Where' the Logic in This?

I haven't written anything about the Michael Vick thingy and frankly haven't been following it very closely. Anything having to do with professional athletes bores me. But this set me back a bit when I saw it.

The owners of 53 pit bulls seized in April from the Virginia property owned by Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick have until the end of the day to claim the animals, a court official said.

Prosecutors have asked a federal judge for permission to exterminate the animals, but it is not known when this will take place.

...

Officials and animal rights advocates agree that the dogs should be killed because their brutal training could make them a threat to people and other animals.

The dogs might not be killed right away because they are evidence in the case against Vick and possibly others referred to in a federal indictment issued in July.

Read it here.

So let me get this straight. Vick committed a horrible crime when he killed non-performing dogs, but the "humane" society experts and court officials are fully justified in killing far more dogs, regardless of their performance, simply because they are not the nice, cuddly kinds of beasts most favored for pets. Unless, of course they might be useful in further prosecutions, in which case they might be kept around for a while.

I thought this whole thing had something to do with Vick's inhumanity toward simple beasts, but aren't the authorities just as bad if not worse?

Primary Sources

The FBI is looking for these guys. Keep an eye out for them and read about it here.

And here's the text of President Bush's speech today to the VFW convention.

And finally, here's the executive summary of the CIA's internal investigation into the runup to 9/11.

Check them out. There's a lot to think about in there.

"Invasion" -- The World the Pods Wrought

“She Who Must Not Be Named” and I went to see “Invasion” yesterday. We had personal reasons for doing so – some of our friends appeared in the film as extras and several scenes were shot in and around the building in which we live. At one point “She” tugged my sleeve and exclaimed, “That’s the table we play bridge on!” As we left the theater “She” marveled at a sequence in which Nicole Kidman exited an apartment in one building, entered an elevator and left it in another building, fled into a passage with no street exit, and emerged from it in an alley three blocks away. Ah, movie magic!

I, on the other hand, was intrigued by the film’s possibilities. I knew it got horrible reviews and did very little business on its opening weekend. I knew there had been production troubles and that the Wachowski Brothers, whose work I intensely dislike, were involved in rewriting the original screenplay. Still, the original director was Oliver Hirschbiegel, whose previous work, especially “Downfall”, had been interesting. It would be fun to see what he could do with the creepy paranoia of the “Body Snatchers” series. I just hoped that the Wachowskis and their pet director, James McTeigue (who shot the execrable “Vendetta” and reshot some scenes for this film), had not done too much damage to the original concept.

Well, they did and they didn’t. The first half of the film works well, building suspense in a quiet way, introducing tantalizing concepts, then the Wachowski influence rears its ugly head and you have pod people hanging off the roof of a careening, blazing car. Too many cooks operating at cross purpose have spoiled what might have been an interesting film. Still, enough of the original remains to raise “Invaders” above the level of genre hackery.

And that is where fanboy reviewers have trouble with the film. Time and again you read the complaint, “it just wasn’t scary enough.” They’re right. Anyone wanting to see a standard monster or zombie flick is going to be disappointed by “Invasion.” It just isn’t that kind of movie. Nor is it a romance. Several female writers complained that Nicole Kidman doesn’t get it on with her sexy co-star, Daniel Craig. [“She” sympathizes with them – one of the high points of her recent film viewing was seeing Craig emerge nearly naked from the water in “Casino Royale”.] But here he keeps his clothes on and the stars never get around to coupling or even cuddling. It’s not that kind of film. Nor is it a suspense drama. The first half of the film, as I noted above, has plenty of suspense as you and the main characters wonder who is and who is not an alien, but once the Wachowskis take over that stuff goes out the window and we get an absurd demolition derby. The creepy sense of paranoia and unfolding peril that characterized earlier films in the series is dissipated. Neither suspense nor action film, nor a romance nor a horror flick “Invasion” cannot help but disappoint fans whose expectations are shaped by genre conventions.

Nor does “Invasion” work as a simple political allegory. Years ago a myth took shape within the critical community to the effect that Walter Wanger’s 1956 production of Jack Finney’s novel was an allegory that had something to do with either representing or condemning McCarthyism. That misperception is now cited as fact by major critics and even appears in texts used in film courses and is a reason why so many lefty critics hold the old film (which after all was just a poverty row B flick) in high regard. It affirms their bizarre understanding of mid-twentieth century American political culture.

But Wanger’s production was never any such thing. Wanger himself, as well as Don Siegel [the director], Dan Mainwaring [the screenwriter], and Kevin McCarthy [the star] as well as Jack Finney, who wrote the serialized novel on which the film was based, are all on record as saying that the whole allegory take on the film is nonsense. I might point out here that even those who believe it was an allegorical critique cannot agree on just what was being represented. To some it was a right wing warning about creeping communist subversion, to others it was a left-wing warning about creeping McCarthyism, to others it was more generalized expression of apprehension regarding conformity. This analytic confusion and repeated denials of their thesis did not, however, stop critics. For more than half a century they have continued to advance allegorical interpretations of “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” and its progeny. It was quite natural, therefore, that critics should try to see in this latest iteration a political allegory and that they should be disappointed to find it lacking.

There is far more to complain about in the film. Much of the editing is…, well, bizarre. There are gaping holes in the logic of the narrative. The acting is adequate, but hardly outstanding. There is really no character development.

Well then, just what is “Invasion” other than an ungodly mess?

It seems clear that the film, as originally conceived by Director Hirschbiegel and Dave Kajganich [who wrote the original screenplay], was intended as a vehicle in which to advance ideas. Only a few critics have recognized this and most of these have seen that as a defect, declaring the film to be “preachy” or too talky. They see the scenes devoted to advancing ideas as being simply an impediment to effective narrative. Only Manohla Dargis, writing in the New York Times, takes the ideas at the core of “Invasion” seriously and she proclaims them politically “abhorrent.” Well, just what are these ideas that so repulsed the critic at the Times?

“Invasion” is, at its core, a film about a trans-humanist, collectivist utopia. Throughout the first half of the film we are reminded time and again of the real, as opposed to fantasy, horrors infecting our world. The point is hammered home during a dinner conversation at which a Russian former communist recites a long list of atrocities and Nicole Kidman’s character replies that “postmodern feminism” might hold a cure for the world’s ills. The dinner’s hosts are a Czech couple who applaud Kidman’s solution and banter good-naturedly with the Russian guest, displaying the kind of genial discourse informed by mutual goodwill and respect – talking rather than fighting -- that sentimental lefties hold to be the solution to all manner of things. Later as the alien infection spreads and more people are assimilated into the collective mind the troubles of mankind begin to vanish. Warring nations make peace, genocidal policies are abandoned, statesmen come together to promote peace and prosperity for all the peoples of the world. The liberal Czech couple willingly, almost blissfully, accepts assimilation into the collective. It is for them the culmination of everything they hoped for all their lives.

And what does assimilation mean? It is the elimination of all normal human emotions – those pesky things that short-circuit our rational processes and cause us to behave badly. The collective is, in other words, an enlightened utopia, a realm of pure reason.

Of course there are some rough edges. Some people die during the transition, and there is a chilling disregard for human life – an obscene willingness of individuals to sacrifice their own lives for the good of the collective. This is made clear in one horrific scene that was featured in promotions for the film. Uninfected people can pass as members of the collective by suppressing all normal human emotions. At one point, while Nicole Kidman is attempting to pass, a couple stages a suicide, apparently with the purpose of stimulating an emotional response in spectators that would allow the aliens to identify non-infected people.

And then there is the problem of immunity. Some people are immune, and (in one of the film’s numerous coincidences) one of these turns out to be Nicole Kidman’s son, played by the terminally cute Jackson Bond. This fact sets up one of the main elements of the narrative – Kidman’s efforts to protect her son. Near the end of the film, when it seems that the aliens have won, it is revealed that they plan to eliminate all the immunes. At that point Kidman’s emotions kick into gear and she turns into a murder machine, ruthlessly gunning down the aliens who are threatening her son. In that moment Kidman (and all of humanity) stands revealed starkly as an unreasoning killer ape.

So there the essential dilemma is posed. The pod people represent collective peace and order and the triumph of reason, and opposed to this ideal is homicidal human individualism and emotionality. We can achieve a liberal utopia, but only at the cost of losing the things that make us human, and we can remain human only if we are willing to accept the horrific suffering that fallen estate entails. Ultimately the film comes down on the side of the killer apes, the aliens are defeated [too easily for many reviewers], and this choice is apparently what repelled Ms. Dargis. There are serious questions at issue here. The problem is that they are so ineptly presented that few viewers are even aware of them.

Don Siegel, director of the original “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” once said that the pod people were studio executives and others in the film industry who couldn’t comprehend art and interfered in its production. The latest version of Jack Finney’s story shows that they are still with us. Their smooth fingerprints are all over “Invasion.”

RELATED:

Several critics criticized "Invasion" for having a "happy" ending [humans win]. Behind this is a broad rejection of the kind of positive conclusion that once characterized American films. Over at Windmills of My Mind, Damian is doing a month-long survey of Stephen Spielberg's career [one that I highly recommend]. In his discussion of "Sugarland Express" he writes:

Throughout his career Spielberg would become known for traditional, Hollywood-style happy endings. Though sometimes his endings (particularly his more recent ones) are a bit more ambigious than he is given credit for, most people seem to agree that endings tend to give Spielberg some trouble. It is, of course, a legitimate criticism that Spielberg can oftentimes add a happy ending to a film that really doesn’t seem to deserve it. At the same time, however, it could be argued that Spielberg’s unabashedly hopeful outlook on life is merely at odds with a culture that’s growing increasingly more dissatisfied with happy endings in general. It seems pretty evident, to me at least, that our worldview as a whole is gradually becoming more pessimistic, cynical and nihilistic. Thus, when we look at the world and apparently see suffering without purpose, evil without consequence and death without meaning, we naturally look to the movies to confirm those ideas and a filmmaker like Spielberg, who is ultimately an optimist, simply rubs us the wrong way.

Read it here.

If by "us" Damien means the community of critics, he certainly has a point -- it most definitely is characterized by pessimism, cynicism and nihilism. I'm not so sure about the general population, however.

Lebanese Beach Babes -- There's More to Life than Politics

You gotta admire the Lebanese. When they want to party, they party, and nothing -- not assassinations, not terrorism, not even war -- gets in their way.

Here was the scene at Damour, a beach resort not far from Beirut.

Young Ukrainian models in flimsy lingerie spray champagne at a boisterous crowd of young Lebanese at a swanky beach resort south of Beirut -- barely a year after Israeli bombs were falling nearby.

Drinks in hand, shapely women in skimpy bikinis dance to the latest club song with men smoking Cuban cigars, underlining the image of a wealthy hedonist minority seizing any chance to escape their country's political crisis and uncertain future.

...

Young Lebanese were... adamant about making the most of their summer despite a brewing crisis over presidential polls.

"We're worried about the presidential elections, but we're not going to stop living until politicians agree on something," said Mark Khoury, 26, lounging near the poolside bar.

Sounds perfectly sensible to me. Way to go Mark!

Read the whole thing here.

The Cruelty of Environmentalism

Remember those poor Romanian villagers exploited by Sasha Baron Cohen in "Borat"? Of course you do! Their condition was pitiful. Well, a similar Romanian village lies close to a rich vein of gold and has plans to mine it. But rich environmental wackos like George Soros and Vanessa Redgrave are trying to block the mining development on the grounds that it might damage local ecosystems.

John Fund has the story here.

Two films have been made on the situation. One supports Soros, the other the villagers. Guess which film will be shown on PBS?

War And Peace

Today there were two must-read articles available on the Web. The first is by Victor Davis Hanson on the subject of “Why Study War?” A few excerpts:

A wartime public illiterate about the conflicts of the past can easily find itself paralyzed in the acrimony of the present. Without standards of historical comparison, it will prove ill equipped to make informed judgments. Neither our politicians nor most of our citizens seem to recall the incompetence and terrible decisions that, in December 1777, December 1941, and November 1950, led to massive American casualties and, for a time, public despair. So it’s no surprise that today so many seem to think that the violence in Iraq is unprecedented in our history.

….

Military history teaches us, contrary to popular belief these days, that wars aren’t necessarily the most costly of human calamities. The first Gulf War took few lives in getting Saddam out of Kuwait; doing nothing in Rwanda allowed savage gangs and militias to murder hundreds of thousands with impunity. Hitler, Mao, Pol Pot, and Stalin killed far more off the battlefield than on it. The 1918 Spanish flu epidemic brought down more people than World War I did. And more Americans—over 3.2 million—lost their lives driving over the last 90 years than died in combat in this nation’s 231-year history…. [M]ilitary history also reminds us that war sometimes has an eerie utility: as British strategist Basil H. Liddell Hart put it, “War is always a matter of doing evil in the hope that good may come of it.” Wars—or threats of wars—put an end to chattel slavery, Nazism, fascism, Japanese militarism, and Soviet Communism.

….

[B]y ignoring history, the modern age is free to interpret war as a failure of communication, of diplomacy, of talking—as if aggressors don’t know exactly what they’re doing…. For a therapeutically inclined generation raised on Oprah and Dr. Phil—and not on the letters of William Tecumseh Sherman and William Shirer’s Berlin Diary—problems between states, like those in our personal lives, should be argued about by equally civilized and peaceful rivals, and so solved without resorting to violence.

Yet it’s hard to find many wars that result from miscommunication. Far more often they break out because of malevolent intent and the absence of deterrence.

….

Military history reminds us of important anomalies and paradoxes…. The 2003 removal of Saddam refuted doom-and-gloom critics who predicted thousands of deaths and millions of refugees, just as the subsequent messy four-year reconstruction hasn’t evolved as anticipated into a quiet, stable democracy—to say the least.

There is more, much more. Read it here.

Then turn your attention to Bruce Bawer’s article on “The Peace Racket”. He writes:

We need to make two points about this movement at the outset. First, it’s opposed to every value that the West stands for—liberty, free markets, individualism—and it despises America, the supreme symbol and defender of those values. Second, we’re talking not about a bunch of naive Quakers but about a movement of savvy, ambitious professionals that is already comfortably ensconced at the United Nations, in the European Union, and in many nongovernmental organizations. It is also waging an aggressive, under-the-media-radar campaign for a cabinet-level Peace Department in the United States.

And what does this peace movement stand for?

First and foremost, they emphasize that the world’s great evil is capitalism—because it leads to imperialism, which in turn leads to war…. Students acquire a zero-sum picture of the world economy: if some countries and people are poor, it’s because others are rich. They’re taught that American wealth derives entirely from exploitation and that Americans, accordingly, are responsible for world poverty.

….

Peace studies students also discover how to think in terms of “deep culture.” How to prevent war between, say, the U.S. and Saddam’s Iraq? Answer: examine each country’s deep culture—its key psychosocial traits, good and bad—to understand its motives. Americans, according to this bestiary, are warlike and money-obsessed; Iraqis are intensely religious and proud. Not surprisingly, the Peace Racket’s summations of deep cultures skew against the West. The deep-culture approach also avoids calling tyrants or terrorists “evil”—for behind every atrocity, in this view, lies a legitimate grievance, which the peacemaker should locate so that all parties can meet at the negotiating table as moral equals.

….

The Peace Racket maintains that the Western world’s profound moral culpability, arising from its history of colonialism and economic exploitation, deprives it of any right to judge non-Western countries or individuals. Further, the non-West has suffered so much from exploitation that whatever offenses it commits are legitimate attempts to recapture dignity, obtain justice, and exact revenge.

And so it goes…, and so it goes.

Read the whole indictment here.

An ignorant public unable to place things in a realistic historical context, rampant anti-Americanism in our educational institutions..., nothing to worry about, or is it?

Gingrich Starts to Get It

I have often argued that it would be a good thing to have Newt Gingrich running for President, not because he has a chance of winning (he doesn't) or because he would make a good chief executive (he wouldn't), but because he has a quick and agile mind that would add interesting perspectives to the deadly, dreary dialogue that passes for debate in presidential campaigns.

Here's an example:

Writing in NRO Newt notes:

There is a war here at home, and it is even more deadly than the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Far more Americans are being killed by violent, evil people here in America than in our official military “combat zones” overseas.

He's absolutely right. Restoring law and order and safety to the streets of American communities should be the overriding issue in the upcoming campaign, and I suspect it will be.

But here Newt's imagination fails him. He tries to tie the issue of domestic criminality specifically to immigration.

Americans are killed by violent criminals all too often, of course. But the senselessness and tragedy of these killings [in Newark] and too many others is that they were completely preventable. Their perpetrators were men who should not have been in the United States to begin with and, after multiple previous arrests, shouldn’t have been on the streets. Instead, they should have been in jail awaiting trial, sentencing, prison, and eventual deportation.

Read the whole thing here.

Newt's argument is good as far as it goes, but it attacks the mote and not the beam. Illegal immigration is not the main source of domestic disorder; it is simply a symptom of a much larger problem -- domestic disorder.

Illegal immigration, to be sure, is a major problem for America, but to conceive of the problem as being specific to the immigrants is to define it too narrowly. The crisis affecting America is the local breakdown of civil order -- the presence in our communities of a significant number of people who refuse to live orderly lives and who a threat to the rest of us. We cannot ignore the fact that violent crime is disproportionately committed not by immigrants, but by people born and raised in our country. Focusing on immigration diverts us from this larger problem.

I suspect, and have long argued, that the overriding issue for 2008 is going to be law and order. The problems associated with illegal immigration are simply a sub-set of that issue. This obviously plays to Rudy's strengths and I am not surprised that his opponents are soft-pedaling the issue and trying to divert it into side channels like immigration, but that won't work for long. The Giuliani campaign recently has shown signs of developing a comprehensive approach to a wide range of issues, tying them all to a restoration of order. That, I predict, is a winning approach -- one that can propel hizzoner into the Oval Office.

Mental

David Freddoso says it well, "You can't spell environmentalist without 'mental'".

Check the loons out here.

The Hooded Man and the Claw

Errol Morris, famed lefty documentarian, has a piece in the NYT Magazine on the fraud perpetrated by one of the Abu Ghraib prisoners, various human rights organizations, and the MSM.

The most famous of the incriminating photographs taken at Abu Ghraib showed a hooded man wired for electric shock torture. The picture gained in value to anti-war forces because a man stepped forward saying that he was the victim under the hood and telling horrible details about his torture and dehumanization. One of the most terrifying details was his nickname, "Clawman", given him because of the mutilation of his hand under interrogation.

Morris notes that none of the photos attached to the story actually showed the mutilated hand, leaving the details to the imagination of the viewer [a magnificently effective expository device] and further discloses that the purported victim was a fraud. The real man under the hood could not be found and thus had no story of horrors to tell. Human rights activists and anti-war journalists needed a story to go with the picture, so when "clawman" stepped forward with his fraudulent account he was welcomed unquestioningly.

In short -- the MSM, the human rights and anti-American activists, and hostile governments accepted and celebrated the pictures because they conformed to the narrative they wanted to tell. They saw what they wanted to see.

Morris is not saying that terrible things did not take place at Abu Ghraib, only that the account spread around the world was falsely over-dramatized for maximum effect. What is disturbing is how avidly and uncritically journalistic and political organizations in this country seized on and publicized the embellishments.

Read the whole thing here.

Words Fail Me

AP reports:

LUSAKA, Zambia - Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe received the loudest cheers Thursday at the start of a southern African summit where his country's economic and political turmoil top the agenda.

Many in the West blame Mugabe's policies for the severe inflation and acute shortages that have crippled his country, once a regional breadbasket. But the dignitaries' reaction as Mugabe was introduced appeared to reflect the opinion that the longtime ruler has been unfairly targeted — or at least a hesitation to criticize a fellow leader many revere as an anti-colonialist hero.

Read it here.

Such is the poison that anti-colonialism has engendered. And who pays? The people of Zimbabwe, that's who.

Faugh!

From the Telegraph:

Cannibal tribe apologises for eating Methodists

A tribe in Papua New Guinea has apologised for killing and eating four 19th century missionaries under the command of a doughty British clergyman.

The four Fijian missionaries were on a proselytising mission on the island of New Britain when they were massacred by Tolai tribesmen in 1878.

They were murdered on the orders of a local warrior chief, Taleli, and were then cooked and eaten.

The Fijians - a minister and three teachers - were under the leadership of the Reverend George Brown, an adventurous Wesleyan missionary who was born in Durham but spent most of his life spreading the word of God in the South Seas.

Read the whole thing here.

No mention of reparations though.

Iraqis Above All

Iraqpundit asks why we haven't heard about this from the MSM?

"The political values of Iraqis are increasingly secular and nationalistic, according to a series of surveys of nationally representative samples of the population from December 2004-March 2007." According to the study, "only 18 percent of those surveyed in October 2006 thought that having an Islamic government where religious authorities have absolute power is 'very good,' compared with 26 percent surveyed in December 2004."

[T]he surveys show a decline in popular support for religious government in Iraq and an increase in support for secular political rule." Note that support among Iraqis for a religious state, now declining, was never very great to begin with.

"54 percent of Iraqis surveyed described themselves as 'Iraqis, above all,' (as opposed to 'Muslims, above all' or 'Arabs, above all') compared with just 28 percent who described themselves that way in April 2006. Three-quarters of Iraqis living in Baghdad said they thought of themselves in terms of their national identity, as Iraqis above all. 'This is a much higher proportion than we found in other Middle Eastern capitals...."

Read the whole thing here.

The answer to the question is obvious. The MSM has settled on a narrative, one that suits the agenda of leading Democrat politicians. It holds that the religious antagonisms in Iraq are so deeply seated in their culture and so widespread that any attempt to create a unified democratic polity must fail. The Iraqis are not, they argue, ready for democracy and won't be for a long, long time. Any attempt to impose it would produce civil war, regional destabilization and widespread religious conflict, and so the only thing for us to do is to retreat and allow the region to stew in its own medieval juices.

Evidence to the contrary, such as is reported by this survey, is either discredited or ignored. It just doesn't fit the narrative.

But the narrative seems to be changing. People are waking to the fact that there is no civil war, that the war on terrorism is not lost, and that the outcome of the Iraq intervention is still undecided.

Peters Loves Petraeus

Ralph Peters is one of the few commentators who is willing to place blame for military ineffectiveness on top military commanders, where it belongs. This has not endeared him to Pentagon bureaucrats who reflexively blame civilian authorities for their own screwups. Peters may be contemptuous of the beltway denizens, but he has tremendous admiration for soldiers who can actually fight.

He notes that al Qaeda shows every evidence of desperation. The recent round of bombings were directed not against Muslims [that has been counter-productive] but against religious minorities. The purpose of earlier bombings was an attempt to create a religious civil war in Iraq. That failed. Now the purpose of the bombings is..., well, let Peters say it himself:

al Qaeda needs to portray Iraq as a continuing failure of U.S. policy. Those dead and maimed Yazidis were just props: The intended audience was Congress.

Al Qaeda has been badly battered. It's lost top leaders and thousands of cadres. Even more painful for the Islamists, they've lost ground among the people of Iraq, including former allies. Iraqis got a good taste of al Qaeda. Now they're spitting it out.

The foreign terrorists slaughtering the innocent recognize that their only remaining hope of pulling off a come-from-way-behind win is to convince your senator and your congressman or -woman that it's politically expedient to hand a default victory to a defeated al Qaeda.

Expect more attempts to generate massive bloodshed in Iraq in the coming weeks. The terrorists are well aware of the exaggerated-by-all-parties importance of Gen. David Petraeus' Sept. 15 progress report to Congress. They'll do all they can to embarrass the general and provide ammunition to the surrender caucus.

And why is al Qaeda in such desperate straits?

Petraeus!

How has Petraeus changed the outlook so swiftly? Numerous factors are in play, but two of his personal characteristics have helped keep him from making a single wrong move thus far.

* First, Petraeus is relentless. The result is that, for the first time, our military approach has become relentless, too.

In the past, we followed up military wins by stepping back and hoping that the reduction of Fallujah or the latest shoot-'em-up with Muqtada al-Sadr's thugs would prove decisive. We were wrong every time - all our forbearance achieved was to give our enemies time to recover.

Petraeus changed the rules, and God bless him for it. He may have a high-school-prom smile for the media, but the general's a clinch fighter who ignores the bell - and who isn't above landing a blow when the ref ain't looking. It's exactly the approach we've needed.

* The second quality is his leadership style. Micro-managers lose control in war. While Petraeus is interested in every detail and spends plenty of time on the ground with tactical commanders, he assigns missions, gives the essential guidance - then trusts subordinates to do their jobs.

Previous U.S. commanders worried about the wrong things, and they worried all the time. Petraeus is concerned about the one thing that matters: Winning.

He's that rarer-than-a-unicorn beast, a full general capable of learning. Petraeus hasn't "defended his dissertation" in the face of contrary facts. The politically correct counterinsurgency manual he produced before taking up this assignment delighted the left-of-center think-tank crowd - but they must be very disappointed today. Once in command in Iraq, Petraeus kept the doctrinal bits that worked, but dumped the baloney.

Wow! And how did you like that tongue-bath General? Want some more? OK!

He's doing what it really takes: Fighting. Our troops are killing those who need killing; tens of thousands of terrorists, insurgents and militiamen are in lockup, with more coming in every day. And any member of the NYPD can tell you that taking murderers off the streets works.

Note the NYPD reference, it's important.

Col. Peters' article is symptomatic of something very real and very powerful. There is a growing hunger in this country for a take-charge, no-nonsense, law and order guy like Gen. Petraeus.

Gee, I wonder which candidate might have credentials in that area?

Lemme think..., hmmm..., Oh Yeah!

Rudy!

I don't usually agree with Col. Peters, but this time I think he's on to something.

Oops! Climate Models Incomplete

Remember all those climate models used to forecast future climate change -- the ones predicting catastrophe in the near or far future? Of course you do. They claimed to be authoritative and complete and and adequate basis on which to institute radical policy changes that would affect the lives of everyone.

Well, as it turns out, they were missing a big hunk of information. Specifically they did not take into account one of the major elements of the ocean circulation system that drives global climate change.

New research shows that a current sweeping past Australia's southern island of Tasmania toward the South Atlantic is a previously undetected part of the world climate system's engine-room, said scientist Ken Ridgway.

The Southern Ocean, which swirls around Antarctica, has been identified in recent years as the main lung of global climate, absorbing a third of all carbon dioxide taken in by the world's oceans.

Read about it here.

Once again the "settled science" turns out to be a lot less settled than the Gorey Gang pretends it is. All the more reason to tread hesitantly when addressing questions of environmental policy.

They're Everywhere, They're Everywere!

Scientologists, that is.

Cracked.com has a list of secret Scientologist celebrities here.

While you are there check out their list of celebrities who are secretly straight. You know what I mean, celebrities who seem to be gay, but aren't.

Petraeus on Troop Levels

Remember Bush's statements to the effect that as the situation improves in Iraq, we will draw down. Well, it wasn't just rhetoric.

AP reports:

BAGHDAD - The top American commander in Iraq said Wednesday he was preparing recommendations on troop cuts before he returns to Washington next month for a report to Congress, and believes the U.S. footprint in Iraq will have to be "a good bit smaller" by next summer.

But he cautioned against a quick or significant U.S. withdrawal that could surrender "the gains we have fought so hard to achieve."

Read it here.

Patience, patience.

Back to Tora Bora

The troops are surging in Afghanistan, too.

Hundreds of US-led troops have launched an offensive against al Qaida and Taliban militants in eastern Afghanistan, while a bomb attack near the capital killed three German nationals, officials said.

The offensive involving ground troops and airstrikes in the Tora Bora region of eastern Nangarhar province is targeting "hundreds of foreign fighters" who are using dug-in fighting positions, said coalition spokeswoman Capt Vanessa Bowman.

The remote mountainous area bordering Pakistan was heavily bombarded in late 2001 by US troops hunting Osama bin Laden and his associates following the September 11 attacks in America. Bin Laden is believed to have escaped that assault.

"This region has provided an ideal environment to conceal enemy support bases and training sites, as well as plan and launch attacks aimed at terrorising innocent civilians, both inside and outside the region," Bowman said in a statement released by the Pentagon.

There were no immediate reports of casualties among militants or US and Afghan troops.

Read it here.

The first battle of Tora Bora failed because Bin Laden was able to bribe his way through local forces we had previously bribed. We won't make that mistake again.

And, note this from Strategy Page:

August 14, 2007: China and Pakistan has signed a formal agreement covering security arrangements for the 4,000 Chinese citizens working in Pakistan. What this has done is make China a major player in the war against al Qaeda inside Pakistan.

Read it here.

The major contribution here is that we and Pakistan will have access to China's rather formidable intelligence capabilities in the region.

The noose..., she be tightening. Pakistan, even the tribal areas, will not be a safe haven much longer for al Qaeda. Unfortunately, the Pakistani military seems to have leaked the targets of the combined offensive to radicals who have vacated the camps under attack. We won't get to kill the radicals, but it will be very hard for them to return to what heretofore was a protected area.

Keeping them running....

Cool It!

Town Hall reprints an interview with Bjorn Lomborg, the "Skeptical Environmentalist". Lots of good sense here.

Read it here.

Meanwhile in Ramadi

The L.A. Times [immediately below] is no fan of the administration and just a few months ago was portraying the Iraq campaign as a total debacle. Their willingness to abandon, even partially, their ideological blinkers is a good indication that things are going rather well in Mesopotamia. More important, though, is this remarkable article that appeared in the violently anti-American Der Spiegel.

Describing the situation in Ramadi, formerly a major battle zone, Der Spiegel writes:

Ramadi is an irritating contradiction of almost everything the world thinks it knows about Iraq -- it is proof that the US military is more successful than the world wants to believe. Ramadi demonstrates that large parts of Iraq -- not just Anbar Province, but also many other rural areas along the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers -- are essentially pacified today. This is news the world doesn't hear: Ramadi, long a hotbed of unrest, a city that once formed the southwestern tip of the notorious "Sunni Triangle," is now telling a different story, a story of Americans who came here as liberators, became hated occupiers and are now the protectors of Iraqi reconstruction.

Even more striking is the description of how ordinary Iraqis react to the presence of American troops.

The square in front of the mosque, a trash-covered wasteland between ruined rows of houses, fills up with people at the end of Friday prayers. Children hang on the American soldiers like grapes on a vine, plucking at their trousers, vying for their attention, for a glance, a piece of candy, a dollar, gazing up at the big foreigners as if they were gods.

The Americans run into acquaintances in the crowd. After being stationed in the city for 10 months, they have become a familiar sight. Bearded men greet the soldiers with hugs and kisses, and passersby hand them cold cans of lemonade. "Thank you, Mister," "Hello, Mister," "How are you, Mister?" they say. They talk about paint for schools and soccer jerseys, and they invite the Americans over for lunch. The Iraqis pose for photos with them, making "V's" for "victory" with their fingers.

And perhaps most significantly the emergence of indigenous Iraqi heroes:

Every child in the city knows the story of how, on May 16, 2007, terrorists attempted to stage a massive attack. Using four car bombs, they first blew up two bridges across the Tigris River in the city's northwest. A short time later, three other car bombs exploded in front of the headquarters of the district police. They, too, were packed with explosives, ripping craters into the ground the size of swimming pools. An eighth bomb struck a police station in the southeast. The attackers followed each of the bombings with an assault with rockets, machine guns and Kalashnikovs. It was clear, on that May 15, that the terrorists were intent on scoring a major coup. But they failed, and in doing so they lost their war.

The Iraqi police officers and soldiers, who until then had not been expected to perform well in combat, threw themselves into battle. Even the wounded refused to be carried off the battlefield, continuing to fight as best they could. Heroes were born on that day in May, the kind of heroes that the entire country sorely needs -- not Sunni, not Shiite, not Kurdish or Assyrian or Turkmen heroes, but Iraqi heroes.

Read the whole thing here.

The NYT and leading Democrats are hedging their bets on the war. The LA Times sees hope. Now, in the most rabidly anti-Bush nation in the world, Germany [see David's Medienkritik on their hatred for America here], a leading journalistic outlet is willing to portray the American intervention positively [although getting in some Bush bashing as it does so]. A significant turning point has been reached in both national and world opinion.

Baqubah -- A Work In Progress

From the L.A. Times:

[Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister] Salih told reporters he was encouraged by what he saw in Baqubah, the provincial capital: streets full of shoppers, produce and sodas for sale in the market, and men with graying beards smoking cigarettes and sipping tea at a cafe.

A month ago, he said, the governor dared not leave his home for fear of militants who for more than a year had imposed a reign of terror in the city. "Today, we could see life returning to Baqubah," he said.

As he spoke, gunfire erupted nearby as U.S. forces guarding the meeting took aim at a sniper who had fired at them.

"This is a work in progress, apparently," Salih acknowledged with a shrug and a smile.

Indeed it is.

Read the whole thing here.

Wehner on Rove

Democrat spinmeisters and liberal journalists are all over the tube today explaining that Karl Rove's legacy was extreme partisanship. In liberal myth Rove initiated the "51% principle" that held that in a divided electorate it was useless to try to build up a large majority by attracting moderates and independents. Instead you should try only for a tiny working majority. The formula for winning that narrow majority supposedly was to divide the country, fire up your base with extreme rhetoric, and ignore the moderates.

This, of course, is nonsense on stilts. As I have pointed out time and again Bush has been a uniter, not a divider, consistently reaching across the aisle to secure important legislation, on taxes, on health care, on education, on foreign affairs. He has been so non-partisan that he has earned the enmity of the Republican "base." It is the Democrats who have behaved despicably to divide the nation in wartime. Now Peter Wehner chimes in. Pointing to Bush's historic win in 2004, a win largely engineered by Rove, he writes:

Not only did the President win, he increased his support among women, Hispanics, Jewish voters, Catholics, African Americans, Asian Americans, union households, suburban voters, moderates, independents, big city residents, and small city residents (so much for the myth of the "base-only" strategy).

Read the whole thing here.

Indeed!

Yon on Political Progress

Michael Yon comments on the current Democrat charge that, while military gains might be taking place in Iraq, there has been little or no political progress.

Here's the key graf:

There may be little progress on political goals crafted in America, to meet American concerns, by politicians who have a cushion of 200 years of democracy. Washington might as well be on the moon. Iraqis don’t respond well to rules imposed from outside their acknowledged authorities, though I have many times seen Iraqi Police and Army of all ranks responding very well to American Marines and soldiers who they have come to respect, and in many cases actually admire and try to emulate. Our military has increasing moral authority in Iraq, but the same cannot be said for our government at home. In fact, it’s in moral deficit because many Iraqis are increasingly frightened we will abandon them to genocide. The Iraqis I speak with couldn’t care less what is said from Washington but large numbers of them pay close attention to what some Marine Gunny says, or what American battalion commanders all over Iraq say. Some of our commanders could probably run for local offices in Iraq, and win. To say there has been no political progress in Iraq in 2007 is patently absurd, completely wrong and dangerously dismissive of the significant changes and improvements happening all across Iraq. Whether or not Americans are seeing it on the nightly news or reading it in their local papers, Iraqis are actively writing their children’s history.

Read the whole thing here.

It's not just in Iraq that the Beltway crows seems to be a bunch of clowns -- a lot of people here in America are coming to the same conclusion.

Huckabee Breaks Out

Lots of people are phoo-phooing the Iowa straw poll, but it has changed the dynamics of the Republican race in one important respect. National attention is now focused for the first time on Gov. Mike Huckabee from Arkansas.

Before Ames Huckabee had impressed a few pundits for his performance in debates but was generally ignored. Only Newt Gingrich seemed to be taking him seriously. Now, at least for a few days, he's all over the place, and he is impressing people.

Last night driving down Rte 83 we listened to the Gov. being interviewed on a New York station by a Democrat talk show host. He was intelligent, charming, witty, and informed. I was impressed.

More importantly, so was "She Who Must Not Be Named." I'm not a Republican nor am I a consistent conservative, but "She" is both. Huckabee made her laugh. "I like this guy", she said. "So do I" I replied.

"She" continued, noting just how sensible he sounded and was obviously interested because she kept asking me questions about his background, his weight loss, etc.

That's impressive. If Mick Huckabee can get her interested in his candidacy he has accomplished something that few other politicians have done.

He's a guy to watch.

Rove Resigns

Karl Rove has announced his resignation and the commentary, most of it partisan hackery, is flowing fast. I suspect that once that dies down an appreciation of Rove's true importance will emerge. Teamed with George W. Bush he won five successive historic elections -- two in Texas three at the national level. This string of unbroken Republican success so frustrated Democrats that they reverted to the most dishonest, nastiest, and most divisive political campaign since the Nixon era. Their main target was Rove whom they sought to destroy. Even so they were only able to eke out a marginal win in an off-year election and now Rove's harshest and most duplicitous critics have been disgraced.

And there was more than partisanship involved. Bush and Rove were always willing to reach across the aisle to achieve important reforms in education, in health care, in foreign affairs and elsewhere. Bush/Rove always swung for the fences and for six years they connected by building ties to reform-minded Democrats and moderates. The nation and the world have been transformed for the better by what they accomplished.

It was not until Democrats lost their third successive election to Bush and Rove in 2004 that the bipartisan record of achievement came to an end on the issue of social security reform. That was not Rove's fault. Democrat strategists felt that mindless obstructionism was their best chance to cripple the administration and to regain control of Congress. They were right, but the sheer duplicity and viciousness of their campaign may have permanently damaged American political culture.

Even in the face of Democrat obstructionism and destructive partisanship, Bush has been broadly successful. His domestic agenda may have stalled, but his foreign affairs record is one of the most significant in history. What is more things are turning his way. France and Germany, once his strongest opponents, are now governed by friends of Bush. Democrat attempts to cripple the war effort have come to naught. Global prosperity is accelerating. Real progress is being made in Iraq as the American military learns to fight and win a new kind of war. Relations with Asian powers have never in our history been better than now, and it is there, not in old Europe, that the mainstream of the future lies.

I think when all is said and done, when all the achievements are appreciated, Karl Rove will be seen as the most important political operative since his idol, Mark Hanna. I think he would be happy to be remembered as such.

Lies of the Left -- The Heroic Che

No revolutionary figure has achieved greater popular acceptance in American pop culture than Che Guevara. Ilya Somin reveals just what kind of monster this hero of the Left really was:

The truth... is that Che was no less a brutal killer than other communist leaders. If he failed to rise to the same "heights" as Lenin or Mao, it was largely for lack of opportunity.

....

1. Che was responsible for the execution of thousands of political prisoners in Cuba (most of them purely for their opposition to Castro's communist policies or for no reason at all).

2. Che enjoyed torturing and abusing the prisoners, including children.

3. Che was instrumental in setting up the Castro regime's massive forced labor camps and secret police apparatus.

4. Che tried to organize campaigns of terrorism against civilians in the US and elsewhere (though he largely failed in these efforts).

5. Far from being merely a Third World nationalist or pragmatic leftist, he was a committed, hard-line Stalinist, even going so far as to call himself "Stalin II" early in his career.

However, as Vargas Llosa points out in this New Republic article, Che was no uncritical admirer of the Soviet Union. To the contrary, he thought the Soviets had not taken communist totalitarianism far enough. In his travels through the Soviet bloc, Che was, by his own account, most impressed with North Korea - not coincidentally also the most oppressively totalitarian of all communist states at the time. Later, as Vargas notes, he criticized the Soviets for giving the private sector too much scope, and for their unwillingness to take even greater risks of touching off a nuclear war during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Yep, folks. You don't get much closer to pure evil than Che, and he's the guy the Left loves to portray as their symbol.

Fukuyama's Future

Frank Fukuyama weighs in on globalization. His point is fairly simple.

Globalization, he argues, is generally beneficial to all participating societies, and one of the benefits is that it requires that participants play by the rules of modern corporate culture. These rules, if adhered to, generate a functional level of trust that replaces other, more limited, traditional repositories of trust such as familialism, tribalism, racial and religious solidarity, and nationalism.

Basically he is offering a critique of and alternative to the "clash of cultures" paradigm that has dominated much commentary and analysis on the contemporary Muslim world.

Read the whole thing here.

Somehow Fukuyama's corporate utopia reminds me of William Gibson's nightmare future. There are times when Frank scares me.

Interesting If True

Why haven't we heard about this before?

In this amazing footage that aired on Iraqi TV in August 2005, Iraqi terrorist Ramzi Hashem Abed sang like a bird after being arrested for terrorist activity explaining his mission with al-Zarqawi, former head of al-Qaeda in Iraq, as part of Osama bin Laden’s terror network. He said that bin Laden’s al-Qaeda had been training in Fallujah….. UNDER SADDAM HUSSEIN’S REGIME…. until they were chased out through Mosul by U.S. forces. He then described them as “scattered”.

Read the whole thing here.

Straining for Significance

There has been a lot of discussion in the MSM about the "astonishing", "unexpected", and "surprising" characteristics of two hominid skulls, one representing "homo erectus", the other "homo habilis", both approximately one and a half million years old and both from the same region of Africa. [here]

Results of analysis carried out on the skulls, according to the media accounts, rewrites the early history of human evolution, showing that different human species coexisted. John Hawks, who is a real paleoanthropologist, isn't buying that story line, arguing that, once again, the journalists have got the story wrong. Specialists, and competent journalists, have long known that human species coexisted. That "scientific consensus" had recently been called into question by a redating of levels in which the African fossils had been found, but finding a very late homo habilis seems to re-establish that consensus. There is, however some question as to whether it really is homo habilis.

Clearly the journalists don't understand the field they are covering, but it is also clear that they are relying upon quotes from scientists who are stretching for significance. The team that conducted the analysis made several questionable statements regarding the nature of homo erectus and the "Asian" characteristics of one of the African skulls. Hawks comments on these too.

Read Hawks commentary here.

What to make of all this?

Simple!

Don't believe what you read in the MSM. Go to the blogosphere if you want the straight stuff -- expert analysis from specialists in the field.

The Full Orwell -- Faking and Misreporting Environmental News

So 1998 is no longer the hottest year on record. 1934 is.

What is more:

Four of the top 10 years of US CONUS high temperature deviations are now from the 1930s: 1934, 1931, 1938 and 1939, while only 3 of the top 10 are from the last 10 years (1998, 2006, 1999). Several years (2000, 2002, 2003, 2004) fell well down the leaderboard, behind even 1900.

Interesting. The Gore gang has long been claiming, based on NASA's figures, that nine of the ten hottest years ever recorded had occurred since 1995. Well, it isn't true.

What is more interesting is how NASA handled the news. The original, inaccurate figures were heavily publicized because they seemed to confirm the claim of the global warming extremists. Those figures stood unchallenged until a blogger pointed out inconsistencies in them, whereupon a recalculation was done. NASA still refuses to reveal just how the calculations were originally made made and how they were recalculated. What is more the new data were issued without comment or publicity. It was bloggers who noted the change and brought it to public attention.

The question now is whether this reveals simply more incompetence on the part of already troubled NASA, or were individuals there pursuing an ideological agenda.

Additionally, this shows the blogosphere at its best -- relentlessly checking and rechecking the information presented to the public by activists, agencies, and a corrupt MSM.

Read about it here.

And then there's this from the American Thinker:

The global warming crowd does not take kindly to being contradicted, either by critics or data. Of course, critics can be defamed and data can be skewed. But unless the critics can be silenced, they can fight back and expose phony data. When it begins to look like predictions of doom are not turning out sufficiently catastrophic, a full Orwell is called for. The media mobilize their templates to completely re-cast the information.

This process was fully in evidence yesterday when the global news service Reuters spun a report in Science magazine (which has been quietly starting to warn its readership that maybe it would be prudent to come in a bit from the end of the global warming limb) as if it confirmed the seriousness of global warning, when in fact the report contained devastating information of flaws in the doomsters methodology and warned that the disaster has been postponed.

"Global warming will step up after 2009: scientists."

That's the Reuters headline on an article in this week's Science magazine. But the Science article itself is an artful retreat from previous, over-confident global warming predictions.

Read the whole thing here.

What is most disturbing is the revelation that heretofore none, I repeat "none", of the climate models upon which global warming predictions have been based have attempted to factor "natural variation" into their calculations. That is an amazing admission, one that invalidates every prediction they have made to date.

Iraq In the Balance

RhusLancia over at Iraqi Bloggers Central has a couple of good questions for those who feel that the only solution to the problems in Iraq is to put a strong man in place. He asks:

Why are so many people so quick to take democracy off the table? The democratic movement in Iraq is faltering, to be sure, but it has not yet collapsed.

Are critics willing to accept the measures necessary to establish the strong man's rule and to keep it in place. There will be mass brutality and suffering, perhaps genocidal policies, certainly the suppression of minorities.

Unfortunately, for many critics of the war no price is too high to pay for disengagement. That is because they think that the Iraqis are the only ones who will bear the burden of withdrawal.

Fools!

Read the piece here.

Chickenhawks

Instapundit points out that the New Republic has unintentionally discredited the charge of "chickenhawk" leveled against many supporters of the Iraq campaign.

It should be an obvious point that in democracies, elected governments decide on policy and armed forces implement it. If you believe that armed forces should be doing the deciding--whether because of their greater expertise, or the moral superiority that comes from their greater willingness to sacrifice--then you are not a democrat (small d), but a militarist. In democracies, elected governments can certainly let their armed forces down. They can do so, for instance, by giving them a job and then failing to provide them with sufficient resources to accomplish it, as many argue the Bush administration has done in Iraq. But elected governments -- and last I heard, our own included something called the "legislative branch" -- cannot by definition let the troops down by debating policy, or changing it. This is the government's job. It can do it unwisely, but the fact remains that the troops' own job is simply to carry the policy out, however misguided it may be.

Read it here.

I have been arguing this for a long time.

On the one side I have argued that the proper role of the armed services is to serve, not to initiate or direct policy. The opinions of military men and women should be respected, but not deferred to. It is the same with the civilian agencies, and that includes the intelligence services. All too often bureaucrats [or "professionals" as they style themselves] take it upon themselves to attempt to shape policy and in doing so engage in dubious, illegal, even traitorous, acts.

And of course the converse is also true. In our democratic political system policy decisions are legitimately made by elected officials or their representatives. No other credential is valid.

Winning Through Conservation is Nuts: Steyn Explains

There is a popular idea going around that we can defund Middle East terrorists and their sponsors by cutting back on petroleum usage in the U.S. This is nonsense on stilts. Mark Steyn explains:

[T]he premise is completely false: If you trade in the Expedition for a Honda Civic, that oil you save won't stay in the ground and thus impoverish the Saudis; it will merely be sold to the Chinese and Indians and other fast developing nations who will replace America and Europe as buyers of the cheapest and most easily extractable oil in the world. So the sheikhs will be as rich as ever and funding as many Islamist nutters. But we'll be driving worse cars and feeling virtuous.

Read it here.

And responding to the objection that any reduction in demand will hurt the Saudis, he writes:

Two points. First: American demand would have to fall precipitously to put a dent in the rise in global demand due to Asian industrialization. In 1990 China consumed 2.4 million bpd. Fifteen years later, it was 7 million bpd.

Second: Saudi oil is cheaply extractable oil. That's why King Abdullah gets the romantic hand-holding Presidential photo ops at Crawford and the Premier of Alberta doesn't. A reduction in global demand would hurt Canadians and other non-jihadist producers long before it hurts the Saudis.

Bottom line: Until we are in the post-oil era, the Saudis will always be oil-rich.

In short:

[T]he idea that we win the war with a passenger rail network is nuts.

That's the way it is with most activist messages. They are so narrowly focused that they fail to consider the broader context of the programs and policies they advocate. The activist world view is simplistic and irresponsible, fueled by outrage and a sense of exclusion; that is why it proves to be so appealing to adolescents and academics.

Read the response here.

Shoeless

Wow!

An amazing fall at the x-games, and he walked away from it.



Check it out.

WBAL Blows It

Last year WBAL made a disastrous decision to drop Rush Limbaugh from its schedule. The result-- listeners flocked to rival stations, especially WCBM 680 which has seen a significant ratings boost. Once the undisputed leader in the Baltimore market WBAL, in the latest ratings,
dropped all the way to sixth.

Granted, dropping Rush was not the only problem at WBAL. They also lost the right to broadcast Orioles baseball. But their research had told them that there was a demand for local programming and so they switched to local hosts who talk incessantly about what is going on with city council, the county commissioners, the mayor's office, etc. You can only take so much of that stuff, especially the whining about electric rates. One of those hosts, Chip Franklin, is fed up with WBAL management and is leaving for San Diego. The decline continues.

When I first moved to Baltimore, many years ago, WBAL was the station to listen to. Not any more. Now I mostly listen to Washington stations.

Read about it here.

Saving the Earth, My Way!

That's me saving the planet.

The Times [of London] reports:

Walking does more than driving to cause global warming, a leading environmentalist has calculated.

Food production is now so energy-intensive that more carbon is emitted providing a person with enough calories to walk to the shops than a car would emit over the same distance. The climate could benefit if people avoided exercise, ate less and became couch potatoes. Provided, of course, they remembered to switch off the TV rather than leaving it on standby.

The sums were done by Chris Goodall, campaigning author of How to Live a Low-Carbon Life, based on the greenhouse gases created by intensive beef production. “Driving a typical UK car for 3 miles [4.8km] adds about 0.9 kg [2lb] of CO2 to the atmosphere,” he said, a calculation based on the Government’s official fuel emission figures. “If you walked instead, it would use about 180 calories. You’d need about 100g of beef to replace those calories, resulting in 3.6kg of emissions, or four times as much as driving.

“The troubling fact is that taking a lot of exercise and then eating a bit more food is not good for the global atmosphere. Eating less and driving to save energy would be better.”

And what about those "new urbanists" who want us all to get rid of our cars and ride public transport?

Catching a diesel train is now twice as polluting as travelling by car for an average family, the Rail Safety and Standards Board admitted recently.

And regarding paper or plastic:

Paper bags are worse for the environment than plastic because of the extra energy needed to manufacture and transport them, the Government says.

Read the whole thing here.

So riding is better than walking, and lounging on the couch is better than both, and driving is better than taking a train, and when you are asked "paper or plastic?" you should proudly reply, "plastic, of course, I'm trying to save the environment."

Wow! I gotta sit down and think about this.

Maybe it would be better to lie down..., in the warm sunlight. Perhaps I should nap for a while. Gotta save energy. Gotta save the Earth.

Aaaaaaahhhhhh!

Zimbabwe Update

I haven't posted on conditions in Zimbabwe for some time. The reason is that things keep getting worse and worse, and there is no end in sight. It's dispiriting as all get out. Mad Bobby Mugabe has turned a once thriving country into a Marxist/Maoist hell on earth.

How bad is it?

Faced with out of control inflation, Bobby did what any good leftist would -- impose radical and wide-ranging wage and price controls. The results were entirely predictable:

BULAWAYO, Zimbabwe, July 28 — Robert G. Mugabe has ruled over this battered nation, his every wish endorsed by Parliament and enforced by the police and soldiers, for more than 27 years. It appears, however, that not even an unchallenged autocrat can repeal the laws of supply and demand.

One month after Mr. Mugabe decreed just that, commanding merchants nationwide to counter 10,000-percent-a-year hyperinflation by slashing prices in half and more, Zimbabwe’s economy is at a halt.

Bread, sugar and cornmeal, staples of every Zimbabwean’s diet, have vanished, seized by mobs who denuded stores like locusts in wheat fields. Meat is virtually nonexistent, even for members of the middle class who have money to buy it on the black market. Gasoline is nearly unobtainable. Hospital patients are dying for lack of basic medical supplies. Power blackouts and water cutoffs are endemic.

Manufacturing has slowed to a crawl because few businesses can produce goods for less than their government-imposed sale prices. Raw materials are drying up because suppliers are being forced to sell to factories at a loss. Businesses are laying off workers or reducing their hours.

The chaos, however, seems to have done little to undermine Mr. Mugabe’s authority. To the contrary, the government is moving steadily toward a takeover of major sectors of the economy that have not already been nationalized.

Yeah, that'll help!

Read the whole thing here.

Mist On the Mountain; Bird on the Porch

We spent the last few days up on the mountain. It was hot and humid, but nowhere as bad as down in the city. And the mornings were spectacular.

One afternoon the heat started to get to me. I went up to the bedroom, turned a fan on full blast, turned up the radio and just vegged out. About an hour later I went back downstairs. "She Who Must Not Be Named" met me at the foot of the stairs. "Where were you?" she asked. "I was trying to call you!"

I wondered what was wrong? What had happened? It turned out this was what had gotten her so excited -- a hummingbird hovering on the side porch.



"She" was looking for my camera and couldn't find it. That's what the shouting was about. Finally she located it and got a few shots before the bird flew away. It would have been nice, though, if she had remembered to replace the lens cap and had bothered to return the camera to its case.

Farewell to the Fertile Crescent

It's just a short notice, but the article it describes promises to change nearly everything we think we know about the early emergence of complex societies.

Ever since the early days of archaeology one of the great organizing concepts in the early history of mankind has been the "fertile crescent." This geographic concept has played an important and sometimes a determinative role in explanations of the "rise of civilization," "the urban revolution," "the agricultural revolution" and other such phenomena.

Originally the term "fertile crescent" was applied to an narrow band of cultures stretching from Mesopotamia in the east, through the Levant and down into Egypt.



But as later research began to reveal the existence of early complex cultures lying outside that zone the fertile crescent began to change. Egypt was dropped out and new areas encompassing parts of Anatolia, Iran, Armenia and elsewhere were added. The new fertile crescent looks a bit like this:


Now comes this notice from the American Association for the Advancement of Science of a forthcoming article that will vastly expand the range of early complex cultural development.

A radically expanded view of the origin of civilization, extending far beyond Mesopotamia, is reported by journalist Andrew Lawler in the 3 August issue of Science.

Mesopotamia is widely believed to be the cradle of civilization, but a growing body of evidence suggests that in addition to Mesopotamia, many civilized urban areas existed at the same time – about 5,000 years ago – in an arc that extended from Mesopotamia east for thousands of kilometers across to the areas of modern India and Pakistan, according to Lawler.

“While Mesopotamia is still the cradle of civilization in the sense that urban evolution began there,” Lawler said, “we now know that the area between Mesopotamia and India spawned a host of cities and cultures between 3000 B.C.E. and 2000 B.C.E.”

....

Archaeologists shared findings from dozens of urban centers of approximately the same age that existed between Mesopotamia and the Indus River valley in modern day India and Pakistan. The researchers are just starting to sketch out this new landscape, but it’s becoming clear that these centers traded goods and could have shared technology and architecture. Recovered artifacts such as beads, shells, vessels, seals and game boards show that a network linked these civilizations.

Researchers have also found hints, such as similar ceremonial platforms, that these cultures interacted and even learned from one another. A new excavation near Jiroft in southeastern Iran, for example, has unearthed tablets with an unknown writing system. This controversial find highlights the complexity of the cultures in an area long considered a backwater, Lawler explained.

These urban centers are away from the river valleys that archaeologists have traditionally focused on....

Read the whole thing here.

Perhaps in the light of recent research we should simply abandon the whole concept of a "fertile crescent". Certainly a whole slew of theories as to why complex societies rose in West Asia will have to be junked. And there is probably more on the horizon. Scholars are now beginning to turn their attention to the ancient cultures of Central Asia and there is a lot of very interesting stuff there that will have to be assimilated into any future explanation of the rise of "civilization" in Eurasia. [For a bibliography of recent publications on Central Asian archaeology see here]

It's fun to watch scientific consensuses crumble and come crashing down -- sorta like watching a Michael Bay movie.

[The picture at the top of this post is of a figurine from Mehrgahr, an early agricultural settlement, dating from about 7,000 BC, in Baluchistan. This site is contemporary with early agricultural communities in the fertile crescent.]