« November 2007 | Main | January 2008 »
3 posts: (1) Christmas Gift: Al-Qaeda's Family Feud!--Us v. Them; (2) Iraq: Barry McCaffrey Sees Victory Within Reach--Us v. Them; (3) 2008 Campaign Themes: Change, Faith and Fakery--The Home Front. LFTC goes on holiday hiatus until Monday, January 7, 2008.
The New York Sun reports that a highly-influential radical Egyptian cleric, whose writings sparked the growth of al-Qaeda and its war against America, has now recanted. The cleric has issued a fatwa calling for ending the jihad, which has infuriated Ayman al-Zawahiri. To which the cleric responds that in the 1980s al-Zawahiri snitched to the Egyptian authorities, turning in his radical colleagues. Rejoice when the enemy plunges into civil war. More details are provided by the Mideast Media Research Institute (MEMRI), in this December 14 translation of the cleric's call.
Retired general and war hero (Vietnam & Gulf War) Barry McCaffrey urges us to "seize the moment" in Iraq. He cites growing reconciliation between ethnic groups, al-Qaeda on the run, radical Shia thug-cleric Moqtada al-Sadr neutralized, a strong, effective Iraqi army and progress in curbing Iraqi police corruption, as benefits that flowed from the surge. On the debit side are a hapless central government and a "clumsy" constitution. McCaffrey believes we will reach the endgame in Iraq in two years, and that victory is within our grasp. With 34,000 casualties and $400 billion spent, snatching defeat from the jaws of victory is not an option.
Dick Morris and spouse (Eileen McGann) identify what they see as Hillary's big blunder: making her experience her campaign theme, when voters are looking for change. They see Hill-Barack as a replay of Nixon-Kennedy. She is rewriting history, too, taking credit for what her husband accomplished. Hill as Tricky Dick is especially appealing, because as a young lawyer she served on the staff of the House Judiciary Committee during the impeachment investigation that ultimately brought Nixon down. Bill Kristol writes that ending the Clinton era in American politics is worth getting a Democratic candidate who will run stronger than Hillary next fall; he reviews recent hardball political tactics that the Clinton's have used against Obama, which Hill presaged Dec. 2, warning that "now the fun part starts." Hillary's idea of kiddie fun must have been setting fire to turtles. Author Sally Bedell Smith writes (in a masterpiece of understatement): "Bill Clinton's mere presence in the West Wing would be intimidating and complicating. Given his unrivaled experience and huge personality, it's safe to assume that he would be no Denis Thatcher, walking two steps behind." No Denis Thatcher, indeed. Denis, a successful businessman, was not known for dating behind Maggie's back. Well, if Bill makes it as First Lug, you can be sure of one thing: There will be no hi-jinks in the Oval Office on Madame President's watch.
Witty Wes Pruden smells the whiff of desperation in Hill's campaign, and in a follow-on column sees Hillary's campaign "cratering." Columnist David Brooks appraises Obama versus Hillary, and concludes that while Hill has been a better senator, with more legislative accomplishments, Obama will be the better campaigner in a close contest. Brooks says that Obama is inner-directed, unlike most politicians, who are insecure and outer-directed. Further, his past statements are consistent with his current campaign. Finally, whereas Hillary is of the school of domestic politics that sees opponents as evil, Obama sees the potential for good and evil in everyone, and thus does not play politics as mortal combat. Brooks concludes, in favor of Obama over Hillary: "The presidency is a bacterium. It finds the open wounds in the people who hold it. It infects them, and the resulting scandals infect the presidency and the country. The person with the fewest wounds usually does best in the White House, and is best for the country." NRO's Noemie Emery finds strong parallels between Hillary and Al Gore in their clumsy, irritating manner, and predicts that like Gore, Hill will fail. A Concord Monitor poll shows Obama passing Hillary (within the error margin) in New Hampshire. Obama has made one misstep, however: It seems that while Oprah drew large crowds, her endorsement cost him support in voter polls. Score on for sensible, post-9/11, voters.
MSNBC's Howard Fineman reports that Hill will probably lose four early contests: Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina. Of complaints coming now from her hubby's campaign crew, Fineman calls that "circular firing squad" behavior, a sign of an imploding campaign. Fineman sees Obama with momentum that easily trumps Hillary's meaningless national poll lead; Obama & Hillary are even in New Hampshire. Hill, for her part, has embarked on a "likability" tour that smacks of the periodic "charm offensive" tours of Soviet leaders during latter stages of the Cold War. It escapes Hill that people who are truly likable do not need likability tours--can you imagine Barack Obama doing one, or John McCain (the latter better liked by voters than by his fellow senators, who have encountered McCain's legendary temper)?
The key for the Democratic outcome is in which primary the 37 percent of New Hampshire voters not declared for either major party decide to vote. Hillary's strength is with registered Democrats; Obama polls at 40 percent with undeclared voters. The Iowa returns will decide in which primary these voters go. If Romney maintains his longtime lead in New Hampshire (much of whose TV market includes Massachusetts stations, making Romney, a former governor of the Bay State, a familiar figure in the Granite State), look for these voters to probably vote in the Democratic contest. So Hill faces an uphill (sorry about that!) climb if she is to win New Hampshire.
Poetic Peggy Noonan sees Hill's campaign as a Potemkin Village, a "queenly procession" to coronation starting in Iowa. Here is Peg's money paragraph:
"This thought occurs that Hillary Clinton's entire campaign is, and always was, a Potemkin village, a giant head fake, a haughty facade hollow at the core. That she is disorganized on the ground in Iowa, taken aback by a challenge to her invincibility, that she doesn't actually have an A team, that her advisers have always been chosen more for proven loyalty than talent, that her supporters don't feel deep affection for her. That she's scrambling chaotically to catch up, with surrogates saying scuzzy things about Barack Obama and drug use, and her following up with apologies that will, as always, keep the story alive. That her guru-pollster, the almost universally disliked Mark Penn, has, according to Newsday, become the focus of charges that he has "mistakenly run Clinton as a de facto incumbent" and that the top officials on the campaign have never had a real understanding of Iowa."
Michael Barone informs us that the Democrats are running to the left of the races run by the only two Presidents their party has had in forty years. In part this is because, he opines, the median voter was born in 1964, and doesn't recall the stagflation 1970s. The result has been to shrink the share of the electorate receptive to small government ideas.
On the Republican side, PN sees Mike Huckabee's rise as signaling a new intensity in the politics of faith among Christians, and wonders if Ronald Reagan could win today. Charles Krauthammer detects "an overdose of public piety" in the scrap over faith between Huckabee and Mitt Romney. Noting the Constitution's "no religious test" clause (Art. VI, sec. 3), CK distinguishes between religious faith as a factor in forming a candidate's beliefs on issues, which is legitimate free exercise, and putting faith forward as a unique qualifier, which smacks of establishing an official state religion. Wes Pruden sees the faith broadsides as the disingenuous use of "artful apology" to keep the issue alive and festering.
WSJ's Kimberly Strassel interprets Ron Paul's campaign as showing (contra Barone) the continuing resonance of limited government and lower taxes among Republican voters. Morris & McGann opine that the Jan. 15 Michigan primary is "make or break" for Republicans, and that two candidates will emerge as still viable, with Florida (Jan. 29) and Tsunami Tuesday (Feb. 5, 23 states) deciding the Republican contest. They see Huckabee winning Iowa, Romney winning New Hampshire. The winner between them and in Michigan (edge to Romney, with roots there--his dad was governor forty years ago), will face either Rudy or McCain on Jan. 29 & Feb. 5.
Fineman thinks Rudy's love tryst security situation undercut Rudy badly, and that Romney is toast if he loses Iowa, where he has lost a big lead. A Daily News poll shows women voters judging Judi Nathan's affair with Rudy more harshly than they did Bill & Monica, because they see Judi as a home-wrecker. NRO's Rich Lowry opines that Rudy is in serious trouble, and unlikely to recover.
John McCain doesn't even get a mention from Fineman (who will not be, one suspects, presidential press secretary in a McCain administration). As I write this, Fox Cable is reporting that the latest Rasmussen poll in Iowa shows Huckabee slipping and Romney recovering, with 10-point swings. Huckabee has been in various gun-sights, and his negatives are clearly being driven up. If he loses in Iowa, he could implode quickly. The Concord Monitor poll re New Hampshire shows Romney with a solid lead over Rudy and McCain, and no sign of slippage. Rudy, whose Florida poll numbers have plummeted, putting him behind Romney and Huckabee, gave a major speech Saturday. There is reason to doubt the Rasmussen poll in Florida, as whether an automated poll can reach a representative sample of the state's voters can be, and thus Rudy's advisers profess not to be worried.
NRO's Mona Charen makes a crisp pitch for Romney, as does this endorsement from the editors of National Review. Stephen Hayes recounts an Iowa town meeting where he feels Fred Thompson showed that he may be getting into a higher gear, at last, in reaching Republican primary voters. Pat Buchnan thinks that the Republican nominee will either be Romney or Huckabee, with McCain having a shot, and Rudy and Fred already toast. But Robert Novak cautions that Huckabee has not wrapped up the Baptist segment of the evangelical vote. The American Spectator's Washington Prowler offers two tantalizing tidbits: Had Thompson entered sooner and embraced conservative immigration policies, Tom Tancredo would have passed the race; and it seems that Huckabee lives on his small pension, his wife's earnings and--get this--speech homoraria paid him by his own company.
A WSJ interview with McCain shows a chipper McCain; pundit Fred Barnes notes that McCain's chances hinge on winning New Hampshire, where some polls now show him drawing even with Mitt Romney, unlike the one taken by the Concord Monitor. A WSJ editorial divines a "surge" in McCain's campaign, which it attributes to the senator's steadfastness on Iraq, and to Joe Lieberman's crossover endorsement, which should help in New Hampshire. On Fox Cable, pollster Scott Rasmussen said that as of now it looks as if independent voters in New Hampshire are leaning toward voting in the Democratic primary, which would, if this preference holds, augur well for Obama and ill for McCain, their two preferred candidates.
Which brings us to a more dangerous problem: fakery. Some fakery is relatively harmless, as it fools no one. Hillary saying of herself, "this old girl," amuses, because no one thinks of her as a "girl"; she is, as everyone knows, a tomboy on steroids. John Edwards posing a tribune of the poor contrasts with his trillion-dollar hair coifs and airport-sized living quarters--enjoy William Buckley's dissection of Edward's faux populism. But Mike Huckabee, of genial charm, is another matter. NRO's Rich Lowry wonders if Republican primary voters are about to commit "Huckacide": nominating a lightweight with zero foreign policy experience, no serious staff support and a talent for sound bites, who wears his religiosity on his sleeve. On ABC, George Will cited Huckabee's having, as Arkansas governor, given more clemencies than his three predecessors combined (one of whom was, of course, Bill Clinton), and also his opposition to school choice, hardly a conservative position. An NRO piece recounts a clemency given to a Huckabee campaign contributer, one that smells. Kimberley Strassel has more on Huckabee's Arkansas ethics during his gubernatorial stint: He was investigated 14 times for violations, and given 5 admonishments. No wonder Democrats are salivating.
Worse, Huckabee now has published his first views on foreign policy, on Foreign Affairs Quarterly's Jan.Feb.'08 issue; a report on what he said does not inspire me, nor does the full-length version. Huckabee accuses the White House of a "bunker mentality" on Iraq, not doing enough to pressure Pakistan, and says that we can contain Iran. The first charge was true for 2004-2006, when the insurgency, and the administration's insistence on pursuing a strategy that was clearly not creating permanently secured areas, was wrecking Iraq policy. It assuredly is not true since 43 launched the surge--in defiance of the Iraq Study (Surrender) Group's December 2006 stinker, and after a decisive "change policy" vote in November gave Congress to the Democrats. The surge has given us a final chance to get a reasonable outcome in Iraq.
Huckabee's Pakistan policy is basically what Barack Obama said, except that Huckabee doesn't advocate sending in more troops. Pressure Pakistan to do more: what an original idea. The question is, of course, how to do that, and until January's parliamentary elections we will not know the lay of the political landscape, which will then suggest what options, if any, we may realistically have. As for containing Iran, which Huckabee says "we might be able to live with," he comes out against putting boots on the ground" there. No one suggests we do so (except perhaps temporarily, in hot pursuit of Iranian forces if they attack us in Western Iraq).
Huckabee was caught by surprise last week, re the NIE on Iran, which he did not learn about until prompted by reporter's questions, to which he answered that he had not been reading the newspapers while campaigning. Apparently, no one on his staff did, either, or they'd have (presumably) briefed him. This hardly gives confidence in his competence, given the monster publicity on the NIE, which upended 43's Iran military options. Worst of all is a cheap shot Huckabee takes on troop levels in Iraq. He reaches back to the prewar sacking of Gen. Eric Shinseki, who said we should send more troops (he was sacked by Rumsfeld), and says this: "I would have met with Shinseki privately and carefully weighed his advice."
Really. Talk about opportunistic shots. Everyone knows we did not have enough troops. Huckabee could have made general reference to that, but to pull Shinseki's name out of the hat and assert that he would, five years ago, have met with him (a claim impossible to disprove), is raw opportunism. Huckabee covers himself, avoiding the "I would have taken his advice" phrasing, an overt fake. Instead, he says that he would have "weighed" Shinseki's counsel--making Huckabee appear thoughtful. He thus makes of himself a retroactive sage, one of life's more fun self-designations. One can be sure that Huckabee had never even heard of Shinseki until well after the first phase of the war.
Stephen Hayes writes that Huckabee also wants to close Guantanamo, end aggressive interrogation techniques, and apply the Golden Rule in foreign policy. This is a non-sequitur, as al-Qaeda scorns reciprocity. In open debate Huckabee acknowledged poverty in Darfur (thanks, Mike!), but said that there is poverty also in the Delta, an answer a liberal Democrat would be proud to give.
Recall the last nominee who did combined the politics of faith loudly trumpeted with zero foreign policy experience, a peanut farmer from Georgia. Alas, he won, and America nearly lost the Cold War. Huckabee may be at the peak of his public reputation, as scrutiny has only become serious in the past few weeks. NRO's Peter Wehner has more on Huckabee's shallow thinking on world affairs. Huckabee counters the charge that he lacks foreign policy credentials by asserting that Ronald Reagan lacked them. This is not true: Reagan's published radio broadcasts include lots of detailed discussions of foreign policy and defense matters, and show a candidate with a keen grasp of both.
So, while Democrats pursue change, which WSJ reporter Gerald Seib says is driving voters to "want to send change roaring through the system like a gale-force wind in 2008," Republicans wrestle with candidate authenticity and illegal immigration: WSJ editor Jason Riley explains why Hispanic voters are furious at Republicans--they now lean 57-23 for Democrats, a 21-point loss for Republicans in the past 18 months. On the Democratic side, Hillary has a million ideas, but, she says, we cannot afford all of them (true), and Barack basks in Oprah's mega-star celebrity halo.
Meanwhile, the New York Post reports that Mayor Michael Bloomberg is contacting consultants as to their availability should Mayor Mike make a third-party bid. Presumably, after Tsunami Tuesday (Feb. 5) the state of the Democratic and Republican fields will be sufficiently clear to enable him to decide if he has enough running room to potentially win. The first day he can register to run as a third-party candidate is Mar. 5, just after the Mar. 4 Texas primary. As a lifelong Democrat who registered Republican solely to have an easier primary race in his bid to succeed Rudy, and who since his re-election conveniently discovered he really is an Independent (as a liberal, he could never get the Republican nod), Hizzoner can run as the "change" candidate. Who better than a political chameleon to promise change? Mayor Moneybags, who makes Mitt Romney's demi-billionaire bankroll look like a pauper's wallet, can finance a billion-dollar campaign with ease.
Bloomie's record as Big Apple Mayor is uneven, with his most notable achievement being continued crime rate reduction; also, he is a solid crisis manager, always good in a chief executive. He strongly pushed education reform, and fought the educrat class on some issues (not others), with mixed results. His worst failure was that he relented, after the obscene three-day transit strike at Christmastime two years ago, and let the union get off mostly scot-free, after a strike that cost the city a billion dollars, forced businesses into bankruptcy and forced commuters to walk in bitterly cold weather. No Reagan he, Bloomie did not decertify the union (as Reagan did with the air-traffic controller union in 1981), and re-hire at reasonable rates, say, two-thirds of the swollen transit worker roster.
It is unlikely, however, that political opponents can make much of what is an essentially local issue, in a national race. Mayor Mike's ideas are mostly liberal Democratic, though, and he may draw more from the Democratic nominee than from the Republican. In an election where neither major party candidate is likely to articulate a clear ideological position, and where the electorate is anxious and fragmented, and with Bloomberg, unlike Perot, being of even, reassuring personal temperament, a third-party candidacy looks more viable than it was in 1992, unless the major parties and their standard-bearers get their collective acts together. The latest USA Today/Gallup poll shows voters disgusted with the President, both parties in Congress, and Washington in general. Figure that Mayor Mike will see these numbers.
George Will sees in this season a replay of the 1970s campaigns, with Nixonian indirect character assassination (Nixon used paralepsis: "I'm not going to talk about my opponent's x, y, or z") plus Carteresque hyper-piety. Will also sees Hillary's experience card as a resume of one bad judgment after another: two failed attorney-general nominations, then the ghastly Janet Reno, who gave us 86 dead at Waco; then kidnapped a 6-year-old child, whose mother had drowned to give him a life in America, and sent him back to a tyranny; and the endless Whitewater mess. Reno also gave us, which Will is too kind to mention, the full-bore "Chinese wall" between law enforcement and intelligence that helped pave the way for 9/11. Hill's one priority was a female A-G--consider 86 dead collateral casualties of gender identity politics. And, of course, there was Hill's health care debacle, which gave the Republicans control of the House for the first time in 40 years. On the Republican side, Will shows that Huckabee is the anti-Reagan, far more divergent from conservatism than Rudy.
WSJ's Dan Henninger laments the endless 2007 campaign, much of it in Iowa, and is relieved that it is nearly time to start counting votes. His remedy: repeal campaign financing laws, which force candidates to spends zillions of hours raising funds. This is a good idea, for First Amendment reasons as well. Ex-43 guru Karl Rove suggests longer primaries within a shorter campaign season. Rove points out that in 2000 there were 7 primaries in the five weeks beginning with the Iowa Caucus, but that in 2008 there will be 32 in the same time period. This time around 50 percent of delegates will have been chosen by Feb. 5 and 75 percent by March 4, thresholds reached one and two months earlier, respectively, than in 2000. Rove suggests multi-region primary days spaced far enough apart so that voters around the country have a chance to meet the candidates in person, instead of having such evaluations effectively out-sourced to voters in a few early contests, with media bandwagons rolling for the early victors.
One final note: By now I have seen a passel of XMAS videos from the candidates, from Barack's all-American family, kids chirping at the end--a 21st century "Bill Cosby Show"; to Hillary's incredibly contrived shtik: "Where did I put universal pre-K?"; to Edwards's forgotten folks, who must never be forgotten again, which belongs in a 1930s Depression-era movie; to Huckabee's Christmas scene with the bookshelf shaped like a cross, allegedly a subliminal message (Peggy Noonan thinks so), that exudes holiday sweetness; to a smiling Rudy Giuliani jesting his way ISO a likability booster shot, to John McCain using his tale of a cross drawn in the prison dirt for him by a North Vietnamese captor, concededly more moving than any of the others; to...zzzzzzz Can't one politico give a "Bah, humbug!" message? Such as:
"Hi, I'm running for President, not First Pop, not First Mom, not First Sibling, not First Friend, and not fFrst Santa. Your life--and your Christmas--is your affair. If you want a cuddly candidate, vote for someone else. If you want a war president who can get the job done and not cry on the air, vote for me. I won't make you love me, nor will I send you XMAS cards, but I will keep you alive and in one piece!"
Alas, it will never happen. In all, it's enough to make one look longingly at 2012. or 20011, or will they start the 2012 campaign the day after the 2010 election, or after the 2008 election....
Oh, here is LFTC's own Christmas message for our readers: the 1897 New York Sun editorial entitled "Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus." N.B., Santa is a resident of the North Pole, not Washington, DC.
5 posts: (1) 2007: "Bali-Baby, It's Cold Outside!"--"It's the Earth Stupid!"; (2) Iran: A Defense Heavyweight Weighs In--The Home Front; (3) FISA Court Mugs ACLU!--The Home Front; (4) Women's Rights: As the Feminists Turn (Away)--Us v. Them; (5) President Bush: A Mideast "Berliner" Moment?--Us v. Them.
Geophysicist David Deming gives us the news Al Gore refuses to hear, and the delegates at Bali's enviro-love-fest will ignore: 2007 was a year of record cold in many places. 2007 was the third quietest hurricane season since 1966 (in 2006, no hurricane made landfall in the U.S.). South America had one of its coldest winters in decades, with snow falling in Buenos Aires for the first time since 1918. Australia had its coldest June ever; exceptional cold hurt New Zealand vintners. 2007 was a very cold year throughout the Southern Hemisphere. Record, crop-killing lows were set all across the U.S. A New Zealander, for his part, plans a March 1, 2008 departure on world-record attempt o circumnavigate the globe in 65 days, in a boat powered only with biodeiesel (i.e., renewable) fuel, and with a zero carbon footprint; check the link out, as the boat is a dandy. The current record is 75 days.
So where does that leave the global warming set that descended upon Bali? It reminds me of a true tale from 1945. On a sizzling summer day in LA, songwriter Jule Styne and lyricist Sammy Cahn decided to cool off by writing a winter tune. The result: "Let it Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow!" A far better, and surely cheaper, product than anything Al Gore and his enviro-pests will ever dream up.
Former SecDef and Director of Central Intelligence James Schlesinger writes that if Iran did slow its nuclear program, President Bush's policies had something to do with it. He scolds the NIE authors for failing to distinguish clearly in the text (it was hidden in a footnote) between covert uranium enrichment, which the NIE includes in its definition of what constitutes a nuclear weapons program, and overt enrichment, which the NIE deems commercial. The ex-SecDef notes that the latter is, in fact, "dual-use," and is deemed by amalysts "the long pole in the tent" of nuclear proliferation. Schlesinger cites four factors that likely influenced Iran's decision to suspend its covert program (if, in fact, the NIE is right that Iran did so): the U.S.-led invasions of Afghanistan and of Iraq, Libya's decision to end its nuclear program, and our exposure of the A.Q. Khan nuclear proliferation network.
Schlesinger attributes the NIE's silence on what factors influenced Iran to a return to a "hard evidence only" standard for intel reports. He notes that such limited intel reporting can itself lead to failures to spot things, as happened when the intel community rejected soft evidence indicating that the North Vietnamese were infiltrating supplies into the South via Sihanoukville, in Cambodia (named after Cambodia's then leader, Prince Norodom Sihanouk).
Hallelijah! In a Dec. 11 ruling, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court dismissed a lawsuit filed by (who else?) the American Civil Liberties Union, that had sought release of all unclassified documents associated with the administration's electronic surveillance program, with FISA Court review of the government's classification choices, a review that the government asserted the FISA Court lacked jurisdiction to perform. Judge John Bates held that the FISA Court did have jurisdiction, but dismissed the ACLU's claim in its entirety.
The FISA Court released its opinion to the public, something it has done only twice before (1981 and 2002) in the Court's three-decade history, out of its thousands of rulings. Judge Bates noted "an unquestioned tradition of secrecy, based on the vitally important need to protect national security." He held that the FISA Court lacked authority to review executive branch classification decisions. The ACLU, he wrote, has neither a common law nor a First Amendment right to gain access to the requested documents.
The good judge then cited considerations for denying such access: compromising sources and methods, that could enable adversaries to evade surveillance, mislead investigators, chill potential sources and damage relations with foreign governments. He added: "All these potential harms are real and significant, and, quite frankly, beyond debate."
Further, there is a risk that the court might, in ordering disclosure, accidentally disclose information useful to an enemy, and thereby chill its relations with the executive branch. Finally, the ACLU's most clever argument, that the government's previous defense of its program undercut its entitlement to have documents pertaining to the program kept secret, the Court summarily rejected. The Court declined to say that the government was, as a practical matter, forced to defend its program, lest it lose it entirely, once the New York Times put selected details on its front page. Perhaps that was implicit in the judge's thinking. One hopes so, lest in future instances where the government finds secret data on page on, it is forced to choose between defending the program and having details made public, or dropping the program on grounds of secrecy considerations. Such a Hobson's choice, common (as "graymail") in criminal cases, where the government drops prosecutions to preserve secrets, must not be forced on the government in wartime national security matters.
Washington Post columnist Anne Applebaum, back in fine form, slams feminist rights groups for ignoring the atavistic anti-women practices of radical Islam. N.O.W.--which Applebaum names an easy target to pick on--is too busy trying to get women into the Augusta National golf club to worry about Saudi Arabia's misogynist policies (Saudi women can't vote, can't drive and can't leave home without a male relative as escort). Nor did N.O.W. play any part in criticism of the hideous honor killing of a Canadian teenager by her fanatic father, because his daughter had the temerity to refuse to wear a head-scarf in public. Applebaum calls for a new worldwide women's movement to stop atavistic radical Islamist maltreatment of women (who get far better treatment in moderate Islamic countries).
Columnist Kathleen Parker credits First Lady Laura Bush with an assist in getting King Abdullah to issue a pardon, due to the First Lady's breast-cancer awareness campaign in the Kingdom, and also in Jordan and the United Arab Emirates. Here are Ms. Parker's money paragraphs:
"Americans, who take breast cancer awareness for granted, also take Laura Bush for granted and underestimate her powers. As witness to her meetings with King Abdullah and others, I can testify that the first lady's personal touch is both deft and profound. What her quiet manner conceals is a fierce spirit; what it reveals is respect for others and the understanding that baby steps precede great strides.
There's no way of knowing what compelled King Abdullah to spare a young woman 200 lashes, but we do know that America's first lady had his ear for a little while.
It can't have hurt that he listened."
A New York Sun op-ed by Rick Richman, editor of "Jewish Current Issues," suggests that President Bush visit the Israeli town of Sderot in southern Israel, and declare himself a citizen of a town that has been under constant Palestinian rocket fire for more than seven years. The idea is to replicate JFK's famous words in his "Let Them Come to Berlin" speech. If 43 declines to do that, Richman concludes that he will show solicitude for a faux "peace process," rather than a commitment to real peace, by rallying world opinion against Palestinian terror.
Here are JFK's money paragraphs from that famous 1963 speech, which 43 will not repeat when he visits the Mideast, at Sderot or anywhere else:
"There are many people in the world who really don't understand, or say they don't, what is the great issue between the free world and the Communist world. Let them come to Berlin.
"There are some who say that communism is the wave of the future. Let them come to Berlin.
"And there are some who say in Europe and elsewhere we can work with the Communists. Let them come to Berlin.
"I want to say, on behalf of my countrymen, who live many miles away on the other side of the Atlantic, who are far distant from you, that they take the greatest pride that they have been able to share with you, even from a distance, the story of the last 18 years. …
"All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin, and, therefore, as a free man, I take pride in the words 'Ich bin ein Berliner.'"
Little known is that JFK made a grammatical error that transformed his intended meaning into a howler, which Germans thankfully ignored--as did global media, understanding his intent. When Germans declare themselves a Berlin resident, they say: "Ich bin Berliner." Inserting the indefinite article "ein" changes the meaning, as "ein Berliner" is German for, "a doughnut" in English. Thus, JFK actually said: "I am a doughnut!."
If someday 43 does give that kind of speech, let's hope he has a better translator than did JFK. Unlike JFK, 43 would not get a pass from today's media.
Learn more in my new book: The Long War Ahead And
The Short War Upon Us
