Dianne Ravitch takes Mayor Bloomberg to task for his mishandling of New York City's public schools. The failures there are emblematic of the nationwide educational failures.

Neither Mr. Bloomberg nor Mr. Klein knew about the war of ideas that had been raging among educators for many years. On one side, beloved by schools of education, are the century-old ideas of progressive education, now called "constructivism." Associated with this philosophy are such approaches as whole language, fuzzy math, and invented spelling, as well as a disdain for phonics and grammar, an insistence that there are no right answers (just different ways to solve problems), and an emphasis on students' self-esteem. Constructivists dislike any kind of ability grouping or special classes for gifted children. By diminishing the authority of the teacher, constructivist methods often create discipline problems.

On the other side are those who believe that learning depends on both highly skilled teachers and student effort; that students need self-discipline more than self-esteem; that accuracy is important; that in many cases there truly are right answers and wrong answers (the Civil War was not caused by Reconstruction); and that instructional methods should be chosen because they are effective, not because they fit one's philosophical values.

We would do well to remember the National Commission on Excellence report which stated that "If an unfriendly foreign power had attempted to impose on America the mediocre educational performance that exists today, we might well have viewed it as an act of war. As it stands, we have allowed this to happen to ourselves. . . . We have, in effect, been committing an act of unthinking, unilateral educational disarmament.”

It is inaccurate to state that we have allowed it to happen to ourselves. In truth, it has been done, and continues to be done to this nation. Constructivism, determinism, and relativism are remnants from a Marxist utopian world view, one that permeates educational dogma. It starts in universities and descends into grade schools. I have first hand experience of the problems with schools of education.

What is being done to our schools, our kids, and our country is an act of war. It is being done with the full consent of the educational system, the universities, and the institutions that they support.

It seems that Miss Arianna has unleashed the fools of hell on us. As Matthew Hoy notes, Lampley is a moron. A few weeks ago I said we're in trouble now.

Like I said, all us right-wing bloggers ought to be scared now. Yeah, really scared. Just don't get in her way.

Back in September, I implored the president to take the gloves off.

Republicans just don't get it. Liberals, and democrats in general, don't want to get along, they want to destroy the president and win at all costs. They don't want to be bi-partisan. To them, bi-partisan means both parties agreeing to liberalism. Liberals will use any tactic at their disposal. They will allow a single judge to thwart the will of the people, they will engage in the politics of personal destruction, they will exploit for political purposes any tragedy, victimize any person for political gain, and are the most hypocritical, duplicitous group of people known to man.

The Bolton confirmation process is just the latest attempt in what I believe is an attempt at a bloodless coup. The democrats really have convinced themselves that the election was stolen, that Kerry should be president, and that even if not, they should still be running the country. They are going to do anything and everything in their power to destroy his presidency.

By launching the character assassination against Bolton, they are trying to usurp the president's authority on foreign policy. Their similar assault on Bush's judicial nominees are an attack not only on the president, but on the courts themselves. A small band of them has decided that they will do anything in their power, and some thigns beyond it, to stop the president.

That's not acting like a responsible opposition party. It's the machinations of a deranged and frightful bunch, deluding themselves and willfully collaborating to destroy the democratic process. These people are beyond dangerous. Is that hyperbole? I don't think so.

Here's a simple test. What substantive complaints have they made about Janice Rogers Brown, Priscilla Owens, Miguel Estrada, John Bolton, Condi Rice, or anyone else they set their sights on. There are none. The whole purpose is to wound the president, to weaken our ability to conduct foreign policy, which in turn weakens the country.

Please Mr. President, take the gloves off and come out swinging. They really truly hate you, and will do everything to destroy you. The time for niceities is over.

(hat tip instapundit)

Why I blog?
Nykola has a great point.

As a blogger, you don't want feel like you're writing for a party of one. And let's just be honest with ourselves here. We might front like you we don't care how many people read our blogs, but tell to the truth, deep down inside, we know it's important. It feeds the ego. Even the random lady in Bangor, Maine, catblogging and posting her favorite hot chocolate recipes wants to know people are reading.

Thucydides wrote "My work is not a piece of writing designed to meet the taste of an immediate public, but was done to last forever."

Well, Thucydides I'm not. I'm not a great guitarist, I'm not even very good for that matter. But that hasn't stopped me from falling love with GarageBand, buying a mic adapter for my guitar, and reliving my teenage years. If we only did things we were good at, nobody would ever do anything. I remember reading newspaper op-eds and thinking, "He gets paid for this?" Well, I thought the same about alot of popular bands too. When I play guitar, I play for myself. When I write, I write for myself. If people like it, fine. If not, it's their problem.

I have addressed some controversial topics, some quite close to home. Some have agreed with what I said, happy someone had the courage to speak out. Some have not liked what I've said, followed with the usual invective so typical of the intellectually devoid. In today's constructivist world, anyone can claim anything about anyone, and believe it to be true. However, nothing I've written is lacking in propriety.

I write for myself, as a matter of expression. I do check my hit counters every day or so, to see if people are reading. I'd be lying if I didn't smile on a busy day, which meant 10-20 hits. I'd be lying if I don't visit my site, read my past work, and think "yeah, that's good."

The wealth of literature throughout the ages, far more than anyone could or would would ever pay for, must indicate that there is an innate need for humans to express themselves. I honestly could not imagine a life so empty that I have no need for an intellectual outlet. Perhaps this is the natural outgrowth of being educated, that knowledge is osmotic, that it has a diffusive property. Perhaps.

Perhaps that is why I teach. Just today in class we were discussing the Battle of Britain, the Africa campaign, Crete, and the Wehrmacht's problems in Russia. Hitler's failure against Britain failed to clear them from the Mediterranean. He needed oil, and had to get to the Middle East through British occupied Egypt, which diverted one quarter million troops. His failure to recognize what a stunning success his airborne operation at Crete was precluded his use of airborne at Stalingrad. And speaking of Stalingrad, he split his army in half, sending the armor south to Rostov and the Caucuses for the all important oil. All that and more in 50 minutes with a map on the board. I just couldn't contain myself, as if some great mystery was unfolding before my eyes. I want my students to know it all too.

I write because it forces me to think more, read more, know and understand more. I write for myself and nobody else. I often wonder what Shakespeare would have written had he wrote solely for himself. I have read too many authors who suddenly become famous and their books begin to resemble screenplays. Your best work will be when you write for yourself, as it is exactly what you want. Anything else is contrived. So I write, as everyone should, for an audience of one.

Tom Friedman is at it again in Brussel Sprouts.

Readers of this column know that I rarely write about nuclear proliferation. It is not because I am not interested. I am. It is not because I think it isn't a grave danger. It is. The reason I don't write about it much is because the solution is so ridiculously obvious there isn't much to say. Here's what I mean:

North Korea's nuclear program could be stopped tomorrow by the country that provides roughly half of North Korea's energy and one-third of its food supplies - and that is China.

All China has to say to Kim Jong Il is: "You will shut down your nuclear weapons program and put all your reactors under international inspection, or we will turn off your lights, cut off your heat and put your whole country on a diet. Have we made ourselves clear?" One thing we know about China - it knows how to play hardball when it wants to, and if China played hardball that way with North Korea, the proliferation threat from Pyongyang would be over.

Ditto Europe vis-à-vis Iran. If the European Union said to the Iranians: "You will shut down your nuclear weapons program and put all your reactors and related facilities under international inspection or you will face a total economic boycott from Europe. Which part of this sentence don't you understand?" Trust me, that is the kind of explicit threat that would get Tehran's attention. Short of that, the Iranians will dicker over their nuclear carpets forever.

So why haven't China and the E.U. said these things? "Like that girl with the brussels sprouts," Mr. Mandelbaum said, "the Chinese and the Europeans are all for combating nuclear proliferation - just not enough actually to do something about it."

At the end of the day, the Chinese would rather live with a nuclear North Korea than risk a collapsed nonnuclear North Korea, and the Europeans would rather live with a nuclear Iran - that Europe can make all kinds of money off of - rather than risk losing Iran's business to prevent it from going nuclear. The Chinese and the Europeans "each assume that in the end, the U.S. will deter both the North Koreans and the Iranians anyway, so why worry," Mr. Mandelbaum said.

Let's examine this for a moment. China and Europe have the power to stop North Korea and Iran but will not. Perhaps some of Tom's friends at the TImes can read this. Our "allies" are completely unwilling to do what needs to be done, safe in the knowledge that, in the end, the US will.

Let's go back to 2003 and the UN debate on Iraq. Doesn't the opposition seem somewhat misplaced now that Tom has come clean. And doesn't that also show a complete lack of understanding, dare I even say nuance, on the part of Monsieur Kerrie'.

This just shows even more so that the president was right to finish the job in Iraq. It is obvious, now more than ever, that Europe was waiting for the sanctions to be lifted and full status returned to Iraq. They must have been salivating in anticipation of all those lucrative oil contracts.

Hey Tom, how's about a mea culpa. It's so funny I don't know whether to laugh or cry.

Pedro from The quietest posts about me:

Anyone interested in a more eloquent voice than mine that also focuses (generally) on what has been named the "Killing of History" by the air, sea, and land attack of political correctness, revisionism, and postmodernist silliness should check out this blog by a history teacher named Mandel. The guy teaches high school and has a big family, yet still manages to find time to post thoughtful kickass takedowns of feel-good history.

Wow. I sincerely hope I can live up to that!! Thanks.

(hat tip Powerline)

Jay Nordlinger of NRO writes:" Can you believe what President Bush said in the Baltics? Can you believe he went to the Baltics, before visiting Russia for the 60th anniversary? Oh, yes, you can, if you know President Bush."

The left hates Bush for a simple reason: he is principled. He says what he means, and means what he says.

Of all the things this is the worst. For them everything is relative. That is seen as the height of intellectualism, the ability as it were to be able to change positions. They see it is enlightened and open minded, while in reality it is simply vacuity.

It is the ultimate constructivist mindset: the truth is what I believe it to be, which is exactly why they hate him so. He contadicts everything they believe, so rather than debate him, they set out to destroy him.

So I'm going through my sitemeter logs, checking referrals to see where people are visiting from, and I come across this nifty group blog from Hawaii. Their post Tyranny of the present was a takeoff on Professor Hanson's article, that Powerline linked to, that linked to my post on textbooks that tripled my total hits in one weekend. The internet is quite amazing.

The point here is that on another front, apparently someone is taking cheap shots at Professor Hanson. Now, he no more needs my help in his defense anymore than Evil Glenn needs my help in increasing his traffic. However, this is quite an interesting little piece:

[Hanson's op-ed] is a conservative's apologia for what we do. On first reading, it seems moving; but on second reading it seems to have come from some op-ed generator. As a conservative, Hanson is clearly drawn to some of the "hooks," viz., 3, 5, 7, 9, that Tim Burke identified and suspicious of others, viz., 1, 4, 6, 8. There are the obligatory contemporary references. Here's one example:
[snippet about W. Churchill]
I'm not one to argue that Churchill is no plagiarist or faker. But I look back at Hanson's opening line: "Our society suffers from the tyranny of the present." Hmm. "... the tyranny of the present" is Ralph Waldo Emerson's phrase, but Hanson gives him no credit for it.** We are, indeed, the beneficiaries of a legacy we barely acknowledge. Isn't that right, Victor?

This is why the left is in trouble. They have not an idea or thought other than to go into ad hominem attack mode. Let me help them out a bit. When a phrase becomes commonly used, and no citation is given, there is a term for this: part of the lexicon.

That is why something as inocuous as "the whole nine yards" has absolutely no literal meaning to someone born after World War 2. There are so many quotes, phrases, and passages of which we haven't the knowledge of origin, unless one is a professional lexographer or linguist. Few of us are.

Yet it is those very phrases that are part of who we are. As David McCullough noted:

Family, teachers, friends, rivals, competitors – they’ve all shaped us. And so too have people we’ve never met, never known, because they lived long before us. They have shaped us too – the people who composed the symphonies that move us, the painters, the poets, those who have written the great literature in our language. We walk around everyday, everyone of us, quoting Shakespeare, Cervantes, Pope. We don’t know it, but we are, all the time. We think this is our way of speaking. It isn’t our way of speaking – it’s what we have been given. The laws we live by, the freedoms we enjoy, the institutions that we take for granted – as we should never take for granted – are all the work of other people who went before us. And to be indifferent to that isn’t just to be ignorant, it’s to be rude. And ingratitude is a shabby failing.

The point he makes here, one which Mr. Luker is in such a snit over, is that Hanson most assuredly has read Emerson, as well as a compendium of literature from antiquity until the present, and it has profoundly inflluenced his prose and speech. As well it should.

It is precisely the knowledge of such great works, and the uncited but very visible use of such that has caused such concern among many. If Mr. Luker had ever bothered to read Hanson's works, he'd understand far better where he's coming from.

Hanson believes in the primacy of Western culture, it's values, institutions, and its legacy. He believes deeply that we are who were today not because of "guns, germs, and steel", but because the Western way, from representative democracy to market capitalism to civic militarism, is the root of our success. And he fears, as do many including myself, that should we lose that, we lose everything. He decries the cultural relativism and anti-Western attitudes taken by so many in academia. And he's right to do so.

The other cheap shot he takes is by mentioning that our history deficiency has been a concern of Hanson's for some time. Hanson is not alone, as many contemporary as well as past luminaries have had the exact same concern.

Then he takes another cheap shot by attacking Hanson for lamenting that the triviality is supplanting the serious in historical studies. Mr. Luker calls passages such as

"The history of the pencil, girdle or cartoon offers us less wisdom about events, past and present,"

"denigration of social history". Well, why are the slaves freed, the Nazis vanquished, and we even having a social security debate? Is it because women wanted to look more shapely?

Grant Jones of 50thStar thoroughly destroys the pencil comment.

According to Beito, Hanson's crime is "dissing" Leonard Read, economist and author of the classic essay I pencil. Beito ignores the fact that Hanson's essay is on the teaching of history in the university and Read's is on the epistemological division of labor of the free market.

If Mr. Luker knew at all what was passing for history in so many claassrooms today, he'd understand a little better. Open up any textbook and you'll see far more text, pictures, and information devoted to how people lived rather than the great people, ideas, and events that have shaped the world. There's a reason why it's not even called history any more. Now it's known as social studies.

Mr. Luker says, "Altogether, I'd say Victor Davis Hanson has some answering to do." Hardly. You attack not at all his arguments, only his use of a relatively obscure phrase. In typical lefty fashion, when you can't win the battle of ideas, you go straight to the attack.

HNN.us puports to be an historical website, but it has a decidely leftward slant. This is fine. However, they should disclose some of their bias prior or at leastr be honest about it. For example, they have an entire section of stories on Iraq that read like a MoveOn.org or Michael More rant. Their opposition to Hanson is as much philosophical as technical. For eaxmple, Mr. Luker cites fellow HNN.us contributor David Beito. From a post titled Victor Davis Hanson v. Leonard Read, he writes:

Hanson's disparagement of the "history of the pencil" betrays a worldview that is fundamentally at odds with the tradition of freedom represented by Thomas Jefferson (at his best), Rose Wilder Lane, Friedrich A. Hayek, and Ludwig Von Mises. Unfortunately it is worldview that is rubbing off on libertarians who embrace the Bushian dream of entrusting the American state to bring "liberty" to every corner of the planet.

This is quite typical of the left, an inability to separate their emotions from their work. One, Hanson never claims to be either a conservative or a Republican. In fact, he is a registered democrat. He is a traditional demcocrat, from the Truman and FDR wing of the party. He believes in American exceptionalism and the dangers of American isolationism. There are deep divisions on both the left and the right regarding the war in Iraq and the larger agenda of the expansion of freedom. What sudden and strange bedfellows Pat Buchanan now has as a result.

Beito gives himself away when he says:

Many libertarians and conservatives who I respect consider Victor Davis Hanson to be a top-flight scholar. I have never read his historical work so can not address this subject. I can say that Hanson's opinion pieces have never impressed me. His article yesterday for The Washington Times shows, as usual, a flair for lofty prose but, just as usual, lacks substance.

And there, in a nutshell, is the problem with the left. " 'I haven't read his historical work' but I can still comment on his work." Here's some free advice: read his work.

Libertarians today have become leftists in their own right. While they oppose some of the leftist agenda like socialized medicine, they adopt the social core of leftism today: cultural relativism and nihilism. For them, it is personal and so too are their attacks. Which is just typical of the left.

FDR is being invoked quite a bit lately. The democrats went so far as to hold a seance in front of FDR's statue several weeks ago. I think the only thing they forgot to bring was a ouija board. The latest battle is over Yalta and the division of post WW2 Europe.

Without writing an entire book, let's take a brief look at FDR and the war.

Long before the war began, he knew we would be unable to stay out. He began preparations long before, organizing industry into war mode, modernizing the navy, and focusing on air power over large land forces. We were openly aiding Britain despite our official neutrality, and fully a year before we were attacked, he began preparing the nation for our eventual rendezvous with destiny. Certainly, anyone who read Mein Kampf knows that Hiter saw land only the east, England as an ally (though we got Churchill, we almost got Halifax), and America as corrupt.

Yet in December 1940, he told Americans that Hitler had plans on world dominataion and America was in his sights. (Sound eerily familiar, eh, Bush critics?) He instituted the draft, and refused to accomodate Japan on her atrocities in China or her expansion in the Pacific.

So we went to war. Whether or not we were attacked at Pearl Harbor (which he used as justifiaction for his Germany first policy), does anyone honestly think that the US would have sat out the second European dance of death.

Let's conlude that FDR's instincts were correct. However, we know that he'd had never gone to war simply to save European Jewry. He was determined, as was Churchill, to save Anglo-Christian society. Without a doubt there were never two more right people at the right time in history.

However, let's conclude that his instincts about "Uncle Joe" were, to be delicate, imperfect. We were under no obligation to supply the Russians with the quantity of supplies we did, nor were we under any obligationto treat them as co-equal partners against the Nazis. Rather, we should have seen them as collaborators who were betrayed. Remember, they invaded Poland two weeks after the Nazis.

Apparently the battle is underway not only to preserve FDR's one great legislative legacy, whatever the price. The fight is on to preserve, in some manner, FDR's war legacy which should be that America must never pursue a policy of isolationism ever again. But that would not fit with the left's agenda, so instead, they're rewriting the past, paiting the Soviets as somehow worthy of their spoils, not as bad as the Nazis, and in a stronger position in February 1945 than they really were.

Let the games begin. The battle for the past is on.

Bush was right to condemn the Yalta conference. We left millions and millions to suffer the blight of communism. How ironic that today those we freed hate us and those we allowed to be enslaved love us.

If the Republicans want to kill their majority status, then all they need to do is pass the national ID act. The Republicans have become the party of big government. This would make them the party of big brother.

This is exactly what Republicans are supposed to oppose as it violates every principle and the supposed core phiosophy of Republicans. Driver's licenses are a state issue. How about this as an aternative. Since the federal government can regulate interstate commerce (see US Constitution), and since airports fall under that authority, then the solution is rather simple.

Make uniform standards of what is an acceptable ID, and list those states that meet federal standards, and those that don't. Simply enough. If Californians can't use their driver's licenses as ID, since anyone with a Matricula Consular card can get one, than us Cali fliers are S.O.L.

And see, it fits exactly with Republican ideas. Washington DC isn't telling the states what they can and can't do, simply what they require for proper identification.

And best of all, it would require no new funding nor any new department.

100 Rebels Killed in U.S. Offensive in Western Iraq

Money quote:

American officials said that the offensive had been a long time coming but that it was spurred by a fresh batch of intelligence gleaned from Iraqis who live in the area as well as interrogations of newly captured aides to the most wanted terrorist in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

This is significant. Expect alot more high profile assaults in the weeks to come, as we sort out the information from Zarkawi's info and the other captured leaders.

Wretchard noted these exact areas a few days ago. This is the Syrian pipeline. It will be interesting to see what we yield from this, and where are next targets will be.

And yes, it indicates that we are winning. We take the fight to them. We kill them on their turf, on our terms. They can blow up a bomb and kill scores of civilians. That is a startegy doomed to failure not just because of the courage of the Iraqi people, but because of the way we're fighting the war.

In Vietnam the tactic was to send units out on patrol and engage the enemy. But the VC got smart, they wouldn't attack a company, so we sent out a platoon. Then they wouldn't attack a platoon, so we sent out a squad. Even when we drew fire, we'd kill many of them, but we'd never pursue them and finish the job.

It was like a macabre pickup basketball game in the city. A bunch of guys go to the court and a game breaks out. In the jungle, a firefight would break out. In Vietnam, we were as apt to let them leave after the game as not. That's not playing to win, only playing.

What we're doing today is finding out where the players live, going into their homes, and either killing them if they resist, or arresting them if they don't. We're playing to win. And we are.

No sooner do I post on the deceit in the social security deabte than the US Today opines that we need to raise the retirement age. Fine. But they seemed to miss a few things.

His plan, known as "progressive indexing," would slice deeply into monthly benefits — and not just for the rich. A 25-year-old making $36,000, for instance, would get checks 16% smaller at retirement than what's currently promised. Reductions rise with incomes. Perhaps unsurprisingly, initial reviews of the plan have been mixed at best.

The checks will be smaller because they will be augmented with personal savings accounts. I don't know which is worse, actaully lying or simply withholding the truth. If all they ever say is "your benefits will be cut" than of course people will be opposed to it. But if you added, "but you're benefits will be augmented by your personal savings accounts" the support would be much higher.

But hate it or love it, Bush's idea at least creates a benchmark to measure other sacrifices against. No cost-free alternative exists, but we think a better tradeoff is available: Increase the retirement age.

Mike Kinsley gets it, the NY Times is starting to get it, and now he US Today is as well. That's a start.

Like Bush's proposal, this is not popular. But unlike Bush's plan — in fact, unlike any other proposal — it addresses the principal reason Social Security has a problem to begin with: People are living longer and therefore collecting more in benefits.

In 1941, the first year Social Security benefits were paid, the average person who made it to 65 would live another 13 years. Now, that same person is projected to live 18 more years. Health advances are expected to continue driving life expectancies upward.

That's not the real problem. The problem is not that people live longer, but that far more people are living longer. It's not that more people are living into their 80's, it's the much higher number of people who make it into the their 70's. Or, in other words, our lives aren't really any longer, it's just that more people are living long lives. In 2002, almost two out of every three people born will make it their 75th birthday, and one in three will reach 85.

Yes, raising the retirement age will alleviate the problem to a degree.

We'd oppose moving the goal posts abruptly for those currently approaching retirement age. But for younger workers, already skeptical about whether Social Security will be there for them, a higher age could be factored into their retirement planning.

No to mention, it would give private accounts another decade to grow.

Much to US Today's credit, they address the hard truths we must face: 40% of federal outlays goes to retired people, social security places an enormous tax burden on workers, and lastly, that healthy elderly are an untapped labor market.

No idea for fixing Social Security is without drawbacks. But raising the retirement age ought to be part of the solution. It would not involve increasing taxes or cutting monthly checks. Unlike the Bush plan, it would not undermine support within the middle and upper classes by causing them to see Social Security as welfare. It would not drive up the national debt.

And, unlike many other proposals circulating in Washington, it would not radically restructure what is, after all, the most popular and successful government program ever.

Social security IS welfare. They tax current workers and transfer that money directly to elderly retirees. If it quacks like a duck...

And we have to stop repeating the "most successful program..." mantra unless we're allowed to say "Columbus discoverred America...". Of course it's populara, and why wouldn't it be? It offers false hope, its most ardent supporters have made out like bandits, and it's become part of the myth of FDR repeated in textbooks across the land. (Don't get me started on that subject.)

Nice job, but not quite.

(Hat tip powerline)

Charles Krauthammer's column The Same Old Saw On Social Security is a masterful swipe at democratic short term political tactics versus long term financial stability. And he even commends for Kinsley praising the president, though I was far less charitable.

The one element missing in the entire debate, the obvious elephant in the room that nobody wants to broach, is life expectancy. But it's not what you think it is. Let's look at the data (pdf file) from the CDC.

There are many charts about probablilty of reaching certain ages, years of life remaining, etc. Sifting through all the charts and tables, I want to focus on two: table 10 and table 12. I also want to complare the years 1949-1951 (per table 10) with 2002. This acocunts for the post-WW2 changes in society and the economy. Also, it is fully a decade after checks firt went out.

Let's look at table 12, life expectancy. Here's a decade comparison:
1951 68.4 years
1961 70.2
1971 71.1
1981 74.1
1991 75.5
2001 77.2

So, we see on average, roughly a two year increment in life expectancy. It is reasonable to assume that by 2011 it'll be 79 and by 2021 81. However, I don't expect it to go much beyond that, as unless there are some advancements in regenerative medicine, the body simply wears out. However, this by itself is not the real problem. That is table 12.

Let's examine the numbers between the two year groupings. Remember, this is the number of people out of each 100,000 born that are still alive in each age group.

AGE*	1951	2002
45	89,000	95,000
55	82,000	91,000
65	67,000	82,000
75	44,000	65,000
85	16,000	36,000
* numbers rounded

Numbers can be numbing. Let's make some sense of them.

It isn't so much that we're living longer, it's that so many more people are living longer. Let me clarify that. It's not life expectancy, it's the expectancy of reaching such old ages. And that is where the problem really lies. As I mentioned, I don't expect to see major increments in life expectancy. I do however expect that more and more people will reach an age near it though. So, even if they pass away in their late seventies, there will be more and more people in the last age brackets.

As it stands right now, over half of all people will reach 80. Since 1939, there has been an almost 5000 per 100,000 person increase every decade in septuagenarians and octogenarians. Carry that out twenty years when 60,000, maybe 65,000 out of 100,000 people born reach will 80 years of age. This is not only possible, but I dare say probable. We are more health and diet conscious than ever. We have cured so many diseases, and are successfully battling many more. The aged have accumulated great wealth, live lives of relative comfort, and have access to the best medical facilities in the world. This is the elephant that nobody dares mention.

I don't propose we set the elderly adrift on an ice raft, nor do I propose we open up Carousel (obscure movie reference). But we must address this, that there will be so many more people in the system who otherwise wouldn't have been there 20 years ago. It's not the people living to 90, it's the enormous number of extra people that will live to 80. Until we honestly and clearly come to terms with this, and it's truly a number we cannot know, any debate about when soc. sec. goes belly up is pure deceit.

I keep trying to post and blogger is screwing it up. I also have lost posts in preview mode. I'm about ready to switch. I want to scream!!!

Everything you ever wanted to know about the Iraqi war is summed up in this one photograph.


The terrorists target the weakest, the most vulnerable. To them, killing women and children is a ticket to heaven, their possible return to power.

The Marines and soldiers preparing for operation Coronet learned they were spared invasion and began readying for the occupation instead. Four years of the bloodiest fighting in US history, the most brutal war against a most brutal enemy had jsut concluded. Bombers, just weeks earlier, filled the skies and rained death and destruction upon hundreds of thousands.

Many in the occupation forces were veterans of one, two, and sometimes even three campaigns. When they arrived in Japan and saw starving Japanese children they gave them their rations. That's the American soldier.

Though most of those GI's have long since passed this earth, they still live on today. Two years of an insurgency and once again, who is there to protect the weakest and most vulnerable, the American GI. The child pictured above could not have been better cared for if that was the soldier's own child.

The insurgents haven't any idea who they're fighting. The media would love for Pvt. England to be the face of the war. Likewise, they've no idea who they're fighting either. The real faces of the war are the soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines who risk their lives daily, who are, like the soldier pictured above, the best friend of the Iraqi, the worst enemy of the insurgent.

In the fighting, it's us versus them and the Iraqis know who the good guys are.

Scott Johnson on Powerline notes in History: The Casualty that(regarding Professor Hanson's "What happened to history?"):

I would go one step further and observe that the little history that contemporary high school students learn (Hanson refers to it as "therapy") is more often than not factually wrong -- that women were not included in the proposition that "all men are created equal," that the founders believed in the rightness of slavery, that Lincoln was a racist and a politician who would change his tune depending on his audience, that the Civil War didn't have anything to do with slavery, and so on.

Please see what I wrote just a couple of days ago. He has no idea.

UPDATE: 5/8/05 6:45PM Servers getting a quite a workout the last hour thanks to powerline link. Awesome!!

UPDATE 5/8/05 11:30 PM Just checked my sitemeter stats. 1300+ hits. Since September, I'd had around 2500 hits. WOW!! Thanks to all who visited.

(hat tip Instapundit)

Strategy Page IRAQ: Changing the Rules of the Blame Game

But the invasion of Iraq, and the overthrow of Saddam, forced Arabs to confront their long support for a tyrannical butcher like Saddam. Here was a dictator who knew how to play the blame game, and position himself as an Arab "hero." Saddam's supporters turned to terrorism to restore themselves to power. Two years of killing Iraqis has shamed an increasing number of Arabs into admitting that this is an Arab problem, not the fault of the United States (who, in the most popular delusion, should have waved a magic wand and made all problems in Iraq disappear.) Even the Sunni Arab media are in awe of the Iraqi Shia and Kurds, for not slaughtering large numbers of Sunni Arabs in response to the terrorism, or simply as revenge for centuries of torment at the hands of Sunni Arabs.

As we celebrate the sixtieth anniversary of V-E day, we still have troops in Europe and still spend bilions of dolalrs on defense of Europe. Europe is basically unable to defend itself, handle its internal security issues, or even offer much more than token assisstance to global concerns.

If we look sixty years into the future, and we have troops in Iraq, still spend billion defending her, and she is unable to offer other than token assissance to Arab defense, then the mission will be an abject failure.

Perhaps the Bush strategy was not plagued by incompetence but by the realistic understanding that turning Iraq into an American satrapy was no more palatble than turning her into a multi-generational welfare dependent. Most of the complaints have stemmed from what we failed to do, i.e. protect the museums, stop looting, secure borders, rebuild infrastructure, etc. What we did do however was force the Iraqis to do these things for themselves.

And that will be the greatest, and least heralded, success of the war. As long as we continued to take care of everything, we would. As soon as Iraqis learned that we wouldn't, and once the initial period of resentment passed, they got on with the task of building a country.

The Sunni in Iraq used to have a saying "the Shia are sheep", meaning of course they are weak and easily led to the slaughter. Why they are acting with the greatest of restraint is no thard to understand. They know full well what the future holds and they have suffered far worse. If the Shia are sheep, and I gether more and more they are hardly, than the Sunni surely are hyenas. They only are strong in packs, they only attack the weakest, the sick, and the dying, and they will turn on each other in a moments notice.