How do working mothers handle this?

Mia is sick, again. I knew she would get a lot of colds when I sent her to preschool last August, and she did. But what about all these more serious, stay home for days kind of illnesses? Since January she's had influenza with accompanying ear infection, rhotovirus (7 full sick days) and now, another high fever. Sure, it's inconvienent that I can't run the errands I had planned, but what if I had a boss to report to? Mia has almost missed enough school to eat up the generous number of sick days I had at my last job. And it's only April.

Update: It was strep. The first round of antibiotics wasn't doing the trick, so we had to bump her up to something a little more powerful. That's a bit unnerving. But she's getting better and I'm getting a little more sleep, so maybe I'll be able to string a few coherent thoughts together in the near future.

I'm not saying that this special diet is expensive,

but if in 15 years, Mia wants to know why we haven't saved anything for her college education, you'll know why. I just paid $4.99 for loaf of gluten-free breadthat's about half the size of a regular loaf. On the other hand, we're saving a bundle by not eating out.

Oh where, oh where have my comments gone?

So I just noticed my comments were gone. I haven't checked out my blog in a few days, so I don't know how long they've been gone. I have them back now and it looks like any comments anyone may have left are back.

Even Bunnies Blog

My daughter is a big fan of the PBS show Arthur. Too be honest, I like it too, especially the Postcards from Buster segments. Buster even has a blog. For those of you without young kids, Buster (a bunny) flys around the USA with his pilot dad visiting interesting places.

By the way, we've seen episodes on the Chinese New Year in San Francisco, Lebanese Christians and Orthodox Jews in New York, Hmong in Madison, Muslims in Chicago and many episodes on Hispanics in the Southwest. We also saw square-dancers in Kentucky and surfers in Cocoa Beach lest one be overwhelmed by the multiculturalism.

So Buster is going around the county, but he might as well be going around the world. I was reminded of the derision heaped upon non-passport holding Americans by Michael Moore. Passports? With all these ethnic groups living here in the US, we don't need no stinkin' passports.

Let's talk about something else

You know, I ignored Terri Schiavo (too horrible to watch) for as long as I could, and I should have stuck with that original impulse. Forgive me if I am abruptly cutting off any conversation but, I'm moving on. My blog is my hobby. It's supposed to be fun. Well, what do you know? Turns out that mothers of disabled kids can't blog about the legal murder of the disabled for fun. I guess I thought I could get away with it, because I don't really think of Mia as disabled, but... let's just say there must be some reason she qualified for that developmental preschool. Now, Mia's very high-functioning, but if the (alas) respected Peter Singer has no problem with offing hemophiliacs, then I can pretty much guess how he feels about autistics.

To sum up: blogging = fun. Wondering where my baby ranks on some academic's list of euthanasia candidates = not fun.

Zogby poll

Here's a press release regarding that Zogby poll that found Americans did not, in fact, want Terri Schiavo starved to death:

"If a disabled person is not terminally ill, not in a coma, and not being kept alive on life support, and they have no written directive, should or should they not be denied food and water," the poll asked.

A whopping 79 percent said the patient should not have food and water taken away while just 9 percent said yes.

Yeah, this issue is really gonna hurt the Republicans. And on my pet topic:

When asked directly about Terri's case and told the her estranged husband Michael "has had a girlfriend for 10 years and has two children with her" 56 percent of Americans believed guardianship should have been turned over to Terri's parents while 37 percent disagreed.

Maybe that 37% is made up of married guys with girlfriends.

(via The Corner)

Family Matters

I haven't been over to Samizdata in a little while, so I just got around to reading the posts on Terri Schiavo. Check out this quote from Perry de Havilland:

To hear conservatives indicate that a husband is not the person best qualified to decide what his wife would have wanted indicates a view of what marriage constitutes that seems rather at odds with the usual conservative obsession with the importance and gravity of that institution.

I guess I've already made my feelings on this clear. Michael Schiavo stretches the conservative definition of "husband" almost beyond recognition and mocks the "importance and gravity of that institution." But that's not my point. Rather, I wonder, are all libertarians this tribal?

I would have thought that the primacy of the family unit as a group entity would be a social conservative position and the primacy of the individual would be the libertarian position. But here we have SC's saying "Screw the husband, think of Terri" and the Libertarians saying "What about the rights of the husband to speak for the clan." Odd.

Or not. I guess for SCs, "the culture of life" trumps opposition to government intervention in the clan, while for Libertarians, a dim view of government trumps opposition to clan imposition upon the individual.

Still, it's odd to find myself so strongly on the side of the SCs. I bought the whole "rights of the individual" thing hook, line and sinker. Enough to put me at odds with SCs much of the time. I thought it was a liberal and feminist position because, historically, the clan does not act in the interest of any individual member (except possibly the head) and those who suffer the most are the women, who are considered disposable.

Let's review how well the clan takes care of the ladies:

Dowry murder: The Indian government has reported that an estimated 6,000 women a year die as a result of dowry abuse in India. Many more are maimed and injured. While these figures are shocking, they may only be the tip of the iceberg. Others have placed the number of dowry-related deaths closer to 25,000 a year. [snip] The most common form of dowry homicide is a phenomena known as "bride-burning," whereby the women is doused with kerosene and set ablaze. The murder is often made to look like a "kitchen accident" or a suicide.

Female Infanticide: According to a 2001 census, the overall birthrate for India was 927 girls per 1,000 boys, a steady decline from 945 girls per 1,000 boys in 1991 and 962 in 1981. These statistics mean that, as a result of abortions or killing girls in infancy, up to 5 million baby girls "disappear" from India every year.

Honor Killing: In 1999, more than two-thirds of all murders in Gaza strip and West bank were most likely honor killings.

I could go on, but I'm depressing myself and I'm sure you've heard if all before.

I'm glad Perry trusts his wife with his life. I'm sure most married people do. But let's recall that 50% of Americans who marry will find out they were wrong to do so. And a quick google search reminds us that for women all over the world, such trust would certainly be misplaced.

Hence the desire to protect the individual. It's disturbing to see the libertarian side of the blogosphere respond with a giant shrug. Perhaps I'm just dead wrong about libertarian support for individual rights. Maybe, as long as it's dear old dad and not Tom Delay ordering a difficult gal doused in kerosine and set on fire, then it's OK. Libertarians, feel free to jump in here.

The Food Free Diet

I should have remained blissful in my ignorance. But no. I'd heard that some kids with developmental problems respond well to nutritional supplements. So, I took Mia off to a naturopath to find out if he could work any voodoo on her. Boy could he ever. We've got supplements out the wahzoo and a fun new diet that basically eliminates any food that a three-year-old might actually eat. Feingold, gluten-free, casein free, soy-free: essentially food free. So, for the past two weeks, I've been going blind reading the ingredients lists and straining my shoulder putting all those things we can't eat back up on the shelf.

I shouldn't complain though. Today, Mia said "I'm hungry." Doesn't sound like much, but she's never used "I" correctly before, let alone in a contraction. Could be a coincidence. Time will tell. If we don't starve first.

Update: Things are looking up. Talked to the doc today and tomatoes, grapes and jelly (staple foods around here) are back on our edible list. Alas pizza, mcdonalds and cinnamon rolls (also staple foods) are still verboten.

Agnostics for Terri

In his article in NRO, Deroy Murdock gives 5 non-religious reasons to oppose the judicial killing of Terri Schiavo, including my pet peeve about this case:

...Michael Schiavo found another woman. He adulterously moved in and fathered two children with her. He now is in a common-law marriage with her. In essense, he's a bigamist. This is a four-alarm conflict of interest. Schiavo should have lost his legal standing in this case the second his common-law marriage commenced.

If we can assume that Terri "wouldn't want to live like this", can't we assume that she wouldn't want to remain married to the man who has been shacked up with and fathering childern by another woman for 10 years. I grit my teeth every time I hear some news personality call that man her husband. Wouldn't if be more accurate to call him "the estranged husband"? This outrage must be the feminist in me coming out. Speaking of which, where are the feminists?
Update: Here's one.

Anyway, Murdock has a sad-but-true conclusion:

I fear that the mere presence of giant crucifixes, priests dressed like Medieval friars, people praying with outstretched arms — as important, meaningful, and admirable as all that may be — has shuttered the hearts and minds of many secular people and nonbelievers who might sympathize with Terri Schiavo, were her supporters clad in black turtlenecks and equipped with decaf lattes and I-pods brimming with techno-trance music. As best they can be ascertained, the facts of this case show that, even for those of us who only like churches for their architecture, Terri's fight is our fight, too.

Unintended Consequences

From Chase me ladies, I'm in the cavalry, a blog unknown to me until I checked out the Britblog Roundup, comes this incisive reader comment:

Killing any single American for being an insensible, drooling vegetable could be the thin end of a fairly sizeable wedge.

Just so.

New immigration blog

Michelle Malkin has started a new group blog on illegal immigration, cleverly named The Immigration Blog. Check it out if you want to have your pants scared off regarding the state of our national security.

What if they get good at faking memos?

Besides the usual typos and misspellings, the latest too-good-to-check memo has this going for it:

What, then, was the evidence for the claim that it was created and distributed by Republicans? As far as the public record shows: There is none. On the contrary, the only published report identifying the purveyors of the memo on March 17 states that they were Democrats.

I guess they don't need to be good forgers. MSM seems to take the bait every time.

Nearly Busted at the Target

Everyone has been sick around here, so I needed to restock the medicine cabinet. I got day and night cold stuff for the kid, day and night cold stuff for the grown-ups, my favorite decongestant (since they happened to have some and it is usually out-of-stock) and, since allergy season is coming up, I picked a box of Claratin. Apparently, that's too much cold stuff. In service to the War on Drugs, the cash register wouldn't ring up the last 2 boxes.

So the cashier helpfully offered to ring up the extra boxes in a separate transaction. Since that was less than five dollars, I paid cash. The college student behind me in line pointed out that paying cash was a wise move, as now there would be no record of all that cold medicine.

Hmmmm. I freely confess total ignorance of all things meth, but do I really have enough cold medicine to whip up a batch? If so, the plan to keep it out of the hands of criminals isn't working very well.

Terri Schiavo

I happened across this succinct post on the Terri Schiavo case that sums up my feelings on it. A snippet (with links! What a labor saving device cut and paste is):

Basically, as a mother, the thought that a son-in-law, who cannot possibly love my child as I love my child, is calling the shots, with his new wife at his side, smells bad.

I'm also loath to see her death go forward because I distrust judges. I'd prefer to see a lot more medical and judicial review on this subject before letting a single judge call this shot.

For more perspectives, see this Andrew McCarthy article about how criminals get more due process than Terri has; and this Rev. Robert Johansen article about the shoddy care and testing Terri has received.

In what universe does a guy who has two kids with another women retain the exclusive right to make life and death decisions for the woman who is his wife in name only. I understand why he would move on, but he has moved on. It's ridiculous to continue to consider him Terri's husband, and therefore, her guardian.

I knew there was something I liked about Lieberman.

In the New Yorker:

But he is unapologetic about his defense of Bush’s Iraq policy, saying, “Bottom line, I think Bush has it right.” When I asked if he was becoming a neoconservative, Lieberman smiled and said, “No, but some of my best friends are neocons.”

Of course, certain lefties want to run him out of the party for this unloyal attitude. Which is why I left the Dems for Bush in '04. And I won't be back as long as Lieberman is the only person in the Lieberman wing of the Democratic Party.

(via LGF)

"St. Patrick chased the snakes out of Ireland.

The least Bush can do is chase them out of the White House."

So says the always insightful Mark Steyn regarding Gerry Adams not being invited to the White House St. Patrick's Day festivities for the first time in a decade. And more:

For the last 3-1/2 years one of the most persistent streams of correspondence I've had is from British readers sneering, ''Oh-ho. So America's now waging a war on 'terror,' is she? Well, where were the bloody Yanks the last 30 years? Passing round the collection box for IRA donations in the bars of Boston and New York, that's where.''

They have a point.

Indeed they do. Looks like, post 9/11, Americans are getting over the nostalgia for the old sod. Not a moment too soon.

Via Brian Micklethwait, who also has a pithy summary of the McCartney's vs. IRA saga.

How's the Reconquista going?

Pretty well according to La Shawn Barber. She links to this amazing story which reports that the Mexican Foreign Secretary, Luis Ernesto Derbez, said "Mexico is working with lawyers in Los Angeles to outline a legal challenge to the Minuteman project."

You know, the Minute Man Project, which plans to send volunteers out to the US/Mexico border to spot illegal immigrants and report them to the US Border Patrol. Hmmm, the Mexican government is planning to sue US citizens walking around in their own country reporting illegal activity. What the ????

La Shawn also has an interview with a Minute Man Project volunteer. I really fear for these volunteers. Sure, a lot of these illegal border crossers will be wannabe fruit pickers and day laborers, but some will surely be drug smugglers and violent criminals They could even encounter terrorists. I hope they're carrying video cameras along with their weapons. If volunteers are required to defend themselves, I'm sure this PC administration will thrown the book at them, rather than admit there is a problem with criminals crossing the border.

Diversity in the Blogosphere

Jeff Jarvis has a great post on the subject, summing up why I haven't commented on the male/female blogger thing:

I honestly don't know the race or gender of many bloggers and commenters I read and -- listen carefully now -- I don't care.

And on what seems to have annoyed the female bloggers:

...it is a mistake to presume that the blogosphere has a "diversity problem" just because the blogs you read aren't diverse (hell, there are eight million of them -- so find some new blogs to read.

Amen brother.

(via Instapundit)

Just another talentless harridan

So, I've never commented on the whole "Why are there no big-time female bloggers?" thing, but I was reading this Steve Sailer article (via LaShawn Barber) and came across this gem regarding Kevin Drum's opinion that women don't enjoy the rough and tumble of politics as much as men:

"And that nearly led to his eyes being clawed out," reported Howie Kurtz in the Washington Post, as obscure women bloggers denounced Drum in the most vicious terms imaginable, causing Drum to cravenly shill for these talentless harridans.

Who, according to Sailer, are these talentless harridans? Well, Ann Althouse weighs in with this vicious take-down:

Sigh. Why is he assuming that promulgating opinions is a mean and domineering sort of behavior? I've certainly noticed that a lot of bloggers that I find unreadable display this tendency, but I think the best blogs are reasonable, good-natured, humorous, and well-rounded.

Yes, what a Biatch. I can certainly see why Sailer is offended. And more vicious eye-clawing from Sissy Willis:

We can say right up front that the shallowness of Kevin Drum's argument turns off this woman. Maybe we're in a Pauline Kael bubble of our own, but most of the women we know -- fellow bloggers, readers, friends and relatives -- adore fiery political discourse and keep coming back for more.

How scary for Sailer to think that at any moment he could be subject to such vicious denunciations.

Most of the women supposedly denouncing Drum "in the most vicious terms imaginable" are, in fact, similarly tame. But the women who toss around the terms "idiot" and "f**ktard" bring my to my main point:

1. Drum says women, who prefer civility, don't like the rough and tumble of political blogging.
2. Women disagree, some in terms strong enough to make us question Drum's premise.
3. Sailer lumps all said women together and calls them names.

Aren't these women just engaging in the frank opinion writing that male bloggers claim enjoy? Of course not. They're just bitches. And thus it ever was.

Being a sweet, innocuous little thing myself, I will grant an exception to any man who feels he deserves it, but somewhere out there are large numbers of men who dislike any declarative statement from a women that's not "Your absolutely right, dear." Women know this.

Maybe it's not the rowdy atmosphere of politics that women dislike, but the inevitable playing of the Bitch Card.

Update: La Shawn has another example.

US media biased against Bush?

Who'd have thunk it?

U.S. media coverage of last year's election was three times more likely to be negative toward President Bush than Democratic challenger John Kerry, according to a study released Monday.

The annual report by a press watchdog that is affiliated with Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism said that 36 percent of stories about Bush were negative compared to 12 percent about Kerry, a Massachusetts senator.

Only 20 percent were positive toward Bush compared to 30 percent of stories about Kerry that were positive, according to the report by the Project for Excellence in Journalism.

(via LGF)

Right back at 'ya, Hezbollah

Wow:

Between 1.5 and 2 million opposition activists converged on Beirut's downtown Martyrs Square and surrounding neighborhoods to mark the lapse of one month on Hariri's assassination. [snip]

What made the trick was the massive turnout of the Sunni sect onto the streets of the capital to defy Syria's tutelage. Crowds from densely-populated Sunni neighborhoods stood shoulder-to-shoulder with opposition activists from various Christian communities and Walid Jumblat's Druze sect, chanting "we want the truth, we want sovereignty, we want Syria out." The Sunnis make up the biggest bloc among Lebanon's eligible voters. (via Publius Pundit, who has much more)

The most depressing thing about Hezbollah's show of strength last week wasn't the big numbers. After all, fascists are notoriously good at putting on a show. The bummer was the high volume of uncritical press they got in the West compared to the collective yawn that greeted the anti-Syrian demonstrators the week before. Can't wait to see how the MSM cover this.

The fact that these people haven't been intimidated by the goose-stepping, automatic weapon carrying Hezbollah goons is pretty impressive. It's almost like freedom is on the march or something.

Update: Speaking of freedom, Mickey Kaus on the Feiler Faster Thesis:

The FFT says that people are comfortable processing that information with what seems like breathtaking speed . It's not a demonstration of the FFT, in other words, if millions of people in Lebanon learn about the Ukrainian revolution and the Iraq vote within hours of those events. It is an example of the FFT if they then suddenly realize that their existing government and social structures are fragile and obsolete and expeditiously act on that belief.

I'm not saying that that's what is happening... But it certainly does seem like the Arab world is blowing through the dialectic of history with impressive speed.

Michelle Malkin asks

"Where is the uproar over this Islamist insurgency subsidy plan?"

Estimates of the ransom paid for Sgrena range from $1 million to over $13 million. Michelle reminds us that the 9/11 plot was sprung for around $500,000.

You're known by the company you keep

Jonah Goldberg in the Corner:

Recall how John Kerry and many, many, many other Democrats criticized George W. Bush for not building a "grand coalition" the way his father had? Well, what was always left out of these criticisms is that grand coalitions need to be built with something. Was it really so grand to have Syria in our coalition if it came at the price of acceding to Syria's control of Lebanon for a decade? [snip]

Again: the key foreign policy principle of the Democratic Party -- and the pro-Europe "multilateralists" -- coming out of the Iraq war is this notion that it is better to do wrong in a group than to do right alone.

Yup.

Random thought on homeschooling

A month or so ago, Antoine Clarke opened a small can of worms by suggesting some sort of government spot check of all children to prevent abuse. Of course, one hears that argument all the time, but not on libertarian blogs. Anyway, I was reminded of the dust-up over the weekend, when we visited my mother, who has retired to the Ozarks.

Now, most residents of south-central Missouri are just normal folks. But there is a subset of the population for whom a move to the trailer park would be a massive leap up in living standard and social status. Mom just happens to live near such a group. No one works. They get by on a combination of largesse from less trashy relatives, disability and other government payouts and (suspected) drug dealing. In one branch of this clan, the father is in jail for getting his 12 year-old daughter pregnant, the mother is shacked up with and pregnant by another guy and the 8 year-old boy has been permanently expelled from school, as he is completely unmanageable.

Permanently expelled from school? How is this possible? Isn't school attendance compulsory? Doesn't the state have a legal obligation to provide an education to all children under the age of 16? Not to worry, he'll be homeschooled. By this semi-educated clan of low level criminals. Seriously. This is the school district's clever plan. I want to point out that it's not just lousy parents that use homeschooling as a cop out. Here you have a lousy school system/social services system doing the same thing. Rather than deal with this difficult kid, they're using homeschooling to cover their failure.

Missouri actually has some pretty stringent record keeping requirements for homeschoolers, but homeschoolers aren't required to show the records to anyone unless they are accused of truancy. Then producing these records is the only defense required. Not having the records usually means a guilty verdict. The chances that this family will provide an adequate education and keep the appropriate records are slim to none. School officials could easily get this kid back in school, but of course, they won't. They're the ones who kicked him out in the first place.

And in a couple of years, when this kid is making meth and/or molesting under-age girls and/or engaging in whatever criminal activity he will undoubtedly become involved in, people will shake their heads, look at each other knowingly, and say "Well, he was homeschooled." Sigh.

Aryan Nations relocating to KCK

Great. Just what the KC area wants to be known for:

...the Aryan Nations national director, Charles Juba, recently relocated to the metropolitan area from Pennsylvania with the aim of enlisting new members.

And after the murder of Judge Lefkow's family members, I suppose we have to take these losers seriously.

When asked about the murders, [“High Counsel” August B.] Kreis said his group wasn't involved, but added: “We love it!”

Nice.

Hezbollah in the US

Chilling interview on Fresh Air with authors of Lightning Out of Lebanon: Hezbollah Terrorists on American Soil.

Main point: even though these Hezbollah cells seem benign (cigarette smuggling, credit card fraud: all non-violent stuff to raise money to send weapons to Lebanon), they can basically serve as advance teams for future terrorists acts in the US. If Iran should decide to attack inside the US, these cells have done the recon to allow them to ramp up very quickly, by sending in professionals to do the deed.

Interesteing discussion of how the FBI is going after Hezbollah, too.

The authors say Hezbollah is better trained and more disciplined than al-Qaeda and there are cells all over the country. Great.

The Making Of A 9/11 Republican

Interesting op/ed by a California liberal born and bred, turned 9/11 Republican. My upbringing wasn't as liberal as hers, but I really related to this:

Thoroughly disgusted by the behavior of those on the left, I began to look elsewhere for support. To my astonishment, I found that the only voices that seemed to me to be intellectually and morally honest were on the right. Suddenly, I was listening to conservative talk-show hosts on the radio and reading conservative columnists, and they were making sense. When I actually met conservatives, I discovered that they did not at all embody the stereotypes with which I'd been inculcated as a liberal.

Although my initial agreement with voices on the right centered on the war on terrorism, I began to find myself in concurrence with other aspects of conservative political philosophy as well. Smaller government, traditional societal structures, respect and reverence for life, the importance of family, personal responsibility, national unity over identity politics and the benefits of living in a meritocracy all became important to me. In truth, it turns out I was already conservative on many of these subjects but had never been willing to admit as much.

In my case, it was less a matter of realizing how "right" I am than of realizing how "left" the left is. (via LGF)

Lebanon's PM resigns

Wow. Lebanon's pro-Syrian PM resigned before a vote of no-confidence, which he was expected to win. Perhaps it was that crowd of 200,000 that persuaded him.

It's great that the US isn't a big player in this. Protesters can't be accused of being American puppets and we can't be accused of forcing democracy on an unwilling populous.

Update: Lots more at Across the Bay.

Dirty War

Saw most of Dirty War on PBS. The after movie discussion panel was actually pretty informative, although not comforting. The Homeland Security rep. put in a plug for reauthorizing the Patriot Act, since the movie police failed to stop the terrorists partially due to poor communication between agencies. Warren Rudman emphasized that there was no way to guarantee that such an attack won't happen here. In fact, he seems pretty sure that there will be such an attack. The terrorism expert also responded to a question by saying that the main threat is from Islamic terrorism.

Essentially, the DHS guy said we have to stop it, because we can't prepare for it and Rudman said we have to prepare for it because we can't stop it.

I'll have a "big frosty glass of chill-the-hell-out."

James Lileks puts the parenting thing in perspective. Refering to the stress of organizing a class party:

Well. It’s too bad Amazon cannot overnight a sense of perspective, because there are, in truth, tougher situations to find yourself in. I’d like to reserve “hating everyone and everything and going insane” for the moment when I’m fleeing the attack helicopters that have come to wipe out my tribe.

(via Joanne Jacobs)

They wrote a book about my life

Confessions of a Slacker Mom

Newsweek has an interview with the author and an essay on the topic by Anna Quindlen. (via Ex-Donkey)

I must admit that, while my housekeeping slackerness is entirely my own choice, my child-rearing slackerness is enforced by my daughter. In her first three years, she was violently shy. Should a stranger deign to look at her or, God forbid, address her, she would scream bloody murder. She startled more than one well-meaning old lady in the supermarket. Play groups were just not going to happen. Gymboree - forget it. Church nursery - pleeese.

She's progressed a lot in the past year, but I still wouldn't want to plunk down the money for a class she may or may not participate in.

But, as a stay-at-home mom, I can relate to the need to justify one's existence. On one hand, having a special needs child provides a built in justification for staying home. Day care would have been impossibly hard on my sensitive little one. But on the other hand, there's the feeling that you should always be doing something to help her catch up or branch out. And if she hasn't caught up, well then, you must not be doing it right.

Of course, if I worked out of the home, then I'd feel people were thinking her problems stemmed from languishing in daycare.

I guess only the mother can protect herself from parenting anxiety by assuming a less defensive posture. Easier said than done, I know. But consider this: nearly half of the people in this country and most of the rest of the world think my politics are dead wrong. I couldn't care less. Someone came to my blog and called me simple-minded. Whatever. It may be annoying, but I wouldn't even dream of being wounded. Who are they? A bunch of people who are wrong, that's who!

Why is it nearly impossible to take that attitude towards parenting. I suppose it's because I am personally responsible for my kid, whereas I'm just one of millions voting for the president . Also, my kid means more to me than politics.

But I try to remember that another mother isn't trying to suggest anything about my parenting skills when she talks about little Bobby's amazing talent on the violin or whatnot. Our kids are so central to our lives that it's just natural to talk about them a lot.

Hey, maybe one of the blessings of having a challenging child is that there is no way in hell we could get everything done. My life is so far from June Cleaver's that there's no reason to even try to keep up. I have already been forced to consider my daughter's need (and my own), and jettison most non-necessities. I've already prioritized, so when someone mentions another enrichment activity they're taking the kids to, I automatically know whether that's something my daughter could handle. Usually, it's not, so there's no pressure to add it.

Whew. Blogging - better than therapy.

Suddenly Bloggers are Everywhere

Up to Date (local call-in show) just did an hour on bloggers. It was pretty basic stuff, but one line I liked, refering to the multitude of small bloggers: "In the future, everyone will be famous for 15 people."

Heh, I should be so lucky.

West Hollywood to build monument to Soviet Soldiers

Okay, this is a strange :

"...West Hollywood is building a World War II memorial to honor the sacrifices of Soviet veterans like Sapozhnikov and their fallen comrades. City officials will unveil the monument May 8, a day before former Soviet countries mark the anniversary of the war's end, in a park located in the heart of the area's Russian-speaking immigrant community.

I'm just not sure it's appropriate to build a monument to the fighting forces of a foreign country, especially one that's been our enemy for much longer than the 4 years it was our ally. Why do these people think we kept 300, 000 troops in Europe during the Cold War? Who would those troops have been fighting? Yes, the same military this monument is intended to honor. And then there is this:

Surrounded by Beverly Hills and Los Angeles, West Hollywood has about 37,000 residents. Many of its 6,000 Russian-speakers began immigrating to the region in the 1970s to escape religious and political persecution.

So why not a monument to Soviet dissidents and the millions of people killed during the 70 years of communist rule?

via On the Wire, who has more on Stalin's contribution to "world peace and justice."

Mark Steyn's website is back

Here's something from his latest:

The folks that have been under the UN wing the longest - indeed, the only ones with their own permanent UN agency and semi-centenarian "refugee camps" - are the most comprehensively wrecked people on the face of the earth: the Palestinians. UN territories like Kosovo are the global equivalent of inner-city council estates with the blue helmets as local enforcers for the absentee slum landlord. By contrast, a couple of years after imperialist warmonger Bush showed up, Afghanistan and Iraq have elections, presidents and prime ministers.

Good Charlie Rose show with Bloggers

Wonkette, Glenn Reynolds, Andrew Sullivan and Joe Trippi sitting around the table talking about the influence of blogs.

Charlie asked Joe Trippi if bloggers could elect the next president, referring to the money a politician could raise online. But I suspect the blogosphere may have elected this president by destroying the image Kerry was trying to create for himself. Bush was vulnerable to the kind of candidate Kerry pretended to be.

Update: More from Jim Geraghty:

Want to know something kind of surprising?

Last night’s Charlie Rose show about blogs left me thinking more highly of all the panelists - Glenn Reynolds, Andrew Sullivan, Joe Trippi and (gasp) even Wonkette.

Me too.

Moral Confusion at UN

This Reuters story via Tim Blair:

UN peacekeepers have been banned from all sex with the local population in Congo because of widespread, continuing abuse of women and girls ...

UN regulations for soldiers usually forbid sex with anyone under 18 and forced prostitution. But often officials found there was a fine line between forced and willing sex.

Yes, women often find themselves thinking "Do I want to have sex with this guy, or am I being forced? I just can't tell."

Idiots.

Update: Michelle Malkin has more.

Sweet Justice

Seems a Minnesota white supremisist turned out to be a bit "racially impure" himself. His good friends in the movement dumped him and he lost his $1 million per year record company, charmingly named Panzerfaust. (via Right Thinking)

Update: Out of morbid curiosity I went to the Panzerfaust website which now forwards to a bunch of white supremisists who are self-certified actual white people. I'm not going to link because...ewwwww. But who would actually buy a reproduction Iron Cross or a Swastica pendant? I guess the same people who would buy an album titled Das Reich Kommt Wieder. And they know who really brought the slaves to America. I'll give you three guesses and the first two don't count.

Glenn Reynolds remembers the not so distant past:

...we've heard for decades that Arab terrorism resulted from Arab despotism, and that if we wanted to end terrorism we ought to quit supporting Arab despots and work for democracy. But it was all talk until one brave man in the White House stood up for Iraqi freedom.

That man was Bill Clinton...

I've always maintained that it wasn't me who changed, it was the Democrats. Democrats used to be ideologically committed to spreading freedom and democracy. Why the change:

I think it's jealousy. Bush-hatred has become all-consuming among a large section of the Democratic Party, and they can't stand the thought of anything that reflects well on him, even if it's good for the country, and if it's something that was their idea originally.

Protesting Democracy

It's sad that so much of the world won't celebrate with the Iraqi people because of the petty and childish dislike of George W.

There was actually a protest against the election in Madrid. So it's OK if the the Spanish use democracy to suck up to terrorists, but when the Iraqis use it defeat terrorists, it's time to take to the streets. Let's hope these losers are a small portion of the Spanish population that didn't have anything better to do with their Sunday.

Courage

A quote from Jeff Jarvis' extensive coverage of the Iraqi election:

This morning, I asked myself whether I would go to vote if I thought I could be bombed at the polling place or shot because of my blue finger. I don't think I'd have that courage. Most Americans would not (hell, most of us don't vote even in the lap of safety). Remember that every single Iraqi who came to vote today is a victory for democracy.

Amen. It's over for the fascists. High voter turnout in the face of an all-out assault on voters is a blue-stained finger in the eye of the "insurgency". Their terrorism failed to terrorize. They're losers.

As George Will said on This Week this morning, the Iraqis used to have two unappealing options: support the fascists who wanted to bring back brutal dictatorship (with plenty of severed heads and scattered body-parts to sweeten the deal) or support the American occupation. Now they have a third option: their own democratically elected government.

They faced down those fascist bastards today. I have no doubt they will continue to do so.

Condi has more class in her little finger

than Democrats have in their whole party. She's on This Week being asked about the large number of Senators who voted against her. She doesn't play the race card or blame post-election sour grapes. She just said she's grateful for the 85 senators who voted for her and then went on to talk about how great everyone at the State Dept. has been.

Better Late Than Never

Tim Russert is grilling Kerry on whether or not he was in Cambodia and the whole lucky hat thing. Now?? 2 months after the election? What is the point of this? Kerry, by the way, is spinning like a top.

Now he's going after Kerry on the form 180 thing (to release his military records). Kerry just said he will sign the form, if the people who challenged him to sign will release their own records. The only other person relevant to this issue (George W), released his records before the election. What is this, kindergarten?

Update: More on Kerry's appalling appearance on Meet the Press.

Iraqis Vote

The Iraqi elections are shaping up to be a big success. My only real concern was that devastating violence would make it impossible for the Iraqis to celebrate this historic day. Well, the polls are closed in Iraq and "only" 36 people have been killed by terrorists (so far). It's sounds callous, but I was really expecting a lot worse.

Here's an excellent point from Glenn Reynolds:

I'll observe, as James Taranto did last week, that high turnout among the Afrikaners wasn't seen as the test of the South African elections' legitimacy. Likewise, high turnout in pro-Ba'ath areas shouldn't be the test here.

Absolutely true, but expect the press to harp endlessly on it.

John Kerry is telling us not to be too excited about the election since there is no way Bush can do the things he needs to do to succeed in Iraq. What an A**. Everytime I see him, I thank God he's not president.

Take all the pie you can, we'll make more

Jay Nordlinger is posting his notes from the Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. This thought jumped out at me:

It is axiomatic at Davos — among the people I tend to meet — that an economy, including the world economy, is a pie. To the extent that one person has a bigger piece, another person has a smaller piece (and there are no other pies in the oven).

I suppose that is sometimes true. For example, when Yasser Arafat dies a billionaire, one can safely assume that he ran off with most of the Palestinian pie. While the pie analogy could be useful when discussing those third world leaders who squirrel away what assets their countries have in Swiss bank accounts, people who take this attitude are never referring to the likes of Arafat. Such references are always directed at the United States.

Presumably this attitude results from socialism having much more influence in Europe than in the US. To socialists, all economic transactions are win/lose, never win/win. They never try to make more pie. It never occurs to them, for example, that those folks with all that pie burning a hole in their pockets (to mix metaphors) might want to trade some pie for an item or service that you have to offer. Oh look, now you have more pie. You might even have to hire some pie lovers to help you out.

And then there's technological innovation and economies of scale working to give your pie more purchasing power. Now if I can come up with three ways to make more pie, why can't those nuanced thinkers of Europe figure it out? For great examples of pie making (with no annoying pie analogies), I highly recommend this article by Virginia Postrel.

Terrorist vs VW

VW wins. I doubt you'll be able to keep from laughing, though you may feel guilty about it later. (via Michelle Malkin)

Bush's Speech

My favorite line:

America will not pretend that jailed dissidents prefer their chains, or that women welcome humiliation and servitude, or that any human being aspires to live at the mercy of bullies.

That should be obvious to even the most casual observer, yet I am forever hearing on the news shows "So Bush wants to bring democracy to these countries, whether they want it or not?" Yes, Mr. Talking Head, that's exactly right. Bush, for his own nefarious reasons, is going to force the blissfully ignorant little natives into a state of political freedom which they aren't suited for and don't really desire. We know this will somehow advance Haliburton's interests, we just haven't quite figured out how. One would think it would be easier to buy the oil (or whatnot) from one corrupt dictator than to win the support of an elected legislative body, but if Bush supports it, we know there must be an imperialist agenda. Sigh.

Honestly, this speech appeals to the liberal in me. It's idealistic and optimistic:

In America's ideal of freedom, the exercise of rights is ennobled by service, and mercy, and a heart for the weak. Liberty for all does not mean independence from one another. Our nation relies on men and women who look after a neighbor and surround the lost with love. Americans, at our best, value the life we see in one another, and must always remember that even the unwanted have worth. And our country must abandon all the habits of racism, because we cannot carry the message of freedom and the baggage of bigotry at the same time.

What's not to like? Except for the possible pro-life line in there, why can't liberals get behind this? It saddens me to see them so angry and pessimistic, as if their only agenda is to be against anything Bush wants, even things liberals should want. "If Bush wants more fuzzy kitties, then we think all fuzzy kitties should die."

Update: Powerline imagines the Democratic response to Abraham Lincoln's second inaugural address:

The president harped on the "colored slaves." He claimed that "this interest was somehow the cause of the war." But the president well knows that ending slavery was never part of the original justification for fighting this war. It is simply an after-the-fact rationalization, developed after it became clear that we had no plan to defeat the South. Nor can the president honestly claim that the slaves are better off in their current, parlous state than they were prior to the war when they lived in peace and tranquility.

That's what I'm talkin' about. (via Instapundit)

"Everyone" knows girls aren't good at math

Reaction to Harvard president Larry Summers' remarks to the effect that men are hard-wired to do better in the sciences than women has been all over the web. I don't want to see the man made the subject of a feminist jihad, but I can certainly see why a female scientist would be irritated. So what if most other women's eyes glaze over at the thought of equations and computer models. I happen to be one of those blank gazers, but I can see that if a woman's area of expertise is in the sciences, it must be infuriating to deal with men who assume they know more than you because "everyone knows women don't do the math/science thing."

I understand that Summers was just offering an explanation as to why there were not more women in the sciences and his point probably accounts for some of the gap, but really... can he be surprised by the reaction? I know he didn't intend to, but he told every female scientist in the room that they were either not as smart as the men, or they were freakish women, since women don't do science. Hmmm, maybe that was his male lack of verbal ability coming into play.

I could go on, but I have that stereotypical sick kid to take care of. Check out Sissy Willis on the topic. Great site, even if she does blog like a girl.

By the way, I happen to fit this stereotype of women pretty well. I don't do the math thing at all and I only do the science thing a little. However, my daughter is so much like her father (the professor of mechanical engineering) that I have a feeling we will be dealing with this issue in the future.

Dems bash heads against stone wall that is Condi

I'm sorry, but Condi is just so impressive. I only saw snippets of her testimony on the news (had to choose between cable TV and high speed internet. I think I made the right choice), but she was cool as the proverbial cucumber while Boxer and Biden looked like morons. I love the way she remained so unruffled by the hostile cross-examination from Boxer. She was the same way at the 9/11 hearings. If I were still a Democrat, I'm sure I'd feel she was boring and possibly cold, but I know I'd still be impressed by her poise.

And I'm not the only one who thinks so. (via Instapundit)

Protest Blogging

Check out the always fascinating protest/counter-protest blogging by Zombie. (Link is to a mirror site). Especially note the chanting by the Palestinian protesters:

One, three, five, seven, all our martyrs go to heaven!
Two, four, six, eight, we are martyrs, we can't wait!

Excuse me? This is in the United States, in Berkeley, CA for god's sake. These people are not just chanting support for suicide bombers, which would be bad enough, but saying they can't wait to become one themselves. Now my first instinct is to freak a little. "Terrorist wann-a-bees in the US. Eeeek." But on the other hand, it can't be that hard to "martyr" oneself, if one really wanted to. If these guys are so hot to get to heaven, what's keeping them? For most of these weenies, this is just some sort of twisted trash talking. Still, it's highly inappropriate given that most of these folks are probably guests of this country: student visa, resident aliens, etc. I would be OK with asking them to leave.
(via LGF)

Slightly disturbing story on All Things Considered

So I turn on the radio in the middle of a story about a guy released from prison after 44 years. It's all about how he's learning to use a cell phone and wants to ride a roller-coaster. I'm thinking this is inspirational stuff about wrongfully convicted man restarting his life. But no, it soon becomes apparent that the man actually did rob a bank, kidnap three staff members, shoot them on the side of the road and leave them for dead. The girl whose throat he slit died.

Now, I'm not going to comment on whether or not he'd "served his time". Alas, 44 years is longer that most murderers serve. But why on earth is this guy getting the head-shaking, it's all so sad treatment, usually reserved for, you know, tragic stuff. Tragic, like the death of the girl he murdered.

Update: Hey, it's not just me. Jonah is posting about this at the Corner.

Good thing there's no racism on the left

Yikes! Michelle Malkin has posted a harrowing collection of hate e-mail she has received accusing her of being a whore for the Republicans. Here's a nice one:

Hi Self hating flat nosed Filipino B***ch! As we used to refer to your kind - little brown F***ing Machines. Looks like this little LBFM learned to whore in a different way to make some pesos. How sweet. (asterisks mine)

She gets this kind of abuse because she's a minority and a conservative. I guess I shouldn't be, but I'm still shocked by the racist vitriol hurled at minorities who don't tow the Democratic party line.

I noticed this even before I went over to the dark side. In fact, it's part of what pushed me over. This column by Maureen Dowd regarding Clarence Thomas' opposition to affirmative action really struck me. A large part of Thomas' problem with affirmative action is that it taints all minorities, since you can never know if they were the most qualifed candidates or if some bureaucrat just needed to fill the quota. Maureen answers this concern with:

It drives him crazy that people think he is where he is because of his race, but he is where he is because of his race.

Did she not notice that she just proved his point?

UN Update

Things aren't looking good for Kofi. From the Telegraph:

Calls for Mr Annan's resignation were once restricted to ideologically driven hardline US conservatives. Now diplomats in New York are openly asking whether the secretary-general can remain in office until the end of his term in December 2006.

Do "ideologically driven hardline US conservatives" care who heads the UN? Don't they just want the UN to go away? If so, then the worse the secretary general, the better. Shouldn't they be big Kofi boosters?

But I digress. It may, in fact, be unfair to pin the numerous scandals of the UN on Kofi. If not unfair, then certainly unproductive. Replacing Kofi with another bureaucrat who would be acceptable to the dictatorships and kleptocracies that make up the majority of the member states probably wouldn't change much. There are serious problems with the stucture of the UN.

Take a look at this article on the UN's latest sex scandal:

Peacekeeping troops guarding refugee camps in the Democratic Republic of Congo sexually abused girls as young as 13, giving out scraps of food or money in return for favours, the United Nations admitted yesterday. {snip}

Investigators found "freshly used condoms" littering guard posts and command centres around Bunia, where peacekeepers from Pakistan, Morocco, Nepal and Bangladesh are based. "We are shocked, we are outraged, we are sickened," said William Lacy Swing, who heads the UN mission in Congo. "Peacekeepers who have been sworn to assist those in need, particularly victims of sexual violence, instead have caused grievous harm. It is inexcusable. We are determined to stamp it out."

Now I'm sure Mr. Swing is sincere in his disgust. He's already furrowed his brow. Can a strongly worded letter be far behind? Seriously though, what are the options open to him to "stamp out" this abuse?

Reports say Pakistani, Moroccan and Uruguayan soldiers have all been charged with abuses. The UN can only repatriate them but it has called on member states to prosecute offenders.

So basically, no matter what the offence, UN soldiers can only be kicked out of the UN with the hope that his home country prosecutes. Can we really blame Kofi for this?
(via Instapundit)

Tsunami donations

President Bush on Friday signed legislation allowing people who donate to Indian Ocean tsunami relief to claim deductions on their 2004 tax returns, if they write the check before the end of the month.

Great idea. Here's an extensive list of organizations that are accepting funds.

I want to highlight Heart to Heart, a group based here in Kansas City that has been flying around the world delivering medical supplies for about 10 years now. They've already sent a plane load of medicine and water filtration supplies to Sri Lanka. A couple local news anchors are going along with the flight, so you can keep an eye on what your donation is accomplishing.

Good Fences and Bad Fences

Cliff May notes a plan for even more fences:

The new fences will be chain-link and six feet tall, topped with small spikes to “deter” those who might consider scaling them. Well, we’ll see what the International Court of Justice in The Hague has to say about this!

Oh, wait a minute, sorry. These fences are not being erected along the West Bank to protect Israeli communities from Hamas terrorists, these fences are being erected between the District of Columbia and Prince Georges County in Maryland, and they are meant to stop “criminals” from crossing from the city into the suburbs.

If it's OK to erect a fence to keep junkies out of you neighborhood (and I think it is), how can a fence that keeps out suicide murderers be wrong?

For more fences from Belfast to Zimbabwe that somehow escape the ire of the international community, see here.

Ever hear the old joke about

the guy who gets beaten up by a mugger. A social worker asks him "What did you do to that poor man to make him beat you so badly?"

Some similar psychology must be at work in the UK regarding their insane gun/self-defense laws. Check out this op/ed in the Telegraph (via Samizdata):

In recent years governments have even felt it necessary to prevent the public from defending themselves with imitation weapons. In 1994 an English home-owner, armed with a toy gun, managed to detain two burglars who had broken into his house while he called the police. When the officers arrived, they arrested the home-owner for using an imitation gun to threaten or intimidate.

The logic seems to be that if you manage to best the intruder, then you have used too much force. Is there some socialist values system at work where all gain is ill-gotten and therefore burglary is merely an alternative wealth redistribution system?

I believe it was Mark Steyn who wondered how long it would be before British homeowners started burying burglars in the backyard instead of calling the police. Seriously, the government is just begging for vigilantism. We had an analogous situation here in Missouri several years ago about which a book was written:

Ken Rex McElroy terrorized the residents of several counties in northwestern Missouri for a score of years. He raped young girls and brutalized them after they went to live with him or even married him; he shot at least two men; he stole cattle and hogs, and burned down the houses of some who interfered with his criminal activities. Thanks to the expert efforts of his lawyer and the pro-defendant bias of state laws, he served no more than a few days in jail, the author shows. In 1981, sentenced for the shooting of a popular grocer and free on bail, he was killed by the men of Skidmore, the center of his felonies; they closed ranks against all attempts to identify those who had pulled the triggers. Written by a first-time author, this is an engrossing, credible examination of the way vigilante action can take over when the law appears to be powerless.

Ya think?

James Lileks on Christmas in the Public Sphere

How can you not love Lileks with lines like this:

If I were a dyslexic atheist I’d say I don’t have a god in this fight.

and:

What amuses me, if that’s the term, is the way retailers and large media have shied away from saying “Merry Christmas” because it might offend the prissy little busybodies who spend their life like a dental filling in a tinfoil blizzard.

Two Kinds of Commie Wanna-bee's

I've always been a bit perplexed by people who live in the free world yet fancy themselves Communists of Marxists or whatnot, especially since the fall of the Berlin Wall. What do these commie wanna-bee's think those throngs of people were running from? Shouldn't it be obvious to all by now that there are no happy endings in communist countries? How may mass graves does an ideology have to fill up before we can rule it defunct? So anyway...

I had a revelation about free world communists while reading Mona Charen's Useful Idiots. It's packed with tales of appalling behavior by politicians, academics and journalists for whom the title is a perfect fit. But what really jumped out at me was a story about Armond Hammer. I'm retelling this from memory, so I don't recall all the specifics. Essentially, Hammer is traveling around the young Soviet Union in the 20's with some party big shot. The two are supposed to catch a train, but the train is late. When the train finally arrives, the big shot asks who is in charge. The big shot promptly has the unlucky engineer and his assistant shot. Supposedly, the pair do not have to wait for a train again.

No surprise there. Typical communism in action. What made the lightbulb go off was Hammer's reaction to the incident. Now Hammer is a big time industrialist. He's just the sort of person communists are always going on about. Yet, he's not appalled by two people being murdered because they had inconvenienced him (as I'd like to think most people would be). No, he was excited. Just think of all he could accomplish if he could just have the head of the labor union shot!

Revelation! Most of the commie wanna-bee's I have know are the college kids and aging hippies who want to make the world safe for fuzzy kitties and rainbows. You know, the ones Lenin characterized as "useful idiots." In my naivete, I never guessed at the existence of the other type. The ones, like Hammer, who see themselves holding the rifles. They plan on designating who will fill those mass graves, not on being grave fodder themselves. They're fully aware that communism is a murderous ideology. That fact doesn't frighten or disgust them. It excites them. They can't wait to put their "obstacles" up against the wall.

About those Swift Boat Vets

So, I'm paging through Time magazine and I see this regarding the Swift Boat Vets: "...even though their attacks on John Kerry's war record were widely debunked." I've see similar sentences in a dozens of different publications, yet I've never seen an article doing any actual debunking. The closest I've seen is that all the official documentation backs Kerry's story. But since Kerry wrote most of the official documentation, I think its a stretch to call that debunking.

2slick notes that the only reason the the SBVs claims are "unsubstantiated" (another popular word the MSM uses regarding the Swifties) is that a certain unsuccessful presidential candidate would not release his military records.

Santa: Democrat or Republican?

The debate rages on:

KERN: Shall we begin our colloquy with a simple Karl-Rovian analysis? Santa Claus is a self-employed Caucasian male who's been married to the same woman for several centuries. It appears likely that he is a churchgoer, insofar as he is a Catholic saint and a former bishop. Is not Santa's political affiliation perfectly obvious from his demographic profile alone?

NOT BROTHER-IN-LAW: I will rebut your assessment with Steve-Sailer counter-analysis: Santa Claus has no children. High-achieving professionals without children trend Democratic.

More on Holland's "Immigration" troubles

Christopher Caldwell explains why Holland's Muslim population remains so unassimilated and what the Dutch are doing (and not doing) about it.

The ACLU Homeland Holiday Advisory System

Tee-hee. (via Right Wing News)

Republican shopping spree?

Says Jim Geraghty:

Hugh Hewitt is right. If Congress can afford to spend $1 million on the Norwegian American Foundation's celebration of Norway's 100th anniversary of independence, then taxes are too darn high.

So true. I like my Republicans stingy. The Norwegians can do what everyone else does: get Coke or Nike to sponser their fete.

UN has lost sight of mission

The original U.N. mission, to protect the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small, has been hijacked and corrupted by nations that neither share the universal values of the U.N.'s Declaration of Human Rights nor have democratic intentions.

Who's hijacked the UN? As if you didn't know. And if you don't know, you should check out the article. It touches on a number of reasons why conservatives shake their heads and laugh when John Kerry uses the words "UN" and "legitimacy" in the same sentence. For example:

Reform of the human-rights commission, according to the secretary general's experts, requires not limiting the commission to states committed to democracy and human-rights protection, but expanding the membership from the current 53 to all 191 U.N. member states. Current members and human-rights enthusiasts like Cuba, China, Saudi Arabia, and Sudan will no doubt be delighted to be joined by friends in Iran and Burma.

Why would we think, even for an instant, that the UN would back the US in its desire to spread democracy when the majority of its member states are not democracies themselves?

I used to think the UN was a righteous organazation, protecting the innocent and bringing peace to the world. But I must admit that was back when I didn't know ONE SINGLE THING about it. I hope their PR guys get paid a lot. They've obviously earned it.

Update: More good press for the UN. Upon hearing the latest allegations of "rape, prostitution and pedophilia by U.N. peacekeepers from Pakistan, Uruguay, Morocco, Tunisia, South Africa and Nepal, Jim Geraghty wonders "how anybody can look the U.N. and not see a moral cesspool".

Why We'll Win

From Protest Warriors - Netherlands Branch. (Via Davids Medienkritik)
If you doubt the accuracy of the poster, you haven't been reading your Little Green Footballs.

The next wave of immigration?

From the Telegraph:

Europe's leader for much of the last century in social experiments, Holland may now be pointing to the next cultural revolution: bourgeois exodus.

More people left the Netherlands than entered it for the first time in 50 years. Seems they can't take the crowded conditions, the traffic conjestion and, oh yeah, islamic fanatics murdering people in the streets. Via SISU who has more commentary on the subject.

Shawnee, KS = White Trash Mecca

Hmmm. Apparently, Thomas Frank, author of What's the Matter With Kansas?, is trying to paint Shawnee as a depressed area filled with "heaps of rusting junk and snarling rottweilers". Okay Kansas Citians, as soon as you've stopped laughing hysterically you can check out the article debunking that claim:

The objects of Mr. Frank's particular concern, his hometown of Shawnee and the rest of Johnson County, have done especially well. For three years in the 1990s, the Shawnee area's unemployment rate actually dipped below 3%, making it one of the tightest labor markets anywhere.

When the recession hit, Shawnee's unemployment rate did rise, but it still stayed below the nation's. And though Mr. Frank describes the place as practically desolate, Shawnee's population grew by a robust 27% during the 1990s. Even more astonishing, today, only 3.3% of its citizens live below the poverty level, compared with about 12.5% nationally. "It's possible his view of us is outdated," says Jim Martin, executive director of the Shawnee Economic Development Council, in classic Midwestern understatement.

Not to question Mr. Frank's account but, as a sometime house-hunter in KC, let me add that we could trade in our 3 bedroom ranch in South KC on the exact same thing in Shawnee for an additional $40k. We do have a few heaps of rusting junk in the neighborhood, but no rottweilers. Maybe we should get some. I had no idea snarling rottweilers could drive up the property values so.

Kofi Must Go

Canada's National Post calls for Kofi Annan's resignation:

Even putting Iraq and the oil-for-food scandal aside, the case against Mr. Annan is damning... Two weeks ago, UN workers in New York City voted that they had lost faith in the Secretary-General's ability and that of his senior administrators.
Mr. Annan has also watched as the UN Human Rights Commission has degenerated into a laughingstock run by some of the worst human-rights abusers in the world. He has refused to stop the UN agency responsible for delivering humanitarian aid to Palestinian refugees from assisting terrorists. And from Rwanda to Srebrenica, East Timor to Sudan, he has time and again permitted himself to be conned by tyrants and butchers while they have murdered hundreds of thousands of innocents.
Given all this, it is amazing to think that Mr. Annan was once thought to be a man who could help reform the United Nations.

It is possible that it's not Kofi's fault. Perhaps this "stunningly disfuncional" organization is so corrupt that no one could reform it.

(via Instapundit)

Dennis Ross on Public Radio

Wow. I'm listening to an amazing radio interview on Up to Date with ambassador Dennis Ross, the chief Middle East peace negotiator for George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton. He's also got a new book out: The Missing Peace: The Inside Story of the Fight for Middle East Peace.

This has got to be the most straight forward program on the Palestinian issue that I have ever heard from the MSM. Ross said (I paraphrase from memory) that the peace process would have succeeded if it hadn't have been for Arafat and it has a good chance now that he's gone (if we can get some cooperation from Egypt and the Saudis). Also, Hamas runs all those social welfare programs that make them so popular because Arafat wasn't interested boring stuff like actually running his "country". Condi is a good choice for Sec State because she has the full confidence of the president. Finally, he said the Israelis had no choice but to build the wall, what with Arafat not lifting a finger to stop suicide bombers from blowing themselves up on Israeli busses. (All sarcasm is mine, ambassador Ross was very professional.)

Somewhere in Kansas City, a CAIR member is writing a hostile letter to KCUR. (I just shot off my appreciative e-mail)

Transcript should be here by tomorrow.

What's wrong with Liberalism and what to do about it

Interesting article in the New Republic on how Democrats went from the "bear any burden" JFK to the "let's have a summit" JFK:

By 1949, three years after Winston Churchill warned that an "iron curtain" had descended across Europe, Schlesinger could write in The Vital Center: "Mid-twentieth century liberalism, I believe, has thus been fundamentally reshaped ... by the exposure of the Soviet Union, and by the deepening of our knowledge of man. The consequence of this historical re-education has been an unconditional rejection of totalitarianism."

However, three years after a new totalitarian threat was brought home to us on 9-11:

...Liberalism has still not "been fundamentally reshaped" by the experience. On the right, a "historical re-education" has indeed occurred--replacing the isolationism of the Gingrich Congress with George W. Bush and Dick Cheney's near-theological faith in the transformative capacity of U.S. military might. But American liberalism, as defined by its activist organizations, remains largely what it was in the 1990s--a collection of domestic interests and concerns. ...There is little liberal passion to win the struggle against Al Qaeda--even though totalitarian Islam has killed thousands of Americans and aims to kill millions; and even though, if it gained power, its efforts to force every aspect of life into conformity with a barbaric interpretation of Islam would reign terror upon women, religious minorities, and anyone in the Muslim world with a thirst for modernity or freedom.

I'm always interested in articles that can help me explain why I switched so quickly and so thoroughly from the Dems to the Reps. Obviously, it was something to do with 9-11, but it's nice to have the deep thinkers lay it all out. The right is trying to deal with the new situation, while too many on the left refuses to recognize that there is a new situation. It must be so frustrating to be Joe Biden or Joe Lieberman.

I am often left puzzling over how Liberals can side with the most illiberal force since... I was going to say Nazism, but while there are quite a few similarities, the Nazis at least had their own twisted version of fun. Polka bands and Wagner and naked women on horse back. The Taliban was the death of fun. The Nazis had their own twisted version of science. Sure, they measured people's heads to determine if they were Jewish, but they also went from prop planes to jet planes over the course of the war. The Taliban was the death of science.

I hope it's obvious that I'm not defending Nazis. I'm just pointing out that Liberals have always taken a hard-line against fascism and before Vietnam, they took a hard-line against communism. Why on earth will they not take a hard-line against an equally odious ideology?

The Republicans are vulnerable to attack by a cold war type of liberalism.

Bush has not increased the size of the U.S. military since September 11--despite repeated calls from hawks in his own party--in part because, given his massive tax cuts, he simply cannot afford to. An anti-totalitarian liberalism would attack those tax cuts not merely as unfair and fiscally reckless, but, above all, as long-term threats to America's ability to wage war against fanatical Islam. Today, however, there is no liberal constituency for such an argument in a Democratic Party in which only 2 percent of delegates called "terrorism" their paramount issue and another 1 percent mentioned "defense."

Count me among that 3%. I think Lieberman had a good shot at Bush. But he had no shot at the Democratic noomination. Guess that's why I had to vote Bush.

Update: Andrew Sullivan publishes a letter from a Dem:

"Only one problem with Beinart's thesis. People like me will not vote for the kind of Democrat he pines for. And people like me are the base of the Democratic party. I would not vote for Joe Lieberman or any Iraq-war supporting Democrat (that includes Hillary, by the way). People like me are the mirror images of the Republican right. We would rather lose than sacrifice our principles."

Then lose you will. That's what Beinart is saying.

Update: Okay, one snarky comment about the article. The author goes on about how Kerry had positioned himself as a liberal war hawk (mainly through his choice of advisors), but because the Iraq War was unpopular, hawkishness became unpopular with the Democratic base. So Kerry voted against the $87 billion to lure the lefties back from Dean. According to the author, one of the main problems with this action was that "...it helped the Bush campaign paint him as unprincipled".

Yes, that's right. Trying to win a primary by voting to deny the military the money it needs to successfully prosecute a war you were in favor of until it became politically unpopular isn't an unprincipled action. Voters only considered it sleazy because Karl Rove painted that highly moral action as unprincipled. Bad Karl.

How's Multiculturalism Doing in Europe?

Bill Dawson, an ex-pat American blogging from Vienna, notes that its worthwhile to keep up with events in the Netherlands, as that country attempts to deal with its Islamist problem following Van Gogh's murder. As one of the most liberal/tolerant countries in Europe it encapsulates the paradox of tolerance: At some point, a tolerant society must be intolerant of intolerance if it wants to stay tolerant. Hmmm.

Some Dutch blogs that are following the story:
Peaktalk
Zacht Ei

Events in the Netherlands have stirred things up in Germany:

While Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder has stepped-up a campaign calling on the country's big Muslim community to fit with the country's laws and its democratic principles, leading political figures in the nation have claimed that multiculturalism has failed in Germany...

[German Interior Minister Otto] Schily drew headlines earlier this year with a harsh warning to Islamic fundamentalists: "If you love death so much, then it can be yours."

Almost Rumsfeldesque. However, Germany is taking steps to better integrate its mainly Turkish Muslim immigrants:

Under this legislation all new immigrants will have to take 600 hours German language instruction plus a 30 hour course on German society. In addition, 50,000 immigrants already here will be eligible to take the courses each year.

The War on What?

From an interesting new blog by a Foreign Service Officer:

OK, I’ve said this before and I am going to say it again. There is no war against terrorism. We are not hunting down the FARC or ETA or Shining Path. We are not chasing the vestiges of the IRA. We are fighting Islamic extremism. I know this is not a ground shaking original thought, but it needs to be repeated. Islamic jihadists are the enemy, and terrorism is simply their weapon of choice.

(Via The Diplomad)

If you can read this...

Seen on a bumper sticker:

If you can read this
Thank a teacher.
If you're reading it in English
Thank a soldier.

Fallujah: proving there are worse things than war

Namely, living joyless lives of subjugation and fear:

"It was horrible," he told an AFP reporter."We suffered from the bombings. Innocent people died or were wounded by the bombings.

"But we were happy you did what you did because Fallujah had been suffocated by the Mujahidin. Anyone considered suspicious would be slaughtered. We would see unknown corpses around the city all the time." ...

"I would hear stories, about how they executed five men one day and seven another for collaborating with the Americans. They made checkpoints on the roads. They put announcements on walls banning music and telling women to wear the veil from head to toe."

It was not just pedlars of alcohol or Western videos and women deemed improperly dressed who faced the militants' wrath. Even residents who regard themselves as observant Muslims lived in fear because they did not share the puritan brand of Sunni Islam that the insurgents enforced.

Isn't it ironic that the Iraqis have far more religious freedom under the cruel American occupation than they have ever had before or will have again if we leave before they have a functioning democracy?

Blackfive's got your exit strategy right here.

Upon discovering that Iranian agents have offered a $500 bounty for each American Soldier or Marine killed, Blackfive offers his own exit strategy from Iraq and Afganistan.

Condi for Secretary of State

Alright! Racist, fascist Bush replaces first black Sec. of State with second black Sec. of State. Instapundit readers wonder whether the lack of play in the press indicates that A) we have come so far as a society that two black Secretaries of State is no big deal or B) MSM can't figure out how to fit it into their Republican=Racism superstory.

Lileks sums it up:

Yay Condi Rice. I want her to go to Saudi Arabia, and I want her first words upon getting off the plane to be “I’ll drive.”

(via Vodkapundit)

It's True! Rove Stole the Election.

Frank J. uncovers the shocking truth:

Hacker2: It was funny to see the Democrats try and cheat the old-fashioned way. They can bring in all the dead people they want to vote, but we'll just change their votes to Republican in the end.

(via Instapundit)

Well, not everyone is sorry

In response to Sorry Everybody, we now have We're Not Sorry, with picture of people who are happy that Bush will be "cutting taxes and killing terrorists" for another four years. Also this heartbreaker:



Now that's something worth being sorry about

Update: why shouldn't the Germans get in on the act.

Everybody's Sorry

Perhaps you've seen the pathetic bunch of whiners congregating at Sorry Everybody, where they have posted picture apoligizing to the world for Bush's reelection. It's a pretty sad display, although I don't think everyone is onboard with the spirit of the project:



(via LGF)

Quagmire, anyone?

Ivory Coast, the world's top cocoa producer and West Africa's economic powerhouse, erupted in turmoil on Saturday after Ivory Coast warplanes killed nine French peacekeepers and an American aid worker in an airstrike on the rebel-held north.

France wiped out the nation's newly built-up airforce on the tarmac in retaliation, sparking a violent anti-French uprising of looting, burning and attacks by loyalist youths. The turmoil has claimed at least 27 lives and wounded more than 900, with no deaths reported among expatriates.

Hmmm. France retaliates? Why not search for the root causes of the violence. Obviously the local population is just trying to throw of the yoke of foreign oppression. I wonder when we'll see the demonstrations in Paris against this imperial aggression. "No Blood for Cocoa!"

Belgian Political Party Declared illegal

According to the BBC:

Belgian's highest court has ruled that the Flemish far-right Vlaams Blok party is racist. The ruling means the Blok will lose access to state funding and access to television which will, in effect, shut down the party... Recent opinion polls suggest the Vlaams Blok is the most popular party in the Dutch-speaking region of Flanders. It garnered almost a quarter of votes in regional and European elections in June.

So what's scarier: that a far-right party is garnering 25% of the vote or that a party that garners 25% of the vote can be outlawed in a supposedly free society? Hmmm. I thought it was America's democracy that was teetering on the edge.

Of course, it's hard to tell how far-right this party really is. After all, one gets the feeling that the folks at the BBC think the Republican party is far-right.

The New World Order according to Der Spiegel

Wow. I don't even go to church, but I'm stunned by the condescension of the European media. Now, tell me again why we should bend over backwards to get our actions pre-approved by Berlin? (via LGF)

Update

A commenter at LGF posts a corrected version of Der Spiegel's map.

Another conspiracy theory bites the dust

That mysterious bulge on President Bush’s back during the first presidential debate was not an electronic device feeding him answers, but a strap holding his bulletproof vest in place...

But sources in the Secret Service told The Hill that Bush was wearing a bulletproof vest, as he does most of the time when appearing in public. The president’s handlers did not want to admit as much during the campaign, for fear of disclosing information related to his personal security while he was on the campaign trail.

Well, duh. 30 seconds of thought should have told you that. But no. Must be another Rovian conspiracy. A campaigning president mixing with large crowds everyday has got to be a major headache for the Secret Service. I'm sure they really want someone from the administration saying "Yes, the President always wears a bulletproof vest" (so be sure to aim for the head). That whole ridiculous dust-up reminds me of reporters who ask "When exactly are you going to invade Fallujah? And with which units? And will you be coming from the north or the west?"

(via Tim Blair)

Who ya callin' stoopid, stoopid?

The Batman Effect

From Truth Laid Bear:

Batman is constantly trying to put the Joker out of business for good. But if you haven't noticed, he generally never quite manages. The Joker is never, ever truly vanquished; he'll always be back for more.

But when the Joker's on the loose again, you don't stop to think "Damn, Batman still hasn't managed to get rid of this guy, we better find somebody else." You don't say "get me Aquaman on the phone." You think about the only guy who actually does something about the Joker, even if it hasn't been a permanent solution: the only guy who's been able to do the clown some damage and set back his schemes a ways. You put up the damned Bat Signal and hope that Batman answers the call.

Bush is Batman to Bin Laden's Joker. And the American public isn't going to dump Batman just because he hasn't won the final battle with the Joker yet.

That's what I thought every time I heard Kerry chastising Bush for not catching Osama. At least Bush took the fight to Osama the best way he knew how. Maybe Kerry stands up to the bad guys, maybe he invites them to a summit. Who could tell?

Married People for Bush

Apparently, more married people than single people voted for Bush. Barbara Ehrenreich just said on the News Hour that this is because women have less influence in a marriage and are so beaten down that they take on the views of their evil fascists husbands (or words to that effect). Tee hee. Apparently she's never met me or my sister-in-law. I was strongly pro-Bush and she was strongly pro-Kerry. Our poor husbands just kept their heads down and tried to stay out of the way.

Just got back from the polls

I made Brian go with me, so I would have some company in line. When we got there, I skated right through because I fell in with that notorious group of slackers: people with surnames beginning J-Z. Poor Brian belongs to the more civic-minded A-I's. He had to wait at least another half-an-hour. Now we just wait to hear the results.