Category: The Dish

I’ve never seen such a stout, courageous, unadorned defense of the West – and the Jewish people – as that from this secular Arab-American woman on al Jazeera, and now, Memri TV. Her name is Wafa Sultan, a psychologist in L.A. She reveals that the best remedy in our current situation is to speak the truth about the failure of extremist parts of the Muslim world to respect basic human norms of civilization. There really is nothing to discuss until they rejoin the ranks of sane humanity. She throws it back in their faces. It’s a wonder to watch. More of the transcript here.

Several readers have objected to my suggestion that Fred Barnes has recently regained his critical faculties. To wit:

"I understand why you say this based on this column, but must beg to differ. It’s all wrapped up in one sentence:

‘Bush made one strategic error in 2005, guessing wrongly that the country was adult and serious enough to reform Social Security.’

Think about this. Barnes thinks Bush made ONE strategic error in all of 2005 (one of the worst years ever for an American administration). That alone still shows severe Kool-Aid addiction. To make matters worse, the error is basically blaming the American public for not blindly accepting the terrible Social Security "reform plan" put forth.
I thought it was the liberals who thought so poorly of the collective American public? That they aren’t smart or sophisticated enough to understand a complicated issue. I guess only 34% of this country is smart enough to know what a great President we have."

He’s not just great. He’s a world-historical genius. Here’s Powerline’s John Hinderaker, from July last year:

"It must be very strange to be President Bush. A man of extraordinary vision and brilliance approaching to genius, he can’t get anyone to notice. He is like a great painter or musician who is ahead of his time, and who unveils one masterpiece after another to a reception that, when not bored, is hostile."

It is always a mark of failing ideologies and cults that their first response to acknowledging reality is to blame the press – then the people. We appear to be in the second phase.

"And they say there is no sectarian war? What do you call this?" – an Iraqi, reacting to the massive casualties of the past few days. 1300 dead in a few days is not a portent of civil war. It is civil war. The question is whether it can now be stopped. Imagine if 16,000 Americans had been slaughtered in a few days in sectarian conflict. Would you call it peace?

George W. Bush isn’t the only national leader with contempt for democratic processes, checks and balances, and the rule of law. Tony Blair has never seen a free act he doesn’t want to constrain, subsidize, tax, regulate or inspire. The appalling sight of an elected mayor of London being suspended by an unelected bureaucrat because he upset some journalist is a function of Blair’s meddling ways. In yesterday’s Times of London, William Rees-Mogg, former editor of the paper, let rip:

"The Prime Minister knows what the issue is. He is against due process as such. He has written a most extraordinary attack on the whole concept in yesterday’s Observer. The article is so incautious that he must have written it himself.

‘In theory,’ Tony Blair writes, ‘traditional court processes and attitudes to civil liberties could work. But the modern world is different from the world for which these court processes were designed.’ This view that due process is obsolete explains the Prime Minister’s conduct; it explains the connection between extradition without safeguards, detention without trial, Asbos without criminal offences, subjective and discretionary judgments, police powers to arrest, and increasing ministerial powers. They are all characteristic of Blair legislation; they all avoid due process of law."

It’s time for free people to tell these meddling monarchs where to stick it.

People are always telling you that a rise in the gas-tax – unchanged since 1993! – is impossible to sell to the American people. I don’t buy it. A new poll suggests that all it might need is a little political leadership.

We should wait and see what further polls say. But 34 percent is about what this president deserves. Even Fred Barnes seems to have recovered some critical faculties.

Thanks for the emails. I should say, I guess, that one of Robert George’s great strengths is his unflinching defense of his own position. He is unafraid to speak what he believes, even if it means he favors banning all abortions and, in principle, favoring laws that would make wanking a criminal offense. Ponnuru is a more slippery character, because he has to navigate the shoals of his own extremism with Beltway political maneuvring. One reader comments on the vacuousness of one of his arguments:

"What’s funny to me in Ponnuru’s post is his insistence that he did some sort of moral exploration in his essay. (He says he "goes through several moral distinctions that separate abortion from the murder of an adult.") While I did note a few strange exculpatory notes on the "social" distinctions between abortion and the murder of an adult, these were couched in such a way as to clearly imply that these distinctions should only be applied in the most legalistic of ways. The moral ramifications of abortion and its definition (killing of a human being) were not changed. In fact, in several instances he seemed to be saying that part of the reasoning behind the proposed lowering of criminal sentences for women and abortionists was not by dint of any moral distinction at all but merely for assuring a conviction from a wavering jury – similar to his disingenuous denouncing of the S. Dakota bill. And he says you write in bad faith…"

Ahem. I think the personal viciousness of Ponnuru is a sign that I have cut a little close to the bone. Good.

They’re having another rally in New York City. Details here. No Hamlet-like waffling. Be there.

Here’s a useful symposium on what is at stake in Iraq and why civil war is now imaginable. I agree with Noah Feldman: what’s remarkable is how these ethnic divisions were largely fostered by the incompetent invasion. They didn’t precede it – certainly not with their current ferocity. Our decision to let disorder reign – and it was a conscious decision – has been disastrous.

The Bull Moose smells meltdown. I’m not so sure. But this point is well worth considering:

"[R]emember, the best thing that ever happened to the Clinton Presidency was losing Democratic control over Congress."

Bush might be saved yet. He’s a very lucky guy. Given his incompetence, he needs to be.