soviet threat, the US sits idly by on the sidelines. Was not the rise of the Taliban and the associated jihadism a direct result of the fall of the Soviet Union and the onset of multi-polarity.

Though a hyper-power, the US has simply the power to respond to, but not reshape, events. And thus, the Iraq war was as much a response to, as a reshaping of, the new world. Terrorist and tyrants make for a potent combination, but when coupled with the pursuit of WMD's and the ease with which they can be produced, we find ourselves at a uniquely familiar situation. It's familiar in that we have a growing threat on the horizon, and it's unique in the threat is diverse and dissipated. In what will be the source of dissertations for decades, that while the threat we face is clearly visible, the enemy is mostly invisible.

And so the president has sought a solution that is simultaneously historic and novel. Little more than a century after Vienna, where stability and legitimacy meant autocratic rule, and a generation after Versailles, where victory was vindictive, centuries of kaisers and emperors were replaced with pluralistic representative democracies. The will of the people, once thought of as something to be molded by the state, now molds the political landscape.

That is the historical. The novel is attempting it in a part of the world thought by most too primitive, too corrupt, too fanatic to have a chance. Whole societies it seemed are more than willing to die in martyrdom operations. And thus it is with abundant knowledge and paucity of perspective that a we witness the deluge of prognostication. Sadly, with but little exception, the battle lines are drawn along partisan lines, as if this were a chess game and we're watching Big Blue versus Kasparov.

Those who despise the president oppose the great struggle we're involved in simply out of spite. Worse that "he" should win, and thus be vindicated, than terrorists should lose, and the world made safer. So they will do everything in their power to promote the latter lest the former be realized. Those who should know better, foretell disaster out of hope.

Either way, those who should know better, and those who don't, all share the hubris of grand prediction. The simple truth remains this: we will know the outcome when the outcome is history. We are living in an age of transformation and great change and can look to the past for guidance only so far as we can find some comparison. Sadly few exist. We know that we no longer enjoy the security of geography and that threats allowed to mature will become more deadly more rapidly. We have been there before.

Can we predict accurately whether we're on the proper course? In a word, no. Any attempt to do so is mere philosophical alchemy. Thus, when Iraqi elections turn out better than expected, it marks not the beginning of the end, but merely the end of the beginning. Just as those at the time could not predict the end of Rome or the onset of European modernity, neither can those today predict the middle east a century hence.

The best we can do is hope. And right now, our hopes are looking better. That's not a prediction, just an observation.

On the ride home from California Adventure park, too dark to read, I had time to think. And it finally occurred to me what needs to be said. After listening to the far left (is there any other kind) spew their lies and hatred, and observing their complete silence at the succeses in Afghanistan and Iraq, it is clear what these people need to do: STFU.

Here's the final word for the hate-filled left:

Japan attacked us, not Germany. In fact, it was US actions, an oil and iron embargo specifically, that caused Japan to see our actions as hostile. Our unqualified support of Israel is seen as reason for al Qaeda.

The reason for invasion of Poland and Russia was lebensraum, or living space. For Hitler, that meant land in the East. In fact, he specifically told his submarine commanders to avoid sinking US ships. And, he thought of the US as a nation of mongrels (you figure it out), that he wnated nothing to do with. Thus, when we put forth a Germany first policy, they were not an immediate threat. It was our actions against them that made us more unsafe.

Japan had no intentions of conquering us, they simply wanted us out of the Pacific. In fact, they were doing nothing different in Korea, China, and the Philippines than what we had done less than a century earlier. In fact, Japan was an "ally" as recently as WW1, when they sent representatives to Versailles. Thus, while we had reason to respond, total war was probably overkill.

FDR had been in secret meetings with Churchill as early as 1940 and had set up secret assisstance arrangements. In fact, as early as 1940, US ships and planes were patrolling the North Atlantic in support of British shipping. Not only did FDR not focus on the enemy who attacked us, he supported Britain at the time our official position was neutrality, and thus, encouraged Hitler to declare war in us following Pearl harbor.

FDR used the Pearl Harbor attaack as a pretext to involve us in the war in Europe, when there was not popular support for it. His planning was at least as early as 1940, when the "peacetime" draft was begun.

So, without a doubt, FDR misled the American people to divert our attention from the real enemy, to fight a war in a country which didn't attack us, had no role in 12/7, and was not an immediate threat to us. And he did this without support of our allies or the international community. Had he told America during his 1940 campaign that he planned on getting the US involved in the war in Europe, no doubt he would have lost reelection.

As early as 1932, Billy Mitchell warned us of possible attack from Japan. And he went so far as to not only foretell an attack, but the very means by which they would carry it out. He had proven to the military the vulnerability of the battleship, and yet, we were still a 19th century gunboat navy on the verge of the aviation war. So, not only did FDR not connect the dots, he did not adequately prepare us for a war he knew we were going to enter. And when we did enter the war, we did so with torpedos that didnt' explode, radar that didn't work, tanks that were under-gunned and poorly armored, and front line fighters that were basically targets.

Every wild charge made against Bush could rightly have been levied against FDR. Of course with the benefit of time, we now know it was right decision, and thus we overlook any failings. In just a few short years, we have seen a rapid and radical transformation of the political landscape in the middle east. Whatever else happens, millions of Arabs and Afghanis have pulled the levers in free and fair elections. They will not easily forget nor readily give up that for a return to the "glory" of Baathist repression.

When the Boxers, Kerrys or Kennedys make stupid mindless comments, when the leftist blogs and their counterparts in the MSM downplay the tremendous successes and play up any violence to score cheap political points, there is just one thing left to say:

STFU