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Like I Said

by John Cole|  August 13, 20059:13 am| 123 Comments

This post is in: General Stupidity

Yesterday, I wrote:

I think this is the last time I am going to discuss this issue, because as careful as I have been to not say anything about Cindy personally, the jackasses on the far left are going to distort this post, lie, vilify, and attack anyway, and it just isn’t worth it to me to deal with their bullshit.

And today, ‘The Poorman offers up this:

It’s got everything: breathtaking incoherence, an elevation of trivial internet slights over the death of a mother’s son, paranoid delusions – the works. Please do read the whole thing – things this perfect don’t come around every day.

The proximate cause and context of all this is a little online soap opera which opens with Sheehan being called a “whore” and an Arab-loving traitor, among other things, by some dude named Erick. Anonymous people left nasty emails and even phone messages for our Erick (which is not nice so don’t do it), he says, and it’s Atrios’ fault, and Erick, as it turns out, is the reeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaallllll victim here.

Hey Andrew- when you start out as a lying asshole, why should we waste any more time reading you? I mean, when you are going to start out by simply distorting what Erick said (because Andrew knows there is no difference between a whore and a media whore “Think about it: what are the chances that a media whore like Gannon would turn out to be an actual whore?”), why should we even take you as honest? Nowhere did Erick caller her a traitor, or an ‘arab-lover.’ And I am far from being paranoid and delusional, considering the heaping pile of steaming nonsense you have written today.

Some dude named ‘Andrew’ goes on to scribble:

The upshot of the post appears to be that there is nothing necessarily wrong with being the mother of a dead soldier, provided you don’t let it influence your opinions in any way, and provided that you don’t feel that you are somehow entitled to an explanation of why, exactly, he was sent off to die. Failing this, you deserve whatever you get, and anybody who calls you a whore is protected by a Level 50 No-Backsies Force Field. This is certainly a step up from collage, but it is still something short of an actual response to the questions Cindy Sheehan wants the President to answer. Ah, the questions! Cole appears to have missed this little detail, insisting repeatedly that Sheehan has already met with the President, as if he was worried she might use this second opportunity to try to sell Bush a set of overpriced encyclopedias, or steal his silverware. She wants to ask “why the war that took her son’s life was started and why it is being continued.”

Dance along with the Poorman now, because ‘all Cindy wants is some questions answered.’ That is it! Just a few simple questions!

It’s worse than that, though, because even if Cindy Sheehan had no questions, she is, in herself, in her own story, an accusation. There are tens of thousands of Americans who have lost a loved one as a direct result of this war of choice with Iraq, and hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of Iraqis. Each of the dead has a mother, and whether or not they camp out in front of Bush’s Ranch of Make-Believe, and whether or not they currently think the war was a good idea, and whether or not they even ever wondered about what it was and is all about, those mothers deserve a real answer.

This isn’t about Cindy Sheehan. Andrew, Atrios, all the folks at dKos couldn’t give a SHIT about Cindy Sheehan. This is about galvanizing support against the war, and not a whit about Cindy Sheehan and her ‘questions.’ And for some of them, this isn’t even about galvanizing support against the war- it is just pure politics.

But you will notice that Sheehan is essentially a “weapon”, a “tool”, “used” by nefarious and – yes, I’ll say it! – “evil” webloggers in order to generate mean emails against some dude named Erick. Or something. She isn’t any of those things. She’s a human being, a mother, and a fucking American, and she deserves a straight fucking answer from the President about why her son is dead.

Pretty good work there from the guy who wrote about the Global Struggles Against Strawmen. And here are the ‘questions’ Cindy wants answered:

“Why did you kill my son? What did my son die for? If the cause is so noble, why don’t you send your twins?”

And, for good measure, some demands:

“Honor our sacrifices by bringing our nation’s sons and daughters home from a war based on lies and deceptions.”

I can’t imagine why Bush hasn’t met with her. Again.

*** Update ***

Northrup responds:

I would like to stress here that Cole is not saying that this weblog is literally edited by some kind of giant, hyper-intelligent, dishonest anus, but merely that The Editors are analogous to a fibbing cornhole in our dealings with him. Now, as long time readers have no doubt suspected, this weblog is literally edited by an enormous, mendacious, disembodied anus.

It shows. At any rate, the bullshit continues in earnest:

… Cole responds, pointing out that Sheehan was not called a “whore” literally, but actually a “media whore”, which is a metaphorical kind of whore that doesn’t necessarily fuck people for money (Jeff Gannon nonwithstanding.) No, I won’t get out of here – that’s what he said. Go see for yourself. So if anybody thought that Erick was literally saying that Sheehan fucks people for money, please disabuse yourself of that notion forthwith!

Don’t feed me that bullshit. Erick’s original quote:

Cindy Sheehan’s son was killed in Iraq. She’s a grieving mother. Last year, the President met with Mrs. Sheehan, comforted her, and grieved with her. At the time, Mrs. Sheehan thought the President had done well and appreciated him. Enter August, no major news, and a media still smarting over the President’s re-election despite everything they threw at him. Cindy Sheehan returns entering stage right — this time a left wing media whore in the form of a grieving mother.

Which has morphed into the following at Eschaton:

Um, has Michelle Malkin talked to Cindy Sheehan’s son? Has Bill O’Reilly? Has Erick Erickson, who called Cindy Sheehan a whore over at redstate.org? If they haven’t talked to him, they should shut up, leave her alone, and defend their incoherent position on the Iraq war without hiding behind Cindy Sheehan’s dead son.

At MYDD:

Blogger Erick Erickson says Cindy Sheehan is a “whore in the form of a grieving mother”

The Poorman himself:

The proximate cause and context of all this is a little online soap opera which opens with Sheehan being called a “whore” and an Arab-loving traitor, among other things, by some dude named Erick.

And, my favorite, at Steve Gilliard’s site:

To call her a “left-wing whore” will affect how people see you and your site. Even your readers disagree with the sentiments here and their expression.

Where he just drops the word ‘media,’ but makes sure he gets the ‘whore’ part in. Funny how the metaphor looks like a literal use of the word ‘whore.’ Just one of those weird coincidences on the InterTrons!

Put it this way- If Erick has said she had become a ‘left-wing media hound,’ how many of these guys would have written posts showing outrage that Erick had called her a ‘hound?’ By conveniently dropping the word ‘media,’ the intent is to pass on to their readers that Erick called her something other than what he said.

Erick also stated the following, in his apology for calling her a media whore:

Amazing what happens when you take on a lefty sacred cow.

Why are the Editors not outraged OUTRAGED! that Erick called Cindy Sheehan a cow?

*** Update ***

Guess someone did take offense at Erick calling her a cow:

Like I SaidPost + Comments (123)

The Anti-War Left’s Perfect Weapon

by John Cole|  August 12, 200511:59 pm| 203 Comments

This post is in: Politics

I haven’t written about Cindy Sheehan because it is just a tragedy. She has lost her kid, is grief-stricken, so I figure it best to just leave her alone. Fair enough.

However, it is understandable that her new-found activism, along with her aligning herself with the radical anti-war left and staging media events with no purpose other than to attack the President, should be seen as opening herself up to criticisms of her political positions. It is also fair to state that many on the left have chosen her as a symbol to bludgeon anyone who still supports this war. The prevailing opinion from the left appears to be that Sheehan is the perfect weapon, someone whose viewpoints are simply not allowed to be challenged, someone who can be used at will to not only galvanize support for the anti-war movement, but to attack the President, the President’s policies, and anyone who chooses to continue to support the mission in Iraq. And no one is allowed to say anything to counter that- the President and those who still support themission are supposed to just sit there and take it, lest they be accused of attacking a grieving mother.

And what a weapon she has turned out to be! As I write this, there are 2,560 current media stories about Cindy Sheehan listed by google news. Technorati coughs up another 4967 blog posts. Google, when asked, coughs and sputters and reveals 729,000 archived stories. By comparison, Todd Beamer, of “Let’s Roll” fame offers up 69,000 hits.

With that alone, a reasonable person might feel safe in stating that Cindy Sheehan is at the very least approaching becoming a public figure. Throw in the MSNBC, FOX, CNN, NBC, ABC, and CBS coverage, her blogging for Michael Moore and the Huffington Post,and it is beyond safe to come to the conclusion that she has eclipsed ‘grieving mother’ status and has moved on to anti-war celebrity status. I would even venture to say that she is a political figure, as well as the perfect political weapon.

And this is what she wants- to put out her political message. To do so, she has enlisted the aid of numerous antiwar groups, including Gold Star Families for Peace, Veterans for Peace, Code Pink, Military Families Speak Out, and numerous others, including some that are specially designed for the occasion, such as MeetWithCindy.org. There are many more, but I am tired of looking for him- accept this as a representative sample.

It is undeniable that Cindy is seeking the media spotlight to put forward her message, but there will be some who continue to deny this, all the while seeking more and more attention for Cindy, so as to maximize the political damage to the administration. Since we have to deal those who deny reality as if they were serious people, I will just let Cindy speak for me:

Today was a highly eventful day. This entry won’t be artful, but utilitarian.

I conservatively got 3 to 5 phone calls a minute. I did about 25 phone interviews and several TV interviews. I did several right-wing radio interviews. I was supposed to do: The Today Show, MSNBC live interview, Connected Coast to Coast (MSNBC) and Hardball (MSNBC). The Today Show just never showed up and the other 3 MSNBC shows cancelled for no reason…

We need to show the media that we are in the majority. We need to show George Bush and his cabal of neocons that when we say “bring the troops home, now” we mean “bring the troops home, now!”

Sure sounds like a public figure with a political agenda who is trying to get as much media exposure as possible, but I am not convinced:

Today started at 4am when I had to get up and get ready to be on Good Morning America. It was pouring down rain at Camp Casey. The wind was blowing and there was thunder and lightening. It was pretty exciting. The interview went very well. I haven’t seen it or read a transcript. Since it was taped, I am just wondering if they showed it when I said Bush doesn’t want to see me because he likes to surround himself with “sycophants…”

I talked with John Conyers today and he wrote a letter to George signed by about 18 other Congress members to request that he meet with me. I also talked to Maxine Waters tonight and she is probably going to be here tomorrow. I am so overwhelmed by the support.

I did non-stop interviews today. 100 people came through today to visit with us. About 25 people are staying the night. More food, water, flowers, and money came through today. One father brought his 2 and 4 year old sons out to meet me and thank me for trying to save his boys from the same fate Casey suffered.

Maybe she is just a grieving mother who simply wants to meet with the President. Again. For a second time. I dunno:

We had a little bit of trouble with locals today. We are beginning to feel a little unwelcome here. One lady almost ran over a television crew. She screamed at us that the neighbors are really mad …so we moved down the road to our closest neighbor who is very sweet. Her husband is a medic who just got home from Iraq.

Again, I did tons of interviews. It looks like I will be on the cover of People Magazine. Time Magazine, Vanity Fair and Oprah’s magazine will be interviewing me also.

It was great having the other GSFP and MFSO there to help me with interviews and greeting all of the hundreds of people who came out from all over the country to be with us today. We were hassled by the Sheriff because there were too many cars out there. Our little Bush Town has grown to full capacity. The town Sheriff said we can put up tents and RV’s in the town stadium. There are wall to wall sleeping bags here at the Peace House.

Maybe, just maybe, this is more than just a grieving mother who wants media attention for her political cause. I still am not sure:

Since Congress is not holding George Bush accountable and the media is not doing their jobs and holding George Bush accountable, we the American people need to hold him accountable for lying to us to get us into a disastrous war. November 2, 2004 was not his accountability moment: today is. We are finished allowing him to get away with deceiving the American public and abusing his power.

We are mad as hell and we’re not taking it anymore.

I can’t be sure, but some people might get the idea that she is an activist with an agenda. I will venture forth carefully, and claim that I tepidly think Cindy, along with being the mother of a dead soldier, is also a media fixture, an anti-war activist, and a self-made lightning rod. I don’t think that is too awfully controversial.

In fact, it appears she is a bona fide political success, if you ask Bernie Sanders:

Cindy Sheehan and the other families of soldiers who lost their lives in Iraq deserve answers from President Bush about his plans to bring our troops home. That is why I, along with dozens of other members of Congress, have urged the President to sit down with Ms. Sheehan…

We know now that the President intentionally distorted information in order to justify going to war and that he misled the American people by suggesting a connection between Iraq and 9/11. The President owes Ms. Sheehan and other families that lost loved ones in Iraq more than platitudes. He owes them and the American public an explanation about his plans for an exit strategy.

Is that true? How could that be? I thought she just wanted to meet with the President. Again. For the second time. Because she is a grieving mother. And you all will go to hell for thinking otherwise. Even if she hates him:

So anyway that filth-spewer and warmonger, George Bush was speaking after the tragedy of the marines in Ohio, he said a couple things that outraged me.

Seriously outraged me.

And I know I don’t look like I’m outraged, I’m always so calm and everything, that’s because if I started hitting something, I wouldn’t stop til it was dead. So I can’t even start, cause I know how dangerous that would be, but George Bush was talking, and he never mentioned the terrible incident of those marines, but he did say, that the families of the ones who have been killed can rest assured that their loved ones died for a noble cause.

And, he also said, he says this often, and this really drives me crazy, he said that we have to stay in Iraq and complete the mission, to honor the sacrifices of the ones who have fallen.

And I say, why should I want one more mother to go through what I’ve gone through, because my son is dead. You know what, the only way he can honor my son’s sacrifice is to bring the rest of the troops home. To make my son’s death count for peace and love, and not war and hatred like he stands for.

I don’t want him using my son’s death or my family’s sacrifice to continue the killing. I don’t want him to exploit the honor of my son and others to continue the killing. They sent these honorable people to die, and are so dishonorable themselves.

So, as many of you have heard, and I didn’t mean to cause any problems with the convention, but I was writing an email to everybody, and I was so mad, like I said, and I just had this brainstorm, I’m going to Dallas, I don’t know where Crawford is. I’ve been in Texas, Casey was stationed at Fort Hood. I drove from northern California to Fort Hood one time, it took like, 30 hours. And I thought, I could be driving for days to get from Dallas to Crawford!

But I don’t care, I’m goin’. And I’m gonna tell them, “You get that evil maniac out here, cuz a Gold Star Mother, somebody who’s blood is on his hands, has some questions for him.”

Personally, I don’t know why he won’t meet with her. Again. For the second time. I wonder what she would say to President Bush?

“That lying bastard, George Bush, is taking a five-week vacation in time of war,” Cindy Sheehan told 200 cheering members of Veterans For Peace at their annual convention in Dallas last Friday evening. She then announced she would go to Bush’s vacation home in nearby Crawford, Texas and camp out until he “tells me why my son died in Iraq. I’ve got the whole month of August off, and so does he.”

Sheehan left the VFP meeting on Saturday morning and is now in Crawford with a couple dozen veterans and local peace activists, waiting for Bush to talk with her. She said in Dallas that if he sends anyone else to see her, as happened when national security adviser Steve Hadley and deputy White House chief of staff Joe Hagin did later that day, she would demand that “You get that maniac out here to talk with me in person.”

She told the audience of veterans from World War Two to today’s war in Iraq, that the two main things she plans to tell the man she holds responsible for son Casey’s death are “Quit saying that U.S. troops died for a noble cause in Iraq, unless you say, ‘well, except for Casey Sheehan.’ Don’t you dare spill any more blood in Casey’s name. You do not have permission to use my son’s name.”

“And the other thing I want him to tell me is ‘just what was the noble cause Casey died for?’ Was it freedom and democracy? Bullshit! He died for oil. He died to make your friends richer. He died to expand American imperialism in the Middle East. We’re not freer here, thanks to your PATRIOT Act. Iraq is not free. You get America out of Iraq and Israel out of Palestine and you’ll stop the terrorism,” she exclaimed.

Really, I can’t understand why Bush won’t meet with her. Again.

So what do I think of the whole situation? I think she should be left alone and ignored. She is a grieving mother, and she can do or say what she wants, and hopefully, some day, she will find her peace.

But she doesn’t have the right to set policy, she doesn’t have the right to make demands of the President, and she most certainly doesn’t have the right to be used as a weapon by people, who, like herself, want only to savagely attack this administration and expect that every0ne will just sit back and take it and not respond.. And that is what is going on right now. She has been adopted by the anti-war left, their surrogates in some sectors of the media, and in whole flanks of the blogosphere as a club to attack the President. It is no coincidence that the vast majority (most likely none, if any) of the blogs trumpeting Cindy’s message have no such time or energy to chronicle the political opinions of families who have lost a loved one in the war yet still support the mission.

Where most of my ire resides is with those who have chosen to exploit Cindy Sheehan’s grief. Those who bristle with anger when the center of attention of their media circus, their ‘perfect weapon,’ is called a ‘media whore.’ While a more delicate phraseology would have been appropriate, it is a laughable presumption that Cindy Sheehan is a media ‘virgin.’ Neither are the numerous people using her to suit their needs.

And they are the focus of my anger- pimps like Atrios, who cynically take the regrettable phrase ‘media whore,’ and render it into more fodder for the masses, who, themselves awash in outrage, blinded by hatred for Bush, will throw critical reasoning aside, and see nothing wrong with outright lies, as long as it helps their cause:

Um, has Michelle Malkin talked to Cindy Sheehan’s son? Has Bill O’Reilly? Has Erick Erickson, who called Cindy Sheehan a whore over at redstate.org? If they haven’t talked to him, they should shut up, leave her alone, and defend their incoherent position on the Iraq war without hiding behind Cindy Sheehan’s dead son

And then they will feed on their own created outrage in an orgy of group think, vitriol, and anti-Bush fervor, and take it upon themselves to make sure that anyone who dares question their cynical misuse of this grieving woman is punished by attacking family members:

Please tell [my wife] the test came back positive, and she should start on AZT immediately.

By the way, she is a terrible f**k.

Or leveling threats:

During the war in Yugoslavia, a squad of eight Serbs captured a famous Muslim soccer player, his wife and their two young daughters.

The chained the player to a radiator pipe and sliced off his eyelids. Then, they repeatedly raped his wife and daughters, aged six and nine.

When all eight Serbs were could no longer come, they gutted the mother and children as though they were, say, trout and let them bleed to death.

The soccer player begged them to kill him, but they laughed and released him to wander the country.

This is what I wish for you and your family.

And those are just the tip of the iceberg, and not even the vociemails and letters trying to get Erick fired for voicing an opinion on an opinion website.

So, for all of you who have asked or wondered why I have not written about this issue, here is where I stand:

I feel deeply sorry for Cindy Sheehan and everyone who has lost a loved one in Iraq. And let’s not forget those who are horribly disfigured, crippled, maimed, blinded and emotionally scarred.

I think Cindy Sheehan has moved beyond the role of grieving mother, and is now a political figure who gets no free pass for her bizarre, outrageous, and offensive statements.

I don’t think there is anything Bush can do to make Cindy happy, and the best strategy is to leave her alone.

I think the pimps in the anti-war left who are cynically exploiting this woman’s tragedy are evil. Even if she wants the attention to aid her cause. Atrios and the human debris such as he know what they are doing, and they represent the worst of the Democratic party.

I think this is the last time I am going to discuss this issue, because as careful as I have been to not say anything about Cindy personally, the jackasses on the far left are going to distort this post, lie, vilify, and attack anyway, and it just isn’t worth it to me to deal with their bullshit.

*** Update ***

After a conversation with someone via email, I feel exactly the same way about the people using Cindy Sheehan every day that I did about Frank Pavone, Randall Terry, and their ilk when they used poor Mr. and Mrs. Schiavo as their political pawns back in March. The Schiavos and Cindy Sheehan, I can understand them speaking out, I can understand them doing what they are doing (even if, in both cases, I disagree with them). The people using them to advance their own agenda? Beneath contempt.

The Anti-War Left’s Perfect WeaponPost + Comments (203)

Blitzer Bullies Billy Jeff

by John Cole|  August 12, 20054:28 pm| 28 Comments

This post is in: Media, Politics

DC Media Girl caught Wolf Blitzer trying to goad Clinton into attacking Bush, and when he won’t, cheapshotting him.

Transcript here.

And lightning bolts are going to come from the sky and strike me dead, but it sure would be nice if Jimmuh Cahtah was half as classy an ex-President as Clinton.

Blitzer Bullies Billy JeffPost + Comments (28)

9/11 911 Tapes

by John Cole|  August 12, 20051:59 pm| 50 Comments

This post is in: War on Terror aka GSAVE®

Via Instapundit, audio recordings of the 911 calls on September 11th.

Awful.

9/11 911 TapesPost + Comments (50)

Even More on ID/Creationism

by John Cole|  August 12, 20051:11 pm| 48 Comments

This post is in: Politics, Science & Technology

Professor Gerald Coyne has an excellent six page story on Creationism/ID in the TNR, some of which I will excerpt:

Why all the fuss about a seemingly inoffensive statement? Who could possibly object to students “keep[ing] an open mind” and examining a respectable-sounding alternative to evolution? Isn’t science about testing theories against each other? The furor makes sense only in light of the tortuous history of creationism in America. Since it arose after World War I, Christianfundamentalist creationism has undergone its own evolution, taking on newer forms after absorbing repeated blows from the courts. “Intelligent design,” as I will show, is merely the latest incarnation of the biblical creationism espoused by William Jennings Bryan in Dayton. Far from a respectable scientific alternative to evolution, it is a clever attempt to sneak religion, cloaked in the guise of science, into the public schools…

Given the copious evidence for evolution, it seems unlikely that it will be replaced by an alternative theory. But that is exactly what intelligent-design creationists are demanding. Is there some dramatic new evidence, then, or some insufficiency of neo-Darwinism, that warrants overturning the theory of evolution?

The question is worth asking, but the answer is no. Intelligent design is simply the third attempt of creationists to proselytize our children at the expense of good science and clear thinking. Having failed to ban evolution from schools, and later to get equal classroom time for scientific creationism, they have made a few adjustments designed to sneak Christian cosmogony past the First Amendment. And these adjustments have given ID a popularity never enjoyed by earlier forms of creationism. Even the president of the United States has lent a sympathetic ear: George W. Bush recently told reporters in Texas that intelligent design should be taught in public schools alongside evolution because “part of education is to expose people to different schools of thought.” Articles by IDers, or about their “theory,” regularly appear in mainstream publications such as The New York Times…

It is clear, then, that intelligent design did not arise because of some long-standing problems with evolutionary theory, or because new facts have called neoDarwinism into question. ID is here for only one reason–to act as a Trojan horse poised before the public schools: a seemingly secular vessel ready to inject its religious message into the science curriculum.

Read the whole thing– it is a fascinating description of the chronology of events and the flaws in ID/Creationism.

None of his story, however, gets to why ID/Creationism is being pushed by certain segments of society. On Nightline Wednesday, Ted Koppel had George Will and Cal Thomas on, and they provided the best description for the “Whys?”

Why did President Bush make his ID remarks?

TED KOPPEL: All right. Let me – let me bring George into the same question. Why do you believe that the President has taken a stance on this?

GEORGE WILL: Well, let me apply Occam’s razor to that question and give the simplest answer that comes forward. I think he believes it. I would be amazed if the President did not believe in intelligent design because this President believes in a providential view of history. That is, he believes that events, wars and other developments are infused with God’s purposefulness. This is not an eccentric belief. If you read the 16th President, Abraham’s second inaugural, it’s full of the idea of providential history. Once you subscribe to that, infusing purposefulness and benevolence, if you will, into the evolution of species is a piece of cake. The critics of the teaching of evolution, the adherence to -intelligent design do not, as I understand it, question that the species do evolve. It is the postulated mechanism that they object to. They say that it is purposeful and benevolent, as God is, and not cruel and random. It’s not nature, red in tooth and claw.

And why is there a renewed attempt to infuse science with faith:

TED KOPPEL: Why can this not, even from a political point of view, Cal, simply be set aside in the context of saying, whether or not we want to say that evolution is God’s doing or random design, however you want to describe it, nevertheless, we have an obligation to try and figure out how it happened?

CAL THOMAS: Well, Ted, I think it could be if it was seen as a stand-alone issue. But taken together with school prayer, same-sex marriage, abortion on demand, the Terry Schiavo case, it is a general feeling that everything that a lot of God-fearing, tax-paying, flag-waving, patriotic Americans care about is taken away. It’s being taken away by the courts and by the wider culture. So, standing alone, this might not have had the resonance that it does. But taken together with all of these other things, I think that’s where the problem lies.

TED KOPPEL: So, part of this, George, is about science but most of it, really in the final analysis, is about politics?

GEORGE WILL: It’s about cultural anxiety. It’s about a sense of being marginalized and disrespected by certain groups. It’s a worry about the coarsening of the culture. All of these may be, to varying degrees, legitimate worries. They have absolutely nothing to do with the scientific puzzle of explaining the mechanism that produced us.

I regret I can not provide the entire transcript for you, as it is available only via Lexis-Nexis, but I think Will and Thomas are absolutely right- were the religious right not fighting pitched battles on every front, and, perhaps, losing many of these skirmishes in the Culture Wars, this would not be an issue. The world is changing, many feel alienated and marginalized, and thus, we have these Quixotic rear-guard actions in battles that in all likelihood have already been lost.

Even More on ID/CreationismPost + Comments (48)

Bush and Sudan

by John Cole|  August 12, 200512:38 pm| 7 Comments

This post is in: Foreign Affairs

President Bush earns some praise in the WaPo:

Some remain skeptical of President Bush’s concern for Africa, and there’s no doubt that the United States could and should do more. But the latest report on Sudan from the United Nations offers a snapshot of an issue on which Mr. Bush has been a leader. So far this year the United States has given $468 million in foreign assistance to Sudan, mostly for humanitarian relief in the western region of Darfur. The U.S. contribution comes to 53 percent of all outside donations — a proportion about twice the size of the nation’s weight in the global economy.

A few other countries have been even more generous relative to the size of their economies, notably Norway, the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark and Britain. But the contribution from many others has been embarrassing. How can France, which prides itself on its leadership in Africa, give only $2 million to this year’s U.N. appeal for Sudan — an amount that, when rounded, comes to zero percent of total contributions to the country? Even if one generously ascribed, say, a fifth of the European Union’s donation of $90 million to French taxpayers, France’s share of the total contribution to Sudan comes to a paltry 2 percent.

Mon Dieu! Read the whole thing, including the lackluster performance from the Muslim world.

Bush and SudanPost + Comments (7)

Saddam’s Trials

by John Cole|  August 12, 200512:32 pm| 15 Comments

This post is in: Foreign Affairs, War

Via Memeorandum, we see this story that Saddam may be executed after his first trial:

Saddam Hussein could be executed after his first trial if he is convicted and sentenced to death for his alleged role in a 1982 Shiite massacre, even though he faces other charges, an official close to the proceedings said Thursday.

The first trial, which involves the deposed Iraqi ruler’s alleged role in the 1982 massacre of an estimated 150 Shiites in Dujail, north of Baghdad, is expected to begin by the fall, said the official. He briefed reporters on condition that his name would not be used for reasons of security and the sensitivity of the case.

Saddam’s daughter, meanwhile, has threatened that the ousted leader’s defense lawyer could boycott the trial — and preliminary questioning — unless the defense gets better access to Saddam. The defense has complained in the past that it has only been allowed to meet Sadddam with U.S. or Iraqi military officials watching.

Iraqi authorities also are building about a dozen other cases against Saddam that they intend to try separately. Those cases include the killing of rival politicians over 30 years, the 1987-88 Anfal campaign that left tens of thousands of Kurds dead or displaced and the crushing of a 1991 uprising by Shiites following the Gulf War.

If Saddam is sentenced to death in the Dujail case, authorities could “theoretically” carry out the sentence without waiting for the other trials to begin, the official said.

“If the sentence were to be the death penalty, I think that the court will have to make a decision based on international principles, Iraqi law, whether or not there is need for him in another case for the prosecution or another defendant,” the official said.

While the salutary effects of immediately executing this thug are hard to ignore, and I am similarly thrilled by anything that will upset moral piker Ramsey Clark, I am not sure how I feel about this.

Seems to me the best approach would be to have a full hearing, sans controversy. This will be a test case for the new Iraqi government, and it is best they start correctly.

Saddam’s TrialsPost + Comments (15)

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