2003

Circle up and Fire

ArchPundit April 17, 2003 No Comments

The Emerging Democratic Majority

The resistance to a larger tax cut by two Republican senators, Olympia J. Snowe of Maine and George V. Voinovich of Ohio, was what caused the budget to be constructed the way it was in the first place, with one tax cut number for the Senate and another for the House. So Republicans, in concert with a re-engaged president and White House operation, will either have to persuade the two senators to change their minds or lean on some other opponents to switch.

The conservative Club for Growth is going the not-so-subtle route, starting a $100,000-to-$150,000 television advertising campaign this weekend in Ohio and Maine that compares Senators Voinovich and Snowe to the French and accuses them of disloyalty to the president for their tax cut position.

And no I don’t think the Democrats will pick up the Senate in this round, but such intraparty feuding isn’t healthy for any party. It is also a good way to scare off someone like Jim Edgar.

Doctor, does he understand why this war took place?

ArchPundit April 16, 2003 No Comments

Atrios points out the utter vapidness of Kyra Phillips.

It is one thing to schill for the right wing, but is it really that hard for one to understand that a kid who just lost his family and his arms is angry and against war? One can, and I do argue, that the war was worth it with the full understanding there are many stories like this out there. But to not understand the impact his actually has people in his position is…well I don’t know, but really, really self-involved and bad. I can’t think of a word for it.

That child is now the responsibility of the United States. And not just to sit there and try and convince him that the war was justified.

Why Was It That We Didn’t Need More Troops?

ArchPundit April 16, 2003 No Comments

Was proving the war could be done with fewer troops really worth losing civilization’s history?

War is unpredictable. We all understand that. However, why weren’t more troops allocated to protecting such sites? Looters aren’t hard to deter so adding cultural sites and maybe even a few hospitals wouldn’t be that hard.

As for the whining about it potentially being Baath Party officials. So what? American tanks and troops deter all sorts of bad people–why not deter them? Actually, wouldn’t we want to deter them especially?

Looting of stores and other types of locations was going to happen. There was no way around that. However, we identified key locations for protections such as the oil ministry. If this is for the Iraqi people as the rhetoric has been claiming, there is no excuse to not protect the Iraqi heritage and indeed the world’s heritage. We have the troops and the hardware–why not use them?

The only rational reason why not to do so is that proving a new war strategy is more important than heritage.

Good Guys Wear Blood

ArchPundit April 16, 2003 No Comments

Coming soon: Mullets and And Blood Night At YOUR COMISKEY PARK!

Edgar Is Expressing Interest

ArchPundit April 15, 2003 No Comments

Jim Edgar is expressing interest in Peter Fitzgerald’s Senate Seat.

?Jim Edgar is the party?s 500-pound gorilla,? with the capacity to preempt the field and avoid a bruising primary, said one source who has spoken with him. Though Mr. Edgar previously toyed with, and ultimately dismissed, becoming GOP party chairman or even governor again, this time, ?it?s serious,? said the source, who asked not to be named

With Democrats sweeping to victory in the 2002 Illinois elections, ?a ticket of Jim Edgar and George W. Bush in 2004 would be a dream ticket in terms of rebuilding the party,? Ms. Topinka said.

?If the president calls, he runs,? predicts another Edgar confidant. ?Remember that he and Bush served together as governors. They?re close.?

Big News! I like many others assumed he was enjoying what was essentially well paid retirement. If he gets in, he is the frontrunner for the general election. He is the most popular statewide politician in Illinois with only Paul Simon and Jim Thompson have similar appeal. He is a fiscally conservative, pro-choice Republican.

The last sentence suggests he could be challenged for the nomination, but I find it hard to believe that any of the usual suspects amongst social conservatives could credibly challenge him. While O’Malley may try, my guess is he will sit out to avoid being a two-time loser (and his State Senate seat is up in 2004 IIRC).

For the Democrats it becomes more vital to nominate the strongest general election candidate and against Edgar, that will be Dan Hynes. Hynes is fiscal conservative and socially moderate allowing little room for space while providing a clear choice in whether Bush’s agenda gets passed–an agenda not particularly popular in Illinois.

Lotta Evasion

ArchPundit April 15, 2003 No Comments

Tim Lambert updates the most recent issues concerning Lott and Reynolds.

Lott should have lost all credibility by this point, but what is strange is that Reynolds seems okay getting caught up in Lott’s little games.

If Lott was the source for the first article:
of them have reputations as being antigun. Steven Levitt, has been

Most of the people selected for the panel have reputations as good scholars, but none of them have specialized in firearms policy. Most described as "rabidly antigun."

The closest that anyone on the panel gets to not being entirely antigun is James Q. Wilson

Glenn responded on an e-mail list that he had published Levitt’s reaction on Instapundit.

Reynolds isn’t revealing his source, but one can expect it to be Lott. In which case, Reynolds is getting burned by Lott if Lott is the source. Lott claims in his book that media accounts describe Levitt as ‘rabidly anti-gun.’ Only Reynolds and Kopel can know for sure, but if Lott is using such sleight of hand, they have a responsibility not to be a part of it.

Lott’s work is poorly done. He is a joke amongst those who do quantitative research in social science. Whether he is better or worse than Charles Murray would be a funny discussion to have. Just who is the biggest incompetent out there?

Yet Reynolds and others continue to schill for him. It would not be that hard for Reynolds to walk across campus and find someone with a decent background in statistics to explain this to him, but he has shown no interest in determining if Lott’s work is of any merit.

Fitzgerald’s Out

ArchPundit April 15, 2003 No Comments

Check it out at the Political State Report

Short Handicapping:

Jim Ryan is recruited by Rove and Rove tries to clear the field
Patrick O’Malley enters the race and creates one of the most divisive primaries ever, beating his last primary challenge to Ryan. Ryan wins, conservatives stay home in the general.

Lotta Instapundit

ArchPundit April 14, 2003 No Comments

Pile on Instapundit. I hadn’t looked at Tim Lambert’s page for a couple weeks–you know the war or something. Anyway, Tim continues a fantastic job on covering Lott’s work.

Tim summarizes what appears to be Reynolds contributing to Lott’s efforts to argue the politics and not the merits of his work. It certainly seems that Lott was an anonymous source that identified Steven Levitt as a ‘rabidly anti-gun’. Even better, Lott cites media sources that suggest such Levitt is ‘rabidly anti-gun’ in his new book. So Lott is likely a source for a claim and then uses it as evidence to support the claim. Uh-huh.

The only thing missing is any evidence that Levitt is actually anti-gun. Even if Lott isn’t the source no real evidence of bias has been presented against Levitt.

But don’t get lost in the amongst the trees in the forest, this is another example of Lott moving the discussion to the politics of the argument over the substance of his argument. By avoiding the actual substance of his work he is able to make a butt-load of money by crying victim and producing results that people want to hear.

Taking part in this little game demonstrates how little of a committment Reynolds has to scholarly research.

Too Few Nos

ArchPundit April 14, 2003 No Comments

Tom Tomorrow expresses his feelings about Jeb Bush for President in 2008.

From my point-of-view, Tomorrow is kinda wishy-washy…

Wanted: Competent Cronies

ArchPundit April 14, 2003 No Comments

It has been abundantly clear this administration has a liking for crony capitalism. This is always bad. However, there are the bad in a way of not everyone getting a fair shake way and bad in a way of screwing up the policy way and only benefiting polical crony way. The Bush administration has a fascination with the second category.

More evidence: Dyncorp
Via both TalkLeft and Body and Soul.

They have been accused of covering up sex rings, which is an all too nice way of saying they covered up child molestation.

But you know those aren’t our kids, so if they can get the job done, hey. Sure, if it was clear they could get the job done at all.

Doesn’t the administration of competency have any cronies to rich who can at least do the job well?