The lead Washington Post story by Woodward and Kaiser is a useful, if terrifying, wake-up call. The administration clearly believes that there is a small chance that al Qaeda has the wherewithal for a dirty nuclear bomb. The following sentence is priceless: “U.S. officials are very concerned that any nuclear detonation by al Qaeda would be a calamitous psychological setback to the war on terrorism.” Er, yes. You can say that again – especially if it happens in an American city. I got the same sinking feeling reading this paragraph: “On at least one occasion, the White House cited the increased concern that al Qaeda might have a radiological bomb as a key reason that Vice President Cheney was not available for a face-to-face meeting with visiting senior foreign officials. The meeting usually would have allowed for informal personal contact, but took place via secure video conference because Cheney was at a secure location outside Washington.” I’m grateful to the Post for this story not least because I notice in myself – and all around me – an unnerving sense that the war is somehow over. People aren’t talking about it in the same earnest and desperate way they were before. I guess we knew this would happen – but it’s surely a mistake. We’re barely three months away from the massacre, and growing psychologically complacent. I’m not say we should stay afraid indefinitely – just that it’s good to have a reminder that we still have something to be very afraid of.
MEDIA BIAS WATCH I: “According to the sources, the planning is being undertaken under the auspices of a the US Central Command at McDill air force base in Tampa, Florida, commanded by General Tommy Franks, who is leading the war against Afghanistan.” – The Observer, London, December 2. War against Afghanistan?
MEDIA BIAS WATCH II: Am I overly-sensitive or is this Elizabeth Bumiller piece in the New York Times beyond snide? The story itself could have been assigned by Terry McAuliffe – the premise being that if the White House cannot be open for tours by the general public, no press Christmas parties should take place either. (Notice the nasty stage whisper high up in the piece that Bush is related to a former president, a detail designed to paint the president as an aristocrat elitist.) Bumiller insinuates, under the guise of news, that the Bushes are a) like the Clintons, selling access to the highest bidder, and b) elitists for accepting secret service recommendations about opening the White House for public access. In fact, these parties have nothing to do with fundraising, they’re dumb schmooze-fests designed to charm the press. And the numbers invited, as the Times concedes, are under half the peak for the Clinton years. And the security distinction makes sense: it’s far easier to vet individuals whom you have personally invited and whose guests are also assigned in advance, than vetting people who line up for Christmas tours on Pennsylvania Avenue. (To all those readers about to accuse me of elitism, I should say, I guess, that although I’ve been invited many times, I’ve never gone to the White House Christmas press parties. My only invites were from the Clintons.) Besides, surely Bumiller has been made aware by now that there is a war on. Security isn’t a matter of elitism; it’s a matter of life and death.
RAMADAN SCHMAMADAN: Remember all that hooey about how we shouldn’t fight terrorism during Ramadan because it violated some religious propriety. I love this sentence from the Washington Post today: “In the past, al Qaeda terrorists have tried to launch attacks during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, which this year began Nov. 16. The first bombings of the World Trade Center, which killed six people and injured more than 1,000, came on Feb. 26, 1993, three days after Ramadan began that year. During the Ramadan observance from Dec. 9, 1999, to Jan. 7, 2000, the United States and other nations stopped a series of attacks that were keyed to the millennium celebration.” Not only do the terrorists allow terror during Ramadan, they positively encourage it. I say: let’s be sensitive to these sensibilities and follow their example.
THE AMERICAN TALIBAN: Several of you have pointed out to me that Robert Brame III was appointed to the NLRB four years ago by president Clinton. I’ve been trying to find out if Brame’s radical Christian Reconstructionist views were known then or have only subsequently been exposed. I wish I’d known when I wrote the first item to provide the context. But it doesn’t change my point. The man has no place in appointed public office. And no, it’s not some new McCarthyism to nix someone for a position like this because of his views or the views of his colleagues on unrelated matters. It’s a political decision for any president to make. And which president would want to advance or condone such views? There are plenty of candidates who aren’t in the pocket of organized labor who could do the job. Why pick someone who has been part of a movement that even the religious right regards as extremist?
THE JEWS DID IT, PART DEUX: “When the Israelis killed a senior Hamas figure just as the US peace envoy, General Anthony Zinni, began his work, they made it almost certain that there would be a response from Hamas. It may well be that Hamas would have staged suicide operations, at this time or later, whether or not a leader had been killed by the Israelis. But there must be a suspicion that some Israelis wanted General Zinni to have a first hand view of terrorism, which might then shift the view of Mr Arafat in Washington.” – The Guardian, in its editorial today. This is a carefully parsed sentence. It doesn’t actually blame the Israelis for the massacre of their own citizens, but it comes extremely close. The European Left’s loathing of Israel never ceases to amaze, and it’s not restricted to the Left. Thanks in part to the BBC, anti-Zionism is now endemic in Britain. I’ve barely talked to a Brit recently who doesn’t essentially blame Israelis for all the violence in their own country. Oh well, they couldn’t quite keep up the moral equivalence with al Qaeda, so Hamas will have to do.
“NO-ONE CAN CONTROL OR CHANGE ME”: E.J. Dionne gets Arafat exactly right, methinks.
The Dish 