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October 15, 2004

I'VE BEEN SLACKING TODAY, and will soon (I hope) be airborne -- but Tom Maguire has been on a roll, again.

ANN ALTHOUSE writes that Kerry is "refueling her mistrust" with his bogus draft claims:

Quite aside from Kerry's attempts to scare people into voting for him with a trumped-up threat that Bush will revive the draft, this statement refuels my mistrust for Kerry. His argument about the draft implicitly asserts that he plans to withdraw from Iraq without adequately providing for a successful resolution of the conflict.

That has been my fear all along, and Kerry hasn't done much to address it. Meanwhile, reader J. H. Weible wonders if Kerry, who wants to add two new divisions, will have a recruitment-and-retention problem in light of polls like this suggesting that he's not very popular among the military. Can Kerry produce the force he's promising without a draft? Somebody should ask him.

I'M IN THE NEWARK AIRPORT, where the wi-fi seems intermittent. But at least I'm not having Will Collier's problems.

Sorry, Jeff: I still love you, but this was a quickie up-and-back trip using one of the fleet of Gulfstreams the University of Tennessee has for faculty use since I was able to line up good nonstop flight connections.

MICKEY KAUS notes that ABC's The Note has been busted by a blogger for posting bogus quotes. ABC has posted a correction, though you'll now have to scroll to the bottom to see it.

JOHN EDWARDS has been savagely beaten by a man in a wheelchair.

CALL ME PETER PARKER: Ken Layne is quoted calling me a "lone webslinger." But in the blogosphere, you're never really alone.

I took this from the cab.

I'M IN NEWARK, in the palatial new building of the Rutgers Law School, at an ABA conference on technology and legal education. Rutgers has a nice WiFi network, but I'll be pretty busy for a while. Blogging, and email response, are likely to suffer. Back later.

ON TRAVEL TODAY: Blogging is likely to be intermittent. I'm taking with me a copy of John Birmingham's alternate-history novel Weapons of Choice, which I purchased solely because of this bit in the Amazon description: "At the start of Australian author Birmingham's stellar debut novel, a United Nations battle group, clustered around the U.S.S. Hillary Clinton (named after "the most uncompromising wartime president in the history of the United States"), is tasked in the year 2021 with stopping ethnic cleansing by an Islamist regime in Indonesia."

That's plausible enough that it makes me wish Hillary were running this year . . .

JEFF JARVIS ASKS: "Would you go to jail for your weblog?" Of course, another way of putting it is, "should your weblog keep you out of jail?" That is, if you do things that would otherwise get you sent to jail -- like violating a subpoena -- does the fact that you're a journalist get you off the hook? The Constitution doesn't say that.

I found the Vanessa Leggett case troubling because the Justice Department seemed anxious to keep her from publishing -- they wanted all her notes, manuscripts, etc., not just copies, and they wouldn't let her keep copies. But as I wrote in a Wall Street Journal piece back then, the Justice Department's problem was as much in trying to draw lines regarding who was a journalist and who wasn't:

Contrary to frequent assertions from professional journalists, there is no special First Amendment protection for members of the press. Such protections, to the extent they exist at all, exist only as a matter of statutory or regulatory grace. Under the First Amendment, everyone enjoys the same protection as "professional journalists." Ms. Leggett probably had First Amendment grounds for refusing to turn over all of her notes, but not for refusing to testify to a grand jury, and not for refusing to make her notes available for copying (rather than seizure). Her refusal to testify may make her a heroine to journalists, but it does not make her a First Amendment heroine.

The Justice Department's behavior was thus doubly odd. The first oddity was requesting her material in such a way as to block work on her book. The second oddity was making an argument based on her status as a nonjournalist. As a matter of internal policy, the Justice Department often avoids asking journalists to identify their sources, but that has nothing to do with the First Amendment.

If you think that journalists -- which I would interpret as anyone doing journalism, but be aware that others may differ -- deserve the kind of privilege that they often claim, then support legislation that grants it. I don't think that legislation would pass, though, because I don't think that most people really believe that it's justified.

October 14, 2004

SOME INTERESTING IRAQ NEWS AND PHOTOS, here.

MY MUCH-LOVED NEC laptop is showing its age. I had to replace the keyboard in April; now it's having charger problems. I'm sending it back but it's obvious that a replacement will be in order soon.

What I'd like is something like it: Small, light, not necessarily especially powerful but with very long battery life. And fairly rugged (since it gets heavy use) but cheap (so I can take it anywhere without worries). Any suggestions? This looks pretty good, though the battery life may be the shortfall. This looks cool, but it's a bit pricey. Could I blog comfortably from a tablet PC?

UPDATE: Randy Barnett says he loves his Toughbook W2. And please, no "get a mac!" emails, unless there is once again a WordPerfect for macs. I'll give up my WordPerfect when they pry it from my cold, dead CD-ROM drive. Or something like that. . . .

EUGENE VOLOKH NOTES MORE CRUSHING OF DISSENT: I guess it's proof that the incidents in Evan Coyne Maloney's film Brainwashing 101 are far from unique.

UPDATE: Crushing of bloggers in Canada, too. More on that here.

I HAVE A PLAN, by Ann Elk.

THE COMMAND POST is looking for a few good bloggers to help provide state-by-state election coverage. Okay, actually at least 50.

PAUL MARKS notes progress.

DICK CHENEY ON KERRY'S USE OF HIS DAUGHTER:

You saw a man who will say and do anything in order to get elected. And I am not speaking just as a father here, though I am a pretty angry father, but as a citizen.

I think it was a major blunder by Kerry -- especially as his position on gay marriage is the same as the President's.

UPDATE: Reader Keith Rempel gets at the heart of what's wrong here, and articulates what I couldn't: "Kerry was using Cheney's daughter to harm her father. How many kids want to be used to harm their parents? Did anyone ask her if she wants to have her sexual practices used in the campaign?"

ANOTHER UPDATE: More thoughts here: "thou shall NOT speak of another's kid in any way that could POSSIBLY be construed as negative."

Meanwhile, Brian Erst emails:

A proper analogy would be if President Bush was asked a question about the issue of divorce. If, in reply, he said, "I believe divorce is very hard on children. Senator Kerry's daughters, Alexandra and Vanessa, know how painful and heartbreaking the divorce of their parents were to them. That's why I believe that we should have a program of marriage counseling that should take place prior to any divorce, to see if we can bridge the gap that has grown between two people who at one time, obviously loved each other. If it can't, then the divorce, however painful, may have to take place, but at least we have tried to minimize the damage to the children."

The inclusion of Kerry's daughters in the above quote would be crass. The matter is one of public record and I believe it has been spoken of to some extent during the campaign, but it still is using another person's family to score a cheap political point. . . . This one was obvious - especially after Edwards made the same point in his debate as well. Add Elizabeth Edwards' cynical psychoanalysis ("I find it sad Lynne Cheney has such a problem accepting her daughter...") and you get the Democratic equivalent of the old Republican tactic of wink-and-nod race baiting.

Well, maybe. I'm not sure I'd analogize gayness to divorce, but the family point-scoring is there. Whatever it is, it's tacky.

MORE: Lots of readers seem to think so. James Somers emails:

Politically, this issue is about parenthood, not gay rights, for the simple reason that there are more voters who are parents than there are voters who are gay. Kerry crassly exploited Cheney's daughter for use against Bush and thus, by extension, Cheney. Perhaps you have to be a parent to understand what that means. But the parents I've spoken to about this today - including some very liberal ones up here in deep-blue Connecticut - found Kerry's ploy nauseous. One Democratic friend, who's a father of four, said he recoiled at Kerry's remarks. And a mother I know who's voting for Kerry, and who believes (like me) that gay marriage should be legal, said she felt "deeply uncomfortable" when Kerry brought up Mary Cheney. The bottom line is that Kerry screwed up.

Yeah, I think it was a mistake.

STILL MORE: Andrew Sullivan writes: "The usually even-keeled Instapundit says that Kerry's 'position on gay marriage is the same as the President's.' I can't see how that's even remotely the case."

Well, it was this Kerry statement that led to my conclusion:

The president and I have the same position, fundamentally, on gay marriage. We do. Same position.

Call me crazy, but I took that to mean that they had the same position. Since it was a Kerry statement, I should have realized that I was probably missing out on a crucial nuance. My bad. Andrew also writes: "One last gripe about Glenn: he also writes that Kerry 'dissed' Mary Cheney. How? Is calling an openly gay person gay an insult?" Of course not. It's not even an insult to call a straight person gay. But it is disrespectful to drag people into debates on sexuality on national TV. And it's disrespectful to do so as an effort to -- as Mickey Kaus suggested -- swing the votes of homophobes. I'm surprised that Andrew is so untroubled by this.

I think this illustrates that those who are expecting some special degree of sensitivity toward gay issues -- or privacy in general -- from a President Kerry are likely to be disappointed. Apparently, it's all just stuff to be manipulated for advantage.

MORE STILL: Mary Cheney was there, along with candidate wives and mothers, but Ann Althouse notes the women who weren't mentioned.

FINALLY: This video clip seems pretty fitting.

And Howard Fineman observes:

But do you like one who mentions someone else’s child to make a nasty political point? There were no laughs but gasps in the press room when Kerry noted that Vice President Dick Cheney's daughter, Mary, was a lesbian. It came during a discussion of gay marriage. Now, of course, everyone knows something about Mary—she is open about her sexual orientation and has worked in outreach programs to gays and lesbians, and even brought her partner to the vice-presidential debate in Cleveland.

Still, what was Kerry's point in hauling her into a discussion of the pros and cons of gay marriage? Was he trying to highlight the fact that the vice president doesn't share the president's support for a constitutional amendment defining marriage as only between a man and a woman? Was he trying to say that Cheney should actively OPPOSE it because of his daughter? Cheney and Kerry actually seem to share the same views.

But different standards.

HEH. Make that a double-heh.

FOR ME, THE ELECTION IS OVER: Went and voted at Early Voting today. It started yesterday, and it will be going on for two weeks. The place was doing a brisk business, and I can't help but think that this is a great thing. Not only for the (considerable) increase in convenience it represents, but also because early voting tends to reduce the impact of last-minute surprises, smears, etc. I'm not sure what percentage of the electorate will vote early this time around, but I strongly suspect that it will be bigger than four years ago.

DEFEAT FOR THE RIAA:

The Supreme Court handed Internet services providers and privacy advocates a crucial victory yesterday when it decided to pass on an important Internet piracy case. . . .

"The recording industry may not agree, but the U.S. Supreme Court thinks personal privacy is far more important that music piracy," Red Herring reported. "On Tuesday, the high court refused to entertain an appeal of a unanimous 2003 decision by the District of Columbia Court of Appeals that held that copyright holders cannot force Internet providers to identify file sharers using a mere subpoena. Industry watchers see this as yet another blow that the recording industry has taken in its fight against online file sharing -- a fight it is slowly losing. The lawsuits in question were between New York's Verizon Internet Services and the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), headquartered in Washington, D.C."

Given that the subpoenas in question were robot-generated, that's as it should be. I wrote a column on this a couple of years ago. Wired News has more on this case, which is quite significant.

UPDATE: Things are going the other way in Britain, though.

LIP-READING: No idea what to make of this.

Read More »


HOW YOU PLAY THE GAME: Stephen Green is very unhappy with what he's hearing.

UPDATE: Be sure you check out Bill Hobbs' running archive on voter fraud.

PAJAMA PEOPLE in the 18th Century: I've often said that the rise of the blogosphere represents, in many ways, a return to the late 18th century environment of pamphleteers, numerous small ideological newspapers, and coffeehouse debates. And I have to say that this passage from Larry Kramer's new book, The People Themselves: Popular Constitutionalism and Judicial Review, could describe the reaction of some in today's haut-commentariat to the rise of blogs and other alternative media:

After the adoption of the Constitution, most Federalists had expected to amicably govern a quiescent population content to follow their wise leadership. Instead, they were shocked to find themselves wrestling with an unruly, rambunctious democracy-in-the-making. Between the burgeoning newspapers, raucous parades, partisan holiday celebrations, and disrespectful debating societies, the people out-of-doors seemed literally to be taking leave of their senses. Suddenly, everyone apparently felt entitled to express an opinion -- more, felt that "constituted authorities" should be listening to their views. . . . Federalist leaders were caught flat-footed, unsure how to cope with this confusing new world.

Heh.

UPDATE: Reader Richard Samuelson emails: "Why did it just occur to me that President Jefferson received Ambassadors in his robe?"

Technically, those were early-19th Century pajamas. . . . But it was bearing out the Federalists' worst fears.

SORRY, JOHN:

German officials on Wednesday reaffirmed their policy of not contributing troops to the American-led force in Iraq and rejected speculation, prompted by a published interview with the country's defense minister, that the policy might change.

Oops. (Via The Mudville Gazette). My prediction, by the way, is that no matter who is elected they'll wind up sending a token number of troops within a year -- about the time when they're no longer really needed.


IS IT TOO EARLY TO THINK ABOUT THE NEXT ELECTION? Ordinarily, I'd say "Hell, yes!" But when you're talking Lileks for Senate, I have to say -- "where do I sign up?"

But only if he promises to keep doing The Bleat from Washington.

STRATEGYPAGE REPORTS:

Sunni Arabs in Iraq are becoming more agitated about being caught in a war pitting an alliance of Saddam supporters and Islamic radicals, against the majority Shia Arab and Kurds who want peace and prosperity, at any price. The Sunni Arabs are increasingly desperate to do something about their situation. Despite the threats from Saddam's old enforcers (almost all of them Sunni Arads), and the al Qaeda influenced Islamic radicals; tribal and religious leaders are suggesting that the Saddam hardliners and foreign Islamic radicals leave. Leave Sunni Areas, leave Iraq, leave this life, it doesn't really matter. The Sunni Arabs see nothing but woe from the Saddam supporters and Islamic radicals. . . . The Sunni Arabs have been cowed by the terror, but not completely immobilized. Deals are being cut, to be finalized when Iraqi troops and police enter Sunni Arab towns under the shadow of American firepower. Will the Sunni Arab leaders remain with the Iraqi majority. Considering the alternative, they probably will.

Sounds promising; I hope it turns out this way. StrategyPage certainly has a pretty good record of accuracy.

Read this, too, which certainly supports the above.

UPDATE: Shannon Love observes:

It may be just an accidental strategy on our part, but allowing this or that group of insurgents to control an area for a period of time seems to have long-term benefits. The locals might imagine that they hate the Coalition and the provisional government, but a few days or weeks of living under the rule of the insurgents seems to provide a stark reality check. The insurgents are thugs and religious extremists, who terrorize and extort the local population and eventually draw down retaliation from the Coalition. The insurgents lose the struggle for hearts and minds through their own brutality. . . .

The actions of the insurgents cause the locals to view the Coalition as the lesser of two evils. We win the battle for hearts and minds by default.

I don't think it's an accident.

THANKS TO EVERYBODY who sent email about the Insta-Dad. I called his hospital room to find out when to pick him up, and nobody answered. Then a little while later he called me from home, to which he'd driven on his own. They let him go first thing this morning. Hope I inherited his superior recuperative powers.

INSTAPUNDIT'S AFGHANISTAN PHOTO-CORRESPONDENT, Major John Tammes, sends the picture above, and reports:

This is my class in CJSA 1348, Ethics in Criminal Justice, which met for 3 hours every Monday and Wednesday night over 8 weeks. I taught them as an Adjunct Instructor for Central Texas College, Bagram Education Center. They had two classes interrupted by rocket attacks and alerts, they studied between missions and after 13+ hour shifts, and they did it well. As I turned in their grades today, it struck me that they had achieved something quite admirable.

Indeed. Tammes adds: "P.S. After reading your Guardian story, I feel like a war correspondent. I'm flattered." Hey, if you're corresponding from a war, you're a "war correspondent." Right?

AUSTRALIA UPDATE: Greg Sheridan in The Australian:

The other critical conclusion to come out of this election is that it was a total vindication of John Howard over Iraq. This is very painful for the commentariat – perhaps the Government should set up special psychiatric triage clinics for commentators unable to cope with their grief over the electorate's decision on Iraq.

Heh. (Via Tim Blair).

TOM MAGUIRE has lots of interesting post-debate observations. Just keep scrolling.

GROUP-BLOGGING in a hotel ballroom with an audience of 650 people? Compare the photos of the Northern Alliance guys with the one of me, below, and you'll have to conclude that they know how to live. . . .

THE BELMONT CLUB offers an evolutionary perspective on the debates. And here's an amusing "what they really said" debate translation.

THE FORESIGHT INSTITUTE emails that Peter Diamandis, founder of the X-Prize, has come on board to help with a nanotechnology prize:

Palo Alto, CA -- October 14, 2004 - Foresight Institute has appointed Dr. Peter Diamandis, Chairman of the X PRIZE Foundation, to lead the think tank's Nanotechnology Prize Steering Committee. The leading think tank and public interest organization focusing on nanotechnology, Foresight Institute established the Feynman Grand Prize in 1996 to motivate scientists and engineers to design and construct a functioning nanoscale robotic arm with specific performance characteristics. The prize was named after Dr. Richard Feynman, a Nobel Prize winner in Physics, whose original goal for nanotechnology - systems of molecular machines building with atomic precision, is the guiding vision of long-term nanotechnology.

If you're interested in this stuff -- and you should be -- you should consider attending Foresight's 2004 Conference on Advanced Nanotechnology starting on Friday.

VIRGINIA POSTREL has a debate review up. "I was dreading tonight's debate as yet another 90-minute exchange of talking points, but it actually had some substance--in part because George W. Bush is a whole lot wonkier when he's talking about domestic issues than foreign policy."

MICKEY KAUS on the Mary Cheney business:

There must be some Machiavellian strategy behind the Democratic urge to keep bringing this up--most likely it's a poll-tested attempt to cost Bush and Cheney the votes of demographic groups (like Reagan Dems, or fundamentalists) who are hostile to homosexuality or gay culture or who just don't want to have to think about it. Or maybe Kerry was just trying to throw Bush off stride. In either case, the fake embrace was even creepier coming from Kerry than it was coming from Edwards.

Indeed.

UPDATE: Lynne Cheney is letting Kerry have it for dissing her daughter:

Lynne Cheney issued her post-debate rebuke to a cheering crowd outside Pittsburgh. "The only thing I can conclude is he is not a good man. I'm speaking as a mom," she said. "What a cheap and tawdry political trick."

That seems to be the emerging consensus.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Shockingly, here's agreement at the BBC: "I thought his mention of Mary Cheney, when asked if homosexuality was a choice, was a cheap swipe, and it defined Kerry's lack of substance. "

GOD FORBID, A SUCCESS STORY: My Guardian column for this week is up.

October 13, 2004

SURFING THE CHANNELS, the talking-heads seem to be giving this one to Bush, and Candy Crowley notes that Kerry felt he had to stress, again, that he could be trusted to defend America. Mary Beth Cahill tries to respond, but she doesn't sound like she means it -- in fact, she sounds like she's been crying. Laryngitis? Who put her on camera?

UPDATE: How do we know Bush won? I just got the Buzzflash spinmail and it's going on about claims that Bush was wired. Hey, did you guys watch him at the beginning of the debate? Must've been radio interference, then. . . .

But Pundit Guy says that Bob Schieffer was the big loser.

Debate summarized here.

Ann Althouse wrapup: "Bush revealed the deep personal side of himself, while Kerry was always cool and businesslike. Dukakis-like."

Tradesports shows a Bush win. I've had some suspicions that people may be gaming those futures markets, though.

NEXT-MORNING UPDATE: I went to bed early, but a Brit-reader sends this:

Both sides think they lost. Watching BBC with the spin merchants.

Hard sale.

The Republicans look depressed and the Democrats look absolutely desperate.

Both caning it utterly unconvincingly.

Is it too late for a Cheney-Lieberman ticket? Or Lieberman-Cheney, I don't care.

Meanwhile Stephen Green updates the Tradesports story: "Tradesport betters did indeed think Bush won. But if you follow the trendline after the debate, you'll find they also think the press claims that Kerry won - with the expected effects on the electorate."

Yeah, after I went to bed the reactions seem to have done a 180. The press is working damned hard to deliver its 15 percent.

MORTON KONDRACKE is saying that Kerry's reference to Dick Cheney's lesbian daughter was a "low blow." Julian Sanchez agrees.

I'm not sure it was a low blow, exactly -- but it's odd given that Kerry has the same position.

UPDATE: GayPatriot wonders why the Democrats are obsessed with Mary Cheney. He agrees with Kondracke and Sanchez.

THE CONCLUSION: Again, not bad for Kerry, but Bush is at the top of his game here at the end. He's still no Ronald Reagan, but he's good -- much better than at the beginning or in the earlier debates. If he'd been like this in the first debate he'd be up by 10.

Sum up: Not much of a debate, though it improved dramatically in the last half hour or so. As I've said before, my judgment is suspect, but I think Bush wins this one hands down -- if anyone was still watching at the end. And hey, at least I agree with Julian Sanchez's rather different crowd.

THE WIFE QUESTION: Both do the best of the evening so far. But Bush hits it out of the park. Kerry hits a double. Bush's problem -- is anybody still watching?

UPDATE: Roger Simon finds Kerry's answer interesting:

Why did Kerry's mother feel she had to remind him "Integrity! Integrity! Integrity!" from her hospital bed when he told her he was thinking of running for President. What did she know. My mother would have assumed I would have integrity in the same situation.

Mine, too.

JEEZ, IS IT A KERRY-MCCAIN TICKET? All I can say is, invoking campaign finance reform is a big mistake. It has been a disaster, and it's responsible for a healthy share of the divisiveness and nastiness in this election.

Kerry goes on about divisiveness, and blames Bush.

Question for Kerry: I wonder if it was a Republican who put up this sign, which I saw downtown the other day?

BUSH AND KERRY ON RELIGION: My Guardian column from last week is looking right on target here.

GUN CONTROL: Bush will irritate his base with his straddle. Kerry makes the argument that the Assault Weapon Ban would have stopped terrorists. Jeez, even the gun-control groups have given up on that dumb argument, as the AWB was purely cosmetic and left functionally identical guns untouched. I score this a loss for both.

UPDATE: The CNN focus group loved Bush's gun answer. Go figure.

MY COLLEAGUE TOM PLANK emails that I'm wrong about this debate: "Damn. I think this is the best debate of the three, and I think both candidates are doing well. [Which means that Kerry is doing about the same or a little better as the first debate, and Bush is doing much better than the first debate.]"

It's improved since the very lame first half-hour.

UPDATE: Stephen Green disagrees:

This thing is, mercifully, two-thirds over. Kerry is doing what Bush did in the first debate. He's smirking "off" camera, he's droning, he's dull. Bush, no matter how boring I find the material, at least sounds passionate. Problem is, other than intoxicated political junkies like me, who the hell is still watching?

I'm not intoxicated! Yet.

"THE BEST WAY TO TAKE THE PRESSURE OFF OUR TROOPS IS TO SUCCEED IN IRAQ:" Good answer.

KERRY'S TOUGH TALK ON IMMIGRATION: We'll do retinal scans -- eat your heart out, John Ashcroft! This is aimed at Bush's base, which is unhappy about illegal immigration and thinks that Bush is a wimp for not doing more. Kerry doesn't want to win them over, just encourage them to stay home.

IT'S GOING TO BE HARD TO SCORE THIS DEBATE, because both so far have turned in much worse performances than last time.

UPDATE: Nick Gillespie agrees: "I'm getting a sense that both of these guys will emerge from this as losers."

Hey, Nick -- put up Ron Bailey's article on health insurance. It's better than what I'm hearing from Bush and Kerry.

Stephen Green adds: "This debate sucks."

ANOTHER UPDATE: Julian Sanchez reports that apparently Bush sucks less: "the 80 percent liberal room I'm watching with seems to agree that Bush is winning."

MORE: Reader David Broadus agrees, with emphasis:

Bush is hitting it out of the park tonight. He does not look or sound like the same person of the last two debates. I don't see how you think they are both losers...

Okay, I've said before my judgment of these things isn't to be trusted.

STILL MORE: Jeff Jarvis is liveblogging, too.

KERRY SAYS BUSH IS INTOLERANT on gay marriage, but also stresses that they have the same position on it. Hmm. Looks like a straddle to me.

A "PLAN" IS NOT A "LITANY OF COMPLAINTS:" First original line. So far this is the weakest debate of the three. That in part accounts for the glassy look in my eyes, though I've had that kind of a day anyway. . . .

UPDATE: Early-call specialist PoliPundit is already calling it for Bush: "In the first debate, Kerry’s harsh prosecutorial manner was effective. In the second, it was boring. In the third, it’s backfiring."

Should you believe him? His track record is good, and Kerry's protectionist trade talk is sure losing me.

JEEZ, HOW MANY LINES from the previous debates are being recycled here? All of them?

I'M BACK. Thanks for the kind wishes for the Insta-Dad. He's doing quite well.

I won't be live-blogging tonight -- see the folks below, and Hugh Hewitt, who'll have his trademark question/answer/evaluation matrix up, for that -- but I'll post a summary afterward, and, who knows, maybe a point or two during. And here's a big list of livebloggers. I think that Daniel Drezner will be liveblogging, along with The Politburo, and LaShawn Barber has opened up a comment thread for your use.

UPDATE: And Ann Althouse announces that her liveblogging will be "au naturel," which should surely drive up her traffic. . . .

And for those wondering if the mainstream media are in the tank, note that Kerry press releases are running on the Boston Globe site. (Via Ken Layne).

ANOTHER UPDATE: They'll also be liveblogging it at the Nashville Scene's blog, Blogville, where we get this insight: "just ninety minutes until the time when we never have to sit through a presidential debate for another four years! That alone is enough for celebration."

Amen. Will either guy have the guts to issue a thank-you to the "several dozen people watching this instead of the baseball game?" Probably not.

SORRY FOR THE LIMITED BLOGGING: The Insta-Dad had aneurysm-repair surgery today. I just left him napping at the hospital, where he's doing fine, while I drop into my office. (It wasn't a near-death experience or anything, it's been scheduled for a while, but it was a bit more involved than they planned).

I'll try to be back for the debates, if possible, and maybe even sooner. But if I'm not, Ann Althouse and Stephen Green will be liveblogging as usual. And there's lots of interesting stuff at The Volokh Conspiracy, so check them out. Plus, what I've called a "media Enron" before is starting to look a bit more that way. Back later.

MORE ON THE AUSTRALIAN ELECTIONS AND THE WAR over at Tim Blair's place, where John Howard weighs in.

THIS SOUNDS LIKE GOOD NEWS:

BAGHDAD, Oct. 12 -- Local insurgents in the city of Fallujah are turning against the foreign fighters who have been their allies in the rebellion that has held the U.S. military at bay in parts of Iraq's Sunni Muslim heartland, according to Fallujah residents, insurgent leaders and Iraqi and U.S. officials. . . .

"If the Arabs will not leave willingly, we will make them leave by force," said Jamal Adnan, a taxi driver who left his house in Fallujah's Shurta neighborhood a month ago after the house next door was bombed by U.S. aircraft targeting foreign insurgents. . . . Several local leaders of the insurgency say they, too, want to expel the foreigners, whom they scorn as terrorists. They heap particular contempt on Abu Musab Zarqawi, the Jordanian whose Monotheism and Jihad group has asserted responsibility for many of the deadliest attacks across Iraq, including videotaped beheadings.

Perhaps we can look forward to not merely a military victory, but an ideological one as well.

UPDATE: I guess these guys must be some of those "chickenhawks" I've been hearing about!

ANOTHER UPDATE: StrategyPage reports:

Although the details are secret, American and Iraqi troops are on the offensive against Sunni Arab and terrorist gangs. Over a year of effort in building up an intelligence network among the population has paid off. Even in the Sunni Arab areas, many people are fed up with the lawlessness and violence created where the gangs operate. So information comes in about who is who and is doing what. This provides more, and higher quality, targets for raids. The ground units usually surround houses or compounds at night and arrest people, and seize weapons, bomb making equipment and documents, without a shot being fired. Some 30 areas have been identified as occupied and influenced by various gangs. The process of clearing out these areas has apparently been underway for two weeks. Not a lot of publicity for this effort, as keeping the opposition guessing is a powerful weapon.

And scroll down for more interesting stuff.

MORE: Reader and frequent Insta-critic Jonathan Miller accuses me of painting a sunny picture of Iraq. [Well, it is sunny there! It's in the desert! -- Ed. "That was a metaphor, wasn't it? Don't you know what a metaphor is?"] He says I don't link a lot of stories involving bad news. True enough -- I figure since that stuff is plastered all over the TV networks and newspaper front pages at the least provocation, I don't add a lot of value by repeating it. The good news, and stuff that bears on the strategic background, on the other hand, somehow seems to get a lot less attention. When bad news matters and is undercovered -- which sometimes happens, if it requires actual understanding to appreciate -- I do try to mention it, as with the CERP program, discussed here and here, among many other posts, or with regard to Zeyad's war crimes reports -- go here for a roundup and follow the links for earlier posts.

But, as I've said before, InstaPundit isn't a news service. I'm not sure any blog is, with the possible exception of The Command Post. And even there, I think they see their mission as supplementary to the larger media world, and don't regard themselves as a free-standing source of information. My sense regarding Iraq is that things are -- despite the problems endlessly documented in the Big Media -- moving along, and that it's no more a hopeless quagmire than Afghanistan has turned out to be. I could be wrong, of course -- I often am, about all sorts of things -- but I think that anyone who wants to assess what's going on in Iraq needs to do more than just "look at what's on television," as John Kerry suggests. I try to help provide a fuller picture than the TV folks, whose chief goal, it sometimes seems, is to help Kerry get elected.

ANOTHER UPDATE: MSgt. John Michael emails from Iraq:

No, it's no Garden spot, but given that many of us are risking our lives for this bit of sand I think we've got a vested interest in making sure the truth is put forth in as bold terms as possible.

So given the number of returned troops, and especially the number who've left Active Duty and aren't bound by any possible legal issues, why aren't there a lot more ex-GI's acting out in a fashion reminiscent of John Kerry '71?

I know there is a handful among the hundreds of thousands, but lets face facts, the folks who were here aren't sharing that MSM view of Iraq, nor are those here now. I think that preponderance should carry some weight.

Indeed.

THE BIG KERRY DISCHARGE STORY that Mickey Kaus was predicting last night is now out in print. I wonder if anyone will ask Kerry about this -- and about why he won't release his military records -- at the debate?

UPDATE: This post from PoliPundit suggests that there's less to this story than meets the eye. We'll see. Well, maybe we'll see, depending on whether anyone else looks at this stuff.

WELL, I SAID IT WAS AN HONOR just to be nominated! Congratulations, Dan!

GET OUT OF THE WHEELCHAIR AND WALK! John Edwards' Ernest Angsley-like remarks have drawn a critical response from Bill Frist.

UPDATE: But Tom Maguire is excited: "Wow! That is going to save a huge amount on health care costs. . . . But how does it work, exactly? Somehow Kerry can make the lame man walk, and the blind man see, but what is involved? Do I have to get on a bus and go to Washington, or will Kerry tour the nation working his wonders?"

October 12, 2004

I HOPE THIS IS TRUE: A reader emails me a Stratfor analysis on Iraq strategy. I won't reprint the whole thing, but here's the key bit:

Whatever Kerry has had to say about Bush's execution of the war in the past, he has made it clear that he will continue what Bush calls the "War on Terror" and that he will not abandon the war in Iraq.

This last is by far the most important thing to have emerged during the campaign from a geopolitical and strategic point of view. However much the candidates argue over who would be better at fighting the war, it has become clear that the war will go on regardless of who is elected or re-elected -- and that that includes the Iraq campaign. Neither is promising a radical redefinition of the war. Each is claiming simply to be the more effective in executing the war.

Therefore, on this fundamental level, the election has become unimportant.

As I've noted repeatedly, I'm a single-issue voter. If I could be persuaded of this, I might be able to look at other things. I have to say, though, that I don't have tremendous confidence in Kerry's follow-through.

One other brief bit from a rather long analysis:

Since al Qaeda initiated the war, it is critically important to understand that it has completely failed to achieve its strategic goals. From a purely political standpoint, the war has thus far been a disaster for al Qaeda. At the same time, assuming that al Qaeda has not lost the ability to carry out operations, the United States has not yet secured the homeland from follow-on attack.

This seems right to me. As for the earlier part, well, I'd sure like to believe it.

UPDATE: It's worth reading this piece on democracy in the mideast by Jackson Diehl, from today's Washington Post, too. Sounds like "root causes" are being addressed.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Many readers say that I shouldn't rely on Stratfor. Fair enough -- I haven't followed their analyses, but those who say they have aren't impressed. Meanwhile, reader Alexandre Leupin thinks their faith in Kerry is unjustified on the facts:

"As I've noted repeatedly, I'm a single-issue voter."

I am too, in the sense that, if our security is not preserved, all the rest (freedom, prosperity, the rule of law, equality of women, etc) becomes meaningless.

I'd say I am a 1 1/2 issue voter, since I like the state confined to a reduced perimeter in my life. And here, W. Bush record is not good, he has tremendously expanded federal spending on domestic issues, excluding the needs of security and defense (understand that I would not object if he ratcheted defense spending up to 7% of GDP- the level at the heigth of the cold war - from the present 4%) . To me, on that point, Kerry would be only a bit worse.

Reading a lot about Kerry's positions on defense (especially the piece in this sunday's NYT magazine), I have come to the conclusion he is not a flip-flopper at all: since 1971, he is at his core, consistently, a pacifist, with a deep reluctance to projet US military might abroad and a hasty willigness to cut spending on defense. This comes without a doubt from his Vietnam experience. In other words, he is not fit to be commander-in-chief today, we are not in Vietnam anymore, Toto.

I'm afraid that's how I see it too. I could be wrong of course -- I've been wrong about Presidents, before, though usually in the direction of being disappointed, alas -- but that's how it looks to me.

TOM MAGUIRE HAS CRACKED BUSH'S CODE.

THE PAYPAL DONATION BUTTON was coming and going all weekend and into today, and some people have noticed. Paypal was having server problems -- here's the story from MSNBC. It seems to be OK now, but . . . .

BUSH WINS:


President George Bush won by almost 400 votes when University of Tennessee students took to the online polls Oct. 7 and 8 in the Student Government Association-sponsored mock elections.

The Bush/Cheney ticket received 1,015 votes to the Kerry/Edwards ticket receiving 643 votes. Students had the opportunity to vote for all candidates that will appear on the Tennessee ballot in the November elections.

A total of 1,721 students - 6.6 percent of the student body - voted in the election.

I rather doubt this can be extrapolated nationwide. But at least they haven't succumbed to the climate of fear!

VICE SQUAD is a blog devoted to, well, vice.

MARK GLASER WONDERS if satellite radio and "podcasting" will bring about a renaissance in radio journalism. I hope so.