For Better or Worse

Best with butter cookies

2006-02-06T05:05:00.000-05:00

Some cartoon characters do siwwy things.

Man Bites Dog

2005-07-30T04:35:00.000-04:00

Oriana Fallaci, scourge of Islam
Jul 21st 2005
From The Economist print edition

THERE is nothing al-Qaeda would like more than for Europeans to turn on Muslims in their midst, uniting fundamentalist militants with those who are neither fundamentalist nor militant. In that sense, Osama bin Laden won yet another victory this week with the publication of another hate-filled, anti-Islamic diatribe by an Italian writer who has become noted for such diatribes: Oriana Fallaci. Over the past three years, the 76-year-old Ms Fallaci has carved out a role as the voice of what might be a new European racism—were race, not religion, her primary cause.…

The Digital Divide

For instance, when Ms Fallaci writes: Nevertheless, there is also a principle of self-defence, or rather, of justified defence, and unless I am mistaken, the Catholic Church used it several times too. Charles Martel repelled Muslim invaders raising the Cross. Isabel of Castilla chased them from Spain doing the same, she forgets in her holy fury that Isabel of Castilla also chased Jews from Spain, "raising the Cross", and that those who chose to remain and conform by getting baptized were burnt at stake if they were caught practising Judaism in private. Perhaps some Jews who might have been tempted to follow Ms Fallaci will remember it.

Ms Fallaci also calls on the judge due to try her for insult to religion in Bergamo, expressing her fear of getting killed by Muslim co-convicts. Let us hope that the judge will declare that she cannot be tried due to the mental incapacity evidenced in this article and in her other anti-Muslim ramblings. And let us hope that the Islamic Anti-Defamation League will not sue the Corriere della Sera for having hosted and given emphasis to these libelous xenophobic ramblings, but will request equal space to answer them.

The Guardian

Anti-Islamic Italian author in new legal fight
Long-running battle over post-9/11 books pits freedom of speech against respect for religious belief

John Hooper in Rome
Wednesday July 13, 2005
The Guardian

One of Italy's best-known authors faces renewed legal action in a dispute that has raised fundamental questions about respect for religion and the right to free speech.
A radical Muslim leader, Adel Smith, told the Guardian he was bringing a civil action for damages against the writer and journalist Oriana Fallaci. He has already succeeded in getting Ms Fallaci committed for trial next year in criminal proceedings for blasphemy.

Last month a judge in the northern Italian city of Bergamo agreed that the 76-year-old Ms Fallaci should answer to claims of abusing Islam in her book The Strength of Reason. Since then, her cause has become a rallying point for mainly rightwing intellectuals and politicians in Italy and the US, where Ms Fallaci lives.
-------------

Oriana Fallaci. Author. Firebrand. Heroine. You go girl. Some of us have a hard time reconciling how the ideology of a person who was by common definitions a mass murderer, armed robber, brigand, liar, and pedophile gets elevated to the status of a religion. Life was brutal in the 7th century and stealing goods was more efficient than producing them, but that doesn't mean that anybody should apologize for or defend a belief system based in no small part on determining exactly how these ill begotten goods were to be distributed among the insiders (believers). Shouldn't you learn a little something in 1,300 years?

A Freakin' Military Genius

2004-11-12T08:17:00.000-05:00

NYT reporters must have some biotech implant that prevents them from ever writing kindly about American soldiers. Even when they are on the ground in Fallujah using their eyeballs to see what's happening, a beam from the HQ of the Liberal Deathstar in New York reaches out and blurs their vision.

These are exerpts from a December 12 article by NYT reporter Dexter Filkins. I've never met Mr. Filkins but I'm telling you now that this guy is a flaming asshole and that if I ever have the pleasure of meeting him that I will slap his face in the most contemptible and insulting manner and then piss on him while he grovels.

The original article is here. Black Flags Are Deadly Signals as Cornered Rebels Fight Back. You can avoid the Deathstar's registration hassle by getting a working password from here. BugMeNot.

But these marines did see a black flag pop up all at once above a water tower about 100 yards away, then a second flag somewhere in the gloaming above a rooftop. And the shots began, in a wave this time, as men bobbed and weaved through alleyways and sprinted across the street. "He's in the road, he's in the road, shoot him!" Sergeant Brown shouted. "Black shirt!" someone else yelled. "Due south!"

The flags are the insurgents' answer to two-way radios, their way of massing the troops and - in a tactic that goes back at least as far as Napoleon - concentrating fire on an enemy. Set against radio waves, the flags have one distinct advantage: they are terrifying.

Did you get that? The US Marines who are killing jihadi girlie-men by the hundreds are going to be terrified by a couple black flags? Yep. A tradition of 229 years of uncommon valor wiped out in an instant by a few black flags.

The insurgents are coordinating their attacks at a time when they have nowhere left to run. American forces have pushed south of Highway 10, the boulevard that runs east to west and approximately bisects Falluja. American intelligence officers believe that many of the insurgents have retreated as far as the Shuhada, a relatively modern residential area that is the southernmost neighborhood in Falluja.

But beyond Shuhada is only the open desert, patrolled by the United States Army. So the insurgents are turning and fighting. And at night, they are setting up deadly ambushes in the moonless pitch blackness of Falluja's labyrinthine streets.

The jihadi girlie-men have had months to stockpile supplies and prepare defenses in an urban environment. By all conventional thinking Fallujah should have been a tough nut to crack. Asshat Filkins fails to mention that the Marines took only two days to root the girlie-men from their prepared defenses in North Fallujah and herd them into a killing zone in the Southern part of the city.

According to Asshat Filkins we should believe that the girlie-men who ran as fast as they could away from their prepared defenses when confronted by the Marines are now capable of coordinating attacks using black flags in "moonless pitch blackness." That is quite a feat. How does it work out in practice?

Meantime, the marines went to the rooftop, saw the flags and got into a firefight. It was silenced when they called in a 500-pound bomb from above onto a house where some of the insurgents had concentrated. The strike was so close that the marines had to leave the roof or risk being killed by shrapnel.

The risk to the jihadi girlie-men was more substantial. What really happened here was that the Marines using their non-terrifying radios, within minutes of receiving fire, coordinated an airstrike that accurately placed a quarter ton of explosives within shouting distance of their position. Which side would you rather be on?

The alley exploded with gunfire and RPG rounds. Somehow the company commander, Capt. Read Omohundro, got two tanks in place to fire down the alley. They let loose with a volley and a building crumbled.

Freakin' amazing those Marines. Somehow, somehow the Marine captain got a couple tanks to shoot back at the enemy. Maybe he used flags. Maybe he spent an hour or so with the tank commander using crayons to draw diagrams to explain himself.

But the insurgents had gotten off an RPG round and disabled one tank; the other tank mysteriously stopped working as well.

Asshat Filkins said "tanks" but could have meant any armored vehicle. You have a better chance of scoring a hole-in-one on a 250 yard par 3 then you do disabling a M1A1 with an RPG. There is almost no possibility of disabling an M1A1 from the front with an RPG. The armor is thick enough to stop a high velocity tank round. I don't know for sure where Filkins was trying to go with this "observation" other than attempting to portray the Marines' equipment as deficient.

If you run into Dexter Filkins he deserves a slap in the face for running down these Marines.

I'm Too Stupid to Vote

2004-10-22T09:36:00.000-04:00

I’m too stupid to vote. I found out today by reading the Op-Eds in the L.A. Times. I’m not alone. Rampant stupidity is endemic in America, affecting about half the adult population. According to Op-ed author, Ariel Dorfman “This anti-intellectualism has, unfortunately, a long history in the United States.”

You see, I learned that I’m too stupid to vote because I believe that John Kerry is a pretentious blowhard who thinks that’s getting the name of Jacques de Villepin’s tailor is more important than protecting the Constitution of the United States.

Ariel Dorfman says: Is John Kerry too intelligent to be president of the United States? It was what I felt instinctively the first and only time I met him, at a lunch at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in 1998. He was subtle, full of cultural and historical references, elaborating each fine argument at length, with perception and nuance.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not so much against people doing brainy things from time to time. Without Isaac Newton’s seminal work could we ever appreciate the effect of Derek Lowe’s sinker ball on 2-3-4 of the Yankee batting order? For me, perception and nuance may be nifty to have when attending mucky-mucky conferences in Switzerland, but when dealing life and death issues with nuclear mullahs clarity is the higher virtue.

If it were not enough to learn that I’m too stupid to vote to begin with, I then learned that even if I went ahead and voted anyway that only third rate candidates would ever get elected. Donald Saari, a professor of mathematics and economics at UC Irvine and director of the Institute for Mathematical Behavioral Sciences tells me that Jean-Charles de Borda, a French mathematician with an eclectic life story, determined in 1770 that plurality voting is inherently stupid.

How perceptive and nuanced is Donald Saari? He tells us. "Using mathematical symmetries from higher dimensional spaces and chaotic dynamics, for instance, I recently proved that the Borda count method is the best expression of the will of the voters"

What’s his proof? Under the stupid election method in the 2002 French elections the conservative candidate won the nomination and the socialist candidate was rejected by the voters.

What’s my take? Ariel Dorfam, for his instincts about John Kerry, and Donald Sarri, for his symmetries from higher dimensional spaces and chaotic dynamics, get my vote as flaming assholes.

Preview of Guvvie Health Care

2004-10-15T17:46:00.000-04:00

"The government bungles its distribution scheme for flu vaccines, causing an unanticipated supply shock, and suppliers face an upward pressure on prices. If the high price is charged, then your anal neighbor, who regularly receives flu shots even though he is in a low-risk category for catching the flu, decides to forego the shot this year, leaving a shot for someone who needs it more. The high price also signals to suppliers to get into the vaccine or vaccine substitute business, which they most certainly would in a less regulated environment.

But the government then threatens to throw suppliers in jail for responding to the upward price pressure, so they don't. People like your anal neighbor (who also showers twice a day) still get them. The government, assuming the task that otherwise would have been performed by the price system, tries to allocate flu doses to parties that value them most, on the margin, with the same success that the Soviets enjoyed. Meanwhile, it bemoans the evil of gouging, a few weeks before election day.

It's an old story, and one that is guaranteed to persist, until a free market in medicine is demanded." Ludwig von Mises Institute

"As the vaccine shortage hits home and long lines queue around the supermarket, a handful of states and the nation's capital are threatening doctors and nurses with fines or even jail if they give flu shots to healthy, low-risk people" Fines, Jail Used to Enforce Flu Shot Rules

Kick 'em out.

2004-10-15T17:37:00.000-04:00

A 17-member Army Reserve platoon with troops from Jackson and around the Southeast deployed to Iraq is under arrest for refusing a "suicide mission" to deliver fuel, the troops' relatives said Thursday. Clarion Ledger

I’m assuming that the troops were not being ordered to use their fuel trucks as rolling bombs, so how would this be a “suicide mission”? Was somebody afraid they might get shot at? Was somebody afraid of a roadside bomb?

Legitimate concerns, yes, but guess what. Iraq can be a dangerous place. If your mission is to deliver fuel to point B then you deliver fuel to point B. Your truck is not the latest model? So what. Have you been performing daily maintenance and cleaning the air and fuel filters as often as needed? You don’t have all the armored vehicles you want to escort you? So what. The US carriers that sailed into Midway to face a Japanese fleet 50 times its size didn’t have any escorts. The Marines kicking down doors in Fallujah don’t have anybody else to go ahead of them. They rely on their skills and their buddies.

I don’t want to see these bozos go to jail but I hope they get kicked out of the Army tomorrow. ABC and the NYT are salivating over the prospects. We’ll see these cowards on Good Morning America. I'm angry already.

We Have a Problem, Abdul

2004-10-12T08:55:00.000-04:00

Camp Blue Diamond, Iraq – At approximately 4:00 p.m. Oct. 11, Marines and Iraqi National Guard members began receiving small arms fire from the Sharqi Mosque in Hit.

Insurgents fired accurate and sustained small arms fire that escalated to heavy machine gun and indirect fire during the three-hour firefight at the mosque.

Marines exchanged proportionate and accurate small arms and machine gun fire until insurgents began firing mortars. At that point, Marine aviation was used to deliver precision-guided munitions to target the threat.

Mosques are granted protective status due to their religious and cultural significance. However, when insurgents violate the sanctity of the mosque by using the structure for military purposes, the site loses its protective status.

Marines are obligated and authorized to return fire with accurate and proportionate fire in order to protect themselves. All caution was exercised to limit collateral damage and prevent non-combatant casualties. The 1st Marine Division stands committed to assisting the Iraqi Security Forces in stabilizing the country. Multi-National Force Press Reslease

If appearing on Jeopardy and asked to identify the most lethal organism to ever inhabit the earth, respond "What is a US Marine Combat Team."

Derrida Bypass Procedure

2004-10-10T11:08:00.000-04:00

From the New York Times (D-NY). Jacques Derrida, the Algerian-born, French intellectual who became one of the most celebrated and notoriously difficult philosophers of the late 20th century, died Friday at a Paris hospital, the French president's office announced. He was 74.

Although Derrida is known for deconstructionism he will, in time, became better known as the first recipient of the medical procedure that bears his name, Derrida Bypass Procedure.

Following WWII, few Frenchmen (about 11 in actual number), when asked what they did in the Resistance, were able to remember anything about either the War or the Resistance. General DeGaulle (peace be upon him) found this intolerable for his plans to restore France as a world luminary, and determined that this national memory loss of how France single handedly defeated the Third Reich was caused by a lack of nutrition to the brain.

DeGaulle commissioned the finest French physicians to come up with a procedure to correct this problem. This elite group determined that they could supercharge the flow of nutrients to the brain, grow intellect and correct memory loss, by bypassing the digestive process and connecting the large intestine directly to the brain. Jaques Derrida was the first to undergo this procedure. First other Frenchmen like Focault, and then the rising class of East Coast and Left Coast intellectuals in the US, amazed and impressed at what was coming out of Derrida’s mouth, rushed to have the Derrida Bypass Procedure themselves. And the rest is history.

Where Have You Gone Oriana Fallaci?

2004-10-08T09:22:00.000-04:00

"You know in the turning of history there are, at times, a brusque turn," she said. "Consider all the steps of history. I'm afraid that we are now at one of those turns. Not because we want it. Because it is imposed on us. It is not this time a revolution, like the American Revolution or the French Revolution .... It is a counterrevolution! Alas. And it is against us. I am kind of happy not to have ahead of me a very long future which will confirm my prediction. But you will live all of it."
The West, she said, is under assault and doesn't realize it.

"If we stay inert, if we let ourselves be scared, then we become collaborationists," she said. "If we are passive ... then we lose the war that has been declared against us.

"We can talk for centuries about the word 'racist,'" she said. "'Racist' has to do with race and not with religion. Yes, I am against that religion, a religion that controls the life of people in every minute of their day, that puts the burqa on women, that treats women as camels, that preaches polygamy, that cuts the hands of the poor thieves .... I am not religious-all religions are difficult to accept for me-but the Islamic one is not even a religion, in my opinion. It is a tyranny, a dictatorship-the only religion on earth that has never committed a work of self-criticism .... It is immovable. It becomes worse and worse .... It is 1,400 years and these people never review themselves, and now they want to come impose it on me, on us?

"Listen," she said, wagging a finger. "Those who do not follow what people like me say are unrealistic, are really masochistic, because they don't see the reality .... Muslims have passion, and we have lost the passion. People like me who have passion are derided: 'Ha ha ha! She's hysterical!' 'She's very passionate!' Listen how the Americans speak about me: 'A very passionate Italian.' New York Observor Interview

Where have you gone Oriana Fallaci? Who speaks for us? Who will stand up and say that their tolerance will never become my submission? Rage & Pride by Oriana Fallaci

Is This the Way it Was?

2004-10-08T08:32:00.000-04:00

October 8, 1944

KESSEL, Germany (Reuters) - A U.S. air strike on the German-held city of Kessel in western Germany killed 11 people and wounded 17 at a wedding party being hosted by the 1st SS Panzer Division, with women and children among the casualties, a hospital doctor said Friday.

John Kerry's McGuffin

2004-10-07T20:37:00.000-04:00

Iraq is John Kerry's McGuffin. What’s a McGuffin? Almost every English speaking person on earth that was born before people walked on the moon has either seen Alfred Hitchcock’s thriller Psycho or has heard about the Bates Motel and what happened there.

But does anybody remember that Psycho was a story of a stolen $40,000? The $40,000 robbery is the McGuffin. At the beginning of the movie the robbery seemed to be the story. Hitchcock used the McGuffin (the robbery) only to get Janet Leigh to the Bates Motel. After that it was all Hitchcock magic and the importance of the robbery disappeared from memory.

Iraq is John Kerry’s McGuffin. It exists only to draw us into the story of American unilateralism, arrogance and selfishness. A story in which American boys die for a mistake and where war is never the answer. As the UN Oil for Food Scandal was breaking replete with the trail of billions of bribe money paid to Jackass' buddies in France as quid pro quo for a Security Council veto, John Kerry was speaking about diplomacy as the only correct response to the maniacal Butcher of Baghdad.

Whether Kerry wins or loses, the mere fact that he’s still a viable candidate less than four weeks from November is proof enough that our liberty and our American Exceptionalism are at risk from without and within.

Sixty years after the fact we rightly marvel at the accomplishments and the courage of the "Greatest Generation." Our parents and grandparents who accepted every challenge before them, and with their hands, their muscles and their hearts confronted Evil head-on in total war and defeated it. I salute you.

Sixty years from now historians who have received permission to write about such things will call today’s adults the Cranial Rectal Inversion Generation. The parents and grandparents who when confronted by Evil ran away shouting "please like us." They died tired.

US culture 'choking' the world

2004-10-07T09:43:00.000-04:00

Hanoi - French President Jacques Chirac warned on Thursday of a "catastrophe" for global diversity if the United States' cultural hegemony goes unchallenged. Jackass Speaks.

Add to Jackass' list United States' military power, wealth, and political influence and voila, you get a strategy that differs only in kind, but not in purpose, from the jihadis. The existential battle for the idea of the United States of America is joined.

Resistance is Futile

2004-10-06T15:45:00.000-04:00

Swedish MPs Want "Man Tax"
05/10/2004 09:40 AM Reuters

A group of Swedish parliamentarians have proposed levying a "man tax" to cover the social cost of violence against women.

"It must be obvious to all of us that society has a huge problem with male violence against women and that has a cost," Left Party deputy Gudrun Schyman told Swedish radio.

"We must have a discussion where men understand they as a group have a responsibility," said Schyman, one of the party members to sign the motion for debate on the new tax.

Sweden already has the highest taxes in the European Union as a percentage of gross domestic product to pay for its famous but hard-pushed cradle-to-grave welfare program.

It is also one of the world's most advanced nations in terms of gender equality, but Schyman said in a headline-hitting 2002 speech that discrimination in Sweden followed "the same pattern" as in Afghanistan under the Taliban. Hat tip: Ludwig Von Mises Institute

Good intentions run amock. No rational person could argue against the benefit to any society of gender equality, but would you want to live in a society where the government deprived half the population of their property (taxes) because of the characteristics of their being? It took the oldest continuous democracy in the world 100 years of contentious squabbling, a monstrously lethal civil war, and another 100 years of contentious squabbling to penalize discrimination based on a person's genetic characteristics. How is this Swedish MP's approach to building a civil society Progressive? How many classes of people in the USA are either being discriminated against or "protected" based only on the genetic characteristics of being?

A Little Carrot with the Stick

2004-10-06T10:03:00.000-04:00

"Marines with the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit today distributed more than $200,000 in such payments, known as solatia, to express sympathy to Iraqis who'd been injured, had lost family members, or had experienced home or business property damage during the recent fighting." American Forces Press Service

Al Sadr's goons delivered two hundred corpses to the citizens of Najaf.

My Ribs are Sore

2004-10-04T16:45:00.000-04:00

I was hopeful that the left-swinging pendulum that started in the 60’s has reached apogee but, alas, it is a false hope.

What can happen when a Middle School teacher places a picture of President George W. Bush in here classroom next to pictures of previous Presidents?

Shiba Pillai-Diaz, the teacher, was verbally attacked by parents and the administration. School Principal Jim Warfel told her she disrupted the school with her "inflammatory politics". He then took her keys and ordered her out of the building.

My reaction is visceral. I don’t care if there’s an apology. I don’t care to hear the rationalization. I feel only contempt for those parents and Mr. Warfel.

Middle School Teacher In Trouble Over Presidential Photo?

Even a dog knows the difference between being tripped over and being kicked.

Burn Baby, Burn

2004-10-02T19:10:00.000-04:00

An official building harboring an Islamic propaganda and surveillance office was set on fire, on Tuesday, in the northern city of Rasht located in the Guilan province near the Caspian sea. The building is the center of the "Rasht's Followers of Imam" group and the Islamist "Guilan weekly" magazine. SMCCDI (Information Service)

The commander of the Law Enforcement Force, Commander Qalibaf, has said some people were arrested in Tehran on Sunday [26 September] following clashes instigated by "counter-revolutionary elements" and opposition currents. There were similar but "unimportant" incidents in Esfahan and another city, he said. He said recent arrests of journalists were carried out on the instructions of the judiciary. BBC

A must read article by Jonah Goldberg of NRO.
"Even if this weren't such a powerful human interest story, it would still be appalling how completely the mainstream media have downplayed what could be one of the most important news stories of our lives. If Iran were to throw off the shackles of the mullahocracy in favor of anything like a sane, decent and democratic regime, it would be the most significant advance for freedom and decency since the fall of the Berlin Wall. It would be a national security victory of staggering proportions."
Iran at the tipping point

The Cavalry is Coming (Sort Of)

2004-10-02T14:00:00.000-04:00

US and Iraqi forces began offensive operations to clear anti-Iraqi forces (AIF) from Samarra, a city of 200,000 on the Tigris River about 60 miles North of Baghdad. Samarra is an AIF stronghold in the Sunni Triangle. Residents report that al Zaqawri militia were driving through the city as recently as Wednesday displaying weapons and Tawhid & Jihad banners.

The Samarra offensive will be followed up or perhaps conducted simultaneously with similar operations in Ramadi, Fallujah and the Sadr City suburb of Baghdad. About 3,000 troops from the US 1st Infantry Division and 2,000 Iraqi National Guard and Army troops are engaged in Samarra. AIF combatants are estimated anywhere between a few hundred to a few thousand depending on the source. The assault began around midnight when US forces engaged a small number of AIF unloading boats on the Tigris River, and appears to have been a surprise. Various reports indicate that this is a combined arms operation with armor, artillery and air support.

According to the BBC, Iraqi Defence Minister Hazem Shaalan told al-Arabiya that Iraqi forces played the main part in the fighting - US troops "only provided cover for our operations". Agence France Presse (AFP) reports that Iraqi 36th Commando Battalion secured the gold-domed Imam Ali al-Hadi mausoleum and that there was no damage to the mausoleum. Other heritage sites in and near the city were also seized by Iraqi forces with no damage. The 202nd Iraqi National Guard Battalion and 7th Iraqi Army Battalion are also taking part in the operation

AFP also reports that:

The massive offensive came despite mounting talk in recent days of an imminent deal between insurgents and Iraq's interim authorities for a peaceful restoration of government control.

Only Thursday, provincial governor Hamed Hamud al-Qaissy said a deal was close and cautioned against any resort to force, saying it risked a new spiral of violence in the region.

The leader of a Samarra political association also expressed dismay at the offensive.

"We were in talks with Prime Minister Iyad Allawi about the situation in Samarra, including reaching an agreement to allow Iraqi forces to enter the city. We were surprised by this military offensive," said Khaled Naji al-Samarrai.

Other reports point out that 110 of Samarra's civic, tribal and religious leaders traveled to Baghdad a week ago to discuss the security situation.

This is the data. What information can we glean from it?

The Belmont Club has an excellent article on the Samarra raid in which Wretchard points out that "one of the most remarkable aspects of the operation was that such a huge force of Americans and Iraqis achieved tactical surprise." We agree. One of the reasons that Iraqi forces have not been effective is that their ranks were infiltrated with AIF friendly individuals. That this raid achieved tactical surprise is a very good indication that these individuals, as well as traitorous types within the provisional government, have been identified and isolated or removed. Based on the AFP article, Samarra's civic leaders were also kept out of the raid's planning loop. In addition to the security aspects, that the Iraqi central government conducted such a large scale raid without receiving specific permission from the civic leaders is a boost to the sovereign authority of the central government. This may turn out to be the best indicator of all that the central government has reached a position from which it can begin to take full control of the Sunni Triangle.

Although there is very little detailed public information about how the raid was conducted we can deduce a few things about the proficiency of the Iraqi forces from the general information. The 36th Commando Battalion succeeded in capturing heritage sites without damage. Considering that these sites comprise several buildings over as many as forty acres we can give some high marks to this unit. If your interested in the down and dirty side of how the Iraqi security forces are coming along this is the unit to Google from time to time. The New Republic did an uncomplimentary article about the 36th Battalion of the Iraqi Civil Defense Corps back in April, 2004. I don't think that is the same unit.

There is no specific information about the performance during the Samarra raid of the 202nd Iraqi National Guard Battalion or the 7th Iraqi Army Battalion. Perhaps some will come later and I can update. If indeed, these units did play a main part in the fighting as claimed then we can grade them at least B- with no additional information based only on the fact that this was a combined arms operation conducted at night. No small number of US troops are killed every year by friendly fire in combined arms training maneuvers. Combat is dangerous for everybody when artillery and air ordnance are involved. At a minimum the mere fact that these units did not suffer friendly fire casualties is a good indication that they have achieved some unit cohesiveness, that their NCOs and junior officers are competent, and that battalion level command and control is able to coordinate movement on the battlefield with American support elements. The MSM plays cynic that some Iraqi units only get three weeks of formal training before joining a unit. That's not much, true, but these individuals continue to train and practice after joining units too so if somebody is two months out of school then they have about three months of training and not three weeks.

There is no information on the AIF order of battle or the quality of the enemy forces killed in the raid. Estimates of enemy forces in Samarra range from a few hundred to a few thousand so apparently nobody who knows is saying. Unknown also is whether the best were left to fight or just caught in the fires by the surprise or withdrew without engaging.

This is story worth following if only to shut up the whiners and posers who are already starting to challenge the legitimacy of the January elections. They should be reminded that 26% of the electoral votes in the 1864 US Presidential Election were not even counted. Maybe Jimmy Carter will try to annul that election too.

Let's flunk the Global Test. Please.

2004-10-01T11:25:00.000-04:00

I thought that Kerry's "Global Test" comment during the debate was most telling of Kerry's character and plans for America. As a young man John Kerry went to Paris to receive the terms for America's surrender and as President he would do exactly the same.

As Zell Miller so dramatically pointed out at the Republican Convention, Senator Kerry has voted against funding every weapons system he ever saw (probably including spitballs if it had ever came up). Why is that so?

Why do you think it is that Kerry so easily dismisses Britain, Australia and Poland as "Window Dressing" or doesn't bother to separate even these WWII allies from the dung spattering of his "Coerced and the Bribed" invective? Why? Because they carry guns and His Kerriness and France do not have a place for guns in the new World Democracy that de Villepin is stumping for at every opportunity.

Take de Villepin's words and put them in Kerry's mouth and you can start making sense of Kerry's contradictory positions on Iraq, his incessant demands for "real alliances", and how we would fight a "smarter" WOT.

The new collective-security system should be "founded on collective responsibility and world democracy," de Villepin said. In particular, he said that France was now looking favorably to the idea of enlarging membership of the U.N. Security Council and vesting it with expanded powers. While he provided no specifics in his speech, aides later said that he believed Germany, Japan, India, Brazil and a major African power such as Nigeria all should be given permanent seats on the council, along with veto power over all Security Council resolutions, including those authorizing the use of force.

What Kerry will never say during the election process is that America cannot participate in the new French led World Democracy until it gets cut down to size. Arrogance and exceptionalism have no place in a multicultural world where the sensitivities of the Islamist regime in Sudan must receive the same considerations as the democratically elected governments of the United States or Australia. How can the United States insist that Iran give up nuclear weapons when it will not do so itself? Sorry, folks, I never thought for a minute of my existence that playing fair was ever a foreign policy objective in a world where survival cannot be assured.

Is anybody in a position to do so going to press Kerry on these issues? This is serious folks. John Kerry is setting us up to become also rans in history, without debate, and without consent. Let's stuff Kerry and his candidacy in an envelope and Fed Ex it to Versaiiles.

Kicking in doors in Fallujah

2004-10-01T10:00:00.001-04:00

A blog site doing the heavy lifting on military matters that was formerly the exclusive province of the MSM is Belmont Club. Instead of replying “no it isn’t” to the constant streams of “Iraq is a mess” or “Iraq is like (pick a war)” Wretchard has laid out the available information on the numbers and locations of casualties and incidents in Iraq over a several months period, in an easy to see and understand manner, that lets the reader make his or her own conclusions.

Wretchard is saying that the military situation in Iraq is not nearly as bad as it’s being made out to be, and I'm betting that two or three months from now that even the most die-hard defeatist is going to have to acknowledge that Wretchard is a freakin' genius. Kerry is an "Iraq is a mess" kind of guy and has criticized Bush for not assaulting Fallujah in April. I did too but now see that the folks on the ground in Iraq are a whole lot smarter than me.

Some context. Over the past few years we’ve witnessed, and many have participated, in a number of unique and historical events. Number one is that awful day in September on which we learned that we were mixed up in something big that almost nobody was prepared for or understood. Everybody was concerned about what was happening next, where we were going, and what we would do when we got there. George W. Bush was an untried and uninspiring CIC. The only military we knew about was what we saw in Black Hawk Down.

How have we done since then? First things first. Forget everything you have read in the NYT or the Guardian. Wipe clean any lingering images of TV screens and talking heads. Make your own decisions. Go get a map of Central Asia and find Afghanistan. You don’t have to be a West Point graduate to figure out that even putting people on the ground in such a land-locked, remote region, and making sure they get enough bullets to shoot and food to eat is a daunting task. Add to that the mission to defeat a government that had the support of the majority of the population and a well earned reputation as giant killers and you get the picture. You know the result. 100 years from now military historians will still be awed that our guys pulled it off. Don’t wait until then. Afghanistan is a remarkable achievement of military planning, organization and execution, and anybody who says anything different is looking pretty dumb pissing on their leg.

On to Iraq. If you were the single individual most responsible for world peace and order and had to pick a geographical location from which you could best influence events in the Middle East and Persian Gulf region you would choose Iraq. Look at the map. Whiners be damned, the US invasion of Iraq and its occupation until democracy was an absolutely necessary step in preserving Western Civilization. The doubters may eventually catch up with history but I don’t really care if they do or not so long as they stay out of the way.

This is getting a little long in the tooth but to properly evaluate what’s happening now in Iraq you have to understand how we got here. Fast forward to the 3rd Infantry Division’s “Thunder Run” through downtown Bagdhad. Whoever made the call to run an armored column through an unreconnoitered and hostile urban area will be Chairman of the Joint Chiefs one day. One memorable quote from WWII about our soldiers was “where do find men like these.” I repeat that quote now with equal admiration. I am humbled by the courage and skill of these men, and forever grateful that the USA can still find “men like these.”

Why was Thunder Run a big deal? It proved conclusively that not only were the Americans audacious but that they were nearly invulnerable and incredibly lethal when operating in formation. Every foot of Thunder Run was made under fire from anti-aircraft guns, RPGs, artillery pieces and small arms. Our losses were precious but small. The enemy lost thousands of fighters for zero gains.

This is not an exercise in triumphalism. Unless you understand the reason why the portrayal of American forces in Iraq as bumbling victims is utter bullshit you’re going to succumb to the crap that the doom and gloomers toss at us every minute of every day.

I’m going a step further than Wretchard. Within two weeks of the moment that the first US Marine kicks open a door in Fallujah the so called insurgency will be broken. Whatever Baathists survive will spend their remaining days hiding in spider holes and Al Qaeda and its wannabes will have reverted wholesale to their true state of rotting flesh. We ain’t losing this war. Not with these guys fighting it.

Dissent is OK. Disloyalty is not.

2004-09-29T09:00:00.000-04:00

“We wish we were exaggerating. It's become obvious over the past couple of years that large swaths of the CIA oppose U.S. anti-terror policy, especially toward Iraq. But rather than keep this dispute in-house, the dissenters have taken their objections to the public, albeit usually through calculated and anonymous leaks that are always spun to make the agency look good and the Bush Administration look bad.” Opinon Journal

Paul R. Pillar a current CIA employee, who in addition to making public appearances trashing the Administration’s anti-terror policy, is believed to be the person who leaked the National Intelligence Estimate that quickly became fodder for the domestic doom and gloomers and a ray of hope for the Iraqi based terrorists.

Porter Goss should fire this guy and initiate a criminal investigation. If Pillar and others in the CIA like him are not capable of placing professionalism over partisanship then they must be driven out of government. A robust intelligence service should have many voices and many opinions. Only by constantly challenging others’ estimates with new facts and interpretations can something resembling the truth rise to the top. When a key part of that teleological loop filters information to suit a personal agenda the process spins out of control and leads to bad decisions higher up.