Free Frank Warner

Murtha aide: Pelosi is going to be ‘furious’ that surge has won the war

Now exactly why should House Speaker Nancy Pelosi be upset with Congressman Jack Murtha’s declaration yesterday that, “I think the ‘surge’ is working”?

Maybe she had a little too much interest in seeing democracy fail in Iraq.

Under pressure by the defeatists, Murtha issued another statement today, saying, sure, the “surge” worked, but let’s stop it. He said:

The surge “has created a window of opportunity for the Iraqi government,’’ but so far the Iraqi government has “failed to capitalize on the political and diplomatic steps that the surge was designed to provide.”

“The fact remains that the war in Iraq cannot be won militarily, and that we must begin an orderly redeployment of U.S. forces from Iraq as soon as practicable.”

Translation: Now that the “surge” has worked for five or six months, let’s leave fast before Iraq’s democracy really takes hold. Let’s pull the rug out. We Democrats don’t want to end the war. We want to run and let it kick up again.

The Democratic defeatists are like the spider who continues to string his web after a walls falls down. They’re building something useless and ugly, flapping in the wind.

Frank Warner

USS Kitty Hawk sailed the Taiwan Strait last week; that can’t happen if China invades Taiwan

Last week, when China at the last minute cancelled the USS Kitty Hawk’s planned Thanksgiving Day stay in Hong Kong, the aircraft carrier turned around and steamed to Japan.

Behind them, the 8,000 American airmen and sailors left many of their families, who had flown from all over the world to meet them for the Nov. 22 port of call. The Communists may have scrubbed the holiday party because of President Bush’s Oct. 17 meeting with the Dalai Lama.

What wasn’t known until yesterday was the route the Kitty Hawk took back to Japan. It cut through the Taiwan Strait, between Communist China and the island of democratic Taiwan.

‘Operational necessity.’ Generally, U.S. ships avoid the Taiwan Strait because China’s totalitarian regime claims Taiwan as part of Communist China, in spite of the fact that the Communists have never ruled Taiwan. The Communists don’t like to see U.S. warships in that area.

The U.S. Navy pointed out that the Kitty Hawk’s route was far enough from both mainland China and Taiwan to be in international waters.

Navy spokesman Shane Tuck added:

“This was a normal navigational transit of international waters, and the route selection was based on operational necessity, including adverse weather.”

A peaceful invasion? When President Nixon agreed in 1972 to accept Communist China into the United Nations as “one China” with authority over both the mainland and Taiwan, the Communists and the Americans reached an understanding that the mainland government could pursue a reunification with Taiwan, but only by peaceful means.

Nevertheless, China has been building up its army and navy, and appears to have been training for a Taiwan invasion. Once next year’s Beijing Olympics are over, that invasion could happen at any time.

If the Communists do invade, the Kitty Hawk won’t be able to navigate the Taiwan Strait so quietly. Trade with China would shut down. It would be a shock felt around the world.

Frank Warner

Update: The Chinese Communists also have rejected the request of the USS Reuben James, a 200-sailor frigate, to stop at Hong Kong on New Year’s Eve. It makes you wonder if they’ll invite all those tourists to the Olympics, but send all the non-Chinese athletes home just before the games begin.

I’m pinching myself: John Murtha says, ‘I THINK THE SURGE IS WORKING’

Oh my God! Oh my God! Oh my God!

Congressman Jack Murtha, back from a Thanksgiving visit to Iraq, declared today, “I think the ‘surge’ is working.”

Break out John Lennon: “And so it is Christmas.” War is over if you win it.

Frank Warner

Only 16% of Americans want all U.S. troops home ‘immediately’

Remember this week’s Pew Research Center poll on the Iraq war? It found that 48 percent of Americans now believe things are going well in Iraq, compared to only 30 percent in February. (Another 48 percent said things are not going well, down from 67 percent in February.)

Pew also reported that 54 percent of Americans want U.S. troops brought home “as soon as possible.”

I wondered what the people in the survey meant by “as soon as possible.” It turns out that information is in the details of the Pew Center survey, which asked a couple more questions of the 54 percent who favored bringing troops home. Check out the details, and you find out that only 16 percent said we should “remove all troops immediately.”

Fully 36 percent said “the withdrawal should be gradual over the next year or two.” The way the key question was framed, it wasn’t clear whether that gradual withdrawal should remove all troops, most troops, some troops or a few troops.

But it is significant that, considering the Iraq war’s test of America’s patience, 41 percent of Americans want to keep U.S. troops in Iraq as long as it takes to stabilize the situation, and another 36 percent are willing to give the fight for freedom at least another year or two. That’s 77 percent who haven’t given up.

Sen. Harry Reid and Rep. Nancy Pelosi are doing a helluva job representing the 16 percent.

Frank Warner

For U.S. troops, this is the quietest November in Iraq

In the Iraq war, November has been one of the more deadly months for U.S. troops. However, this November has been the quietest since the U.S.-led coalition ousted Saddam Hussein in 2003.

With two days of the month remaining, the number of Americans killed this November in defense of Iraq’s new democracy is 34. That’s about half the U.S. deaths of the previously least violent November.

[Update: The final total for the month appears to be 37, and let’s remember that these numbers represent people, usually young men, whose basic job was to protect the freedom of strangers. That the enemy would kill such selfless people shows all the more clearly why this war must be won.]

Here’s the record on post-invasion Novembers:

U.S. deaths in Iraq war:

November 2003:   82.
November 2004: 137.
November 2005:  84.
November 2006:  70.
November 2007:  34. Update: 37.

Echoes of defeatism. In May of this year, 126 Americans were killed in Iraq as the “surge” was taking shape under U.S. Army Gen. David Petraeus. For the U.S., it was the third deadliest month of the war. On May 27, as Petraeus urged patience and resolve, and promised a September progress report, U.S. Sen. Carl Levin said:

“Why wait until September? We’ve got men and women dying in Iraq right now. Why not make that change in course right now?”

Of course, Levin’s “change in course” was the cowardly course of retreat and surrender. He wanted to set an arbitrary date and leave. For the selfish haters of the Democratic Party, it was the politically popular course, even if it guaranteed renewed fascism, genocide and war in Iraq.

Sacrifices for freedom. Today, the torch of liberty glows much brighter in Iraq. GIs have risked everything, and thousands have given their lives for democracy and Iraq’s only real chance for a lasting peace. It appears our troops’ bravery and sacrifices have paid off.

Earlier this week, there was no fighting in Falluja, in Iraq’s formerly volatile Anbar Province.

Two days ago, a U.S. Marine lieutenant asked Michael Totten, a Falluja visitor, “How many people got shot at last night in New York City?”

“Probably somebody,” Totten said.

“Yeah, probably somebody did,” 1st Lt. Barry Edwards replied.

That night, no one was shot, and no one was shot at in Falluja.

New kind of calm. The Sunni Arab city still has its tensions and occasional violence, but it is settling into a calm not seen in years. For the first time, its calm is accompanied by liberty, the freedom to voice opinions and choose leaders, the right to due process under law.

The 407 Americans who died in Iraq these last five Novembers, the nearly 4,000 who died these last five years, and their hundreds of thousands of brothers in arms cleared the way for that new democratic atmosphere.

Let’s hope the progress sticks this time. Let’s hope the trend continues. Let’s hope the setbacks are few. It would be wonderful if next year we could see tens of thousands American troops come home victorious, “return on success” as President Bush put it.

Here’s hoping for a November in freedom and peace.

Frank Warner

A note of caution: The death rate of American soldiers at war tells only part of the story. Iraqi deaths are down, too, but they still are dying by the hundreds each month. Further, history reveals that a period of relative calm toward the end of a war doesn’t mean it’s over or won. Remember World War II. It was real quiet before the Battle of the Bulge.

* * *

See: ‘Single Backpack Theory’: What really happened at the Iraq National Museum.

See: Mark Twain’s secret critique of a Medal of Honor winner of the Philippines war.

See: The full story of Ronald Reagan’s Evil Empire Speech.

See: Hillary Clinton proposes new 401(k) accounts. Isn’t this privatizing Social Security?

See: The Dawes Act: Why American Indian reservations are doomed to failure.

See: Proposal: Double the minium wage for illegal immigrants.

See: Noam Chomsky is alive, but he is one sick man.

See: Valerie Plame and Joseph Wilson made sure we were 100% wrong on WMDs.

See: When will Waxman reveal how The Washington Post blew the Jessica Lynch story?

What are the rules for using Tasers?

It just seems to me that if police and others limited their use of Tasers to situations in which lethal force is justified, Tasers would be no big problem.

Obviously, if you are acting so dangerously that someone has the right to shoot you to death, then a Taser is a fair alternative. You might die, but at least you had a chance to survive.

So my question is, when are police allowed to use Tasers and other stun guns? And what do the manufacturers tell other buyers? “You may use this stun gun” when?

Like other ‘arms’? I’m not recommending anyone get a Taser, but why should their use be more prone to lawsuits than the use of handguns?

I notice the lawyers are learning they shouldn’t sue Taser International. They’ve decided they have a better chance suing only the police and claiming the police weren’t adequately trained to use the Tasers. That’s my point: Police have rules on when to use firearms; the same rules should apply to Tasers.

I wonder, too, if the courts consider stun guns as protected as other “arms” covered by the Second Amendment. (Of course, the Second Amendment is hard to pin down on anything. The courts so seldom rule on it.)

Frank Warner

Anti-Iraq-victory movies bomb because they’re dishonest

Roger Simon says the new anti-victory-in-Iraq movies are bombing at the box office because the directors themselves didn’t believe the premise: that fascists should rule and we shouldn’t bother them.

Simon writes:

For Vietnam: The evils of communism could be and were rationalized by the left as a plea for social equality in an economically unjust world. For Iraq: The evils of Islamofascism and just plain fascism are considerably harder, indeed almost impossible, to rationalize.

This problem is particularly true for Hollywood because the evils of Islamofascism – notably extreme misogyny and homophobia – are justifiably big no-nos to people in the Industry. In fact, they are close to the biggest no-nos of all for them in their daily lives. Who is worse than a sexist pig? Only a violent, murderous sexist pig who wants to take over the world. It then becomes a complex balancing act indeed to make a movie that ignores or downplays this in order to criticize the US as the larger villain. No one has been able to come close to pulling off this balancing act in a film. In fact, it may well be impossible because it is fundamentally dishonest.

Good versus bad. In other words, in the real world, it’s hard to make those who defend the defenseless and free the oppressed look like bad guys. As a screenwriter, you can focus on the liberator’s imperfections or cue the creepy music, but when your villain ends up freeing 25 million people from totalitarian chains, the audience is going to see him as a superhero.

If the underlying truth says “good” but the film’s tone says “bad,” movie-goers will look for irony, but then they’ll give up. Eventually they’ll leave and tell their friends the movie sucked.

Frank Warner

Once again, the increasingly popular campaign to win the Iraq war

MSNBC, usually reluctant to admit democracy might win in Iraq, finds itself forced to report:

US public opinion on military progress in Iraq has improved sharply since the troops “surge” started in February but a majority of Americans still want soldiers brought home, according to a new poll.

Some 48 per cent of Americans now believe that the US –military effort in Iraq is going well, compared with 30 per cent in February, according to the latest poll by the Pew Research Center.

The troops. MSNBC reports that 54 percent of Americans want U.S. troops to come home. As Jules Crittendon asks, who doesn’t want U.S. troops to come home? The division is over whether they come home abandoning Iraq to endless war or come home as victorious liberators.

The Pew Research survey, conducted Nov. 20-26, found that 48 percent of Americans now believe the U.S. effort in Iraq “will succeed,” as opposed to only 42 percent in September. About 46 percent believe the effort to establish a secure democracy will fail.

Pew says:

The number of Americans who say that the United States is making progress in reducing the number of civilian casualties in Iraq has doubled from 21% to 43% since June. The proportion saying that progress has been achieved in preventing terrorists from establishing bases in Iraq is also up substantially, as is the number saying the U.S. is making progress in defeating the insurgents militarily. …

While Iraq remains a deeply polarizing issue across party lines, there has been improvement in how both Democrats and Republicans view the war. At the lowest point in February, barely half of Republicans (51%) said things were going well. Today, 74% of Republicans say the same. And while Democrats remain far more skeptical than Republicans, the proportion of Democrats expressing a positive view of the Iraq effort has doubled since February (from 16% to 33%).

33% of Democrats for Iraqi freedom. Democratic support for Iraq’s democracy winning has doubled! They’re all the way up to 33 percent. In a word, perceptions are improving.

And why not? We won the war yesterday!

Frank Warner

Afterthought: The last time I wrote about "the increasingly popular" fight for Iraq's democracy was Sept. 20, 2006. That turned out to be the last high point in public support for victory. Support dropped fast after that, to an all-time low in February this year. Since then, things have turned around or (caution here) appear to have turned around for the better.

Is Hugo Chavez sinking in popularity?

Polls show Hugo Chavez has taken a public opinion hit, with Spain’s king telling him to shut up and Colombia’s president telling him to butt out.

But when the Venezuelans vote in two days on whether to allow Chavez a chance to be dictator for life, will there be enough independent poll workers to count the ballots accurately? It doesn’t look that way.

Chavez says he “cannot fail” on the referendum. Maybe he knows something he’s not telling the rest of us.

Frank Warner

Iran will host Middle East terror conference

With the United States hosting Middle East peace talks, Iran’s theocratic dictatorship has announced it will hold a Middle East convention of terrorists.

Agence France Presse reports:

“These groups are planning to come to Tehran within the next week or two and they are all the Palestinian groups that are struggling for the freedom of their land,” government spokesman Gholam Hossein Elham told reporters.

Iran is one of the most vocal backers of Palestinian militant groups like Hamas and Islamic Jihad and pledged millions of dollars in 2006 to the then Hamas government crippled by a Western aid cut.

The Islamic republic does not recognise Israel and its President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has provoked outrage by calling for the Jewish state to be wiped off the map.

Iran isolated. It seems President Bush’s Annapolis peace conference has produced at least one worthy result. The contrast between those seeking peace and those relentlessly committed to war is too obvious to miss.

Frank Warner

2007 has half of predicted hurricanes, and tropical storms are weakest in 30 years

The five or six Atlantic hurricanes this year were an average number, but they were under the number forecast, and the storms were much weaker than normal.

Meteorologists are having trouble explaining the poor predictions. Several prominent forecasters had predicted seven to 10 hurricanes this year.

More frequent this year were the tropical storms, and of course that’s because they didn’t gather enough energy to become hurricanes.

The Miami Herald:

“The seasonal hurricane forecasters certainly have a lot of explaining to do,” said Max Mayfield, former director of the National Hurricane Center.

“The last couple of years have humbled the seasonal hurricane forecasters and pointed out that we have a lot more to learn before we can do accurate seasonal forecasts,” he said.

Just before the season started on June 1, the nationally prominent Gray-Klotzbach team at Colorado State University predicted that 17 named storms would grow into nine hurricanes, five of which would be particularly intense, with winds above 110 mph. …

A different team at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predicted 13 to 17 named storms, seven to 10 hurricanes and three to five intense hurricanes.

The actual results for the 2007 season: 14 named storms, five hurricanes, two intense hurricanes.

Reuters reports:

The 14 storms beat the long-term average of 10 per season while the number of hurricanes, five -- or six if you count Tropical Storm Karen which most weather experts expect will be posthumously upgraded -- is about normal.

Yet most of the storms were perplexingly short-lived, lasting on average just 2.4 days, the lowest ratio since 1977, according to a noted hurricane season forecasting team at Colorado State University.

“Our 2007 seasonal hurricane forecast was not particularly successful. We anticipated an above-average season, and the season had activity at approximately average levels,” Philip Klotzbach, Bill Gray and other CSU forecasters said in an end-of-season report on Tuesday.

Warming easier to predict? The obvious question is, if you can’t accurately predict hurricanes a month before the season begins, how can you forecast whether global warming is likely to continue over the next 100 years, threatening our coasts with flooding?

I know the two major political parties already have their answers to that question. But I don’t care what they think. I want to hear what nonpartisan, nonpolitical scientists say.

Frank Warner

V-I Day! We have been winning. We may have won.

Don Surber may be right. By preparing to reduce U.S. presence in Iraq to about 50,000 troops by the end of next year (way down from the 160,000 or so there now), President Bush and Prime Minister Maliki are saying the war is over. Freedom won.

Says Surber:

Funny how while the Democrats were calling for a troop withdrawal and the surrender of Iraq to al-Qaeda — while the New York Times was even condoning genocide — President Bush changed course and won the war.

It may be time to prepare a Fourth of July Iraq War Victory Parade.

Bush isn't hanging out another "Mission Accomplished" sign yet. But if things keep up as they have the last half year, most of our GIs can "return on success" next year as liberating heroes. We'll also have time to honor those who died and those who were wounded in the cause of freedom.

Mark down Nov. 27, 2007. This may be the quietest V-I Day you ever imagined.

Frank Warner

* * *

Update: Note that one of Surber's commenters points out that today is the anniversary of NBC's decision to call the Iraq war a simple "civil war." The commenter wants NBC to tell us which side won. Ha!

President Bush’s big blunder in the Middle East

President Bush was right to remove the Taliban and al-Qaida from power in Afghanistan and let the Afghan people choose their own way. He was right again to liberate Iraq from Saddam’s fascism and let the Iraqis choose their own way.

He was wrong in October 2001, when he told members of Congress that the United States was ready to recognize a Palestinian state next to Israel. That big blunder today will handicap the would-be Middle East peacemakers in Annapolis, where Arabs and Israelis are meeting.

On Nov. 10, 2001, Bush announced to the United Nations:

The American government also stands by its commitment to a just peace in the Middle East. We are working toward a day when two states, Israel and Palestine, live peacefully together within secure and recognize borders as called for by the Security Council resolutions. We will do all in our power to bring both parties back into negotiations.

First for Palestine. He shouldn’t have said it. It’s not that a Palestinian state is necessarily a bad idea. In fact, for 40 years, it has been likely that negotiations over Israel’s occupation of the West Bank (formerly a part of Jordan) would produce an independent Palestine on the West Bank.

But Bush gave away America’s high card when, possibly in reaction to the Sept. 11 attacks, he said he already had decided, even before Sept. 11, to accept a Palestinian state. He was the first president ever to say the Palestinians deserve a state next to Israel.

When he made the declaration, Bush no doubt was trying to defuse Muslim Arab hostility toward the United States. Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida’s fanaticism was fueled in part by Arab rage over Israel’s long-running battles with Palestinian terrorists.

Pointless appeasement. Unfortunately, Bush’s idea was doomed because it ignored all the rules of successful negotiations.

First, it had the appearance of rewarding the Sept. 11 attacks. That fact alone made it a horrible move. It was appeasement of the worst kind. And secondly, the give-away drew not even the smallest promise of peace in return.

Not one Arab nation reacted with gratitude or sincere calls for a live-and-let-live policy toward Israel. The Arabs took Bush’s freebee -- a commitment to a Palestine state -- and demanded more -- the destruction of Israel or conditions that would do the same thing.

What U.S. leverage? Imagine how much more influence the United States would have over today’s conference had Bush not given away that Ace in the hole six years ago.

Arabs would be expressing their impatience over America’s refusal to recognize the Palestinians’ right to their own country. There would remain some doubt about whether the U.S. ever would approve an Arab Palestine on the West Bank.

Bush could be using that  uncertainty as powerful leverage in the negotiations. Announcing U.S. support for an independent Palestine could have been the move -- the last step -- that pushed the talks through to success.

Price of folly. But Bush gave it away. The Arabs know exactly where America is going with the negotiations, and like all skillful bargainers, they’ll start there and negotiate for even more. The Saudis won’t even shake hands with the Israelis.

I wonder whose idea it was to show our hand on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. I do know that Bush at least went along with it, and we’re paying the price today.

Frank Warner

Rohan Sullivan declares John Howard’s 53%-47% loss ‘a humiliating defeat’ in Australia

Is there more than a little bias in The Associated Press coverage of Australia’s election?

Rohan Sullivan writes for The AP:

Conservative Prime Minister John Howard, one of the Bush administration’s staunchest allies, suffered a humiliating election defeat Saturday at the hands of an opposition leader who has vowed to pull troops out of Iraq.

Labor leader Kevin Rudd, a Chinese-speaking former diplomat, has also promised to sign the Kyoto Protocol on global warming, leaving the U.S. as the only industrialized country not to have joined it.

Howard, who reshaped his country’s image abroad with unwavering support for the war in Iraq, dominated Australian politics for more than a decade but failed to read the signs that voters had grown tired of his rule.

2004 referendum on Iraq. Is a 53 percent to 46.8 percent loss “a humiliating election defeat”? And what did the Iraq war have to do with Australia’s election? Most polls showed it was hardly an issue there. At the height of the Iraq war controversy, in 2004, Howard had been re-elected prime minister, winning both houses of parliament.

I suppose Sullivan will hang his “humiliating” adjective on Howard’s likely loss of his seat in parliament. But he went a little too far in tying this loss to the Iraq war, which Howard has helped win in freedom’s favor.

Frank Warner

Cuban democrats wear a new word: ‘Cambio’

With fascist dictator Fidel Castro slithering toward the grave and Raul Castro struggling to maintain the Cuban police state, more Cubans are feeling emboldened to call for something new: Change.

They’re wearing the word “Cambio” (Change) on wristbands as a statement that they’re not just going to let Raul carry on with Fidel’s brutal totalitarianism. They’ve been expecting freedom and the right to choose their own government when Fidel dies, and they’re demanding it.

So far, about 70 Cubans have been arrested for wearing the “cambio” wristband.

Frank Warner

Putin tosses the chess board, arrests Kasparov

Vladimir Putin walks around with a major anti-democratic chip on his shoulder, as if he believes freedom has ruined Russia.

Then he accuses his neighbors of preparing what he obviously wants any excuse to do – to attack. Putin wants the old Soviet Union, and he’s chomping at the bit to reclaim all its lands and all its brutal repression.

Garry Kasparov, the former chess champion, has been trying to tell Putin and other Russians to cool it, that democracy will work out best for everyone.

Kasparov detained. So naturally, Putin’s police arrested Kasparov today. Kasparov and fellow Other Russia Party members were in a March of Dissenters, protesting the lack of choice in the upcoming Dec. 2 parliamentary elections.

Yesterday, Putin’s police broke into Kasparov’s office and took down the passport numbers of all his supporters. Is this Putin one creepy criminal or what?

Frank Warner

The best news from Iraq

The Iraq army is growing!

As The Long War Journal reports, "While the [U.S.] surge brigades will eventually depart, the Iraqi Army is not leaving Iraq."

Frank Warner

New York City expects fewer than 500 murders in 2007 – down from 2,245 in 1990: Why?

New York City had 2,245 murders in 1990, and no one blinked.

The number of homicides had been rising steadily since 1960. It seemed an irreversible trend, the result of unstable families, drug wars, income inequality, cynicism and chronic hopelessness.

Many had forgotten that, at the height of the Depression, in 1939, New York had only 300 murders, and the population was about the same. (“8 million stories in the naked city.”)

The death drop. Well, this year, New York is on a course to register fewer than 500 murders. The homicide rate has dropped steadily since 1990, and again, the reason is slightly mysterious, especially considering how the unstable families, drug wars and income equality remain. Cynicism also is abundant.

Maybe it’s hope that turned New York around. Maybe it’s been the good habits developed by about 25 years of nearly uninterrupted economic growth. The economy sputtered in 1991 and 2001, but that was hardly a blip compared to the Depression or the 1970s’ oil-shock recessions, which led to the early 1980s recession and high unemployment.

The 1970s were a great dividing line for much of America’s social, political and economic history. It took until 1990 to wring out much of the damage from the era. Despite the static, New Yorkers have made more healthful society for themselves.

Frank Warner

Colombia tells Hugo Chavez to shut up and stay away

Hugo Chavez, who views himself as a messiah, offered his divine talents to mediate a stand-off between the Colombian government and Marxist guerrillas, who have taken 45 hostages in Colombia.

But soon after he started talking with the FARC terrorists, it was obvious Chavez had little more to offer than the hollow rantings of a tyrant obsessed with the sound of his own voice.

Two days ago, Colombian President Alvaro Uribe told Chavez gracias, pero no gracias, your help no longer is welcome.

Reuters:

Chavez said he totally disagreed with a decision [by President Uribe] that was taken without consulting him but offered to resume negotiations if Uribe changed his mind.

The break-off was a blow to Chavez, who had burnished his credentials as a statesman by working for weeks to talk to Marxist FARC guerrillas over freeing hundreds of hostages, including a French-Colombian politician and three U.S. defense contractors held for years in jungle camps.

The Washington Post:

Chavez … came under withering criticism, just over a week before Venezuelans are to vote on constitutional changes that would abolish presidential term limits.

Constantly talking -- the president gives 40 hours of televised speeches a week -- Chavez revealed delicate details about the negotiations, including disclosing that Uribe might be willing to meet with FARC leader Manuel Marulanda.

Chavez also hosted the rebels in Caracas, giving a group considered a terrorist organization a platform that irked the government in Bogota. Uribe had tried to rein him in, announcing a Dec. 31 deadline on mediation.

Then, as [Colombian Senator Piedad] Cordoba spoke from Caracas on Wednesday to Colombian army Gen. Mario Montoya, Chavez got on the line, according to Colombia’s Caracol Radio. “General Montoya, it’s Hugo. How are you?” the Venezuelan leader said.

Chavez asked him how many soldiers and police officers were held by the FARC. Montoya reported the call to the president's office, which decided to end the roles of Chavez and Cordoba in seeking an exchange of rebel hostages for guerrillas in Colombian prisons.

Reuters again:

That broke protocol and violated an agreement that only Uribe and Chavez would hold discussions between the two countries about hostages held by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, the government said in a statement.

“It is hard to imagine how Uribe could have stayed the course with Chavez,” said Stephen Donehoo, Latin American expert at the consultancy Kissinger McLarty Associates.

“Can you imagine (Russia’s president) calling the chairman of the U.S. chiefs of staff and asking about things? That is completely jumping borders and chains of command.”

Colombia also complained Thursday that Chavez had met a rebel leader this month without warning Uribe.

Chavez talks and talks and talks and talks. If he gets his way in the Dec. 2 referendum, he’ll have all the decks stacked to let him talk Venezuela into eternal insanity.

Frank Warner

Oswald didn’t wait for the camera: Zapruder film might have missed a shot

A few of the doubts over whether Lee Harvey Oswald could fire three shots so quickly at President John F. Kennedy could be settled if we assume the famous Zapruder film recorded only two of the rifle shots, an interesting article in The New York Times speculates today.

The story, by Max Holland and Johann Rush, says it’s possible that Abraham Zapruder’s 26-second film didn’t capture Oswald’s first shot because Zapruder didn’t start filming until he had a clear view of Kennedy’s limousine on Elm Street in Dealey Plaza, Dallas.

Keep in mind that, in those days, you just didn’t let your film camera run on an on, as you can do today with videotape. Each 8mm roll usually lasted no longer than 4 minutes and 10 seconds (I remember well), and Zapruder wouldn’t want the film to run out before the president drove by.

11.2 seconds for 3 shots. If Zapruder missed that first shot and his film shows us only the two final shots hitting Kennedy, then the old complaints that Oswald couldn’t possibly have fired so quickly go out the window. He had 11.2 seconds to fire three times; that’s not hard.

In other words, 44 years after JFK’s death, we have more evidence that Oswald acted alone.

Frank Warner

See also: More Kennedy assassination facts in: Oswald acted alone.

Thanksgiving Day

Today in Iraq, democracy is more secure than it was a year ago. If freedom continues to find its place, 25 million Iraqis have a future of progress and hope.

For their liberty, the Iraqis have a few hundred thousand Americans to thank. The rest of us Americans also owe those liberators our gratitude, because if democracy does take root in Iraq, the chance is almost non-existent that we’ll ever have troops fighting there again.

With Iraq’s new democracy under U.S. protection and building an army of its own, that part of the world has a better chance than ever of finding a lasting peace.

Today, Thanksgiving Day, is an appropriate time to be thankful for our blessings at home and for those who risk their lives every day to defend the free and free the oppressed.

Frank Warner

Ralph Peters: Hope in Iraq

Ralph Peters on prospects for securing a democratic Iraq:

[T]he positive indicators are now so strong that the left’s defeatist lies are losing traction among the American people.

One year ago, it didn’t seem likely we’d see this kind of optimism from Peters.

Frank Warner

Someone finally takes on Paul Krugman's dishonesty on Social Security

Ruth Marcus of The Washington Post challenges the Democratic leaders' amazingly dishonest "no crisis in Social Security" mantra, and attacks Paul Krugman of The New York Times for leading us toward disaster.

Good for her!

My continuing question for Krugman: What’s the difference between the so-called right-wingers’ plan to privatize up to a third of Social Security, and Hillary Clinton’s plan to reduce Social Security benefits by 30 percent (by ignoring the cash shortage the next few decades) and create a new 401(k) privatized account? Don’t the two plans look pretty much the same?

Frank Warner

* * *

See also: Hillary Clinton says it’s ‘smarter’ to have no rescue plan for Social Security; Barack Obama says she’s ducking.

See also: The other ‘Groundhog Day’: The Social Security that is never fixed.

See also: In 1998, President Clinton warned of ‘the looming fiscal crisis in Social Security.’

See also: If Social Security funding isn’t a crisis, why did Al Gore want to put its cash in a ‘lock box’?

Bush was right: You don't have to destroy more embryos for stem cells

And now the Democrats fear they've lost something to be mad about.

What's with The Washington Post referring to "the president's unwavering six-year opposition to funding for embryo-cell research"? I didn't vote for President Bush, but wasn't he the first president to allow federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research?

He did limit the research to stem cell lines already in existence. But he did allow funding for, after President Clinton didn't. And now that scientists can make stem cells without embryos, Bush's restrictions look prescient.

Frank Warner

District of Columbia v. Heller: It’s about time we tested – and upheld – a handgun ban

Considering how seldom government takes on any big problem directly, I’m pleasantly surprised that the U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case that will proclaim loud and clear whether a city may ban handguns.

The District of Columbia v. Heller will test whether the D.C. government or any government is forbidden by the U.S. Constitution to prohibit the private possession a certain kind of firearm.

The centerpiece of the debate is the Second Amendment, part of the Bill of Rights in the Constitution:

“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

Living Constitution. But here’s the legal problem: Neither side will be arguing the original intent of the Second Amendment, because the Founding Fathers intended this to mean private citizens have a right to own everything from muskets to warships. I doubt Dick Heller’s lawyers are going to argue he has a right to keep an aircraft carrier. On the other hand, the gun-control side, my side, is going to have to press some “living Constitution” concepts.

I hope the high court rules for common sense -- that of course a city may ban handguns. The justices might give us a compromise, giving extra protection to the possession of rifles. We’ll see.

Whatever the justices come up with, it will be new law. The question is, how far will they stretch for it?

Frank Warner

We get the ‘Violence declines in Iraq’ headline, but a story of a lost teenager should have been on Page 1

Yesterday, the blogs were full of justifiable questions about the lack of Page 1 and network headlines on the progress in Iraq.

I thought about this when I picked up The Philadelphia Inquirer and found the lead story to be headlined, “Violence declines in Iraq, U.S. says.”

That story was fine, even if it was two months late. I could imagine the Page 1 editor explaining to his fellow editors:

“Well, I know we’re all Democrats and we hate pointing out any success of a Republican president, but we’ve got to put one ‘Iraq is doing well’ story on A1 just to balance out the 364 other days of the year when we tell our readers Bush is an evil failure.”

Or something like that.

The big story. Then I saw something else in The Inquirer, on Page B1. It’s a column by Daniel Rubin about a 16-year-old boy, Donyea Phillips, who shot two Philadelphia policemen.

Rubin tracked down what this boy is all about. His father happens to be a minister. The great quote from the Rev. James Taylor, Donyea’s father:

“He told me, ‘Dad, I’m sorry.’ … He told me he understood everything I’d taught him, but didn’t pay attention.”

The boy’s mother turned him in to police. He’s in jail on attempted murder charges.

On iniquity. At a Sunday church service two days ago, the Rev. Taylor called Troy Zimmerman, 21, Donyea’s cousin and alleged drug-dealing accomplice, to read from the Bible in front of the congregation. He told Zimmerman to read from Psalm 51:

“Have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy loving kindness: according unto the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions.”

The young man’s voice started out strong, but quickly broke under the weight of the words.

“Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.”

When he took his seat he was sobbing, and some of the 20 or so parishioners wrapped their hands around his neck to comfort him.

Read the whole story. Yesterday, that’s what should have led A1.

Frank Warner

Update: Even The New York Times reports: "Baghdad’s Weary Start to Exhale as Security Improves."

Jimmy Rollins is 2007 National League MVP

Well-deserved. Shortstop Jimmy Rollins gave us Phillies fans a wonderful finish to an almost ridiculous regular season.

Who won the World Series? Can’t remember.

Frank Warner

Gateway Pundit has numbers on recent Iraq war success

Gateway Pundit has numbers showing Iraq war violence is down 50 percent since June.

GP also makes the claim that the overall War on Terror has been “the most successful military campaign in this nation’s history.” The point there is that, as bitter as each death is, the lives lost in this war are low, compared to other wars and to what is at stake. The second, odder point is that the military lives lost in this war are not much higher than the military lives lost in peacetime (lower compared to some periods, when the armed forces were larger and accidents more common).

As far as the Iraq war goes, let’s wait till April to see if we have a trend. Give hope to the children, but we adults need resolve.

Frank Warner

Iraqi terrorists want to attack Fort Huachuca, Arizona?

When I was a boy and my father a sergeant in the Army, I lived in Fort Huachuaca, Arizona, for two and a half years.

For a youngster, that post near the Mexican border was a paradise, the weather almost always sunny, the hot desert and cool canyon a vast playground to explore. This is land that tested Coronado, Geronimo, Wyatt Earp and the U.S. Cavalry.

Well, apparently, the same openness that my three brothers and I enjoyed there may have attracted the attention of a few fanatical Iraqis.

‘Perpetrate the attack.’ According to KOLD-TV in Tucson, the FBI has some evidence to believe Iraq extremists want to attack Fort Huachuca. The report doesn’t link the would-be terrorists to al-Qaida, so it’s not clear which group the FBI is watching.

KOLD says that an “FBI urgent report” states:

“A group of Iraqis may have entered the United States through tunnels from Mexico into Arizona,” and those same “Iraqis are believed to be the ones who will perpetrate the attack on Fort Huachuca.”

Responding to the television news story, the FBI said that, while the agency has distributed the report to police in Arizona, the information in it has not been “completely evaluated” and is not yet considered “a credible threat.”

Bears and diamondbacks. If terrorists are gathering for an attack on Fort Huachuca, I suppose they could survive a while in Huachuca Canyon, but they’d better watch out for the bears and javelinas. Down below, it’s the rattlesnakes that’ll get them.

Frank Warner

Jack Kelly: Iraq is a quagmire for Osama bin Laden

Jack Kelly, columnist for The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette:

We’re floundering in a quagmire in Iraq. Our strategy is flawed, and it’s too late to change it. Our resources have been squandered, our best people killed, we’re hated by the natives and our reputation around the world is circling the drain. We must withdraw.

No, I’m not channeling Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. I'm channeling Osama bin Laden, for whom the war in Iraq has been a catastrophe. ...

You may not be aware of the calamities that have befallen al-Qaida, because our news media have paid scant attention to them.

“The situation has changed so unmistakably and so swiftly that we should be reading proud headlines daily,” said Ralph Peters, a retired Army lieutenant colonel. “Where are they?”

Headlines to come. I can understand the hesitation on the headlines. I think we can more properly demand stories of victory when we see our generals in Iraq -- as opposed to the cowardly politicians in Washington -- determining we’ve been successful enough to reduce troop levels in Iraq below what we had in 2006.

Yes, we’ve defeated al-Qaida in the big battle. But until we defeat the defeatists, the victory of freedom is at risk.

Frank Warner

Which Swift Boat point does John Kerry say was false? Will Kerry release his records to T. Boone Pickens?

Now that T. Boone Pickens has offered a $1 million reward to anyone who can prove false any 2004 statement by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth on John Kerry’s Vietnam War service, it’ll be interesting to see who makes a run for the money.

Kerry himself says he’d like to make his case for Pickens’ cash. Pickens says fine, but first, release all your war records. Pickens wrote Kerry two days ago and said:

In order to disprove the accuracy of the Swift Boat ads, I will ultimately need you to provide the following:

1) The journal you maintained during your service in Vietnam.
2) Your military record, specifically your service records for the years 1971-1978, and copies of all movies and tapes made during your service.

When you have done so, if you can then prove anything in the ads was materially untrue, I will gladly award $1 million. As you know, I have been a long and proud supporter of the American military and veterans’ causes. I now challenge you to make this commitment: If you cannot prove anything in the Swift Boat ads to be untrue, that you will make a $1 million gift to the charity I am choosing -- the Medal of Honor Foundation.

Just for history’s sake, let’s see Kerry’s logs for Christmas 1968.

Frank Warner

Kevin imagines a different world

Kevin over at Blogiburton looks at things in the most unusual way. Just take a look at his artist’s conception of the origin of toast.

But then he comes up with this “good point,” which at least is thought-provoking:

Imagine a flipped world where there were a BILLION Jews and only 15 million homicidal muslims. I’m not Jewish, but I’d move to that world in a heartbeat. Jews, like most free people, move the world forward and should be commended for it. muslims, not so much.

I don’t think the world today really is 15 million Jews and a billion “homicidal Muslims,” but if Kevin’s point is that it would be better if the Muslim world were as free and open to innovation as the Jewish world, I agree. It also would be easier on everyone if the number of suicidal and homicidal fanatics were much smaller than it is.

Frank Warner

Democrats to American troops: Stop winning the war!

It’s about time our Democratic Party leaders stop encouraging the enemy with surrender dates. Congress, stop inviting a renewed war in Iraq. Put up the money, and let freedom win!

Frank Warner

The awakening in Ramadi

Douglas Halaspaska reports:

Sitting in a small room lined with cots and gear, the lieutenant talked to Mohammed through an Iraqi interpreter. “We know you were an insurgent during the [2005] fighting -- you’re in no trouble -- I just want you to tell me the truth.” Mohammad was now visibly shaking and appeared nervous before he quietly answered “yes.”

“Did you ever fire on any Marines?” was the lieutenant’s first question.

Mohammad was clearly concerned and replied with a long answer, but ultimately ended with a simple yes.

“I was in Ramadi during the same time, so you could have possibly been shooting at me,” stated the lieutenant. “It’s okay Mohammad -- if you were shooting at me then I was firing back at you,” joked the lieutenant.

The rest of the session involved the lieutenant and Mohammad exchanging promises to never fight again, and to work together to protect the city of Ramadi.

Think of it. Ramadi a year or two ago was one of the most dangerous cities in the world. Can the calm stick?

Frank Warner

Capt. Coulson: Those who deny Iraq progress should look again

Army Capt. Eric Coulson, in Iraq since last year, notes that anti-victory professor Juan Cole refuses to believe reports that thousands of Iraqi refugee families are returning from Syria to a more secure Baghdad.

Coulson says:

Some people will deny that things have improved here over the last year, I suppose because they want to say they were correct. The people who have worked over to improve this deserve better than that.

Certainly Iraq’s liberators deserve better than selfish and dishonest cynicism. Isn’t fighting the armed enemy hard enough?

Frank Warner

‘No Tears’: Song for Sgt. Brandon Wallace, who died in Iraq

Rick and Lisa Wallace have written a song about their 27-year-old son, Army Sgt. Brandon Wallace, who died April 14 when a roadside bomb exploded near his humvee in Falluja.

The High Ridge, Missouri, couple’s song is called “No Tears,” and it’s part of a CD that many military families are requesting to mourn and honor those who have died liberating Iraq.

Rick Wallace sings the song. They are the words he and his wife imagine Brandon would say:

I was watching from a window in Heaven
You seemed so close yet so far
I could see teardrops falling that you shed for me
I saw you crying, calling out my name
I wanted to hold you, tell you I’m OK

No tears will fall in Heaven
Teardrops aren’t welcome up here
No tears will fall in Heaven
There’s no sorrow, there’s no pain
God wiped my tears away

I was walking down the streets of Heaven
I was singing with the angels round the crystal sea
I was dancing on streets of gold when your memory came to me
I wanted to tell you, though you couldn’t see
All the shackles are broken now and I am free.

We cannot forget the sacrifice of Brandon Wallace, his family, and others like them. For all the world, they have done the hard and heroic work in the cause of democracy and a lasting peace.

Frank Warner

* * *

See: Breaking chains.

See also: Thanksgiving Day.

Harry Reid: Bush is a ‘bully,’ and ‘it is getting worse’ in Iraq

Just when you know the next would-be jihadi martyr is asking himself, “Is this al-Qaida fad just about over?” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid comes out and tells him no, hang in there, Islamofascism still has a chance.

“Every place you go you hear about no progress being made in Iraq,” Reid said yesterday.

“It is not getting better, it is getting worse. …

“He [President Bush] damn sure is not entitled to having this money given to him just with a blank check. Americans need someone fighting for them taking on this bully we have in the White House.”

Partisan hatred. It never ceases to amaze me how Democratic Party leaders can find one new way after another to invite the victory of tyranny over freedom. History will look back at these power-hungry racists with shame.

Reid’s quote is fascist-friendly enough for a place in this week’s Democratic Pep Talk for Tyrants.

Frank Warner

O.J. Simpson will go to trial on kidnapping and robbery charges

The weird thing is, the act that probably will send O.J. Simpson to prison was little more than a tough guy’s prank. If the allegations are true, all he intended was to stage a stunt at that Sept. 13 Las Vegas auction, but the toys he foolishly chose to bring along turned out to be deadly scary weapons.

I’m not defending him. But I have to wonder if this bizarre, if malicious, episode justifies life behind bars.

Then again, there are those two life sentences O.J. dodged.

Frank Warner

He’s rich, but Warren Buffett still campaigns for the estate tax

Billionaire Warren Buffett told Congress yesterday that it would be wise to keep the estate tax, even if the tax does apply to “guys like me” (when they are dead).

“I think we need to ... take a little more out of the hides of guys like me,” Buffett testified before the Senate Finance Committee.

“The resources of society I don’t think should pass along in terms of an aristocratic dynasty of wealth. I believe in keeping equality of opportunity as much as you can in this country.”

Impassioned debate. Buffett gave the same advice last year. I agreed, and the whole idea touched off an intense debate, with you here and with humans I deal with face to face.

I recall a heated discussion with a friend who ended up shouting (politely), “You’re crazy! You’re crazy!”

That was in response to my argument that Buffett really doesn’t go far enough. Congress shouldn’t be taxing only that part of estates over $2 million ($4 million for married couples). Congress should be taxing all of those estates. Except when a spouse or children under 18 survive, Congress and the states should take 100 percent of estates.

End inheritance. In other words, abolish all inheritance given to adult sons and daughters.

Why take all of a dead man’s money and put it into federal and state treasuries? Because, obviously, the man who earned that money is dead.

My unpopular point -- with which capitalism’s father Adam Smith happened to agree with me -- is that it makes no economic sense to give wealth to an able-minded adult who didn’t earn it.

Prove your worth. As I said then, if your parents want you to have some of their money, they should give it to you when they’re alive. That act would prove you earned it in some way.

If you’re a grown-up, don’t count on your dead parents’ wealth. Make your own living.

Frank Warner

Democrats vote to bring full-scale war back to Iraq

Democrats in Congress voted yesterday to tell our fascist enemies in Iraq not to give up, that the U.S. will surrender Dec. 15, 2008, and then they can resume their full-scale war against democracy.

The Associated Press:

House Democrats pushed through a $50 billion bill for the Iraq war Wednesday night that would require President Bush to start bringing troops home in coming weeks with a goal of ending combat by December 2008.

The legislation, passed 218-203, was largely a symbolic jab at Bush, who already has begun reducing force levels but opposes a congressionally mandated timetable on the war. And while the measure was unlikely to pass in the Senate -- let alone overcome a presidential veto -- Democrats said they wanted voters to know they weren’t giving up….

The bill represents about a quarter of the $196 billion Bush requested for combat operations in the 2008 budget year, which began Oct 1.

It would compel an unspecified number of troops to leave Iraq within 30 days, a requirement Bush is already on track to meet as he begins in coming weeks to reverse the 30,000 troop buildup he ordered earlier this year. It also sets a goal of ending combat by Dec. 15, 2008, and states that money included in the bill should be used to redeploy troops and “not to extend or prolong the war.”

Obvious contradiction. So this shamefully irresponsible bill says remove the U.S. troops on an arbitrary timetable, but don’t “prolong the war.” Right there, the legislation contradicts itself.

If American GIs are removed before Iraq is ready, the war will flare up larger than ever, “prolonging” it.

If American GIs are removed too fast and the fascists win Iraq, the United States can count on being drawn into another war there within 20 years. That’s what fascists do. They abuse their nations and invade others in the name of repression. And guess who would have to clean up that mess? Europe?

Lesson of history. If you want the war ended as swiftly as possible, if you want it ended once and for all, end it with the fascists defeated and democracy secure.

When will the Democrats learn the lesson of history? You end a war forever by winning it for freedom.

Frank Warner

Former Hugo Chavez supporter urges Venezuelans to vote ‘no’ on giving Chavez more power

Dictator Hugo Chavez’s former defense secretary has called on Venezuelans to vote down the referendum proposal that would lock Chavez in power, AFP reports.

Agence France-Presse says:

“Mr President, for the country’s sake, withdraw this proposal and thereby guarantee ... the peace and stability of our nation,” retired general Raul Baduel said at a news conference.

Baduel urged Venezuelans to “massively vote no” at the December 2 referendum on the proposed constitutional changes that would further boost Chavez's powers.

The former minister had earlier compared Chavez’s plan to change the constitution to a coup. The president responded by calling him “a traitor”.

Baduel had played a key role in returning Chavez to power following a short-lived coup in 2002.

The retired general claims the constitutional amendments would give excessive power to Chavez, a former paratrooper who won at the polls in 1998, the power he failed to grab in a military coup attempt six years earlier.

The long wild ride. That is a short and tidy description of the political merry-go-round that has run out of control in Venezuela for 15 years.

Bloomberg news says Chavez didn’t only call Baduel a “a traitor”:

Chavez, speaking to foreign reporters in a televised news conference in Caracas, said there isn’t room for the  “weak” in his so-called Bolivarian socialist revolution.

Power to the powerful. So now Chavez admits he is a champion of the “strong” totalitarians against the “weak” who stand for democracy. He is desperate to see that Dec. 2 ballot question approved, changing 69 articles of the Venezuelan constitution in favor of an all-powerful executive.

The worry now is that Chavez already may have consolidated power so tightly that his poll workers will guarantee a majority “yes” vote, not matter what the real count is.

Frank Warner

FBI Agent Piro, Saddam’s pal

Over a year in a Baghdad prison, Saddam Hussein grew so close to FBI Special Agent George Piro that the dictator cried at their last meeting, Piro says in a new book.

Piro had become Saddam’s best friend. Saddam even told Piro about how he tried to “hit” on a cute American nurse at the prison.

Hey, The New York Times has been telling me we torture all our detainees. What gives?

Frank Warner