Like Dennis Miller, only less funny.

 
I've MOVED: Check me out at www.variousorthodoxies.com!
posted by Chance at 2:50 PM

 
I've taken out the comments buttons. Two reasons: I wasn't getting any, and the whole idea of "Shout Out" as a comments indicator was a little juvenile. It was the only comments selector I could find (and get to work) on blogger. I feel comfortable getting rid of it now, however, because -- thanks to Rachel Lucas and Dean Esmay -- I'm going to be moving to my own site, and powered by Moveable Type. I should be able to get real comments using that powerhouse program.
posted by Chance at 12:28 PM

 
I think that Maggie Gallagher went a little overboard with this ending line:

"Winning the gay-marriage debate may be hard, but to those of us who witnessed the fall of Communism, despair is inexcusable and irresponsible. Losing this battle means losing the idea that children need mothers and fathers. It means losing the marriage debate. It means losing limited government. It means losing American civilization. It means losing, period."

I don't know how I feel about this. Conflicted. I don't really see wholesale abandonment of a historically grounded, important social institution merely because the state decided to include a non-traditional form into it hallowed halls. But I also see the point that gay marriage isn't necessarily the same as that between a man and woman; and that states might have the right to legalize (or illegalize, more to the point) its moral distinctions. I find myself agreeing with Mr. Justice Thomas in the Texas Sodomy case. I recognize this to be the rallying cry of liberals, "he agrees with Thomas." But I can't argue with it logically. This, by the way, is a source of consternation among liberals. They decry Scalia's results but can't fault his process. It makes for a weak argument from the left.
posted by Chance at 10:12 AM

 
I am somewhat disturbed by the whole 16-word fiasco. Oh, not because I think our President "misleaded" us in any way. Bush strikes me as an upfront, honest leader. A politician to be sure, but as guileless a one as possible (which has its own disturbing foreign-policy implications). No, I don't think he lied. The stakes are simply too high in a SOTU to mess around with something they know to be false. What bothers me is the seeming keystone cop quality of our intelligence community. I mean, some guy somewhere forges papers, sells them to the Italians, who then pass the info to the British, who then give it to the Americans. What was this, a game of telephone? And no one bothers to check out the original source before okaying it for the President?

And, please, stop talking to me about the White House skewing information. I fully believe that the beaurocrats in the CIA can cover their asses with the best of 'em. And they probably feather their analysis with, "absent other factors...," or "in view of available intelligence...." To get a piece of intelligence with no caveats is going to be impossible.
posted by Chance at 9:11 AM

 
You know, once again I was reading the NRO, specfically Jay Nordlinger's Impromptus today, and Jay is incensed at something Joe Lieberman did, which is fine. But he started in on Michigan's affirmative action programs. He wrote

"Consider: When Ward Connerly announced that he would invite Michigan voters to renounce racial preferences, Lieberman said, "This is a divisive and destructive act, and people of all political persuasions should condemn it as such." This, of course, stands truth on its head: It's the racial discrimination — "reverse" or not — that is dividing and destroying. What Connerly stands for is the good old liberalism, whereby you judge people by the content of their character, not by the color of their skin, and you uphold equality of opportunity and equality under the law — the Civil Rights Act and all that square stuff. Haven't we learned, at this point, that judging and hiring and admitting and promoting on the basis of skin color is, in fact, divisive and destructive? (And un-American?)"

No, it's not. And I hate when conservatives quote Martin Luther King, Jr. I'm all in favor of judging solely by the content of character. I just don't think that everyone is there yet. MLK dreamed of a day. But I think even he would say that the day hasn't arrived. Until then, as I've said, we need disparity of result to offset disparity of process.
posted by Chance at 11:27 AM

 
I know I'm supposed to be thinking about composing a magnum opus, but I read this and just had to comment:

A political science instructor at Santa Rosa Junior College is being investigated by the Secret Service for telling his students to compose an e- mail to an elected official that included the words "kill the president, kill the president," a school administrator said Wednesday.

Michael Ballou, a part-time lecturer who teaches an "Introduction to U.S. Government" course at the college's Petaluma campus, intended the assignment to be an "experiential exercise that would instill a sense of fear so they would have a better sense of why more people don't participate in the political process," said Doug Garrison, the vice president and executive dean of the Petaluma campus.

However, it "clearly is a violation of our board policies," said Garrison, who learned of the incident on Monday from campus police officials and immediately summoned Ballou to his office for an explanation. He said Ballou was continuing to teach his classes while the matter was under investigation by the Secret Service.

Ballou did not respond to requests for an interview.

Most of the 30 students in the class dismissed the June 25 assignment as a joke, but after it was repeated at a subsequent class, one student did send the e-mail to U.S. Rep. Mike Thompson (D-Napa Valley) on July 5.

Leslie Danz, a spokeswoman in Thompson's Washington, D.C., office said the e-mail, which said only "kill the president, kill the president," was not opened until Monday because of the holiday weekend. It was immediately forwarded to the Capitol police service, she said. It was the first time the office has encountered such a threat, Danz said.

The student was interviewed by the Secret Service, which had begun investigating the assignment after being tipped by a classmate, Garrison said.

Making a threat against the president is against the law and subject to up to five years in prison.

"Whether the intention was there or not, he created an environment where he was jeopardizing students," Garrison said.

The thing that I really love about this article, besides the asininity of the professor, is the kid who, upon getting an assignment to write an e-mail including the words "kill the president," then wrote an e-mail with only those words. You gotta love it.

posted by Chance at 2:31 PM

 
Brilliant commentary, from Best of the Web:

Democrats seem to be just as out of touch today. Rather than celebrate the overthrow of a tyrant and enemy of America, they are trying to discredit it by retrospectively niggling over the nuances of the argument for war. It's as if they were defense lawyers arguing an appeal on behalf of Saddam, trying to get him off on a technicality.

The Washington Times quotes Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld as explaining to a Senate committee yesterday: "The coalition did not act in Iraq because we had discovered dramatic new evidence of Iraq's pursuit of weapons of mass murder. We acted because we saw the existing evidence in a new light, through the prism of our experience on September 11."

Rumsfeld is exactly right, and the Democrats will self-destruct unless they grasp the political ramifications of the national epiphany that was Sept. 11. The response that "Iraq had nothing to do with Sept. 11," though possibly accurate, is beside the point--the equivalent of arguing in 1942 that Germany had nothing to do with Pearl Harbor. FDR and Truman knew who America's enemies were, but many of their heirs seem not to.

posted by Chance at 7:20 PM

 
I've been doing some thinking lately about the US, and reading quite a bit. I'm almost finished with Victor Davis Hanson's "An Autumn of War: What America Learned from September 11 and the War on Terrorism." Thought provoking. (For those interested in reading it, its Dewey Decimal System # is 974.71044H.) Anyway, I'm considering doing a Bill-Whittle-style longer piece. So don't expect any blogging for the next few days, until I can organize my thoughts, and see whether they're worth the effort of an epic entry.
posted by Chance at 6:01 PM

 
From the same posting: "Some on the left seem to think U.S. intervention is just fine, so long as its moral purity isn't tainted by self-interest." I like it both ways. I believe that we should intervene when it's in our self-interest and when it's not necessarily in our self interest, but there's a moral imperative. There's no reason we can't do both.
posted by Chance at 5:01 PM

 
This from Opinion Journal, quoting Howard Dean:

"The situation in Liberia is exactly the opposite," Dean said. "There is an imminent threat of serious human catastrophe and the world community is asking the United States to exercise its leadership."

Is it me or is leadership more apparent when everyone is asking you not to do something, something that should be done, and you do it anyway.
posted by Chance at 4:58 PM

 
There's a reason why this guy gets paid to write: Victor Davis Hanson at NRO. My favorite quote:

Meanwhile, the assassins of American soldiers in Iraq were lionized on the West Bank — itself nursing the fresh wound of losing the murder-subsidies from Saddam Hussein, whose mug at least still adorned the coffee houses of Gaza and Ramallah. We, the American public, were asked for forbearance — to ignore that some Palestinian militants were canonizing the murderers of American soldiers — as we went forward to save the same Palestinians from the righteous anger of Israel. "Stop the Apaches and the F-16s so we can cheer in peace those Saddamites who shot your soldiers," they must think. What a weird group, who hate Israel so much that they are infuriated that the "Zionist entity" is walling itself off from the likes of them.

But the whole thing is worthwhile reading.



posted by Chance at 4:34 PM

 
I don't quite get the logic of this quote from Michael Kinsley's column in the Washington Post.

The law school dean testified that "the extent to which race is considered in admissions . . . varies from one applicant to another." It "may play no role" or it "may be a determinative factor." O'Connor cites this approvingly, but it is nonsense on several levels. First, "no role" and "determinative factor" are in fact the only possible options: A yes-or-no question cannot have an infinite variety of effects.

Why can't race just be one factor of the, say, five, that make up the admittor's decision to admit?

posted by Chance at 11:49 AM

 
Read this by Victor Davis Hanson. Now read it again. Now one more time. I can respond only with a vulgarity, "F**kin-A Right, Bubba!"
posted by Chance at 10:08 AM

 
I really like this editorial from the Daily News:

Repeat: Truce with Hamas was not the deal. Negotiation with Hamas was not the deal. Accommodation with Hamas was not the deal. Hamas promising to play nice was not the deal. The deal was Hamas is gone. Dismantled. Dismembered. Thrown to the crows.

Exactly Right!

posted by Chance at 9:16 AM

 
This is from an Edward Said column a few days ago:

Mr. Corrie told me that he had himself driven bulldozers, although the one that killed his daughter deliberately because she was trying valiantly to protect a Palestinian home in Rafah from demolition was a 60 ton behemoth especially designed by Caterpillar for house demolitions, a far bigger machine than anything he had ever seen or driven.

Forget the content. Have you seen a worse sentence structure?! This guy is supposed to be a PROFESSOR!

posted by Chance at 5:04 PM

 
Re-reading Scalia's concurrence in Grutter, I was thinking that he really rails on O'Connor for what will -- and he's right about this -- certainly be a unending stream of litigation regarding the particulars of any individual admissions scheme. But what are the alternatives? Should we have consistency for consistency's sake? The court made a tough call, but I think a correct one. They did not give any definitive guidance in the area. They gave signposts, "go that way!" And the like. Almost like the, "you're getting warmer..." games of old.
posted by Chance at 2:19 PM

 
On most issues, I have become quite the conservative. I love NRO. (and recently subscribed). I love Democrats except for two things: everything they say and everything they do. But on affirmative action, I tend to think most conservatives have their heads up their a**. I think that this country pissed on black people for so long, and now when we help them up and give them a towel, conservatives complain that it's "reverse discrimination" because everyone doesn't get a towel. Well, everyone didn't get pissed on. And as a Jew, I know what piss feels like, if you'll excuse the vulgarity. I think that until the educational system in this country has equalized, so that a black person has every opportunity that a white person does, then we have to equalize things on the other end.

Unfortunately, our country engaged in shameful discrimination against black people for the better part of 100 years. We can't just say, "well, I don't discriminate, therefore everything is hunky-dory." We have to realize that 100 years of discrimination takes a toll on the systems of education and jobs. Until those systems are fully adjusted to the new reality, we have to take steps to skew the results on the back end, meaning, discrimination in favor of those previously discriminated against. This is a temporary measure, to be sure. But we're not done yet. And probably won't be for another 100 years. After all, my father remembers whites only toilets, and waiting rooms, into the late 1970s. We're not that far from outright race hostility. Give it some time.
posted by Chance at 10:31 AM

 
A fantastic tribute and a worthwhile read. Right Wing News gives us the Best of Jonah Goldberg. One of the better examples (and one at which I laughed out loud):

"(I)t is simply wrong to confuse cowardice with appeasement. Cowardice is a failing of character. Appeasement is a failure of policy. Stalin appeased Hitler when he signed the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. Stalin was an evil character, to be sure. But cowardice really isn't the first word that comes to mind when thinking of Stalin — that word is "sexy." I'm kidding, I'm kidding." -- Jonah Goldberg

posted by Chance at 1:16 PM

 
I got this link from Impromptus, at NRO. It's a speech by Chaim Herzog to the UN about Jewish settlements in Judea and Samaria. If you didn't read at the top that it was given in the late '70s, you'd think it was given yesterday. Jewish Settlements in "the Territories" Aren't the Problem
posted by Chance at 10:28 AM

 
I have been keeping up with the nomination of William Pryor, Attorney General of Alabama, for a seat on the Court of Appeals. This entry, from NRO is a good start. What a refreshing experience! He is actually saying what he thinks, and standing up for what he believes. He may not get confirmed, but he deserves to be, just based on his honesty. Good job!
posted by Chance at 4:09 PM

 
I was reading this piece about a Bushism, actually, a Fisking of a Bushism, on The Volokh Conspiracy. (Scroll down to the post at 2:42 p.m.) It occurred to me that for most Bushisms, I don't mind them. After all, a President that talks colloquially, or even, sometimes, incorrectly, is not such a bad thing. The more I think about this President, the more I like him. This is not to say that I agree with him, but I like him. He more and more is growing into the job. He's becoming more presidential as we look at him. It's a pleasure. I've said before that great Presidents, like Bush will be remembered, grow into the job (or, more correctly, are pushed to grow by crises). My distaste for Clinton is that he shrunk the office to fit his personal predilections.

Anyway, I like the fact that Bush is a little garbled sometimes. I like that he's human. I like that he has faith. I like that he tries to get what he wants, because, deep down, he wears his patriotism on his sleeve. And he's handled the war on terror about as good as it could be handled, I think. You can always find fault, but it's a little different when the lights are on you.

So for those who constantly point out his errors of speech, I say, "I think you are misunderestimating him."
posted by Chance at 3:11 PM

 
Have I mentioned today how much I like Rachel Lucas? I mean, she's just a little younger than me, she has the 42nd most popular blog around, or something like that, and reading her is such a delight, every time. I like sassy impudence as much as the next guy, and I feel her "I hate stupid people" pain. I could probably do without so many dog pictures, but to each his (or her) own.
posted by Chance at 2:01 PM

 
By the way...I read today that France's trade balance with us has decline by $290 billion dollars! They had a surplus, now it's a huge deficit. Way to go, Americans!!
posted by Chance at 1:57 PM

 
Thanks to Rachel Lucas for reprinting this hilarious piece.

Reasons why the English language is so hard to learn:
The bandage was wound around the wound.
The farm was used to produce produce.
The dump was so full that it had to refuse more refuse.
We must polish the Polish furniture.
He could lead if he would get the lead out.
The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.
Since there is no time like the present, he thought it was time to present the present.
A bass was painted on the head of the bass drum.
When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes.
I did not object to the object.
The insurance was invalid for the invalid.
There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row.
There is no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple. English muffins weren't invented in England or French fries in France.
Sweetmeats are candies while sweetbreads, which aren't sweet, are meat.
Quicksand works slowly, boxing rings are square and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.
And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing, grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham?
If the plural of tooth is teeth, why isn't the plural of booth beeth? One goose, 2 geese. So one moose, 2 meese?
Doesn't it seem crazy that you can make amends but not one amend.
If you have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it?
posted by Chance at 1:49 PM

 
Jed Babbin on War & Security on National Review Online

Just because we are — militarily — the world's most powerful nation, that doesn't mean that it is our burden, and ours alone, to bring peace to the world. Our first duty is to win this war.

Amen, brother.
posted by Chance at 9:45 AM

 
Another reason to love Lileks

Sometimes I swear the mainstream media won't take a look at the Palestinian's horrid death-cult subculture until we learn that a suicide bomber played "Doom" at an Internet cafe for five minutes. And then they'll blame Intel.

posted by Chance at 4:05 PM

 
Other than calling Massoud al Titi a martyr, this is an excellent article by James S. Robbins at NRO.
posted by Chance at 11:40 AM

 
Unusually, Andrew Sullivan gets it completely wrong:

Of course there's nothing wrong as such with that kind of distant, open marriage. If that's the way the Clintons want to set up their relationship, it's their business. The problem is that America is in many ways a publicly conservative - or at least quietly hypocritical - culture. Americans - especially in the heartland between the two coasts - don't particularly want their president as an exemplar of a transparently post-modern marriage.

Yes, there is something wrong with that kind of marriage, and no, it's not just their business. And the fact that middle-America doesn't want immorality as the main trait of their leader doesn't make them prudish. The President doesn't administer the country, he (or she) leads her. That means more than just being good at keeping the government running. It means showing us, by example, who we aspire to be, and where we want to go. I don't know when Clinton lost that, or if he ever had it, but I know that I was ashamed to have him be my President. And I voted for him, twice. Hillary strikes me as the epitomy of calculating. And she, too, basked in the kind of "I'm better than everyone else and the rules don't apply to me" principle. She told big lies. Bald lies. But she fully expected to be believed. Unfortunately, she was believed by some. The one that sticks out for me is finding the several-years-old law firm billing records on the coffee table one day. Does anyone really believe that? And I don't feel sorry for her at all. Maybe, the first time Bill cheated, or the second, or even the third, but please, stop insulting my intelligence by saying how shocked, shocked, you were that gambling was going on in this establishment.
posted by Chance at 3:51 PM

 
One more reason to hate the Times: this article in which the front-page blurb (1st story) says that the attack came "just as Hamas was considering a truce." Of course, the full story goes a little further:

The incident came just four days after Hamas broke off talks with him on halting violence. However, some Hamas leaders said before Tuesday's strike they were considering resuming truce talks.

So let me get this straight...Hamas walks away, says that there will never be peace with Israel, and that they aren't going negotiate until Israel, and all Jews, cease to exist, and the times reports it as "just as Hamas was considering a truce." Talk about ridiculous.
posted by Chance at 9:27 AM

 
I spoke to a friend over the long weekend, who told me he actually read the blog. So to the hordes soon to come, welcome! Welcome!
posted by Chance at 12:26 AM

 
If you have some time, and you want to make sure it's well-spent, go read Bill Whittle's latest masterpiece, Magic. It's long, but it's so wonderful to read. The man is a genius. It's always a treasure to find a written work that hits the mark as much as this one does. And so rare. Enjoy.
posted by Chance at 12:24 AM

 
In Georgia, a group of lawyers and federal judges passed a resolution supporting Justice Thomas, and "disapproving" of any rude or insulting remarks. Someone was going to give a "counterspeech" criticizing Thomas, and the group wanted to diassociate themselves from it. And the "counterspeaker" had some things to say about the horrid disapproval:

He argued that the resolution was based on a factual error, because only a handful of Georgia law students had invited Thomas, not the entire school. He continued: "There was no rudeness or insulting behavior directed toward Thomas; there was only legitimate, First Amendment-protected protest about his selection as graduation speaker and his anti-human rights voting record on the Supreme Court.
"To disagree with the selection of Thomas as graduation speaker, and to publicly protest his anti-human rights record, is as American as apple pie, and neither I nor anyone else was rude toward Thomas or insulted him, although we certainly did come down hard on his record because it deserves severe criticism.

Why is the First Amendment thought to be some universal antacid for rudeness. No, Mr. Counterspeaker, free speech can be rude. And insulting. The only thing is definitely cannot be is outlawed. The first amendment recognizes your G-d-given right to be as rude and insulting to Mr. Justice Thomas as you would like. And it appears you were. But don't sit there and use the first amendment as an excuse to be rude. Be a man. Say, "Yeah, I was rude, but I was right, and here's why." The First Amendment is about the exchange of ideas. To open the public debate to all forms of thought, and argument. So as to give the people the ability to knowledgeably decide for themselves on any issue. You presented your side. And some people thought you were wrong both on substance and on process. And, by the by, it is entirely possible to be critical yet respectful.
posted by Chance at 1:49 PM

 
From NRO, Impromptus, a quote from Carol Moseley Braun:

Asked whether President Bush deserved any credit for Iraq, the candidate said, "Well, you know, I mean, if you pick a fight, and if — you know, you pick a fight with somebody that's smaller than you and you beat 'em, where's the honor in that?"

This is always a little annoying. The object of war is not honor. It's to win. And "fair" means all my troops come home alive. Screw the others. War is a brutal state, and the battlefield its nexus. On the battlefield, there is no room to fight "for honor," you fight for victory. how you fight, and why you fight is where you display your honor. But don't tell me that to be honorable, we have to give them a fighting chance, so to speak.
posted by Chance at 2:14 PM

 
See, this is the sort of statement that really pisses me off. Can't this guy (and Arafat before him) just take responsibility. Can't they ever just say, "We were wrong," without adding, "but it was caused by the occupation?" At least the Palestineans were marching against the right people: the terrorists who, cowardly, hid in civilians land. Yahoo! News - Angry Palestinians Lash Out at Militants

Interviewed in Gaza by Israel TV's Channel 10, Abbas repeated his denunciation of the recent suicide attacks claimed by Muslim militants. "They sabotage the process the same as Israeli occupation sabotages the process," he said. "The whole situation is tragic, the attacks in Israel and the destruction on our side."

posted by Chance at 4:04 PM