Section 9

George and Laura Bush, Condoleezza Rice, and Bush 41 and Bar went down to Atlanta today to attend the memorial service for the late Coretta Scott King.

The late Mrs. King was, by all accounts, the First Lady of Black America. So, the occasion of her passing might have been a chance for a show of unity during a time of war. Silly me, I forgot. It's a funeral.

Put Democrats in a large room with a funeral and the Wellstone Catastrophe breaks out.

The Reverend Joseph Lowery of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference excoriated Bush indirectly while the President sat not ten feet behind him. Bush was sort of trapped. He had to be the whipping boy for black Democrats while Bill and Hillary Clinton got to celebrate themselves at a memorial service for the passing of a great woman.

Later, former President Jimmy Carter, the man who helped to make North Korea safe for Atomic weapons, was his bitter, resentful self as he attacked the President for wiretapping and for the results of hurricane Katrina. Every time Carter speaks, I thank God I had a small part in the horsewhipping delivered to him by Ronald Reagan.

On the whole, a baleful, sad day. Why do Democrats do this? Why do they act with such predictable swinishness at one of "their" events. I suspect, given some of the defensiveness of some of the Usual Suspects in the Toady Media, the Press Pimps realized that this "looked bad" to the public. Too late!

I'm back.

It's been two months. I've refinanced the house, paid some bills, and settled some debts. Meantime, the Condi campaign continues, the Karl Rove scandal is about to peter out, and the London bombings signal a new effort by Al Qaeda to make its influence felt in Europe. More about all of these in the next posts.

in this post of his. Impact quote:

We cannot become like the enemy. If we do, we will have denied ourselves victory. You can see the essence of the temptation in this passage from the Belmont Club blog:

Not only the treatment of the enemy combatants themselves, but their articles of religious worship have become the subject of such scrutiny that Korans must handled with actual gloves in a ceremonial fashion, a fact that must be triumph for the jihadi cause in and of itself.

No; no; no. It is insane to believe that maintaining America's long-held respect for others' religion, especially when those others are in the custody of the U.S., is somehow a victory for Jihadism. It is the opposite. It is a victory for our values that we do not stoop to their depraved understanding of what morality is. It is a victory for Jihadism to turn this battle into a fight between Islam and Christianity, or to watch our own military descend into the religious bigotry and intolerance we are fighting against. It is so sad to watch decent people like Glenn Reynolds or Wretchard descend into this moral abyss, even though their motives are doubtless good ones.

Yet here's my problem with Sullivan's rant of today. He missed Wretchard's larger point. Wretch was speaking of our relative restraint in our conduct of the war, yes (were he Victor Davis Hanson, the Athenian expedition against Melos would have been brought up by now...). However, what Sullivan fails to mention, and what I deliberately mentioned to him in an email, was something Wretchard posted at the end of that same posting that Sullivan cites. Money quote:

But if the US has been at pains to avoid the image of ruthlessness, the enemy by contrast has made a special effort to magnify his brutality by attacking mosques, beheading women, mutilating children, etc. often on camera. And the really disappointing thing it is that the intended intimidation works. If George Galloway's standard response to his critics is a lawsuit and radical Islam's first recourse is a fatwa then terror's first answer to insult is always the Grave of a Hundred Dead. Intimidation brings them respect from the very people who style themselves immune to intimidation. It is plain to the lowliest stringer from the most obscure tabloid that to insult America is cheap but to insult the local 'militants' very, very expensive. Kipling's cynical dictum is proven again and the lesson not forgotten.

We live in a strange world where the Beslan story vanishes in weeks while Abu Ghraib lives on for years. Maybe it reflects the inherent importance of the stories but it more probably demonstrates the media's ability to prolong the life of some stories while ignoring others. I hope it is not impertinent to observe that the media's demeanor towards terrorism bears more than a passing resemblance to cheap cowardice; but though outwardly similar it really springs from a high-minded idealism, deep courage and profound learning. Or so I hope.

I wonder why the hell Sullivan left that part out?

I suspect it is because he understands that the Mainstream Media doesn't give a damn about Beslan, or Iraqi mass graves, or the thousands of victims of the Taliban, and has even lost interest in 9/11, except insofar as that black day may be used as a club to be used against the head of the wicked Bushitler (for an example of the latter, see Ankle Biting Pundit's exciting fisking of Kristin Breitweiser, Professional Widow and Obnoxious Bush Hater). But they do give a damn about sullying the reputation of the American fighting man and bringing into disrepute the cause for which he fights. This statement by Andrew:

Some fun with the amazing troops working in Iraq. It goes without saying, doesn't it?, that criticisms of policies of abuse are designed not to undermine the war but to support the vast majority of ethical soldiers who do great work in incredibly tough circumstances. Well, in this case, they seem to be having a blast.

....shows the best of Andrews own intentions combined with the worst of his own naivete. He really believes the that MSM is not out to undermine the President and the war that the media overwhelmingly opposes by any means necessary.

Now then, Andrew, if the BBC opposes this war and uses slanted reporting against our troops in the field, what makes you think that CBS or ABC won't do the same thing?

In fairness to Sullivan, his reporting on this issue is of a genuine concern over abuses in the U.S. Army prison and detention system. There have been abuses. People have died. The UCMJ needs to be followed to the letter. But no more than that. I see no need for the U.S. Government to wear the hairshirt, especially given the barbarism of our enemies. Indeed, a firmer attitude on our part, insistent on respect towards us if respect is expected to be given in return should be the cornerstone of any policy.

Justice. But no apologies. I didn't hear any of those bastards apologize to us after 9/11 did I?

Americans For Rice begins its ad campaign in New Hampshire and Florida in a little under 24 hours. We've bought radio time on WNTK-AM/FM in New Hampshire and WKAT-AM here in Florida. These will be multi-week campaigns that will be focused on early primary states (New Hampshire and Florida to start) with others to follow in their train.

This has been an eventful month for our organization. A month ago we were flat on our back for several reasons that I'd rather not go into. Let's just say that liberals are not nice people and PowWeb truly sucks. However, we were persistent, and have gotten this far, which is no small thing-given how far we've come.

Our ad campaign coincides with Freedom Fest, a conservative gathering in Las Vegas. Crystal Deuker, our research chair and traveling one-woman dynamo, will be out there at the Bally's Las Vegas representing our outfit.

And to think, when Condoleezza Rice does become President of the United States in 2009, it will all have started with us. Or at least with Richard Mason and his buttons.

They're the hardest things to mail.

China and Taiwan, Condi Rice as Faye Valentine, and the Ressurection of Americans For Rice. Coming this week on this blog.

After several weeks of frustration, we at AmericansForRice.com have found a server that appears to be halfway competent at customer care. I'll be filling you in as we go along.

Now to spruce up the site. I'm told by the webmaster that we actually made it to SitesThatSuck.com. We'll be changing this as we get back into the agitprop biz.

...who sort of echoes what I had been saying in the previous post.

Kaus was reacting to Bill Bradley's essay in the March 30th New York Times on the Republican Party's ideological pyramid. Apparently, we possess this huge financial ziggurat atop which stands, every four years, a Bush or a Dole or a Bush the Younger. Meanwhile, what is really going on is that a financial conspiracy allows the Ann Coulters and Michelle Malkins of the world carry on like the Hebrew slaves of old farther down the pyramid's base. The efforts of the intellectual flunkies and errand boys (and girls) are to support the campaigns of the aforementioned Stooges of Finance Capital. Only Ann Coulter and Michelle Malkin get PAID!

Well, if I can't be a major Stooge of Finance Capital like Bush the Younger, can I be a minor Stooge, like Ann? Or Condi? Wait, Condi may become a major Stooge in 2008, so I'd best watch myself. Anyway, back to Kaus.

Kaus observes that Bradley's solution is to ape what the Republicans are doing instead of waiting for a Bill Clinton or a Jimmy Carter to come along. For the Democrats, 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue is but one Messiah away. This notion of a Messiah Candidate is common among liberal Democrats. Consider the psychosexual reaction to Barak Obama's ascent last fall. It actually bordered on the obscene. Barak Obama beat a weakened Republican Party that had the misfortune to hire Alan Keyes as a mercenary canidate. For that he got a Second Coming cover on Newsweek.

Kaus observes what smart Republicans (and even smarter Dems, like Kaus here), know about the Donks...

Money graph:

The problem, of course, is that the Democratic party's most stable institutional elements are also its most problematic elements: 1) unions; 2) the civil rights and Latino lobbies; 3) the senior lobby (AARP); 4) institutional feminists (NOW); 5) trial lawyers; 6) Iowa-caucus style "progressives;" and 7) Hollywood emoters. If a national problem could be solved without trampling on the interests of this institutional base, Democrats would have solved it in the decades when they were in power. What's left are the problems that can't be solved--even solved in accordance with liberal principles--without trampling on these liberal interest groups: competitiveness, for example, or public education, or entitlement reform. If the Dems' permanent institutional base is what gets to "develop" and "hone" the ideas to be adopted by the party's presidential nominee, then the Democrats will in perpetuity be the party of union work rules, lousy teachers, mediocre schools, protectionism, racial preferences, unafforadable entitlements, amnesty for illegals and offensive rap lyrics! That winning collection gets you, what, 35%?

In the previous post, I mentioned that the Democrats are the Party of Reaction. They have become reactionaries simply because the act of change would kill their coalition (see Kaus above). It's the paint off the flywheel illustration discussed in the previous post. As a 20th Century political party, their entire reason for being is in danger of passing into history if they don't find a way to change with the times. Clinton was able to warm this over with his handshake and backslap and hale fellow well-met act for eight years. But the internal contradictions of the Democratic coalition and its resisitance to the 21st Century's demands could not be put off forever. So here we are today, and there you have it.

Republicans are slowly coming to grips with the fact that they are a governing party, and a majority party to boot. And so, they are also coming to grips with the 21st Century. Are there fits and starts? Yes. Are there royal screwups from the getgo? Sure. Roosevelt had the Works Progress Administration, whose unofficial symbol was said, only half in jest, to be a man leaning on a shovel. But George W. Bush is committed to trying to get things done. Voters notice that. The response of the Left, of course, has been to scream "BusHitler" during the war and to say "There Is No Crisis" (see intellectual oatmeal in post below). To top it off, Howard Dean, who maintained that the Saudis tipped off Bush to 9/11 before the attacks, is now head of the DNC. And he claims that we, that is, we Republicans, are "evil".

Well, as long as Howie doesn't find out about the Swiss bank accounts and the secret decoder rings, I guess we're okay.