January 31, 2006

Enablers of Palestine

I have always found the US State Department one of the duller institutions and I cannot help but think they are behind the latest desperate salvo to keep alive the career of Mahmoud Abbas, despite the PA leader's electoral humiliation. The State Department Mind in its withering conventionality thinks because something has been done the same way (badly) for decades it must be right. But wouldn't it be better for the Palestinians to have to face the reality of their choice - Hamas? The State Department approach amounts to the continued infantilization of the Palestinian people. We have seen the results. But perhaps the State Department and the Palestinians are both incapable of change.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 2:29 PM
Comments (7)

Iranian nukes an illusion

Posse Incitatus has a very different view of the Iranian nuclear standoff. I'm not buying it, but it's worth reading.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 2:21 PM
Comments (8)

Back in the Apple again

This blog has been silent most of today because I was flying to NY where I am appearing on a panel tomorrow afternoon at a conference held by the Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA) [Is that part of the NSA?-ed. I don't know... sounds like it... but this guy is also on the panel. Is he a spy? I think he once knew Valerie Plame.]

UPDATE: One of the big Google honchos is the lunchtime speaker. That should be interesting, under present circumstances.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 1:04 PM
Comments (0)

January 30, 2006

But how much went to pay Suha's hotel bills?

I always knew the AP was filled with some potententially great comedy writers, but they didn't really "put me on the floor" until tonight's article on the jockeying around about aid payments to the new Hamas-led Palestinian Authority:

Europe is the largest donor to the Palestinian Authority, which had a $1.96 billion budget last year. About one-third of aid goes to salaries and the rest to rehabilitate Palestinians' war-shattered infrastructure.

Badda-bing, badda-boom!

[What did you expect them to say - to the Swiss bank accounts of the leadership?-ed. It's called recycling.]

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 7:32 PM
Comments (15)

And now the fun begins...

From Drudge (blinking light), permanent members of the Security Council have agreed that Iran should be referred to that body.

UPDATE: Here's the AP coverage:

The United States and other permanent members of the
U.N. Security Council agreed Monday that Iran should be hauled before that powerful body over its disputed nuclear program.

China and Russia, longtime allies and trading partners of Iran, signed on to a statement that calls on the U.N. nuclear watchdog to transfer the Iran dossier to the Security Council, which could impose sanctions or take other harsh action.

Foreign ministers from those nations, plus the United States, Britain and France, also said the Security Council should wait until March to take up the Iran case, after a formal report on Tehran's activities from the watchdog agency.

If the wait until March meant bringing in Russia and China, perhaps it's worth it. This will indeed be interesting, even if pointless.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 5:54 PM
Comments (2)

The Importance of Being Emma

No one beats a screenwriter for hating everybody else's movies (including most of his own), so I am known among my friends as a terrible film curmudgeon, bemoaning the great days of Fellini, Bunuel, et al. What a bore. So I'm pleased any time I can recommend a new one and I did quite enjoy Nanny McPhee, which Sheryl and I saw with Madeleine Saturday night of its opening weekend at Hollywood's Arclight Cinema. Of course, I am a huge Emma Thompson fan, as an actress and as a writer. Her script for Sense and Sensibility was one of the best Austen adaptation's ever. I also understand she had her hand in the new version of Pride and Prejudice. Here she has written herself a role filled with wart-filled amusement as the Nanny-from-Hell come to reform a family of deliciously unruly kids. At first you almost cannot look at her, then her blemishes (and snaggletooth) gradually disappear as the children do reform and it's the same beautiful Emma. Corny, but effective.

McPhee has some other terrific performances, stacked as it is with a who's who of the British stage - Colin Furth, Derek Jacobi, a scenery-chewing Angela Lansbury. And speaking of scenery, that's probably the best part of this film - Michael Powell's colorfully playful Victorian sets which resemble William Morris on acid. Costumes are in a similar vein as you can see here from the photo of Celia Imrie who portrays the potential Wife-from-Hell for hapless Colin Firth. You will not be surprised to learn that it never happens.

Don't take this as an unqualified rave. I am at the point in my life that I realize that your pleasure in a movie (or anything else) is vastly related to your mood, place and the company you are with. Who knows if I would like La Strada if I saw it now? I might get bored. (Nights of Cabiria, which I have seen recently, however, did not bore me. It still made me cry forty years after I had first seen it.)

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 5:03 PM
Comments (9)

The Plot BY the Doctors

I'm sure it's just an accident, but something about the medical profession appears to attract fascist ideologues - first Mengele, now Zawahiri. The sinister Zawa is back with the following news (via AP):

"U.S. warplanes have launched a raid ... on a village near Peshawar just after the Eid al-Adha (feast) in which 18 Muslim men, women and children were killed in their (U.S.) fight against jihad which they call terrorism," he said, referring to the January air strike in Pakistan.

"They said this was intended to kill myself and four of my brothers but now the whole world has discovered the U.S. lies and their failure and brutality," Zawahri added.

Of course the 'brothers' have not been produced, but no matter. Perhaps they are alive. The "good doctor" continues:

"I will meet my fate (death) as set by God the Almighty but if my time did not come you (U.S. President George W.) Bush or all the powers on earth ... cannot bring it one second closer."

That's interesting. Why doesn't he just come out of hiding then? "God the Almighty" will protect him.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 1:15 PM
Comments (9)

Would the EU have done this for Israel?

The European Union gave Hamas more time to renounce terror and accept Israel's right to exist. A Dutch leader put it in a time frame. From Bloomberg:

"We still have three or four weeks to make up our minds,'' Dutch Foreign Minister Bernard Bot said. "Once people are in power, maybe they change their position.''

Shall we hold Mr. Bot to this? This blog has put it on its calendar. On the first of March, which gives Bot a little wiggle room, we will examine what has happened and see what he has said and what the EU has done.

Germany's FM was less specific, at least according to the Bloomberg report:

"The key lies in the Palestinian territories,'' German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said. "There, a decision needs to be taken on whether to take the political path. That means renouncing violence, putting down arms and recognizing Israel's right to exist.''

How many weeks or years is Herr Steinmeier offering? We don't know. Bot explained things this way:

"Europe always has said that it will not do business with a regime that intends to eliminate another country and that favors terrorist attacks.''

Oh, really? I haven't seen the well-known opinions of Mr. Ahmadinejad slowing down this European company's business activities in Islamofascist Iran, not for a second. [You didn't read carefully. Bot said "Europe has always said". Not what it would do.-ed. Touché]

UPDATE: No comment so far from the Europeans on the following Hamas demand for the Israelis to change their flag.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 8:20 AM
Comments (3)

January 29, 2006

No more "hudnas," thank you

Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Zahar has told CCN's Wolf Blitzer that his party would offer Israel a "hudna," if it pulled back to its 1967 borders. This term meaning "truce" or "armistice" as well as "calm" or "quiet", coming from a verbal root meaning "calm", according to Wikipedia, has become well known to anyone following post-9/11 events. We also know that its first example of was the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah in 628 between the Muslims and the Quraish, a Meccan tribe. Again via Wikipedia:

Two years later, in 630, a skirmish between the Bedouin and the Quraysh occurred; Muhammad considered this to constitute a breach of the treaty. Muhammad and his followers, 10,000 strong, marched upon Mecca and demanded the surrender of the city, which capitulated.

No more hudnas, please. How about plain old mutal state-to-state recognition.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 12:25 PM
Comments (18)

For a radical center

Reading on Gateway Pundit of the rise of Cindy Sheehanism in the Democratic Party and the simultaneous Bill-bashing by large portions of that party, I started again to dream the impossible dream - suppose they gave a "system" and nobody came?

Meaning: imagine a situation in the next presidential cycle where the Republicans nominate someone too conservative for the American public on social issues and the Democrats someone too ... whatever ... can't really use the world liberal here ... isolationist? ... on foreign affairs. The conventional wisdom is that the people will compromise and accept one of the "big tents." How tediously boring, how indeed "conventional," and how, fundamentally, undemocratic. In our system, as it is currently constructed, the majority more often than not gets screwed.

I know many people hate change, fear it in their souls, but to use a modern cliché, we may be reaching a tipping point. Our major parties are based on threads of allegiances that go back decades and are increasingly thin and often self-destructive to the parties themselves, certainly to evolving thought and changing conditions. Yes, websites, blogs, etc. serve to whip up the bases of those parties (and keep things ever the same), but they also serve to inform swing voters who think for themselves and control the final outcomes, especially to the extent those centrist voters are able to find candidates who reasonably represent them. Our system has often militated against that, but here's another suppose: the Repubs and the Dems nominate candidates from those extreme bases and Rudolph Giuliani runs as a third party candidate. Would he win? I not only think Rudy would but, depending on how extreme the other candidates are, I think he would win big. It would revolutionize a moribund system.

We need a rebellion from the center.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 12:11 PM
Comments (39)

Hamas on its best behavior

According to Haaretz, Israel's Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz says that since its electoral victory on Wednesday Hamas has been "behaving responsibly." The big debate in the Israeli government is now whether to pass the tax revenue to the (new) Palestinian Authority on schedule.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 9:44 AM
Comments (2)

January 28, 2006

More Trouble in Google Paradise?

The other day I recommended selling Google stock on moral grounds; today maybe it's more pragmatic than that. From a Hiawatha Bray column in the Boston Globe:

Umbria Inc. a market research firm in Boulder, Colo., that tracks blog postings about businesses, has detected ''a huge peak in activity" related to Google, according to Howard Kaushansky, Umbria chief executive. Kaushansky said a sudden burst of online comments could mean trouble for the world's leading Internet search service.

Another aspect of the Google controversy I have not seen raised very much is the issue of "modeling." While our country goes around trumpeting democracy as the keystone of our foreign policy (and our values), our flagship companies (Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, Cisco) wink slyly and say "just kidding - we really want to make a profit first." There are a million rationalizations, but that's what it comes to. The fact that there are work-arounds doesn't cut if for me. What you do is what you are.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 4:02 PM
Comments (15)

Welcome to Hell (move over, J. P. Sartre)

Sartre famously wrote that "Hell is other people." Until now, he may have had a point. But indisputably today: Hell is Gaza.

From the AP:

Thousands of angry activists from the defeated Fatah Party demanded their leaders' resignations, Palestinian police stormed a parliament building in Gaza and other security forces clashed with Hamas gunmen - signs of growing instability following Hamas' victory in parliamentary election.

Fatah gunmen climbed on top of the Palestinian parliament building in Ramallah, fired in the air and posted a picture of the late leader Yasser Arafat on the roof to cheers and whistles from hundreds of supporters below. Dozens of armed police officers briefly stormed the building in Gaza City and demanded an immediate trial for Hamas members who killed police in fighting in recent months.

And then there's this:

About 2,000 Fatah members marched in the West Bank city of Nablus, led by dozens of gunmen from the Fatah-allied Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, who fired in the air from the back of a truck.

"We are now no longer part of the cease-fire," one of the gunmen, Nasser Haras, told the crowd. Palestinian militants groups agreed last year to a cease-fire with Israel.

In Bethlehem, about 400 activists, including dozens of gunmen, took over the party's local office and demanded the resignation of party leaders. In Tulkarem, gunman Ibrahim Khreisheh warned against cooperating with Hamas.

"Whoever will participate in a government with Hamas, we will shoot him in the head," he said.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 7:43 AM
Comments (10)

January 27, 2006

Hillary makes a misstep

Hillary Clinton's move to join the anti-Alito filibuster is a dumb political move, as is this accompanying bit of bloviation:

"History will show that Judge Alito's nomination is the tipping point against constitutionally-based freedoms and protections we cherish as individuals and as a nation," Clinton wrote in a statement during a fundraising stop in Seattle.

Good thing she just wrote it down because saying something that inane out loud would provide a perfect soundbite for Republican commercials in years to come. Clinton does not nearly have the sophisticated political ear of her husband. There's a time to hold 'em and a time to fold 'em. The time to fold 'em came a long time ago on the Alito nomination. Only big time losers like Kerry don't seem to know better. By aligning herself with the likes of Prince John the Hairful, she's heading in the opposite direction from the Oval Office. I thought she and Bill were talking to each other again. Maybe they're not.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 8:10 PM
Comments (52)

The Importance of Being Ahmadinejad

From the Financial Times:

Despite persistent disillusionment with the war in Iraq, a majority of Americans supports taking military action against Iran if that country continues to produce material that can be used to develop nuclear weapons, a Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll has found.

The poll, conducted Sunday through Wednesday, found that 57% of Americans favor military intervention if Iran's Islamic government pursues a program that could enable it to build nuclear arms.

It seems the man with the unpronounceable name has managed to convince American he's for real. He certainly has me.

Meanwhile in Tehran:

Hundreds of Tehran's Collective Bus drivers, technicians and workers have been arrested, since yesterday, following the issuance of a notice of strike. The protest action is to start from Saturday early morning and should affect most of the ten transit areas of the Greater Tehran.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 7:08 PM
Comments (5)

West Bank lifestyles

From Reuters, Al Aqsa promises to "liquidate" any Fatah members who join Hamas. Meanwhile, Haaretz is reporting only five wounded in demonstrations so far. [Are those fatah-lities?-ed. I knew you had potential as a comedy writer.]

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 3:04 PM
Comments (3)

But didn't they see "Schindler's List"?

Iran's mission to the UN says "more study" is needed to prove the Nazi Holocaust. [Yes, they saw "Schindler's List," but then they saw "Munich" and changed their minds.-ed.]

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 2:59 PM
Comments (1)

Happy Birthday, King Abdullah

Among all those wondering what to make of the Hamas victory, Jordan's Abdullah may be the least happy about the possible developments. Follow any or all of these scenarios: Hamas supporters attack Israel, Fatah supporters attack Israel, Fatah and Hamas supporters attack each other and Israel... what happens? Israel is dealing with some kind of violent state on its eastern flank and acts in self-defense, pushing out to the most natural of all security walls, the Jordan River. The normally sane and reasonable Abdullah has several million crazed refugees on his hands. Jordan is a mad house. That's what he woke up with the other morning.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 8:41 AM
Comments (13)

January 26, 2006

No Instapundit in Davos

Old media rules at the World Economic Forum, according to Fortune:

Justin Fox reports: For members of the Old Media, Davos remains stuck in a blissful time warp where they still matter and there's no Matt Drudge or Instapundit or Daily Kos around to cause trouble. Genius that he is, World Economic Forum founder Klaus Schwab long ago swept the people who run the world's newspapers, magazines and TV networks into a tight embrace, and he's not letting go, at least not yet.

Not to put too fine a point on it -- who cares? [You do. There's good skiing.-ed. Oh, yeah, I forgot about that.]

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 2:06 PM
Comments (10)

A mind is a difficult thing to change... Is it ever?!

Neo-neocon, continuing her groundbreaking serious on political change, begins installment six with a quote from Trotsky: You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you. (PS: You may enjoy the photo over on PJ.)

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 10:54 AM
Comments (14)

Barbarians at the Gates

This AP coverage says it all: Hours after unofficial results indicated Hamas' clear victory in the Palestinian elections, Hamas supporters poured into the Palestinian parliament amid clashes with Fatah loyalists.

The two camps threw stones at each other, breaking windows in the building, as Fatah supporters briefly tried to lower the green Hamas banners. The crowd of about 3,000 Hamas backers cheered and whistled as activists on the roof of the parliament raised the Hamas banner again.

Actually, on ten minutes reflection (it's pretty early here in LA), I am glad Hamas won. Elections should reflect the will of the people and this one reflects the will of the Palestinians. Now we know. The big winners: stockholders in the various companies building the wall. The big losers: the people of the Middle East. [But they always lose.-ed. Yes, that's true.]

UPDATE: I respectfully disagree with my Pajama partner Wretchard at Belmont Club. I do not think this will necessarily make Netanyahu the next Israeli prime minister. I imagine Olmert knows how to behave under the circumstances.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 7:15 AM
Comments (29)

January 25, 2006

Davos, Mon Amour

Anti-Semitism at the World Economic Forum? Ce n'est pas possible.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 5:51 PM
Comments (9)

Does this mean war?

Iran has accused Britain of involvement in the bombing in the Iranian city of Avhaz, which killed nine.

Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said British soldiers equipped and directed the perpetrators of the two bombings, according to a report by the IRNA news agency. He said British forces had provided "safe haven'" and "practical and extensive facilities" for the attacks.

Tony says no!

"The Iranian government's suggestion that we somehow had a hand in yesterday's bomb explosions in southern Iran is obviously ludicrous and deserves to be treated with scorn by the international community,'' Blair's office said today in a statement read over the telephone.

What's interesting is why the Iranians would want to up the ante with the British in this way. The mullahs seem to be pushing, pushing, pushing for some reason.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 5:01 PM
Comments (15)

Tick, tick, tick... goes the Iranian clock...

From the AP: Iran's top nuclear negotiator said a Russian proposal to enrich uranium for the Islamic republic needs more work and renewed a threat that Tehran will forge ahead with the technology that can make nuclear arms if the issue is referred to the U.N. Security Council.

As if they haven't... Meanwhile, the sabers rattle: "Zionists should know that if they do anything evil against Iran, the response of Iran's armed forces will be so firm that it will send them into eternal coma, like Sharon," Gen. Mostafa Mohammad Najjar said.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 12:30 PM
Comments (3)

What to do about the new Axis of Evil?

I'm talking about Yahoo, Microsoft and Google, of course, those three Internet mega-corporations who are actively cooperating with totalitarianism in China.

Google is the latest to prostrate itself before the new emperors. Timesonline sums it up:

Google today caved in to pressure from the Chinese Government by launching a localised version of its website that self-censors information deemed "subversive" by the Communist authorities.

"In order to operate from China, we have removed some content from the search results available on Google.cn, in response to local law, regulation or policy," the internet company said in a statement issued yesterday.

Okay, instead of boring everyone discussing the corporation's probable rationale ... we're working from within their system, etc., etc., as if they were an automobile or ball-bearing firm and not a media company involved with the dissemination (or in this case non-dissemination) of information and ideas ... I will cut to the proverbial chase. Since this is obviously a manifestation of corporate greed at its most unbridled, not to say cynically exploitive of (even, in a way, racist towards) the people of the most populace country on Earth, it's time to deal with Google in a manner that could actually affect the retrograde policy of the company. In other word, it's time for...

... a Google stock divestment campaign.

Everyone who cares about the free-flow of information, about democracy in China, in fact about democracy anywhere, should start selling their Google stock. This should begin most especially with those vast university endowments because academic institutions, of all places, should be most concerned with the censorship of ideas and information. Union pension plans as well should seek to divest as their members should be particularly appalled by the company's restrictive behavior. I could go on, but you certainly get the point. I welcome suggestions for how to mount this campaign in the comments below.

(Full disclosure: I do not own any Google stock, but would, I'm assuming, have the courage of my convictions, if I did.)

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 6:22 AM
Comments (25)

January 24, 2006

Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow.

When I read Kofi Annan's oped on the human tragedy in the Sudan (Darfur) in tomorrow's Washington Post, all I could think of was this report on that same Sudan from yesterday 's Fox News site.

In another section of the report, however, OIOS [Office of Internal Oversight Services] auditors recommend that the U.N. investigate possible collusion among U.N. officials to award Skylink an $85.9 million fuel contract for peacekeeping in Sudan. According to the report, one of the officials who was directly responsible for overseeing implementation of the Skylink contract abruptly resigned in December, 2005-about the time the OIOS investigation entered its final stages. No reason was given for the departure.

It goes on with numerous other UN scandals. It's hard to keep up. The United Nations, as we all realize now, is one of the greatest economic rackets of all time, if not the greatest. And yet institutions like the WaPo continue to give Annan a forum to bemoan the state of places like Darfur as if the UN were its salvation, not one of the causes of that country's misery. If the UN is serious about doing something for the people of the Sudan, it can start by cleaning itself up in a serious way. That begins with total fiscal transparency for all United Nations transactions. Otherwise the idea that we would trust this klepto-bureaucracy with another dime is ludicrous.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 8:02 PM
Comments (9)

Good move by Disney

The purchase of Pixar, even at seven plus billion, modernizes the aging Mouse House. I wish we could now get Steve Jobs working on our moribund auto industry. On my recent trip to the LA Auto Show, I didn't see a single American car that didn't put me to sleep. What happened to the creativity? I didn't see any on the stylistic or the technological sides. Hint to Detroit - the 1950s are over.

Other plummeting business here.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 1:33 PM
Comments (8)

The good Hitch and the bad Hitch

Like most of us, Christopher Hitchens has his bad days. Sometimes he goes off with odd, tasteless screeds, such as his attack on Bob Hope for never being funny the day after the comedian died. Not only did this reveal the journalist's ignorance of film history (didn't he see The Cat and the Canary?), it also showed his almost compulsive need to shock.

But the good Hitch is as good as it gets and today, while not at top-top form, he is clearly on target with Al-Qaida is Losing:

The conditions for this latest truce are of course impossible as well. All one needs, in order to earn Bin Laden's mercy, is to give up Afghanistan and Iraq. But this raises a more intriguing question. Why are formerly triumphalist jihadists using the language of "truce" at all? Not very long ago, God was claimed to be on their side and victory certain.

This development, while fairly obvious, is virtually overlooked by our mainstream media.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 12:03 PM
Comments (36)

The (Continuing) Trouble With Harry

Yesterday, while working out at the gym like a good boy, I witnessed this same interview between Harry Belafonte and Wolf Blitzer on the screen above my treadmill. Like so many of my generation, I grew up on Belafonte and loved him. And, an extraordinarily handsome man, he looks amazing at seventy-eight. But I can't say I was surprised by his idiotic blather comparing Homeland Security to the Gestapo. Alas, we've been hearing a lot of that kind of nonsense from Harry over the years, which, I wouldn't doubt, only hurts the causes he thinks he's espousing much more than he helps them. It's all a pathetic game. I blame the press in this [What again?-ed. Yes, again] more than I blame Dotty Harry. Why should this septuagenarian going on octogenarian be more interesting than any other? Because he sang "Day-O"? Now that's a qualification.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 8:36 AM
Comments (5)

January 23, 2006

No George Smiley

Is there a diplomat at any major embassy who is not a spy?

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 10:58 PM
Comments (3)

Reuel Marc Gerecht thinks we're lucky to have Ahmadinejad

In his new Weekly Standard piece Coming Soon: Nuclear Theocrats, the AEI scholar also has tough things to say about the State Department (where many assume a democratic Iran to be impossible), the CIA (its ineptitude in covert and overt operations regarding Iran) and waffling about the Mullahcracy within the Bush administration itself. But he concludes:

Remember: Ahmadinejad is heaven sent. Unfortunately, things in Iran are probably going to have to get a lot worse before they can get better. He and his supporters may ruin the economy and galvanize a much broader and braver base of internal opposition to the regime. He may add jet fuel to internal clerical dissent and open up lethal fissures in the ruling elite. No doubt, he will do all that he can to convulse and purify his society. Will we be ready to handle the challenge and the opportunity?

Ahmadinejad is the world's wake-up call. Are we ready for it?

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 8:23 PM
Comments (10)

The UN - could it get any worse?

Claudia Rosett and her partner in crime (stopping) George Russell say it could:

How bad is the still expanding scandal in the United Nations' multi-billion-dollar procurement division? Based on a still-secret internal investigation, the answer is: for the U.N., it is just as bad as the gigantic Oil-for-Food debacle - or maybe worse.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 3:35 PM
Comments (5)

There's torture and there's torture

I've seen the tapes now up on on the Foundation for the Defense of the Democracies website to coincide with the reopening of the Saddam trial. Once is enough.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 3:31 PM
Comments (2)

You break it, you buy it

The Palestinians, never long on their own self-interest, seem to be headed toward electing a fair number of Hamas candidates. But not to worry, Hamas itself is "changing" and might even negotiate with a "non-existent" state or is it "entity," at least according to this AP report:

"Negotiation is not a taboo," said Mahmoud Zahar, a prominent Hamas leader in Gaza and a top candidate for the group. He said Hamas would be willing to talk to Israel through a third party, similar to past negotiations between Israel and Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon.

Touching, that.... Tony Blair is evidently not impressed.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 3:13 PM
Comments (7)

No, his name isn't Ito

New judge is named to lead Saddam trial.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 3:10 PM
Comments (2)

81!

You may not like him but... this was phenomenal. From the front page coverage in the LAT:

Jackson, who coached Jordan and played against Chamberlain, called Bryant's performance "something to behold."

"I wasn't keeping track on what he had, and when I turned to [assistant Frank Hamblen] and said, 'I think I better take him out now,' ... he said, 'I don't think you can. He has 77 points,' " Jackson said. "So we stayed with it until he hit 80."

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 10:38 AM
Comments (17)

The educational gender gap (continued)

Joyce Howard Price has another of those opeds in the Washington Times today - Academic underachievers - filled with more stats on the growing scholastic gender gap between girls and boys. Every time I blog about this, I get a plethora of comments (almost always from men) that there are no women Einsteins, that what you learn in school isn't ultimately that important, etc., etc.

Well, I'm not so sure it's that simple. I think we may be seeing massive changes in our society in the next twenty years that Gloria Steinem couldn't have predicted in her wildest dreams. (Indeed, people like Steinem ... and, say, Jesse Jackson ... depend on there not being real change. But that's a different argument.) A comparison between the gap between boys and girls in math (small in favor of boys) and in reading (large in favor of girls) may only be a minor indication of what's going in. We may be witnessing a tectonic shift in all technically advanced societies.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 7:18 AM
Comments (24)

January 22, 2006

Media's ancien régime est mort...

Hugh Hewitt concludes his excellent piece on the Columbia Journalism School (where tuition and expenses have mounted to 59K per annum) this way:

In the past, almost every bit of information was difficult and expensive to acquire and was therefore mediated by journalists whom readers and viewers were usually in no position to second-guess. Authority has drained from journalism for a reason. Too many of its practitioners have been easily exposed as poseurs.

[CSJ dean Nicholas] Lemann understands completely what has happened. I think he regrets it. He is certainly trying to salvage the situation. And there is simply no way he can succeed.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 4:37 PM
Comments (15)

Oil... have we got it all wrong?

Jad Mouawad, writing in Friday's NYT, expresses the CW on the current standoff with the mullahs:

As world leaders and diplomats debate how to deal with Iran's nuclear ambitions, the worry among analysts these days is the fate of the country's oil sector. The prospect of sanctions against Iran might have been easily shrugged off a few years ago, when the world sat comfortably on millions of barrels of untapped oil capacity. But the picture today is quite different. Iran exports more oil than the world's current spare capacity.

Conventional as that thinking is, I would have been prepared to believe it had I not received an email today from Roger Stern of the Johns Hopkins University Department of Geography and Environmental Engineering. Stern was calling my attention to an article he had just published that he thought might be of interest to readers of this blog. I think he's right - at least it was of interest to me. Science News Daily describes the article:

In a peer-reviewed journal article, Roger J. Stern argues that the decades-old belief that petroleum-rich Persian Gulf nations must be appeased to keep oil flowing is imaginary, and the threat of deployment of an "oil weapon" is toothless. His review of economic and historical data also shows that untapped oil supplies are abundant, not scarce.

Stern's analysis, titled "Oil market power and United States national security," appears in the Jan. 16-20 online Early Edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. In the article Stern argues that the longstanding U.S. security concern that our oil supply could be threatened is wrong.

I had read this argument before, about the actual abundance (not scarcity) of oil, but I had never seen them fleshed out to the degree they have been in Stern's article. Of course, if true, the implications of this are many on the global war on terror. Although a scientist and writing, presumably, for his colleagues, Stern does not stint on these observations, pointing out how OPEC is a consortium generating wt (wealth transfer) to states like Saudi Arabia and Iran that export terrorism and may soon turn into nuclear-armed regional super powers. By believing falsely in the scarcity of their product, we have in a sense been suckered into their game.

The article is here. If there was ever a case of "read the whole thing," this is it. (Warning: Pdf... plus your algebra skills may be tested, if they are, like mine, a little rusty)

UPDATE: Related news.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 2:26 PM
Comments (23)

Tap Dance

A couple of days ago, ABC's Alexis Debat had a column on the series of anonymous runners (evidently even to each other) Al Qaeda uses to bring Bin Laden audiotapes from their leader's hiding place to the offices of Al Jazeera. As usual, Al Qaeda prefers personal private communications to public. Years ago they abjured satellite phones. They knew we were listening.

This is another reason the brouhaha over NSA wiretaps (recently encouraged by Al Gore) strikes me as a charade. When terrorists take to the cell phones, for the most part they do it as quickly as possible. If we don't react just as quickly, the terrorists (and their plans) have vanished. Everyone knows this, including, I would assume, Mr. Gore, who was close to the helm himself for eight years, though one wonders these days if he and Clinton were talking for much of that time.

Of course, Gore, who is increasingly acting like a candidate for anger management training, is not the point. More important are those in serious positions of power spending endless government time and money on hearings about covert activities, which only succeed by being covert. This would still be a valid, indeed crucial, enterprise if it could be shown that innocent US citizens were indeed having their privacy rights violated in a substantial manner. Such a person, however, has thus far not been produced. Does he or she exist? Given the present rancorous climate, I am skeptical that we wouldn't have heard from them already. But I am willing to be convinced. Until then, in the brave new world of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, I would prefer the NSA do its work unabated.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 9:31 AM
Comments (66)

January 21, 2006

Everyone knows it now - the Coushatta are cheap

Seattle Post-Intellligencer has a (probably unconsciously) hilarious article about Sen. Patty Murray's refusal to return money donated to her campaign via disgraced lobbyist Jack Abrahamoff:

The donations, from 1999 to 2005, placed Murray second among Senate Democrats and ninth overall in the Senate, according to records compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics, a Washington, D.C., organization that tracks money in politics.

The Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe in Michigan gave Murray $14,980. She received $12,000 from the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians in California; $9,000 from the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians; and $5,000 from the Coushatta Tribe of Louisiana, the report said.

But wait, there's more (actually it comes earlier in the article, but why blow the punch line?):

Sen. Patty Murray said Friday that returning contributions from Indian tribes represented by Jack Abramoff would "taint" the tribes.

[How could she say that with a straight face?-ed. That wasn't a straight face. That was a poker face. Yuk-yuk. Listen, wisenheimer, Senator Murray has sympathy for the downtrodden. Don't you remember she ... Don't say it!"]

(via Glenn)

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 7:52 PM
Comments (21)

Softer, please

According to Reuters: Russia is unlikely to support a draft resolution that refers Iran to the U.N. Security Council over its nuclear programme unless it is softened, a European diplomat said on Saturday.

So what's the problem here - other than that Russia hasn't changed its self-destructive political stripes (except superficially) since the tsars? The answer comes a couple of graphs later:

... the EU3 diplomat said the Russians objected to language in the draft that suggests Iran is a threat to world peace and paves the way for a so-called Chapter Seven resolution at the Security Council.

Chapter Seven resolutions are binding under international law and enforceable with sanctions and in some circumstances military action. Non Chapter Seven resolutions are widely viewed as rhetorical.

Ah, that's just what we need - a few rhetorical flourishes slapping the wrists of the mullahs. Not to worry. Putin may be a second-rate KGB hack, but he's no Ivan the Terrible.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 2:14 PM
Comments (6)

Caring CAIR

Given the organization's track record, it's hard not to be skeptical of the AP report that "A delegation from the Council on American-Islamic Relations flew to Baghdad from neighboring Jordan in a bid to drum up momentum for [journalist Jill] Carroll's release. The 28-year-old was abducted Jan. 7 in a tough west Baghdad neighborhood." But I think this is a good thing overall. Just getting a group like this to take concrete action in any way against terror puts them on record as being against the tactics of the so-called insurgents. If the insurgents behave as they normally do (as murdering psychopaths), this only enhances the isolation of the terrorists.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 9:33 AM
Comments (8)

Intransigent Design

Some things are confusing and some are not in Iran's continued standoff with the West. No one seems to know what to do. Rep. Tom Lantos suggests:

The Bush Administration must be more assertive with our friends and allies, and Russia and China, to convince them that continued trade and investment will lure the Ayatollahs of Terror away from their multi-year quest for nuclear weapons. If persuasion fails, then the United States must finally use the sanctions authority in U.S. law to punish and deter those who continue to invest in, and thereby aid and abet, a state bent on adding nuclear weapons to its arsenal of terror.

This campaign to stop a nuclear Iran must begin on February 2nd, when all responsible Member States of the IAEA must vote in the affirmative to send Iran to the Security Council. Anything less will give fresh hope to the Ayatollahs of Terror that the world will remain tremulous and divided in the face of their threats. We in the Congress will watch carefully who among our friends will stand up and be counted.

They may watch, but what does that mean? Only a few paragraphs earlier, Lantos himself put the calculus this way:

Ahmadinejad, in a rare moment of lucidity, revealed Tehran's view in this regard: "The West needs us more than we need them." With billions of dollars of Western investment in its oil and gas fields off the table, why would the offer of some lesser additional trade be tempting enough to convince Tehran to forego its 18-year quest for The Bomb? In other words, when you already own the carrot patch, where's the incentive in a few more carrots - especially if you expect them to be offered from an acquiescent West after you do "go nuclear?"

Not to mention China, whose interests in Iranian oil trump everbody's. Scary times, indeed. Frances Fukuyama, where are you? [Don't look for your stocks to go up on Monday.-ed. I'm not.]

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 8:26 AM
Comments (10)

January 20, 2006

Via Clive Davis, I found the site of the Boroumand Foundation where you can read the following:

Omid: a Memorial in Defense of Human Rights is an electronic database of human rights violations in Iran. The Memorial is dedicated to the victims of the Islamic Republic since it was established in 1979. Omid's ultimate goal however is to be an impartial historical record that includes victims of human rights violations since December 10, 1948.

Exploring this site in the light of recent events in Iran is far more than just a "sobering experience." I would suggest a quick look at the browse page, which begins:

The names listed below are those of individuals whose violent death is attributed to the Islamic Republic of Iran, or to agents acting on its behalf. The list, drawn mainly from published sources, is not exhaustive. Executions are not always announced and the media has not been consistent in reporting those that were made public...

It then goes on with names from thousands of executions. [I guess they have the death penalty in Iran.-ed. Not just in Iran. These killings happen worldwide, including the murder of the Japanese translator of "The Satanic Verses" at home in Japan.]

Clive also links to David Ignatius column "Containing Tehran" in which the WaPo columnist seems mildly to be approving - in synch with the administration - a "go slow" policy on the mullahs. The columnist appears to have inside sources. Frankly, it's not reassuring. It doesn't seem as if anyone knows what to do.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 1:22 PM
Comments (81)

Back to the OJ Future

The OJ Simpson Trial may have made more media celebrities than any single event our history and one of those was coroner Cyril Wecht. Wecht is now before the law himself with an 84-count indictment, which, according to CNN, "includes mail fraud, wire fraud, theft of honest services and theft from the Allegheny County coroner's office, which Wecht heads. " [What are "honest services"?-ed. Beats me.] Rising to Wecht's defense is another (sorta) celeb - former U.S. Attorney General Dick Thornburgh who, bloggers of all people will recall, did an okay job of obfuscating the perfidy of one Dan Rather. How do you say "Six Degrees of Separation"?

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 11:57 AM
Comments (3)

Naughty Jacques

The Germans are up in arms - or some of them anyway - about Jacques Chirac's saber rattling over "states" that sponsor nuclear terrorism. [Who could that be?-ed. I dunno. Estonia?] According to Deutsche Welle:

Chirac's threat of a nuclear response to any terrorist attack on his country prompted widespread criticism in diplomatic circles in Berlin.

The Social Democrats' foreign policy expert, Gert Weisskirchen, told Spiegel Online that Chirac had acted rashly.

"This is a unilateral declaration on the part of the French president, and it's something he ought to have discussed with his European partners first," Weisskirchen said.

Quel horreur! For the first time in a decade or so Chirac reacts like a real person and the Germans get into a flutter. You may be relieved to know:

Germany's Green party called on the German government to demand Chirac to retract his threat. The Greens' defense expert, Winfried Nachtwei, called Chirac's statements "risky" and "irresponsible."

"The Greens' defense expert." Now there's an interesting concept.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 2:03 AM
Comments (16)

January 19, 2006

Hillary dosey-dos

Sashay to the left, sashay to the right, swing your partner and... Nobody can accuse Hillary Clinton of not learning her triangulation lessons from her politically savvy husband. Monday she's in Harlem accusing Republicans of running the House like a "plantation," Wednesday she's in Princeton accusing the same folks of being soft on Iran. I guess both could be true, but excuse me if I think this is so much political bilge and she knows it. There is something good here, however. Hillary trying to out-hawk Bush on Iran might awaken some of the dead in the Democratic base. The Democratic Party was not always a sewing circle for unemployed isolationists. It might even make it easier to get action on Iran in the Congress.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 7:42 PM
Comments (19)

Bin Laden butts in

Because of my stomach flu, all I could do was roll over and think "him, again!" when I first heard this morning that Binny's back and he's shaking his finger. Frankly, when I finally got around to reading the entire transcript translated by the AP, I actually almost smiled. This dude really sounds like a politician "runnin' scared." He can't believe that his invoking American polls and sticking his nose in our politics is anything but good for Bush. He has to have other intentions. Gerard van der Leun, witty as always, says Osama is tossing his hat in the ring for the Democratic nomination, but if so the wannabe Caliph ought to pay close attention to Hillary's move to the center. (How about "Bin Laden gets tough on terror"? There's a good campaign approach. Follows right in Chirac's footsteps. Everybody's doing it.) Of course, what Binny is really doing, as he almost always is, is preaching to the Islamic choir. The boy may be somewhere in the mountains of Waziristan but his heart is in Riyadh, battling out family squabbles. Most of us don't grow up, but particularly, and most murderously, Bin Laden.

Of course, the real proof that Osama's "runnin' scared" is that his threats aren't even upping the terror level. [Maybe he's jealous of Ahmadinejad...-ed. I'd be. He's got nukes.]

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 6:14 PM
Comments (10)

Welcome Back (not) Kotter

Looks like this blog is back with a new hosting service (LivingDot) and functioning comments (intermittently, anyway). Having spent the day in bed, groaning with stomach flu, it's been a surreal experience. Hello, again.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 6:04 PM
Comments (3)

January 18, 2006

Comments off again

Sorry about that. This is going to require more drastic surgery.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 2:19 PM
Comments (0)

Iran, Europe and our bleak possibilities...

Charles Krauthammer has a depressingly hard-nosed column about Iran today. Near his conclusion, he writes:

The only sanctions that might conceivably have any effect would be a boycott of Iranian oil. No one is even talking about that, because no one can bear the thought of the oil shock that would follow, taking 4.2 million barrels a day off the market, from a total output of about 84 million barrels.

The problem that mortifies the Europeans is what Iran might do after such an attack -- not just cut off its oil exports but shut down the Strait of Hormuz by firing missiles at tankers or scuttling its vessels to make the strait impassable. It would require an international armada led by the United States to break such a blockade.

Krauthammer goes on to bash European myopia, and he's probably right, but where do we go from here? All doors seem slammed shut. Like Dan Drezner, I would like to see some constructive thought about this from other quarters. Maybe it's a time when people can finally get off their partisan hobby-horses and take a clear look at a future that will effect all of us and our children.. unless, of course, you think Ahmadinejad is just joking. Then relax and go back to thinking about how you can win South Dakota next year.

UPDATE: I just discovered, via the PJ tip jar, an example of the partisan crapola I was just talking about. According to The First Post, it's the fault of the dreaded neo-cons that we now face problems in Iran. Okay, now that that's clear.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 12:32 PM
Comments (0)

Bora Bora beachfront - not yet

Just when those television experts were telling us the bull market was back, things suddenly seem to be headed South again. [Isn't it awalys that way?-ed. Seems to be.] And for some really scary news go here. The upside? Some ootential real estate buys in Osaka.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 8:51 AM
Comments (0)

From Brother Ledeen

The conclusion of his new Iran article - Do the Right Thing - from NRO (read it all):

On the other hand, we do know what will happen if we continue to dither, if we continue to act as if the United Nations could possibly have a decisive effect, and if we continue to put up with the sly appeasement of Iran that is practiced by the spent forces of Europe. Terror against our troops and our friends will increase; nuclear blackmail will become a commonplace in the Middle East; the fanatics of Tehran may very well fulfill their promise to wipe Israel from the map.

How about it?

[What? No "Faster, please"?-ed. He must be getting desperate.]

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 8:18 AM
Comments (0)

January 17, 2006

Publius Pundit on El Baradei

Robert Mayer (Publius Pundit) writes of the IAEA's Mohammed El Baradei's sudden display of cojones regarding the mullahs in Newsweek:

I'm feeling mixed emotions here. I don't know whether to be happy or sad. Happy that the world's foremost pacifist has reached a realization, or sad that it had to get this far before it happened.

I respectfully disagree. (Publius is one of my favorite in many ways.) Given El Baradei's "credentials," this a huge and important signal not just to Iran (doubt they'll listen to anything anyway) but to various dithering factions in Europe, even to the Russians and Chinese. The IAEA leader has developed clout through this pacifism - whatever you want to call it. (via Instapundit)

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 9:36 AM
Comments (2)

January 16, 2006

It's all propaganda...

You, me and everybody else - but especially the New York Times. American Thinker got the scoop on their latest absurdity.

It appears that the Times, once-upon-a-time regarded as the last word in reliability when it comes to checking before publishing (which makes them so much better than blogs, of course), has run a fake photo on the home page of its website. The photo has since been removed from the home page, but still can be seen here.

The photo that appeared on the NYT website is such an obvious fake it's almost parody off the pages of the Onion. In their apparent zeal to make our forces look bad, they just couldn't resist. Will that cause any introspection? I doubt it, because they have too much invested in their self-image (not to mention their audience). At least, however, they removed the offending object from their website, which is more than you can say for France 2, which never acknowledged this fake.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 8:53 AM
Comments (8)

More Pajamas Media logos

What's the matter with you people?-ed. Can't you make up your mind? We're trying. We're just getting some (voluntary) outside help.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 8:45 AM
Comments (4)

It's about 'earl'

CNN reports some differences between the US and UK approaches to the Iranian nuclear crisis. Although both favor bringing it before the Security Council, Britain says "go slow" on economic sanctions for their own obvious reasons. From CNN:

"I don't think we should rush our fences here. There are plenty of examples where a matter is referred to the Security Council and the Security Council takes action and that action is followed without sanction," PA quoted [British Foreign Secretary] Straw as saying.

Iran is the second-largest producer in the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).

Our other important ally, the more economically-powerful Japan, is hugely dependent on Iranian oil. Catch 22? How about a US-Japanese crash program to develop alternative energy sources?

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 7:18 AM
Comments (12)

January 15, 2006

Movies on the Edge

Three controversial films were screened at the AFR festival in Hollywood Sunday afternoon - The Full Story (a settler-sympathetic short from Israel), Submission - Part 1 (excerpted scenes from the movie that cost Theo van Gogh his life) and the world premiere of the documentary Islam: What the West Needs to Know. Security was tight because, in these odd times, it is the non-PC films that bring us to the edge of danger in the way movies like Battle of Algiers did in the old days. The VIP lounge and the balcony were closed for these screenings because of unspecified threats. But enough about the perils of movie-going, here's my take on the films themselves.

The Full Story tells the tale of the supposedly accidental, but actually terrorist motivated, death of a settler mother and child on the West Bank. I am not a supporter of the Israeli settler movement, but I found Yehezkel Laing's crudely-made first film oddly affecting. Part of the reason is that it contrasted the warm family life of the Orthodox settler dad with the self-involved hedonism of a secular Israeli (an anchorman, no less). A stacked deck, yes, but a passionate one.

I had seen Submission, Theo van Gogh and Aayan Hirsi Ali's famous attack on the misogyny of Islam, some months ago on the web. But seeing it on screen in a theatre (as it was intended) is a different experience. What surprised me about the excerpt we saw Sunday was the visually-stunning level of the filmmaking (not to mention its star, Ms. Hirsi Ali - I knew that already.) This is the only film of Theo van Gogh's I have ever seen, but he clearly knew what he was doing with a camera - another reason to lament his hideous premature death. As for Submission itself, the excerpts were too brief to make much comment. I wonder why the festival didn't show the whole thing. Were they not allowed to or were they simply too anxious under the circumstances?

From what I understand, the makers of Islam: What the West Needs to Know (director: Bryan Daly) were reluctant to screen with Submission because they didn't want to be associated with the notorious film, which is strange since their documentary is easily as hard on the Islamic faith as van Gogh's work. The documentary is ninety-five minutes of non-stop recapitulation of the history of the religion, its belief system and political intent narrated by well-known scholars and critics Robert Spencer, Walid Shoebat, Serge Trifkovic and Bat Ye-or. I have read all these people exept Trifkovic and respect them all. Speaking one after another as talking heads on the film (it's that kind of old-fashioned documentary) they raise the question of our time that few dare speak, at least on any level of serious analysis. Is jihadism the real Islam or is there an actual moderate strain of the religion? Clearly, from its title, it's obvious this film takes the former view and warns the West to heed the consequences of its dire conclusion.

Does it convince? Not entirely. But I think documentaries - particularly talking-head documentaries - are not ultimately a convincing form. They are too easily subject to manipulation by the filmmaker. The various writers who speak here are more interesting in their books, which develop their arguments at much greater length and depth. Still, this is a necessary film and I hope it finds distribution. Even though I wish its arguments were at least partly wrong, I fear that they are not.

UPDATE; Video of audience reaction to the film at Mondo Hollywood.

CLARIFICATON: I received the following in email from Andrew Leigh of the film festival:

The reason we showed only a clip [of "Submission"] was not because we were afraid to show the whole thing, but rather, the copyright owners refused to allow us to show the entire film (they said it was due to security concerns). We begged them to let us screen the film in its entirety, but alas they said no. We showed as much as they gave us in the hope that this will help to break the "taboo" which appears to be developing against this movie and others like it.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 5:26 PM
Comments (7)

More AFR Coverage by Mondo Hollywood

Another video (Patricia Heaton) is up. I'll be down at the festival at 2:30PM for the "Submission" screening.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 8:30 AM
Comments (0)

The Stockholm Syndrome - it's bad and it's back

Allison Kaplan Sommer finds a "classic" example.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 8:28 AM
Comments (0)

January 14, 2006

What's a "conservative film festival"?

Beats me. I don't even know, as I have written ... okay ... ad nauseum, what a conservative or a liberal is anymore. But I have attended a lot of film festivals (more than I care to admit over more years than I care to admit), submitted films to them, been accepted and rejected, sat through a lot of stinkers and eaten a lot of bad food (particularly at the Berlin Festival). What I do know is that ideology, or perceived ideology, has a lot do with the selection process.

So conservative or whatever it is the American Film Renaissance Festival, which PJ is now covering with the superb video work of Andrew Marcus and his on-camera partner Clay Champlin is hugely welcome for one word above all - openness. Lots of viewpoints, some (like intelligent design) with which I completely disagree, are presented. But they are there. You don't see a lot of that at Sundance. Everything at that festival is open pretty much from one side only. Here you have a pro-life film, which could be considered relatively prudish, mixed with the first-ever screening in Hollywood of clips from "Submission," which is anything but.

As one who has frequently criticized the lack of Hollywood response to the murder of "Submission" director Theo van Gogh (stone silence is more like it), I am looking forward finally to seeing the film in a theatre (Sunday at 2:30). I wonder how many of my colleagues will be there.

BTW, our second video from the festival is now up.

UPDATE: Interesting interview with Gary Sinise at the festival should be up on Mondo Hollywood soon (roughly six pacific). Sinise talks about his program for Iraqi children.

MORE: For the record, AFR is not the first right-leaning film festival in Hollywood. The Liberty Film Festival, of course, was that.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 1:36 PM
Comments (4)

Mondo Hollywood is live!

Pajamas Media coverage of the American Renaissance Film Festival is up with video. Enjoy! (I hope)

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 9:18 AM
Comments (3)

January 13, 2006

The stupidity of partyline politics

... One of my favorite subjects, I know (I'm a little "hobbyhorsical" about it, as Sterne would say)... but I was reminded of my beloved hobbyhorse by this article on the NPR site. Ron Elving writes:

Once again, the power of television to create reality has overwhelmed a historical event. The ascent of Samuel Alito to the U.S. Supreme Court became inevitable this week because his performance before the Senate Judiciary Committee on live TV sold the nation on his judicial image. Not coincidentally, the same hearings left his opponents looking disorganized and peevish.

Well, right ... up to a point. Peevish, yes (although I might have used a stronger word), but "disorganized," no. Over-organized would be more like it with reams of obscure and essentially useless information assembled by their staffs. Then each opposition Senator had to get all his/her "research" out to show his/her constituents, and the world at large, that he/she would be the one to wield the straw to break the candidate-camel's back. What resulted was an inability to hear or even see the man sitting in front of them. In that sense, this was a reality show and the Democrats on the committe are pretty close to being kicked off and being replaced for the new season. They could save themselves by being grown-ups and abjuring party politics, by surprising us. Elving, like most others, doesn't think that will happen:

Even before the weeping [by Mrs. Alito] that sealed the deal, Judge Alito's own lawyerly sangfroid had largely put an end to the suspense. The committee will vote 10-8 along party lines to recommend Alito's confirmation, just as it likely would have if the vote had been taken before the hearings began.

That's the CW, all right, but suppose the Democrats didn't do that? Suppose half (or more) of them decided that Alito was a qualified candidate, as he clearly is, said so and voted for him. The big winners in this with the American public would be those Democrats who showed they had the maturity to do this. Of course, their bases might go berserk, but I sense a vast percentage of the people of this country are becoming increasingly fed up with the tiresome bases of both our political parties. In fact, we are being held hostage by them. The list of issues that remain unresolved in our society because of the obdurate, knee-jerk opinions of our parties's bases would scroll down this page and probably out your computer and down the street. Enough already. As the words liberal and conservative become increasingly meaningless in our culture, the people who sat in judgment of Alito were conservative in the deepest emotional sense, rigid almost like members of the Inquisition with the most predictable line of questioning and the most predictable attitudes. We deserve more. We deserve people who think.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 9:18 PM
Comments (33)

The Biden Boomerang

According to the Financial Times: Senator Joseph Biden - a Democrat who attracted widespread ridicule for directing bombast and verbiage at the nominee rather than questions - says the hearings should be abolished.

Who can blame him? [Is it true that Sanofi drugs is renaming Ambien the Biden?-ed. The President Biden.]

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 12:41 PM
Comments (13)

Mondo Hollywood

If you liked Mondo Alito, Pajamas Media is cooking up another goodie to appear over the weekend - Mondo Hollywood. This may be an ongoing feature through which this blogger loses all his remaining friends, but to start it will contain coverage of the American Film Renaissance Festival here in Tinseltown. For the first time we will be featuring video. Documentarian Andrew Marcus is coming in from Chicago for the event and will be videoing the participants at the Chinese 6 theatre and the Renaissance Hotel, all at Hollywood and Highland center.

UPDATE: Marcus' own blog is here with a few festival highlights.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 11:19 AM
Comments (6)

January 12, 2006

Yet again - sorry about comments

Permissions have been turned off at my server. I am trying to get them turned on again. Thanks for your patience.

UPDATE: Comments are now ON. We were hit both those "friendly" comments spammers again.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 10:02 PM
Comments (1)

Into the mullah-strom

From the BBC:

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has urged the UN to confront Iran's "defiance" over its nuclear programme.

Ms Rice backed the EU move, saying: "These provocative actions by the Iranian regime have shattered the basis for negotiation."

What next? Even the NYT is flummoxed in their editorial of (apropriately) Friday the 13th:

Even if the United States and Europe got the Iran case referred to the United Nations Security Council, it is not clear what that body would or wouldn't do. Even if Russia and China could be persuaded to go along with sanctions, that might not be enough to pressure Iran, a major oil exporter whose leadership doesn't seem to care very much about other areas of international trade or diplomacy.

There are no realistic military options, especially for Washington. Iran is more than three times as large and nearly three times as populous as Iraq. And it is worth recalling that the ill-fated invasion of Iraq was first sold to the American public as the most promising way to keep weapons of mass destruction out of the hands of terrorists and terrorist-friendly states.

Well, it is so if you think so, Mr. Pirandello, but the millions of new voters in Iraq might have their own views of the "ill-fated invasion." As for how to handle Iranian nukes, there are other options than mass military action a la Iraq. The folks at the NYT know that as much as the rest of us. They just prefer not to mention it so they can tut-tut after the fact. But again like the rest of us, they would probably breathe more easily.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 9:20 PM
Comments (2)

Bird, bird, bird, the bird is a word

Well it's more than that, we know. It's a three-letter (not a four-letter) word these days. From Reuters:

One of two boys who tested positive for bird flu in Turkey has now begun showing symptoms, Turkish officials said on Thursday as experts cautioned the threat of a pandemic is steadily growing.

The virus, while it is spreading and changing, still poses no immediate threat of a pandemic, but experts stress it could do so at any time. They say it is vital to prepare emergency response teams, stockpile what drugs there are and build up surveillance networks to detect new outbreaks.

More from the blogosphere here.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 4:28 PM
Comments (1)

The center will hold

While Ariel Sharon remains in a coma, several paragraphs down in Reuters' coverage of the Israeli political situation is this interesting tidbit:

Signaling Washington's intent to keep Middle East diplomacy from sliding into limbo, President George W. Bush telephoned [Acting Prime Minister Ehud] Olmert to express solidarity.

U.S. and Israeli officials said Olmert could be invited to the White House as early as next month.

This will immediately project Olmert as a world figure. Although being seen as an American poodle is not on percent winner with the Israeli public, with their elections slated for March 23, this is no small thing. A seal of approval goes on Olmert and Israeli centrism.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 2:38 PM
Comments (0)

To the Manor Born - Psychoanalyzing Teddy

The big loser of the confirmation hearings so far is Teddy Kennedy. In his hectoring and tasteless attack on Samuel Alito he has succeeded in nothing but reminding us of his (Teddy's) past. While Alito may have been associated with a creepy Princeton alumni publication of twenty years ago, Kennedy was associated was something much worse than that - and we all know it. Those of us of a certain age remember well his dazed expression when questioned about the events on Chappaquiddick, the answers that never added up, the story that never computed (still doesn't) and the moral, emotional and intellectual contortions we (supporters like me) went through to try to believe him.

I even knew a woman who went to the party in Chappaquiddick that night. She was so loyal she refused to talk about it her entire life as far as I know. Kennedy himself worked for years to rebuild his reputation, achieved that to a great extent by working hard on issues like health care. Of course tragedy had occurred within his own family and we all had compassion for him, forgiving him his well-known excesses - the weight, the booze, the allegations of womanizing.

But then anger started to build. It seemed to come simultaneously from within and without. In recent years, a man who was famous for being able to "work across the aisle" (with Orrin Hatch, notably) began to manifest rage against his opponents out of proportion to reality. For some reason, he had morphed into a hatchet man (was this rage against the self?). Then, most recently, at these confirmation hearings, it seemed as if he had come adrift of his moorings. There was something weirdly self-destructive in his questioning of Alito, the bizarre insinuation that the judge could be a racist (hello, Joseph Kennedy!) when everyone in the room knew Alito wasn't, the obviously staff-driven nonsense about what newspaper articles Alito may have read twenty years ago, the intimations of sexism on the judge's part that quite clearly didn't exist. Where did this all come from? Was Teddy just preaching to the choir for his next campaign war chest? He needs that like a hole in the head. No, this anger was coming from a deeper, sadder place.

When Mrs. Alito walked out of the room, I thought of Mary Jo Kopechne.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 5:03 AM
Comments (39)

January 11, 2006

Neal Cavuto on the Judiciary Committee Hearings

"Sounds like my family reunion"

I hate to disagree with Neal (who made that crack on his Wednesday night show). These hearings are worse. They are an embarrassment.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 10:01 PM
Comments (4)

Waiting for Godot - The Sequel - by Samuel Beckett the Younger

ESTRAGON: First I want to go over some of the things you said yesterday. Vladimir, you testified yesterday that you'd keep an open mind. Isn't that right?

VLADIMIR: I did and I do.

ESTRAGON: Now are you aware of any nominee in the history of the republic who has come before the Senate and testified he'd keep a closed mind?

VLADIMIR: I'm not aware of that. But I can only speak for myself.

ESTRAGON: Of course.

VLADIMIR: I will keep an open mind on all issues.

ESTRAGON: You also testified yesterday that no one, not even the president, is above the law. Right?

VLADIMIR: That's certainly true.

ESTRAGON: Yes.

And are you aware of any nominee in the history of this republic, of whatever political philosophy, judicial philosophy or denomination, who has come before the Senate -- party denomination -- and testified that, actually, there are a few people who are above the law?

VLADIMIR: I'm not aware of a nominee like that, Estragon.

ESTRAGON: Me either.

And you also testified that the court should have respect for the Congress. Isn't that right?

VLADIMIR: Yes.

ESTRAGON: Know of any nominees who came before the Senate and said, The heck with you guys; I don't have any respect for the Congress ?

VLADIMIR: Estragon, I can only speak for myself and those are true expressions of what I think.

ESTRAGON: I know that. But all I want to say is -- and I don't doubt your sincerity in saying them -- but this morning's newspapers were filled with headlines to the effect you would keep an open mind.

(From the VERIFIED TRANSCRIPT of the Judiciary Committee Hearings. The role of Estragon has been played by Senator Schumer, the role of Vladimir by Judge Alito. All rights reserved.)

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 4:20 PM
Comments (5)

"Mondo Alito"

Coming soon on a Pajamas Media near you. The blogosphere is going wild with Alito hearing posts and we thought PJ should establish a clearing house. And if you wish... you can go directly to... MONDO ALITO!

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 2:36 PM
Comments (3)

Natanz danz

From the Guardian: The prime minister said today it was "likely" that the UK, the US and European allies would seek to refer Iran to the United Nations security council.

Tony Blair spoke of his "deep dismay" over Tehran's decision to break the UN seals at its nuclear enrichment facility in Natanz and said sanctions could not be ruled out.

The question remains just how close to nukes are the mullahs. Or have they already bought a few off the shelf from AQ Khan, et al?

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 9:12 AM
Comments (9)

The Spook 86 Who Came In From the Cold

Channeling the novel that made LeCarré's rep, the (must be) pseudonymous Spook 86 (a man with what appears to be considerably more intell background than Valerie Plame) has started to blog at In From the Cold. This blog is naturally interested (with the usual caveat about anonymity). Top of In From the Cold this morning: Joe Wilson, Meet Russell Tice. But there are several more interesting (scroll down).

You don't have to be a political operative to figure out that Democrats will earmark NSA "whistle-blower" Russell Tice as this year's answer to Joe Wilson, and use his allegations to tar the Bush Administration. And so far, Mr. Tice seems quite willing to go along for the ride.

Tice also believes that he isn't in legal jeopary, as long as he doesn't divulge classified information. That's a little like dropping a match in a gas can and hoping it doesn't explode. Given the nature of his work at the NSA, any testimony that Tice gives to Congress will quickly enter the classified realm, and probably result in the disclosure of extraordinarily sensitive information.

UPDATE: This post downplays the likelihood of an Israeli attack on Iran. Interesting.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 7:52 AM
Comments (5)

January 10, 2006

Oil-for-Food... no, we haven't forgotten thee...

How could we with Claudia on the watch:

In the ever-more-amazing United Nations Oil-for-Food scandal, the arrest in Houston last Friday of South Korean businessman Tongsun Park brings us a step closer to understanding the origins of the largest humanitarian fraud in U.N. history. Not least, Park may be able to provide some answers to questions surrounding one of the top former U.N. officials with whom Park had dealings - the godfather of the Kyoto treaty, former potentate of the Canadian-power industry, and longtime eminence of U.N. policy, 76-year-old Canadian Maurice Strong

Park is charged by New York federal prosecutors with acting secretly as an agent of Saddam Hussein's U.N.-sanctioned regime to try to influence to Saddam's advantage the shaping of the U.N. Oil-for-Food relief program for Iraq, which ran from 1996 to 2003. Park had not yet entered a plea as of Tuesday night. Allegations made against Park over the past year, some by federal prosecutors, some by Paul Volcker's U.N.-authorized probe into Oil-for-Food, are Byzantine. They involve tales of Park's trips in the mid-1990s to Baghdad, and his onward travel, allegedly carrying cardboard boxes of cash, plastic bags filled with cash, and paper bags filled with yet more cash. They also involve tales of Park's encounters with former U.N. Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali, who has denied any wrongdoing.

When Strong endorsed this check, back in 1997, he was serving as a top aide to the newly promoted Secretary-General Kofi Annan, coordinating U.N. reform. Strong had just finished a stint in 1996 similarly advising Boutros-Ghali on reform issues. Asked last year by Volcker's team to explain this payment, Strong first denied any memory of the check. Then, when Volcker's investigators showed him his own signature on the cancelled check, he denied any knowledge of where the funds originally came from. Strong said he had done nothing wrong and that the check was meant solely to cover an investment Park wished to make in one of Strong's family-controlled companies, Canadian-based Cordex Petroleum Inc.

This is still the great story of our times from which nearly everything flows. This blog has been calling for economic transparency from the UN for some time (here's one link from February 2005). The Volcker Commission didn't approach that (no surprise). It went up to a point, but only so far. As Rosett points out, there is still a lot more it could do:

Whatever the reason Volcker's needle skipped right over Strong's role in that 1997 transfiguring moment of Annan's Oil-for-Food "reform," other investigators, or perhaps Strong himself, might yet provide some better insight into that busy season. If Strong was not the author of the Iraq-program office, perhaps he can tell us who on his small team was. Best of all - improbable though it may sound in a U.N. universe - would be for the Volcker committee and the U.N. itself to allow public access to the archives. It would pose no threat to the innocent - and that may well include Maurice Strong - to let the public peruse the full records of whatever discussion went on inside the U.N. over the decision to create an "Office of the Iraq Programme," which pretty much conformed to what Saddam reportedly desired, and which Saddam then powerfully exploited to corrupt the biggest humanitarian effort in the history of the U.N.

Open the archives? Why not? We're waiting, Mr. Volcker.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 7:33 PM
Comments (5)

Message to Ahmadinejad?

When I read the news (via PJMedia, Jawa Report and Clarity & Resolve) of a certain rather large Air National Guard deployment, I immediately thought a message was being sent to the new President of Iran (or his handlers). Writes F-16.net:

The Indian[a] ANG 122nd wing will be deployed in upcoming days to Southwest Asia, officials announced. Col. Jeffery A. Soldner, 122nd commander, did not give specific numbers, but said it is the largest single deployment for the wing since it was called to Chambley, France, in 1961 during the Berlin Crisis.

It's interesting, though not surprising, that the MSM hasn't picked this up yet. Perhaps they don't consider it news, but I'm sure these folks do. No doubt they paid particular attention to these paragraphs:

Where soldiers in the unit will be sent for the Operation Iraqi Freedom deployment won't be released until they have arrived, said Lt. Lauri Turpin, community manager with the 122nd. It's unknown how long they will be gone, she said.

The deployment date is classified, he said, and a specific location would not be disclosed until the unit comprising fighter pilots, maintenance and support personnel is in place.

We're winding down in Iraq, but we're making the biggest deployment of ANG F-16s since the Berlin Crisis? Doesn't compute, except for this... As for whether it's any more than saber rattling, your guess is as good as mine.

UPDATE: Didn't realize these units were quite as small as noted below. Still, it's interesting (anomaly with F-16 and Berlin date also noted).

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 6:13 PM
Comments (12)

How to win elections

I'm not sure this will work every time, but Sharon's Kadima party has risen in popularity since his stroke. From Haaretz:

If elections were held now, Kadima would win 44 Knesset seats - four more than in the first survey taken after Sharon was hospitalized. Labor dropped two seats (to 16), while Likud lost one (to 13) in comparison with that poll. No significant changes were recorded for the remaining parties.

I think it's the Shwarma Factor (even though some people, who should know, are warning me to be skeptical).

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 5:55 PM
Comments (1)

Chuck Schumer at his fundraising best

From the transcript of today's Supreme Court nomination hearing:

SCHUMER: Does the Constitution protect the right to free speech?

ALITO: Certainly it does. That's in the First Amendment.

SCHUMER: So why can't you answer the question of: Does the Constitution protect the right to an abortion the same way without talking about stare decisis, without talking about cases, et cetera?

ALITO: Because answering the question of whether the Constitution provides a right to free speech is simply responding to whether there is language in the First Amendment that says that the freedom of speech and freedom of the press can't be abridged. Asking about the issue of abortion has to do with the interpretation of certain provisions of the Constitution.

SCHUMER: Well, OK. I know you're not going to answer the question...

Huh?

Just to be clear, I have always supported Rowe v. Wade and a woman's right to choose, but that doesn't stop me from thinking Sen. Schumer is a tiresome blowhard who uses Judiciary Committee hearings almost exclusively as opportunity to preach to the choir and line his campaign war chest. [Unless he has a cognitive disorder.-ed. Well, that's always a possibility.]

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 4:50 PM
Comments (23)

A Saudi Profesor of Islamic Law has things to say about Christians on Saudi TV

Read it here. See it there. [Is this worse than Pat Robertson?-ed. Well, actually, yes. And everyone piles on Robertson these days. He's a joke. This sounds like business as usual - yikes.]

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 4:34 PM
Comments (3)

"Sharon steps away from the precipice..."

... according to the Jerusalem Post. He's being stimulated by Mozart and shwarma - but they didn't say in which order.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 12:21 PM
Comments (1)

Will She or Won't She?

According to the AP, Iran just did what most of us assumed she would all along:

Iran removed U.N. seals on uranium enrichment equipment and resumed nuclear research Tuesday, defying demands it maintain a two-year freeze on its nuclear program and sparking an outcry from the United States and Europe.

The U.N. council could impose sanctions on Tehran.

Or it won't. I could be my usual wiseacre self and say "Anybody taking bets?" But this is indeed going to be an interesting moment in United Nations history. Hiding will not be as easy as is normally the case - or necessarily as productive. Some of the key parties (Europe) have very conflicting INTERESTS - oil vs. their lives.

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 11:20 AM
Comments (3)

First the bad news, then the good news

From Timesonline: "Israeli burglars stay home to follow Sharon news" - Burglaries, car thefts and other crimes have more than halved since Israelis began gluing themselves to television sets for news on the health of Ariel Sharon, their ailing Prime Minister.

Talk about political clout!

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 9:37 AM
Comments (4)

Hath Thou Considered Thy Servant (Steve) Job(s)?

Macworld is about to begin.

CNET has live updates for the obsessed. [You talkin' to me?-ed.]

Posted by Roger L. Simon at 9:27 AM
Comments (13)

Send this man to Iraq!

He promised to bring his