Busy Day Tomorrow
ArchPundit
Out Tomorrow until late—have some John Lott updates and maybe some news on Blagojevich. Check Out Tim Lambert if you want the Lott story now. At the left in the blog roll.
2003
Rich Miller In Iraq
As I mentioned the other day, Rich Miller is reporting in Iraq currently. His reporting isn’t the big picture stories of the nightly news, but personal reporting of the daily lives of Iraqis and how the invasion and occupation affect them and then putting that into context of the larger context. While such reporting doesn’t get the cliched ‘whole story’, for those that have spent time in the Developing World, it is critical to understanding day to day life and how US actions are affecting the country. Both stories are quite moving. (hmmmm….far too nice–have to find something in Miller’s work to criticize soon)
Postwar Iraq Moves Dangerously Close to Civil Disaster
UP DATE: I received a complaint that Miller’s articles aren’t balanced and that a better article would be Max Boot’s.
First, I don’t think that all articles should be balanced–in fact, given that no single story catches the full picture, a well written story captures an important element of the story. I think those of us in the US need to hear very personal stories that tell of the problems. They are ultimately anecdotes and I expect intelligent readers to understand this. But more importantly, the Boot article has the same problem–Boot spent his time with US Soldiers giving him a skewed view–meaning neither should be taken as a single point of truth. There are two reasons to point out the Miller articles–one is that they are by a local journalist, and two, because Americans have a hard time imagining what life is like if you are an Iraqi right now. I think those articles capture some of the situations Iraqis are going through.
Taken together, I think the Boot and Miller articles provide a couple key points. First, civilian control is where we need to head. Abizaid’s report specifies this. Second, the tactics being used may be problematic at times–as noted in Miller’s piece, but also mentioned in Boot’s with the discussion of regular army unit tactics in keeping control.
Second, I think Boot is missing a key point. Him and the amorphous media reports he criticizes are wrong about this being analagous to Vietnam. This is an occupation of country with no sovereign not a limited war against insurgents in a country with a functioning government. We are the sovereign and producing civil order should have been the top priority–and while we need to move torwards civilian rule, we first have to establish civil order and then support it. It seems hard to argue that we didn’t and still don’t need more troops. First, to produce civil order and then to rotate them in and out. Those can be American or UN troops, but they have to create a climate of order. We didn’t do that at first, because our troops were busy finishing off the Iraqi army. More troops would have reduced this problem. More troops would reduce this problem now. But now we are prolonging the issues because we didn’t get it right at first.
Truly Great News
Berkeley Breathed is starting a new comic for Opus
Open Meetings Law, errr..enforced
Being a bit behind, I haven’t had time to link to Lisa Madigan’s shocking enforcement of the open meetings law.
Within the past week, both Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan and Cook County State’s Attorney Richard Devine have told the CTA board it violated the Illinois Open Meetings Act on Aug. 6.
Apparently she was serious,
Madigan, the daughter of state Democratic Party chief and Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, fired the first shot across the CTA’s bow.
She announced last week that attorneys for her office had told the CTA board to either void the pension fund hikes or she would file a lawsuit to nullify its Aug. 6 action.
I asked Sean Denny, a former assistant Illinois attorney general, who for nearly two decades was in charge of enforcing the Open Meetings Act, if he could ever recall the attorney general filing a lawsuit against Chicago or one of its agencies.
His answer was, "No."
Lisa Madigan ran for the office of attorney general vowing to aggressively enforce the state’s sunshine laws, and eight months into her first term she’s been good to her word.
Who knew?
Kudes to Dick Devine too…
Rich Miller’s Photos from Iraq
For those not aware, Rich Miller is reporting from Iraq. I’ll post some links to the stories which are good when I see them appear in the papers. They capture a very basic level of what is going on in Iraq more than most of the mega picture diddling about the President’s, ahem, ‘plan’. He has some pics posted at the Capitol Fax.
In his weekly column, he has a good piece on the Republican Senate candidates. Most notably, he has nice things to say about Kathuria.
Sawicky on a Tear
First, he thanks Ted Kennedy for keeping Bork off the bench. Why?
Judge Bork’s last point is that the new rule of judges is international. "Judicial imperialists" made a crucial start at the Nuremberg Trials of Nazi leaders. The trials established a bad habit of confusing moral justification (Goering deserved what he got) with legal justification for retroactive lawmaking. It would have been better simply to execute the big Nazis, as Britain proposed at the time. Nuremberg established the idea that legal busy bodies can run the world according to their own notion of virtue, and it was only a few short steps to the World Court and the International Criminal Court. This argument is so sweeping as to sound paranoid — but paranoids are not always wrong . . . "
That’s just amazing.
Even more amazing, Sawicky even thinks the deficit is going to be too bigh. I now stand corrected if I teased him about never seeing a deficit he didn’t like.
What If My Dissent Is for More Troops
Rumsfeld pulls a hell of a number today, playing the dissent is emboldening our enemies.
Mr. Rumsfeld did not mention any of the domestic critics by name. But he suggested that those who have been critical of the administration?s handling of the war in Iraq and its aftermath might be encouraging American foes to believe that the United States might one day walk away from the effort, as it has in past conflicts.
Ted (Thank God He’s Back) Barlow then gives us the appropriate reference to Peter Pan.
The problem I have is that I don’t know how I’d be emboldening our enemies when I’m calling on the Friggen’ President to actually go after them in both Afghanistan and Iraq with more troops–foreign or domestic. Funny, but it would seem that I’m calling for a stronger response, as are most of the Democratic candidates, and a real commitment. How does that criticism encourage our foes? By pointing out the twit in the White House is a paper tiger?
Dude, That’s Your Base
Saint Louis has been blessed with a visit from Al Sharpton who has taken the side of supporters of a boycott against the Saint Louis Public Schools. He came into town last night for a church rally and joined a group of protesters carrying a child in coffin on a route to City Hall this morning. That’s gonna cost someone a whole lot of therapy.
The boycott was unsuccessful with about 4.5% more students attending the first day of school this year over last. While not as strong of a day as school management had hoped for, it is improvement. It’s important to note that nearly 10% of students are in transitional housing or homeless in the SLPS and beyond that, nearly many schools have 25% mobility rates during the year, so moving around during the summer is a challenge to many families.
The boycott supporters include local radio show host and obnoxious twit, Lizz Brown. She attempted a stand down campaign in 2002 against Jean Carnahan to no noticeable affect in the ward vote totals. She is generally disliked by most black political leaders with the exception of a couple Northside alderman.
But the important news for Al is that he is lashing out at his base. He attacked St. Louis’ black leadership that generally opposed the boycott by calling them rented negros and Uncle Tom’s. While such language might buy him a few votes amongst the nihilist faction of St. Louis Black Politics, he isn’t going to win a majority of the black vote who he is calling, well, rented negros.
Taking on your base ala Sister Souljah is a useful technique. Pissing on your base’s leg is generally just unproductive.
What’s Al’s strategy then? Get on Tv?
Abortion Polls
Polling is poorly understood by most and, believe it or not, it is best understood in horse races. It is worst understood when discussing public policy because all too often the issues are skewed by poorly formed questions and especially in abortion, those polls ask questions that try to draw conclusions about political questions from questions that elicit moral responses.
It shouldn’t be surprising that people differentiate between what should be good public policy and what is moral behavior. While people often hold inconsistent or even silly beliefs, when you probe people can differentiate between the two spheres. The problem is most polls are limited by money and thus, limited in what they can probe. Even beyond that, depending on what comes to mind to an individual will influence their response to a specific question.
Eric Zorn takes Dennis Byrne to task over misusing public opinion polls on abortion.
Yes, but they also show that most people–consistently about 60 percent — feel the abortion decision should be between the woman and her doctor, and that the percentage of people who feel that abortion should legal under any circumstances is always higher than the percentage of people who feel it should always be illegal.
Many people who are for abortion rights are uncomfortable with abortions. That isn’t inconsistent, it is a recognition of living in a complicated world. For a group that wants limited government, conservatives often miss that people place higher barriers to government intervention in their personal lives than in other areas.
49-7
5 sacks? I didn’t see the game, but for crying out loud, what the %$#%, is Neil Armstrong coaching again?
You’ll be playing in a toilet bowl, you aren’t supposed to flushed down the toilet.