The Dish

The leader of the National Association of Evangelicals has stepped down to seek spiritual counseling. Ted Haggard was also founder and leader of the Colorado Springs-based New Life Church. I don’t know the facts of the matter – but here is the story in the Denver Post.

Today is the second anniversary of the Islamist murder of Dutch film-maker, Theo van Gogh, in the streets of Amsterdam. In his honor, here is the short film that sealed his fate. It’s a meditation on the struggle many women have in Islamist societies where freedom is denied them. It’s called "Submission." It’s a reminder that we are still at war with a terribly dangerous bunch of religious terrorists – a war this administration has fatally bungled.

A Godless reader writes:

You don’t think that Ms. Coulter will start whining about "due process" and other fancy liberal notions, do you? Is she going to hire a defense lawyer – some goo-goo Democrat liberal, elitist, fancypants who went to Berkeley Law School who’s going to argue that she shouldn’t go to prison – or, Heaven forbid – that some technicality requires that she not be charged with anything?

No, of course not. Technicalities, defense attorneys: they are what guilty people use with the assistance of liberals to avoid responsibility for their conduct.

Just so you know where I’m coming from. I’m not a liberal. I believe in small government, balanced budgets, welfare reform, and a flat tax. I’m against affirmative action and hate crime laws. Personally, I’m pro-life, although I can live in a society in which legal first trimester abortions are safe, legal and rare. I’m pro-marriage – I just want everyone to have access to the family structure. I was for the Iraq war. I published the Danish cartoons. I wore a Reagan ’80 button in an English high school. I’m a Catholic. I would never have voted for the Medicare prescription bill because we simply cannot afford it. In other words: don’t get your hopes up. I’m not on the left, whatever the religious right is now saying about me.

One the other hand, I have some new liberal readers who say I have only recently seen the light on Bush. Just for the record, I very reluctantly endorsed Kerry in 2004 because of what I believed was Bush’s incompetence and recklessness. So this is not a new or sudden epiphany for me. But the way the Republicans have run this campaign has confirmed my worst fears about them.

If you’re an old-style Goldwater conservative, I think you’ll have little choice but to kick the current GOP in the posterior next Tuesday.

If you want to read a conservative critique of the current shambles in Washington, check out my new book. It says much more than I can say on the blog. So far, many, many liberals who have read the book are emailing me to say they don’t agree with all of it, but find it refreshing to read a case for principled old-style conservatism. It helped them figure out why they were liberals. So give it a chance. You can get it online here.

280 religious leaders speak up against the draconian constitutional amendment to strip gay (and unmarried straight) couples of most of their legal rights.

At 5.20 pm, I’ll be on Albert Mohler’s radio talk-show on the Salem Radio Network. Mohler is an intelligent fundamentalist; and I’ve always enjoyed our conversations in the past. No Hewitt, in other words. Then tonight, I’m debating Jerry Falwell on CNN’s Situation Room in the 7 pm block; and on Anderson Cooper 360 at 10 pm. Tomorrow night, I’ll be on PBS’s Now newsmagazine show; and on Sunday morning, I’ll be in my regular chair on the Chris Matthews show.

As marathon runners sometimes say, the race doesn’t start until you can’t breathe. But the stakes are high.

[Update: I’ve just been told Falwell will not now be debating me. No idea why. No idea either why Hannity won’t debate me on conservatism or have me on his show. He’s not chicken, is he?]

"I supported the removal of Saddam Hussein. I believed that Arabs deserved a chance to build a rule-of-law democracy in the Middle East. Based upon firsthand experience, I was convinced that the Middle East was so politically, socially, morally and intellectually stagnant that we had to risk intervention — or face generations of terrorism and tumult. I still believe that our removal of Hussein was a noble act.

I only wish the administration had done it competently. Iraq is failing. No honest observer can conclude otherwise," – pro-war arch-conservative Ralph Peters.

But remember: according to the president, Rumsfeld is doing a "fantastic job." The only inference one can draw is that conservative Ralph Peters has just written that president Bush is dishonest. And he’s right.

Bush is a liar about this war; and he’s been lying for a long time. It’s way past time to call him on it.

"No one can truly be pro-Casey-for-Senate," – Kathryn-Jean Lopez, NRO.

Some weird news about a person who believes that anyone who disagrees with her is Godless:

Ann Coulter is being investigated for possibly voting in the wrong precinct during a local election last February in Florida.

That’s a felony that carries up to five years behind bars.

The man in charge of elections in Palm Beach County says officials have sent Coulter four letters since March, asking her to clarify her address. But he says the conservative pundit won’t answer, so he expects to turn the case over to prosecutors.

And it appears they just did.