Two Prejudices

Beliefnet: Shmuley Boteach: Beauty vs. Babies and Beards

Of the many prejudices prevalent in society, there are two that are rarely addressed. The first is a prejudice against families with many children. I should know: We have seven, thank G-d, and I find myself apologizing wherever I go. The frequent stares loaded with disapproval and scorn seem to imply that the housing crisis in New York and the famine in Ethiopia were caused single-handedly by my own large brood. I suspect that now with seven, I present a most extreme example of selfish overpopulation. But any family with more than three kids meets with subtle, or not so subtle, condemnation from strangers. When I have broached this very issue with others who dare to overpopulate, they relate to the experience of suspicious stares and raised eyebrows. We have grown accustomed to the looks on the faces of strangers-first puzzlement, then pity, then scorn-as they try to fathom why we would voluntarily subject ourselves to such a horrific fate. But while we now know to expect it, I fail to understand it.
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The second prejudice that seems largely overlooked is a cruel disdain against people deemed unattractive by society's standards-or at least those who aren't well-groomed and beautiful. Often the two prejudices come together, as if only those who are ugly or unconventional-looking would be dumb enough to have lots of kids.
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There is something seriously wrong in the world when children are treated as a nuisance while dogs are treated as love objects. And there is something seriously amiss when appearance, rather than actions, can dictate likeability. There is something dangerously off track when men and women who love children, and aren't afraid to have large families, must feel apologetic and guilty for doing so. To paraphrase Martin Luther King, we await the day when our children will be judged by the content of their character rather than the comeliness of their skin. And we await the day when the fact of our children's existence is not judged at all, but seen as the embodiment of infinite blessing.

Our veneration of beauty and youth leaves no room for the unattractive or, God forbid, the younger who might take the spotlight off or the current generation.

The Difference between War and War Games

Jonathan Rauch National Journal:A Bad Idea That Deserves A Try

President Bush, characteristically, is not leveling with the public about the risks he is taking with his plan to "surge" more U.S. forces into Iraq. Jack Keane, a retired Army vice chief of staff and a leading proponent of the strategy, is more frank. Here is what he told Charlie Rose earlier this month:

"If we have to go into Sadr City" -- a Shiite stronghold in Baghdad -- "what will happen will be rather dramatic. The Badr Corps and the Jaish al-Mahdi [two major Shiite militias], which are not aligned, will align. And they'll also be able to align the vigilante groups, which are essentially protecting the neighborhoods and causing some mischief and havoc. They'll all get aligned, and we'll have to contend with about 70,000 people under arms in one of the heavily and most densely populated areas of Baghdad."

Read that again. Then repeat after me: Uh-oh.

Painfully aware that the Iraq war has given commentators a lesson in humility, I offer the following assessment with no certainty at all but with the hope of at least contributing to clarity: The Bush Surge is unlikely to work, but Congress should not try to stop it.

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Going to war against the Shiites would be a nightmare, and everyone knows it. American forces could soon find themselves in firefights not only with tens of thousands of armed and angry Shiite militants but also with Iraqi police and army units, in or out of uniform. The Pentagon could win such a conflict militarily, Keane told Rose, "but in my judgment we should avoid it at all costs, and try to resolve it politically."

In effect, Keane appears to be saying that the plan works at an acceptable cost only if the United States can pacify the Shiite militants without forcibly confronting them. To me, and possibly also to the Sadrists, this looks like what gamblers call a bluff.

So why shouldn't the Democratic Congress block such an unpromising strategy? Three reasons point, I think, independently in the same direction.

First, the Constitution. It provides for one commander-in-chief, not 536.

A determined president can evade all but the tightest congressional attempts to override his military decisions, and any sufficiently tight congressional strictures are likely to emasculate the presidency and fracture the Congress.

Second, politics. Blocking the president's last-resort plan would divide the country for years to come. Many Republicans would believe that the war was winnable and that Democrats lost it. If the United States is going to leave Iraq, it should do so when even Republicans agree that there is little reason to stay -- which they will, if Bush's Hail Mary pass fails.

Third, morality. America has not quite discharged its debt to Iraq.

Apart from evacuating as many as possible of those Iraqis who personally aided the American effort, the United States can do nothing for moderate and peace-loving Iraqis if the Baghdad government is determined to press or abet a sectarian agenda. A tragedy will unfold. But if there is any chance that the Iraqi government might yet be salvageable, then the United States owes it to the Iraqis to find out.

Once the surge takes place, Americans are likely to know in a matter of months whether the Maliki government is serious about pacifying Shiite militants, coming to terms with Sunnis, and cleaning up the ministries and security forces. If not, Washington can begin withdrawing forces and shift into damage-control mode -- not without guilt, but at least with certainty.

Politically it makes sense. Morally it seems outrageous to advocate sending troops, or more accurately allowing troops to be sent, on a disastrous course of action that you believe will result in a good number of them coming home in flag draped caskets without a reward worthy of their sacrifice.

EOBR's revisited

Back on the 11th I mentioned the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration's new Electronic Onboard Data Recorder rule which would apply to less than 1% of the industry.

Here's a couple data points

Ol' Blue USA:HOS Survey Review – Opens Eyes

Ol’ Blue, USA™ recently conducted a survey on its Website (www.OlBlueUSA.org ) about the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s (FMCSA) Hours of Service (HOS) Regulations – and the results were alarming, but not surprising.
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Of the 1,094 qualified respondents, a vast majority of them (65%) were company drivers, while 26% were leased owner operators, 8% were independent owner operators with their own authority, and 1% were involved in other occupations which require a CDL. The primary route these respondents traveled broke down to about 63% long haul (more than 500 miles from base), 32% regional (within 500 miles of base), 8% local (within 100 miles of base), and 3% of other types of routes. The total percentage exceeded 100% due to multiple route types.

What did the survey find? In a nutshell, it revealed that the majority of drivers feel that they understand the HOS regulations, to a certain extent, but have questions. The alarming (but not surprising) data was the fact that 77% of the respondents admitted to deliberately violating the HOS regulations in the past and 55% said they were still currently deliberately violating the rules.

From a 1997 survey of truck drivers Let It Be Palletized:
A Portrait of Truck Drivers’ Work and Lives (PDF)

Not including those who reported no work in the previous week, drivers worked up to the legal limit on
working. Drivers worked 60 hours in the last seven days at the median, and averaged 63.2 hours. Few
drivers, only slightly over 10% of the respondents, worked 40 hours or less in seven days. A larger
proportion worked more than permitted by the hours of service regulations: 25% of the respondents
reported working at least 75 hours, 10% reported working at least 90 hours.

It seems like a bit more than 1% of the driver population is violating the rules.

Clinton/Bayh?

Tribune-Star:Bayh: Troops needed in Afghanistan

On the same day it was reported that a United States aircraft carrier is being positioned in the Persian Gulf to show “resolve” to Iran, Sen. Evan Bayh wrote a letter along with Sen. Hillary Clinton urging Defense Secretary Robert Gates to deploy more troops to Afghanistan.

Bayh (D–Ind.), who recently returned from a four-day trip to Iraq and Afghanistan with Sen. Clinton (D–N.Y.), said that while the situation in Afghanistan is looking “much more hopeful,” the war in Iraq continues to deteriorate.

In a teleconference from Washington on Wednesday, Bayh summarized his trip, during which he, Clinton and Rep. John McHugh (R–N.Y.) met with U.S. military commanders and members of Iraqi leadership, including Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

Military commanders in Afghanistan are requesting additional resources, “including another battalion of troops to meet what they anticipate will be another Taliban offensive” in the spring or summer, Bayh said.

The “lessons of Iraq” should help inform the next steps taken in Afghanistan, he said. One difference there, he added, is that “Afghans are politically fairly united. They don’t want to go back to the days of the Taliban, they support what we’re doing.” Iraqis, on the other hand, still are torn and unsure whether to accept help from Iran.

Another difference is the number of troops, Bayh said. “More forces early on could have made a difference in Iraq. I think we’re beyond that point now. In Afghanistan we’re still at a point where if we add the resources including a few extra troops right now, we can tip the struggle in a positive direction … Remember we were attacked by Afghanistan, so we have a strong interest in making sure it doesn’t sink back into a kind of collapsed state that will be a safe haven for terrorists. For a tiny fraction of the resources we’ve been asked to devote to Iraq, we could make a major difference in Afghanistan.”
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When asked if he and Sen. Clinton had discussed a joint run for the White House in 2008, Bayh said they had not talked about it. “We were there to focus upon one of the biggest challenges facing our country today: what to do about the global struggle against terrorism, what to do about Iraq and Afghanistan.

“That’s what we were focused on.”

Be an interesting pairing. Hillary may want to cover her left flank, though.

The Ownership Society in action

The Wall Street Journal:How Wall Street 'Sweeps' the Cash

The phrase "cash sweep" may sound like a cleaning crew gathering loose change. But on Wall Street, the top brokerage firms are increasingly turning cash sweeps into gold.

The blue-chip securities firms are reaping bigger profits from a few simple changes to how investors' idle cash balances are treated. And most investors either don't notice or don't care that Wall Street's gains are coming at their expense as brokers turn around and reinvest the money for their own benefit at a higher rate.

Merrill Lynch & Co., which pioneered such tactics starting in 2000, is expected to report next week that its profits derived mainly from reinvesting customers' cash will top $2 billion for 2006, up from $1.3 billion two years ago.

Last year Morgan Stanley ramped up the same strategy of "sweeping" client cash to insured bank deposits, which pay rates as low as 1.25% on the smallest accounts. And the Smith Barney unit of Citigroup Inc. in September also began paying rates as low as 1.51% for cash in smaller accounts.
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Take Wachovia Corp. Its brokerage pays just 1% on bank-sweep cash for accounts with under $100,000 in assets and 1.3% for accounts under $250,000, while accounts with over $1 million get 4%.

Joe Nadreau, director of client strategy, acknowledges the lower rates are "beneficial" to Wachovia, but notes they are just one element of its fees and costs in "the whole competitive fee landscape" in which larger accounts are inherently more profitable.

One person familiar with Merrill's decision to move uninvested funds to bank deposits starting in 2000 said it was inspired partly by a strategy pursued even earlier by discount broker Charles Schwab Corp.

Schwab had used its own interest-bearing account, effectively a Schwab IOU, as an alternative to money-market funds for client cash, earning a profit by reinvesting the funds at higher rates. Currently, Schwab and other online brokers earn more in interest income from cash balances and margin loans than from commissions.

Amid the regulatory prodding, some firms send clients brochures about their sweep programs that include some cautions. But readers have to look closely to discern that they may suffer financially.

The Merrill Lynch disclosure, for example, carries the bland headline, "Timely Reminder Concerning Yields on Deposits with the Merrill Lynch Banks and Certain Investment Alternatives." It says rates are "tiered" without saying plainly that small accounts get less. But it says the deposits are "financially beneficial" to Merrill Lynch, and a table indicates that accounts with less than $250,000 will receive just 1.51% and rates of up to 4.4% are available in money funds if clients speak with their broker.

A Merrill spokesman said the tiers are part of "relationship pricing, which rewards those clients with larger asset bases for consolidating all of their business with the firm. The process is transparent and fully disclosed in writing to clients."

NY Times Dealbook:Mack’s $40 Million Bonus Sets Record, For Now

Morgan Stanley gave its chief executive, John J. Mack, $40 million in stock and options for 2006, the largest bonus ever awarded to a Wall Street chief. But the record may be short-lived as press reports and analysts are predicting even bigger rewards for the C.E.O.s of rival investment banks.

The Wall Street Journal, citing unidentified sources, writes that Goldman Sachs’s chief executive, Lloyd Blankfein, is in line for compensation exceeding $50 million, and analysts told the newspaper that that some other chief executives, such as James Cayne of Bear Stearns and E. Stanley O’Neal of Merrill Lynch, could get $40 million to $50 million, or higher.

Mr. Mack received his entire bonus in stock and options. He was granted shares valued at $36.2 million as of Dec. 12, and about $4 million in options to buy Morgan Stanley shares. The firm also granted more than $57 million in bonuses for seven other top executives.

So the rubes trying to save for retirement get taken advantage of for the benefit of the large corporations and by extension their execs. That's the ownership society, fewer and fewer people own more and more snatched from the pockets of everyone else. The thing is is there's plenty of money to be made without fleecing folks. As folks wake up to the graft practiced by the rich, economic populism is only going to grow in appeal. The greed of the upper class is going to be repaid with interest and they will have no one to blame but themselves.

Unanswered Questions

RealClear Politics:Sandy Berger: What Did He Take and Why Did He Take It?

Some things cry out for explanation. Like finding $90,000 in marked bills in a Congressman's freezer. Or finding out that a blue-chip lawyer who held one of the most important jobs in the nation was willing to risk his career, his livelihood, and his liberty to steal, hide, and destroy classified documents.

We all have a pretty good idea what the money was doing in Representative William Jefferson's freezer. But the questions about President William Jefferson Clinton's National Security Adviser, Sandy Berger, just keep piling up.

It's time we got some answers.

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According to reports from the Inspector General of the National Archives and the staff of the House of Representatives' Government Operations Committee, Mr. Berger, while acting as former President Clinton's designated representative to the commission investigating the attacks of September 11, 2001, illegally took confidential documents from the Archives on more than one occasion. He folded documents in his clothes, snuck them out of the Archives building, and stashed them under a construction trailer nearby until he could return, retrieve them, and later cut them up. After he was caught, he lied to the investigators and tried to shift blame to Archive employees.

Contrary to his initial denials and later excuses, Berger clearly intended from the outset to remove sensitive material from the Archives. He used the pretext of making and receiving private phone calls to get time alone with confidential material, although rules governing access dictated that someone from the Archives staff must be present. He took bathroom breaks every half-hour to provide further opportunity to remove and conceal documents.

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At President Clinton's request, he reviewed highly confidential material during four visits to the Archives over four months. Only Mr. Berger knows what transpired on his first two visits, when he reviewed collections of confidential memos, e-mails, and handwritten notes, including materials taken from counter-terrorism adviser Richard Clarke's office - all of which were not catalogued at the individual item level.

On Mr. Berger's third visit Archives employees became suspicious that he might be removing classified material. Rather than directly confront a former Cabinet-level official, Archives officials simply took steps to identify further theft on succeeding visits. That is how Mr. Berger's thefts on his fourth and last visit were documented.

We don't know what Mr. Berger might have removed from the uncatalogued materials reviewed in his earlier visits, but we know his last visit focused on a memorandum called the Millennium Alert After Action Report (MAAAR). Copies of this report were made available to the 9/11 Commission, but the information in those copies undoubtedly is not what interested Berger most. Berger took five copies of the report and later destroyed three of them.

What was on the copies he destroyed? Handwritten notes from Berger, the President, or some other official? Observations that would be embarrassing to them, evidence they missed an important threat or considered or recommended actions - or decisions not to act - they wouldn't want to defend in public? Evidence, perhaps, that would have supported the Bush Administration? We don't know, and no one who does is saying, but the evidence must have been terribly damning for Berger to take the risks he did.

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Mr. Berger, the Clintons, and their allies do not want questions about this story asked or answered. Mr. Berger's lawyer, Lanny Breuer, along with former Clinton officials, assured us that all of the material destroyed by Berger existed in other form and was made available to the 9/11 investigations, that nothing relevant to the Clinton Administration's response to al-Qaeda was withheld.

Of course, we also were assured that Monica had only imagined a relationship with Bill and that rumors to the contrary were, in Hillary's famous phrase, the work of a "vast right-wing conspiracy."

Politicians never like to admit mistakes. They see legitimate inquiries as politically inspired, which they often are. Changing the subject or shifting blame to others aren't tactics peculiar to the Clintons.

The Clintons, however, take the game of deny-deceive-and-distract to a new level. Their relentless personal attacks on Ken Starr were designed to undermine the credibility of information about Bill Clinton's perjury, to deflect attention from his own failings. Clinton's excessive reaction - complete with hyperbole, finger-wagging, and scolding - to a simple question from Fox News' Chris Wallace about his response to al-Qaeda is in the same vein. Something here touches a nerve.

That nerve is exposed in the Sandy Berger saga. This story at bottom is about the security of our nation, about what was - or was not - done to protect us from the most shocking and deadly attack on American citizens by foreign agents in our nation's history. This story is critical not only to understanding our past but also to securing our future. It can help us understand what it is reasonable to expect can be done to keep us and our loved ones safe from harm. It is, in short, as important a story as there is.

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It is a story the news media should be desperate to explore, not desperate to avoid.

They should want to know the full story, no matter what the implications are for the legacy of a president much loved by an overwhelmingly liberal media or what the risks are for a former First Lady whose future is tied to her husband's past. Those risks loom especially large before a field of potential Republican presidential candidates with strong reputations in security matters - like Rudy Giuliani, for example, whose courageous performance on 9/11 still resonates.

Those who wrap themselves so frequently in the mantra of the people's right to know should want to know the truth - all the time. Sadly, today's would-be Woodwards and Bernsteins look more like ostriches than hawks, showing no curiosity about what Sandy Berger was hiding. Had that been the attitude when Watergate first appeared as a minor news story, Richard Nixon would have served out his full second term. The rest, as they say, is history.

This is one of the ugly parts of the Democratic response to 9/11. Go to Kos or Klein and you'll hear all manner of conspiracy theories about the Republicans in the comboxes (at Kos pretty much everywhere) but no one will ask about the Donkey in the room. Why would Berger take things that were "available from other sources"? That's kind off of the scale on the risk-reward relationship.

Doin' the heavy liftin' for Iran

Newsweek:Fareed Zakaria: We might win but still lose

Administration officials have pointed to last week's fighting against Sunni insurgents in and around Baghdad's Haifa Street as a textbook example of the new strategy. Iraqi forces took the lead, American troops backed them up and the government did not put up any obstacles. The Wall Street Journal's Daniel Henninger concluded that the battle "looked like a successful test of unified [American-Iraqi] effort."

But did it? NEWSWEEK's Michael Hastings, embedded with an American advisory team that took part in the fighting, reports that no more than 24 hours after the battle began on Jan. 6, the brigade's Sunni commander, Gen. Razzak Hamza, was relieved of his command. The phone call to fire him came directly from the office of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, a Shiite. Lt. Col. Steven Duke, commander of a U.S. advisory team working with the Iraqis, and a 20-year Army veteran, describes Hamza as "a true patriot [who] would go after the bad guys on either side." Hamza was replaced by a Shiite.

Joint operations against Shiite militias are far less likely, and not only because of political interference from the top. Groups like Moqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army don't generally start fire fights with the Americans or attack Iraqi forces. Their goals are different, quieter. Another U.S. adviser, Maj. Mark Brady, confirms reports that the Mahdi Army has been continuing to systematically take over Sunni neighborhoods, killing, terrorizing and forcing people out of their homes. "They're slowly moving across the river," he told Hastings, from predominantly Shiite eastern Baghdad into the predominantly Sunni west. If the 20,000 additional American troops being sent to the Iraqi capital focus primarily on Sunni insurgents, there's a chance the Shiite militias might get bolder. Colonel Duke puts it bluntly: "[The Mahdi Army] is sitting on the 50-yard line eating popcorn, watching us do their work for them."

SO we take out the Sunni militias (probably flattening half the neighborhood) behind the cover of Shia Iraqis. Then the "Iraqi police" show up and drag people from their homes (who later show up at the coroner looking like a dark version of a Home Improvement gag. That's sure to engage the Sunnis in the political process.

Really Sad

Street Watch:Notes of a Paramedic: Christmas Eve: Fifteen on the Scale

It's Christmas eve. We get called to one of the local nursing homes for rib pain. The room number sounds familiar. The nurse hands me the paperwork. "Mr. Ryder," she says. "He says he needs more Percocets. He's requesting transport."

Mr. Ryder is a tattooed biker, an emaciated COPDer with a long white beard. Almost sixty, he can't weigh more than a hundred pounds. He sits in his wheel chair, wearing his motorcycle jacket and oxygen cannula.

"I'm in real bad pain," he tells me in his whisper of a voice. "Fifteen on the scale." He nods as if to say it is the truth.

"Well, we'll take you down to the hospital and maybe they can help you."

It seems he fell a couple weeks ago and cracked a rib.

I have taken him to the hospital at least ten times over the years. The night medics have taken him more. Nearly every time it is self-dispatched. He agitates the nurses until they call his doctor who after several calls relents and tells the nurses to go ahead and call an ambulance just to get him to stop pestering them. He gets pneumonia a lot and complains of the chest pain. It is always real bad, he says. He goes to the hospital and gets sent back a couple hours later. He is rarely admitted.

While I don't like to categorize patients in this way, he does fall into the "pain in the ass" category.

I see him nearly everytime we go into the nursing home. He is always sitting out in his wheelchair in the main TV area. He sees me and his eyes light up. I say "Hey Jimmy! How'ya doing?" as I push the stretcher past going for someone else on the wing.

He lights up and says, "Not too bad, hanging in there."

That's the jist of our relationship.

Today in the ambulance, I have an EMT student do vitals as we start toward the hospital. I'm not going to do anything for the patient -- no IV, no monitor -- just keep him on his normal 2 liters of oxygen. His color is good and he doesn't appear in any distress. He, in fact, seems rather lively.

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The patient looks up at the EMT student and says, "This guy over here, me and him go back a long way."

"He's taken care of you before?" she says.

"Yeah." He nods at me and then says, "He's probably one of my best friends in the world."

I melt a little inside at his words. It also makes me terribly sad. I think of all his biker buddies -- Hoss and Mongo and Big Steve -- and wonder if they are partying at the Iron Hog without him tonight or if maybe they are all either in the ground or solitary in nursing homes themselves.

He looks up at me now, his eyes locking on mine. "I'm in real bad pain," he whispers urgently. "Fifteen on the scale."

It's hard when folks have that mixture of manipulation and genuine need.

A legend walks off the field

ESPN:Favre not only one getting misty-eyed

He's done.

The most durable, most compelling, most watchable quarterback of our NFL generation is going to call it quits. The official announcement might not come for a week or two, but it will come. That's because Brett Favre's secret was betrayed by his tear ducts, which were powerless against the suddenness of the moment.

One minute he was being hoisted off the field by teammate Donald Driver and then enveloped in a sideline group hug. The next minute he was semi-sobbing in front of a national television audience as NBC's Andrea Kremer gently and expertly let his wet eyes answer her questions.

Brett Favre said: "If it was the last game, I couldn't be more pleased with the outcome."
How could you not watch Favre in the aftermath of the Green Bay Packers' 26-7 woodshed win against the Chicago Bears at Soldier Field Sunday evening and not think that for all intents and purposes, he had decided to retire after 16 years? How could you not watch the heartfelt handshakes and embraces with fellow Packers and opposing Bears and not understand that this was his way of saying goodbye? And how could you not secretly hope that maybe, after the emotions recede, and the Packers presumably detail to him their grand plan to improve this 8-8 team through free agency, that Favre calls a timeout and decides to return in 2007?

But Favre has never been very good about hiding his feelings. He wears them on his Packers jersey sleeve, and Sunday night's game against the supposed No. 1 team in the NFC was no exception.

He yelled at wide receivers when they cut their routes short. He pumped his fist after a score. He sought out Brian Urlacher for a handslap after the Bears linebacker somehow tipped away a would-be Favre completion. He tapped Bears' defensive linemen on the helmet tops after tackles. He patted Bears' defensive backs on the shoulder pads at the end of plays. He attempted a block on a goofy reverse. He grinned on the bench. He was 37 going on rookie from Southern Miss.

But the gray hair gives it away. So does the fact that he has a daughter going off to college, and another child at home, and a wife who might not mind having her husband back. His own father died before his time and, well, at what point do you say enough is enough? Favre can still play. My gawd, how he can play. I'd pay money to watch him during pregame warmups.

Nobody in the league plays with the same Pop Warner joy as Favre does. Nobody, with the exception of perhaps Peyton Manning, Tom Brady and Steve McNair, is so willing to say, "`I'm going to win this game, or die trying." Nobody is likely to touch his astounding record of 237 consecutive NFL regular season quarterback starts (257, including playoffs) for at least another six years.

I can't help it: Favre is my all-time fave. And he might be the favorite of most everyone he played against. He earned respect not just by those 50,000-plus career passing yards and those 400-plus career touchdown throws, but by the way he played, win or lose.

Can you remember the last time he made an excuse? Can you remember when he wasn't playing in some sort of pain? Can you remember the last time he backed down from anyone or anything?
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Now isn't the time to discuss Favre's football legacy. All you need to know is that he'll be wearing one of those yellow Pro Football Hall of Fame blazers in five years.

Weird. An NFL without Favre.

I think I'm going to cry.

I really don't watch football that much any more. Once or twice a year to keep up my "redneck male" cred. But Favre is a legend and deservedly so. I hope he has a great retirement and can find something he enjoys nearly as much as quarterbacking.

How Crazy Would It Be?

Indianapolis versus Chicago in the Superbowl?

The faux art of the deal

Robert Reich:Bad Medicine

House Democrats are pushing a bill to require Medicare to negotiate drug prices. So far, so good. But in what appears to be a bow to the political clout of Big Pharma, the bill does not authorize Medicare to drop from its approved list drugs on which manufacturers fail to offer good deals. This is like Wal-Mart telling its suppliers "we’re going to use our bargaining clout to get from you the lowest prices for our customers – but regardless of what price you offer we’ll still carry your product in our stores." What kind of incentive is that?

The Department of Veterans Affairs gets a 25 percent discount on drug prices for veterans because if a drug company won’t give a big discount, Veterans Affairs won’t include the drug in its plan. Medicare recipients will only get these kinds of savings if Medicare can do the same – walk away from a drug manufacturer that won’t deal.

So the Democrats can make some noise and look clever while keeping the K Street crowd happy. It is past time that we stopped subsidizing Canada and Europe's prescription drugs. We provide the margin that makes developing new drugs worthwhile and many of the innovations brought to market originate (after lots and lots of private investment) from discoveries in our tax-supported labs. I understand and support selling lifesaving drugs at production cost to poor countries, but wealthy Western Democracies don't need a free ride.

The gift that keeps on giving

CNN: White House: We will send more troops in Iraq

President Bush, facing opposition from both parties over his plan to send more troops to Iraq, said he has the authority to act no matter what Congress wants.

"I fully understand they could try to stop me from doing it. But I've made my decision. And we're going forward," Bush told CBS' "60 Minutes" in an interview to air Sunday night.

Vice President Dick Cheney asserted that lawmakers' criticism will not influence Bush's plans and he dismissed any effort to "run a war by committee."

"The president is the commander in chief. He's the one who has to make these tough decisions," Cheney said.

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Any attempts to block Bush's efforts would undermine the troops, Cheney said. He took particular aim at Democratic lawmakers who have blasted the president for increasing troops despite opposition from Congress, military advisers and a disgruntled electorate that in November ousted the Republicans as the majority party on Capitol Hill.

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Like Bush, though, Cheney said Americans need to look at the war in Iraq as part of a much longer effort.

"This is an existential conflict," Cheney said. "It is the kind of conflict that's going to drive our policy and our government for the next 20 or 30 or 40 years. We have to prevail and we have to have the stomach for the fight long term."

The White House also said Sunday that Iranians are aiding the insurgency in Iraq and the U.S. has the authority to pursue them because they "put our people at risk."

First off, in a lot of ways wars are run by committee. You have folks evaluating intelligence, folks devising military strategy, and folks working the domestic and international political angles, and perhaps most important of all folks making the military logistics work. If the ammunition won't make it to the line till Tuesday, no matter how determined the commander in chief is, the offensive really shouldn't happen on Monday and the logistics commander is not out of line or disloyal for saying an "offensive on Monday is a really, really bad idea". The president does not have the support of the American people for the war and it is appropriate for the Congress to remind him of that. I really doubt funding will be cut off anytime soon (if ever).

20,30,40 years? Well given how this gang has performed so far it seems likely that we are on course for another Hundred Years' War

Three weeks from disaster

Reuters:Ethanol boom to evaporate corn surplus

The fuel ethanol industry's ravenous appetite for corn will leave the United States with only a meager three-week supply of the grain when this year's crop is ready for harvest, the U.S. government said on Friday.

Corn (maize) prices will surge to the highest level in a decade, an average $3.20 a bushel at the farm gate, the Agriculture Department predicted. Analysts said the dwindling stockpile makes it vital for farms to produce a huge crop this year.

Ethanol distillers are expected to use 2.15 billion bushels, or 20 percent, of the 2006 corn crop in making the renewable fuel. They could consume more than 3.1 billion bushels of the 2007 crop, an increase of nearly 50 percent.

In a monthly look at crop output and usage, USDA estimated 752 million bushels (19.1 million tonnes) of corn will be in grain bins in August, the smallest figure since 1996/97 and equal to a three-week supply.

"That's next to nothing," said private consultant John Schnittker. He cited estimates that corn plantings must increase by 10 percent to assure enough corn for ethanol makers, livestock feeders, exporters and foodmakers.

"Corn is driving the whole thing. It squeezes into acreage for wheat and soybeans," Schnitter said.

Don Roose, president of U.S. Commodities, a trading house, said larger plantings were needed. "Our margin of error has shrunk dramatically," he said.

America's farmers used to feed the world, now they feed our SUV's. I'm glad the farmers are making some money, but one crop monopolizing our farmland seems like a bad idea, kind of like putting all your eggs in one basket. Plus corn is hard on the soil. As farmers move to shorter rotations to maximize corn production per acre production declines, so you get diminishing returns leading to more acres being devoted to corn, etc.

FMCSA courageously takes on incompetent liars

The morons who took nearly two decades to write hours of service rules (quickly tossed out by the courts for not meeting the explicit instructions of Congress from back in 1984) have now finally written a rule concerning Electronic Onboard Recorders (EOBRS) for trucks and busses (only 12 years after Congress told them to)The Trucker:Proposed EOBR rule would make device mandatory for only serious HOS violators, at least this one only took 12 years.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration this morning issued a proposed rule on Electronic On-board Recorders (EOBRs) that for most of the industry would make use of the devices voluntary.

Under the proposal announced here by FMCSA Administrator John Hill, only some 930 truck and bus companies that had been subjected to at least two compliance reviews within the past two years would required to use the devices for a minimum of two years.
..........

If adopted, Hill said FMCSA estimated that within the first two years that the rule is enforced approximately 930 carriers with 17,500 drivers would be required to use EOBRs..

To expand use of the devices among the more than 650,000 motor carriers in the U.S., the incentives for voluntarily installation include using an examination of a random sample of drivers’ records of duty status as part of a company compliance review and partial relief from HOS supporting documents requirements.

So we took 12 years to write a rule that applies to less than one percent of the industry. George Bush's administration is hard at work protecting us all.

Wheels within wheels

India eNews: US forces storm Iranian consulate in Iraq

Meanwhile, a source close to the Kurdistani government said the administration was unaware of the US plans to raid the Iranian consulate and did not know the purpose of the operation.

After raiding the consulate, the US forces headed for Eikawa district, which hosts foreign companies and countries' representatives. Security forces of the Democratic Party of Kurdistan (KDP) reportedly surrounded three US military vehicles to prevent them from further action.

International Herald-Tribune:Iranians detained in raid on consulate in Iraq

IRNA also quoted an Iraqi Kurdish security official, whom it did not name, as saying that Kurdish forces were responsible for maintaining security in Erbil, including protecting the consulate. American forces "disarmed the Kurdish guards of the consulate and used force to enter the building," IRNA quoted the Kurdish official as saying.

Kind of scary to antagonize your best allies in the country.

The iPhone has landed

After years of speculation Apple has introduced the iPhone. It looks very nifty. When I told my wife about it, her first words were "I'm getting one!" It's not a new Newton but we can't have everything (but I'm still holding on to my Newton as a reminder of what might have been).

Compare and Contrast

AutoWeek: Ford won't use European diesels for cars in the States

DETROIT -- Ford Motor Co. can't make money selling cars with diesel engines in the United States. So it will use diesels only in trucks in North America.

Ford's powertrain plans became clearer at a pre-Detroit auto show event here last month. Mark Fields, Ford's president of the Americas, said the company will not launch a vehicle unless it makes money.

The F-150 pickup will get a new 4.4-liter turbocharged V-8 diesel engine developed by Land Rover. It is expected to debut in the United States by late 2008.

But for cars, Ford plans to boost fuel economy two ways. It will use smaller engines loaded with technology, such as a turbocharger and gasoline direct injection, and offer more models with an optional gasoline-electric hybrid powertrain.

AutoBlog:Accord Diesel in, Accord Hybrid out

Hybrids have now been hyped up beyond their own capabilities, so we find ourselves eagerly anticipating the comeback of the diesel engine. Volkswagen is sure to be one of the big diesel players in the beginning, having just announced its new TDI engine yesterday. But it looks like Honda might be in an even better position to bring oil burners back. Peter Nunn, Winding Road's roving reporter embedded on the isel of Nipon, claims that Honda's first diesel application in the Accord sedan will replace the Accord Hybrid sedan when it goes on sale around 2009.

The diesel in question will be an ultra clean 2.2 - 2.4L four-cylinder able to meet the toughest emissions standards in the world, i.e. California's Tier II / Bin 5 standard. Nunn reports that the Accord Hybrid will be "quietly retired" upon the arrival of the four-cylinder Accord Diesel, which should be able to handily trounce the outgoing hot-rod V6 hybrid in fuel mileage at the same time delivering decent get up and go.

Business Week: Mitsubishi planning diesel car for U.S.

Mitsubishi Motors Corp. said Monday that it will introduce a car with a new diesel engine in the U.S. market by 2010.

Mitsubishi Motors is the latest among Japanese car makers to announce plans to roll out diesel models in the United States, amid increasing demand and regulations for fuel-saving vehicles.

Honda Motor Co. said in May that it will introduce a cleaner diesel engine in the United States by 2009, while Nissan Motor Co. last month said it will launch diesel vehicles by March 2011.

Mitsubishi, Honda and Nissan all said their engines will meet the new U.S. Tier 2 Bin 5 emissions regulations that require nitrogen oxides emissions to be as low as similar emissions from gasoline engines.

Hybrids have a place, urban stop and go driving. They are very good at that. Diesels do better at the kind of driving that most Americans do, a relatively long commute, primarily on high speed roads. Both add weight and cost so combining the two is usually not practicable. Direct Injection will make some gains but not as much as either. I think two big issues pushing Ford to perhaps a less than optimal choice are 1) a low reputation for quality (fair or not) that limits consumer's willingness to try new technologies and 2) limited pricing power forcing them to low initial cost solutions.

The big three are going to have to adopt a conquest business model. The Japanese automakers started with no brand equity. At first they made sales via low cost. As they improved their products they gained a reputation for quality which then translated into pricing power. Hyundai is well down the path and the Chinese are getting ready to start. You cannot win new customers with low content high cost products. I think if you are going to grow your business in such a competitive marketplace you have to make a product that people value at more rather than less than the asking price. Great Styling can draw customers when a car is brand new but loses its power after the first year of the product cycle. To keep margin up the product itself has to have great quality and features. The big Three has been trying to protect margin by cutting costs (including content) as much as possible. But as the cars get "cheaper" (older technology, materials as cheap as they can possibly be) the amount of money they can fetch for the cars goes down even faster (and the amount of money the customer can recover when they sell the car takes a beating too).

Are Corn Fed Cars a good idea?

The Auto Prophet: Ethanol: Corporate Welfare for Farmers

A large part of the political support for ethanol--for mixing requirements, CAFE credits, and outright subsidies--is old fashioned "special interest" pandering, nest feathering, corporate welfare.

One aspect of this farmer protection program is the import tariff on ethanol. Currently, ethanol imports are taxed at a whopping $0.54/gal (per gallon!). The effect of this is to protect the domestic ethanol producers, and to keep ethanol expensive. But it isn't the "family farm" that is being protected--the big winners are the huge producers of ethanol, corn, and seed--companies like Monsanto and Archer Daniels Midland.

This doesn't make much sense for the bigger picture. Ethanol derived from corn and soybeans is much less energy efficient than ethanol derived from sugarcane, according to a Wall Street Journal article I just read. Corn has an ethanol energy factor of 1.3 (1.3 BTU's out for every BTU it took to produce), while sugarcane has an efficiency of a whopping 8....

Reuters:Underestimated US ethanol craze may hurt poor-EPI

Poor people in countries that depend on grain imports could soon be hit with rising food prices driven by explosive growth in the number of U.S. distilleries producing the alternative motor fuel ethanol, an environmental expert said on Thursday.

"Soaring food prices could lead to urban food riots in scores of lower-income countries that rely on grain imports," Lester Brown, president of Washington, D.C.-based Earth Policy Institute, a environmental research organization, told reporters on a conference call. Consumers in Egypt, Nigeria, Mexico and Indonesia, where many spend more than half their income on food, would be hardest hit, he said.

U.S. ethanol demand for corn will rise to 139 million tonnes by the 2008 harvest, half of the U.S. corn crop and more than double the U.S. Department of Agriculture's forecast of nearly a year ago, said Brown.

Ethanol producers have been struggling to keep up with demand amid high petroleum prices and as oil companies use it as a replacement for the gasoline additive MTBE, a suspected carcinogen banned in several states. The Bush administration has offered producers millions of dollars in incentives in an attempt to reduce imports on foreign oil.

Demand has already pushed grain prices higher. U.S. corn prices rose to more than $3 a bushel late last year, a dollar above prices of a year before and near the record price set 10 years ago. on the rising demand for the grain from ethanol plants.

Interesting hypothesis

Town Hall:Ben Shapiro: Breaking down the 2008 Presidential Race

For the Democrats, the choice is clearer: It's Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York all the way. Although constant media attention has elevated rookie Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois in the polls, this is part of a broader Democratic strategy to boost Clinton. The Democratic Party believes deeply that the illusion of political momentum for a candidate emerging from the primaries is more important than actual political momentum. To that end, the Democrats dub a challenger every four years. Every four years, they talk about how popular the new kid is. Every four years, the old warhorse, the candidate obscured by the blinding brightness of the hot new star, emerges victorious. In 2000, the hot new thing was Bill Bradley; the old warhorse was Al Gore. In 2004, the hot new thing was Howard Dean; the old warhorse was John Kerry.

In 2008, the hot new thing is Barack Obama; the old warhorse is Hillary Clinton. While everyone focuses on Obamamania, Hillary goes about her business -- shoring up her political contacts, busting her campaign coffers at the seams, lurking in the political background until the time is right. And when it is, Obama will recede, possibly to a second spot on the Democratic ticket.

Multitasking

Richard Clarke writing in the Washington Post:While You Were at War . . .

n every administration, there are usually only about a dozen barons who can really initiate and manage meaningful changes in national security policy. For most of 2006, some of these critical slots in the Bush administration have been vacant, such as the deputy secretary of state (empty since Robert B. Zoellick left for investment bank Goldman Sachs) and the deputy director of national intelligence (with Gen. Michael V. Hayden now CIA director). And with the nation involved in a messy war spiraling toward a bad conclusion, the key deputies and Cabinet members and advisers are all focusing on one issue, at the expense of all others: Iraq.

National Security Council veteran Rand Beers has called this the "7-year-old's soccer syndrome" -- just like little kids playing soccer, everyone forgets their particular positions and responsibilities and runs like a herd after the ball.

In the end, there are only 12 seats at the conference table in the White House Situation Room, and the key players' schedules mean that they can seldom meet there together in person or on secure video conference for more than about 10 hours each week. When issues don't receive first-tier consideration, they can slip by for months. I learned this firsthand: In the early days of the Bush administration, I called for an urgent meeting to discuss the threat al-Qaeda posed to the United States. The Cabinet-level meeting eventually took place -- but not until Sept. 4, 2001.

Without the distraction of the Iraq war, the administration would have spent this past year -- indeed, every year since Sept. 11, 2001 -- focused on al-Qaeda. But beyond al-Qaeda and the broader struggle for peaceful coexistence with (and within) Islam, seven key "fires in the in-box" national security issues remain unattended, deteriorating and threatening, all while Washington's grown-up 7-year-olds play herd ball with Iraq.

Global warming: ......
Russian revanchism: ......
Latin America's leftist lurch: ......
Africa at war: ......
Arms control freeze: ......
Transnational crime: ......
The Pakistani-Afghan border: ......

As the president contemplates sending even more U.S. forces into the Iraqi sinkhole, he should consider not only the thousands of fatalities, the tens of thousands of casualties and the hundreds of billions of dollars already lost. He must also weigh the opportunity cost of taking his national security barons off all the other critical problems they should be addressing -- problems whose windows of opportunity are slamming shut, unheard over the wail of Baghdad sirens.

The challenges are incredible. I'm not sure if he's overstating the role of the Iraq war in most of these things falling off the radar. I imagine absent the Iraq adventure, that out of those choices the Pak-Afghan Border and the turn in Latin America would have dominated attention. I wonder, too if the dizzying complexity is a secular trend merely shown in sharper focus by the myopic focus on saving the Iraq project. Peggy Noonan's musings last October come into focus:

I think there is an unspoken subtext in our national political culture right now. In fact I think it's a subtext to our society. I think that a lot of people are carrying around in their heads, unarticulated and even in some cases unnoticed, a sense that the wheels are coming off the trolley and the trolley off the tracks. That in some deep and fundamental way things have broken down and can't be fixed, or won't be fixed any time soon. That our pollsters are preoccupied with "right track" and "wrong track" but missing the number of people who think the answer to "How are things going in America?" is "Off the tracks and hurtling forward, toward an unknown destination."

...... I mean I believe there's a general and amorphous sense that things are broken and tough history is coming.

Let me focus for a minute on the presidency, another institution in trouble. In the past I have been impatient with the idea that it's impossible now to be president, that it is impossible to run the government of the United States successfully or even competently. I always thought that was an excuse of losers. I'd seen a successful presidency up close. It can be done.

But since 9/11, in the four years after that catastrophe, I have wondered if it hasn't all gotten too big, too complicated, too crucial, too many-fronted, too . . . impossible.

I refer to the sheer scope, speed and urgency of the issues that go to a president's desk, to the impossibility of bureaucracy, to the array of impeding and antagonistic forces (the 50-50 nation, the mass media, the senators owned by the groups), to the need to have a fully informed understanding of and stand on the most exotic issues, from Avian flu to the domestic realities of Zimbabwe.

.........The range, depth, and complexity of these problems, the crucial nature of each of them, the speed with which they bombard the Oval Office, and the psychic and practical impossibility of meeting and answering even the most urgent of them, is overwhelming. And that doesn't even get us to Korea. And Russia. And China, and the Mideast. You say we don't understand Africa? We don't even understand Canada!

.........It's beyond, "The president is overwhelmed." The presidency is overwhelmed. The whole government is. And people sense when an institution is overwhelmed. Citizens know. If we had a major terrorist event tomorrow half the country--more than half--would not trust the federal government to do what it has to do, would not trust it to tell the truth, would not trust it, period.

It should be noted that all modern presidents face a slew of issues, and none of them have felt in control of events but have instead felt controlled by them. JFK in one week faced the Soviets, civil rights, the Berlin Wall, the southern Democratic mandarins of the U.S. Senate. He had to face Cuba, only 90 miles away, importing Russian missiles. But the difference now, 45 years later, is that there are a million little Cubas, a new Cuba every week. It's all so much more so. And all increasingly crucial. And it will be for the next president, too.

John Edwards wants to deal with Poverty, but he is going to have to deal with national security. McCain wants to focus on National Greatness, but he is going to deal with poverty. Whatever the signature issue a candidate runs on it is doubtful that will be what they get to focus on. Remember Compassionate Conservatism? That vanished in the dust of 9/11, only mentioned in passing in a whatever happened to..... way sort of like that weird outcast kid that just stopped coming to school without any explanation.

What Apple does well

Townhall:Stupid Technology

See what happens? I finally bought an iPod last week after thinking about it for, oh, maybe a year or more.

Why did I wait so long? Because iPods kept getting bigger and and better and cheaper so fast, I figured the longer I waited, the better off I'd be.

Should have waited a little longer. An iPod phone?

Now, that's what I need. Still very happy with my purchase, and it's really easy to use (which I'm sure all of you know because you all bought one before I did). I managed to synch my iPod with my Outlook Calendar in minutes flat-- a feat I've never been able to accomplish with the Blackberry I've owned for a year.

A few features you can intuitively use beats many you cannot.

Just don't use the G word

Jeff Vail:Two Mysteries and a Map

Developmental Micro-Biology (a case study in Field Teleology, for lack of a better term): The other fundamental mystery (in my opinion), is the unexplained teleological phenomena at work in our world—that is, the unexplained progress towards an apparent “purpose.” The case study here is human developmental microbiology: when a fertilized egg begins to divide, first into thousands, then millions and billions of cells, some of these cells become one kind, and other become other kinds—facilitating the creation of complex organisms like humans, where the liver is different from the brain from the bones. Where is the master blueprint stored to tell some cells to become a liver (and how to structure something as incredibly complex as a liver) and to tell other cells to become a heart (and how exactly to do that)? Science does not know—they have absolutely no clue. Some suggest that the answer is in our DNA, but the DNA is identical for all the cells, so how do they self-organize into such discrete and complex functions? We don’t know. Some (decidedly “non-scientific” perspectives) suggest that DNA (among other functions) is a “tuner” of sorts to receive instruction from a “galactic field” or some similar concept. Sounds ridiculous—especially to a more scientifically “attuned” mind—but it does no worse than science at explaining the mystery of developmental microbiology. On a grander scale, the mystery of teleological phenomena such as this are all-present. If some force outside the egg/zygote/fetus is responsible for directing development—as many argue and a logical analysis suggests—then what else in our world is similarly influenced? What is the interplay between emergence and teleological phenomana? These are all questions that, for now at least, “science” seems to have no answer for. This shouldn’t be looked on as a failure of science, but rather as a reminder that “science” as a concept is a tool, but not the end-all-be-all of gnosis. There are some things that, by its very method, science cannot explain—and these are increasingly more than just abstract philosophical or theological matters. Increasingly they are critical to advancing our society into new organizational forms, to advancing our consciousness beyond the market-state mentality, to preventing the destruction of our ecosystem, and the other critical tasks of our time.

Not-so-Great Minds think alike?

First blog I read after my last post references this story:

Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said yesterday that he believes top officials in the Bush administration have privately concluded they have lost Iraq and are simply trying to postpone disaster so the next president will "be the guy landing helicopters inside the Green Zone, taking people off the roof," in a chaotic withdrawal reminiscent of Vietnam.

"I have reached the tentative conclusion that a significant portion of this administration, maybe even including the vice president, believes Iraq is lost," Biden said. "They have no answer to deal with how badly they have screwed it up. I am not being facetious now. Therefore, the best thing to do is keep it from totally collapsing on your watch and hand it off to the next guy -- literally, not figuratively."

Weird.

Hardball with Chris Matthews: Transcript of Dec 28th show discussing the taped interview of President Ford by Bob Woodward:

ANDREA MITCHELL, NBC CORRESPONDENT: Well, let me give you the context. President Ford knew that this interview would not be published by Bob Woodward until after his death. Bob Woodward taped the interview. And we have that tape. It took four hours, the interview. He went out to see him in Boulder Creek, Colorado in the summer of 2004.

And President Ford was not that close to George W. Bush and would never have offered advice on foreign policy to Bush, but was heavily influenced by his own experiences with Vietnam and lifelong regret that America had been forced to retreat from Vietnam on his watch. He inherited that war. He didn‘t decide to go into Vietnam, as you know, but he was the president in the Oval Office who had to decide to unwind it and admitted in this interview to Woodward that we had waited too long to withdraw from Vietnam, something that he now acknowledges was a mistake.

The next President is probably going to "get" to walk a mile in Gerald Ford's shoes. I wonder if all the folks angling for the White House have considered what it will be like to have to make that lonely decision. Ford could not have substantially changed the outcome of the war when he took office, but he was still took the hit when the images of the Helicopters evacuating the embassy hit the news. No doubt there will be many who will attempt to blame the new President for pulling the plug on an inherited mess. It certainly isn't the kind of moment kids think of when they dream of being the President when they grow up.

Rewarding Success?

CNN:Sources: U.S. Iraq ambassador in line for U.N. job

The U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, is the leading candidate to be the next American ambassador to the United Nations, three Bush administration officials told CNN Thursday.

However, two of the sources indicated that President Bush was not yet prepared to make an announcement of the appointment.

Ryan Crocker, a veteran Middle East diplomat who is the U.S. ambassador to Pakistan, is expected to be nominated by Bush to replace Khalilzad in Baghdad, two senior administration officials told CNN.

If nominated for the U.N. job, Khalilzad would replace John Bolton, whose recess appointment to the post ended Thursday.

Despite nearly two years of trying, Republican leaders could not push his permanent confirmation through the Senate.

Khalilzad, 55, a native of Afghanistan and a Sunni Muslim, has been the U.S. ambassador to Iraq since June 2005.

He was previously U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan.

Crocker, 57, has previously served as U.S. ambassador in three countries bordering Iraq -- Lebanon, Kuwait and Syria.

In 2003, he was also a high-ranking official in the Coalition Provision Authority, which governed Iraq after the U.S. invasion that toppled dictator Saddam Hussein.

Normally you'd pick someone who was associated with success. Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria are not nations we've had good luck motivating to act along with our interests (or their own), and the transitional Authority? Granted many of the bad decisions were made in Washington, but still. Well at least this one will maybe make the Democrats feel warm and fuzzy while nothing gets accomplished in the UN.

Great headline

Balkinization:U.S. Government: You can't believe Padilla when he says we tortured him because he's crazy from all the things we did to him

EDIT:The day after I made this post I heard a story on NPR about the Padilla case. The story quoted an anonymous government official as saying that it would not be a bad thing if Padilla was found incompetent to stand trial and sent to a Psychiatric prison because "the goal all along was to incapacitate him".

So we are dispensing punishment now before the trial, or really I guess I should say, in lieu of a trial (being as the government only charged Padilla after being smacked down by the courts). Even being a citizen is not a defense against being imprisoned without trial on vague ever changing charges and tortured until you are broken.

What happened to my country?

The Republicans have forgotten principles and so do things because they are expedient, the long term consequences to the Republic be damned! (Of course the Democrats have their own blind spots too). [sarcasm]I mean, those idiots that wrote the Bill of Rights certainly had no recent experience with an existential struggle so we can obviously cast them aside as out of date for the dangerous world we live in! [/sarcasm]

Coming soon to a nation near you

NY Times:With Beheadings and Attacks, Drug Gangs Terrorize Mexico

In recent months the violence has included a total of two dozen beheadings, a raid on a local police station by men with grenades and a bazooka, and daytime kidnappings of top law enforcement officials. At least 123 law enforcement officials, among them 2 judges and 3 prosecutors, have been gunned down or tortured to death. Five police officers were among those beheaded.

In all, the violence has claimed more than 1,700 civilian lives this year, and federal officials say the killings are on course to top the estimated 1,800 underworld killings last year. Those death tolls compare with 1,304 in 2004 and 1,080 in 2001, these officials say.

.......
The five men beheaded in Uruapan, in Michoacán, were street-level methamphetamine dealers, addicted themselves to the synthetic drug. They were linked loosely to the Valencia family, which once controlled most of the drug trade in the state and is a part of the Sinaloa group, the police say. The killers came from a gang called The Family, believed to be allied with the Gulf Cartel.

A day before, the killers had kidnapped the five men from a mechanic’s shop they had been using as a front for selling “ice,” as crystal methamphetamine is called on the street. They sawed their victims’ heads off with a bowie knife while they were still alive shortly before going to the bar, law enforcement officials said.

“You don’t do something like that unless you want to send a big message,” said one United States law enforcement official here, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

The beheadings, in fact, have become a signature form of intimidation aimed at both criminal rivals and federal and local authorities. In the tourist town of Acapulco, killers from one drug gang decapitated the commander of a special strike force, Mario Núñez Magaña, in April, along with one of his agents, Jesús Alberto Ibarra Velázquez.

They jammed the heads in a fence in front of the municipal police station. “So you will learn to respect,” said a red note next to them.

“This year has been one to forget, a black year,” said Jorge Valdez, a spokesman for the Acapulco police. “It’s the most violent year in the last 50 years, and the acts are barbaric, bloody, with no trace of humanity.”

The violence is by no means limited to Acapulco. In mid-July, about 15 gunmen attacked a small-town police station in Tabasco State at dawn with grenades, a bazooka and machine guns in an attempt to liberate two of their gang members, who were arrested after a bar fight the night before.

Two police officers died in the assault. The authorities said the attackers were dressed in the commando outfits of federal agents and belonged to the Zetas, former soldiers who work for the Gulf Cartel.

One reason for the wave of law enforcement killings is that the Mexican police do a poor job of protecting their own. Arrests have been made in only a handful of the assassinations of police officers this year. The overwhelming majority remain unsolved because witnesses fear testifying against drug traffickers. Even seasoned investigators are afraid to dig too deep into the murders.

“There is an atmosphere that affects us, of distrust, of terror inside the police force,” said Jesús Alemán del Carmen, the head of the state police in Guerrero, where 22 law enforcement officials have been brutally assassinated this year.

One of the officers killed was Gonzalo Domínguez Díaz, the state police commander in Pátzcuaro, Michoacán. In February, he received a death threat from a local businessman who law enforcement officials say has links to the Valencia crime family.

The threat came just minutes after Commander Domínguez arrested two men on weapons possession charges. He arrived home that night pale and shaken, said his widow, Fanny Carranza Domínguez. His anxiety grew over time, after prosecutors released the men he had arrested, for a lack of evidence, his wife said.

In early May, he told his wife that he had heard on the street that gunmen were looking for him. “He said, ‘I know that if I arrest them I am risking my life,’ ” she recalled. “ ‘I bring them to the capital, and they let them go.’ ”

On May 8, a car cut off Commander Domínguez’s police car as he was driving home alone about 6:30 p.m. Within minutes, he was shot point blank in the head with a 12-gauge shotgun and twice in the chest with an AK-47. He never unholstered his sidearm. So far, prosecutors have made no progress in solving his murder. He was 47, the father of three.

“I think the commanders that haven’t been killed are in the game, and the ones that have been killed, it is because they attacked crime,” Mrs. Carranza Domínguez said.

“The prosecutor seems asleep here,” she added. “He doesn’t do anything but collect his salary and go home.”

Commander Domínguez was one of 16 state and federal police commanders assassinated this year across Mexico, along with 2 judges handling drug cases and 2 federal prosecutors. Local police chiefs have also been targets. Eight have been murdered, most of them in Michoacán.

Most were ambushed in their cars or outside their homes by men with machine guns. A few were kidnapped by men posing as federal agents. In these cases, the bodies were found later, shot full of holes, often showing signs of torture.
................
Nearly every day, new victims are found in states along the major drug shipment routes, especially Quintana Roo, Michoacán, Guerrero, Tamaulipas and Baja California. Most are bound, gagged and shot to death, their bodies dumped on lonely roads.

In the towns hardest hit by the gangland warfare, the fear is palpable. For two years now, Nuevo Laredo has been the main battleground for a fight between gunmen loyal to Joaquín (Chapo) Guzmán of Sinaloa and the remnants of the Gulf Cartel, whose leader, Osiel Cárdenas, is in prison awaiting trial.

“I wouldn’t be human if I said I wasn’t afraid,” acknowledged Elizabeth Hernández Arredone, a state prosecutor in Nuevo Laredo who has taped to her door a photograph of a female judge who recently disappeared.

The effects are everywhere. Many local journalists have stopped covering drug violence for fear they may become targets themselves. Tourists used to spill across the border from Laredo, Tex., to swig tequila, buy trinkets and run wild. Not anymore.

I think we need the troops on the Southern Border more than we need them in Iraq. If the Mexican people choose not to deal with the narcoterrorists in their midst that is their choice and we should respect that (but should do something to deal with the drug problem here to help as much as we can), but we should make sure consequences of their bad choices do not spill over into the United States. Especially if the Mexican state collapses as some are forecasting

Our Long National Nightmare is just beginning

CNN Commentary by Ruben Navarrette Jr.:Commentary: Immigration is a key test for Democrats

SAN DIEGO, California (CNN) -- In the 1980s, San Antonio Mayor Henry Cisneros helped convene a gathering of Hispanic leaders to christen the time in which they were living: the Decade of the Hispanic.
......
That summit was ahead of its time. Yet, two decades later, it's clear we've embarked on something grander: the Century of the Hispanic.

Congressional Republicans obviously didn't get the memo. If they had, they may not been so eager to use the immigration debate to try to score points at the expense of the nation's largest minority.

That didn't work out so well. And it's just one reason why -- when the new Congress convenes this week -- Republicans will be in the smaller offices while Democrats bask in the power that comes from being in the majority.

In the last election, Hispanics lit into the Republican Party like a swarm of 7-year-olds tearing into a piñata.

Nearly 7 out of 10 Hispanic voters shunned the GOP and tossed their support across the aisle. Democrats earned 69 percent of the Hispanic vote, compared with 30 percent for the GOP.

Conservatives don't want to hear this, but some of the pummeling that Republicans got from Hispanics was payback for the immigration hard-line taken by House Republicans.

.......Polls taken before the election described immigration as a "motivator" for Hispanics and one reason many of them were enthusiastic about voting.

Well first off the best the Republicans have ever done with the Hispanic vote is about 40-45% (Bush 04), typically it runs about 35%, So we're talking 5, on the outside 15, points of less than 10% off the vote. The Republicans are never going to outdo the Democrats on the issue so it's hard to see them ever moving beyond 40% of the Hispanic vote. Second, the idea here is "if you enforce the law on members of my tribe I will vote against you". This brilliant "identity politics trumps all" philosophy is fresh from Iraq where it has been such a force for good over the past couple years. Oh boy, what laws does Mr. Navarette propose to exempt Hispanics from next? Does every race get to pick a few laws (5? 10?) to be exempt from...or else? We can look forward to all sorts of wonderful fallout (pun intended) from the collapse of Border Security the parties seem intent on inflicting on the nation.

Fat is where it's at?

The New Republic:Weighting Game

As we have seen, most of the people the government and the health establishment claim are too fat--those categorized as "overweight" or "mildly obese"--do not in fact suffer from worse health than supposedly "ideal-weight" individuals. It is true that some groups of fat people--generally those with BMI figures well above 30--are less healthy than average, although not nearly to the extent the anti-fat warriors would have you believe. (Large-scale mortality studies indicate that women who are 50 or even 75 pounds "overweight" will on average still have longer life expectancies than those who are 10 to 15 pounds "underweight," a.k.a. fashionably thin.) Yet there is considerable evidence that even substantially obese people are not less healthy because they're fat. Rather, other factors are causing them to be both fat and unhealthy. Chief among these factors are sedentary lifestyle and diet-driven weight fluctuation.

The most comprehensive work regarding the dangers of sedentary lifestyle has been done at the Cooper Institute in Dallas. The institute's director of research, Steven Blair, is probably the world's leading expert on the relationship between activity levels and overall health. For the past 20 years, the Cooper Institute has maintained a database that has tracked the health, weight, and basic fitness levels of tens of thousands of individuals. What Blair and his colleagues have discovered turns the conventional wisdom about the relationship between fat and fitness on its head. Quite simply, when researchers factor in the activity levels of the people being studied, body mass appears to have no relevance to health whatsoever--even among people who are substantially "obese." It turns out that "obese" people who engage in moderate levels of physical activity have radically lower rates of premature death than sedentary people who maintain supposedly "ideal-weight" levels.

For example, a 1999 Cooper Institute study found the highest death rate to be among sedentary men with waist measurements under 34 inches and the lowest death rate to be among physically fit men with waist measurements of 40 inches or more. And these results do not change when the researchers control for body-fat percentage, thus dispensing with the claim that such percentages, rather than body mass itself, are the crucial variables when measuring the health effects of weight. Fat people might be less healthy if they're fat because of a sedentary lifestyle. But, if they're fat and active, they have nothing to worry about.

Still, even if it's clear that it's better to be fat and active than fat and sedentary--or even thin and sedentary--isn't it the case that being thin and active is the best combination of all? Not according to Blair's research: His numerous studies of the question have found no difference in mortality rates between fit people who are fat and those who are thin.

Of course, in a culture as anti-fat as ours, the whole notion of people who are both fat and fit seems contradictory. Yet the research done by Blair and others indicates that our belief that fatness and fitness are in fundamental tension is based on myths, not science. "Fitness" in Blair's work isn't defined by weight or body-fat percentage but rather by cardiovascular and aerobic endurance, as measured by treadmill stress tests. And he has found that people don't need to be marathon runners to garner the immense health benefits that follow from maintaining good fitness levels. Blair's research shows that to move into the fitness category that offers most of the health benefits of being active, people need merely to engage in some combination of daily activities equivalent to going for a brisk half-hour walk. To move into the top fitness category requires a bit more--the daily equivalent of jogging for perhaps 25 minutes or walking briskly for close to an hour. (Our true public health scandal has nothing to do with fat and everything to do with the fact that 80 percent of the population is so inactive that it doesn't even achieve the former modest fitness standard.)

Other researchers have reached similar conclusions. For instance, the Harvard Alumni Study, which has tracked the health of Harvard graduates for many decades, has found the lowest mortality rates among those graduates who have gained the most weight since college while also expending at least 2,000 calories per week in physical activities. Such work suggests strongly that when obesity researchers have described the supposed health risks of fat, what they have actually been doing is using fat as a proxy--and a poor one at that--for a factor that actually does have a significant effect on health and mortality: cardiovascular and metabolic fitness. As Blair himself has put it, Americans have a "misdirected obsession with weight and weight loss. The focus is all wrong. It's fitness that is the key."

So I suppose losing fat is not as important as getting fit. Of course I'm sure you can read ten different well researched, well written articles and find ten different prescriptions for what your body should be like.

Five Years After 9/11

Heavy Duty Trucking:TWIC Not Ready For Start-Up, Says Federal Watchdog Agency

The Department of Homeland Security needs to finish its homework before it implements the Transportation Worker Identity Credential, says a federal watchdog agency.
DHS must solve a host of problems with TWIC before it puts the program in place, according to the Government Accountability Office. Failure to fix the flaws "could lead to further problems, increased costs and program delays without achieving the program's intended goals," the agency said.
The TWIC, which has been in the works for five years, is a card with fingerprint identification that a worker can use to get into a secure maritime facility. The TWIC requires a background check of criminal, immigration and terrorist records. Conceptually, the TWIC would eventually function as a sort of universal ID and security card for all transportation modes, but for the time being the government is limiting its focus to the maritime sector.
GAO, which serves as a kind of auditor for government agencies and regulations, studied the TWIC program and found three major problems.
The first has to do with the practical challenge of enrolling and issuing cards to some 750,000 maritime workers, including the estimated 110,000 truck drivers who serve port facilities. DHS tested its plan but only on a small scale – the actual population of workers is significantly larger than the test, GAO said.
The second problem is that key TWIC technology – specifically, the devices that read the biometric identifier on the card – may not work properly. The two DHS agencies in charge of the program, the Coast Guard and the Transportation Security Administration, have recognized that problem. They have started a separate rulemaking on the requirement that port operators install TWIC scanning devices as part of their security systems.
Third, DHS needs to balance the security gains of TWIC with potential disruptions it may have on the flow of maritime commerce, the agency said.
DHS needs to develop and test solutions to these problems, and improve its handling of the contractors that are working on the program, before it pushes the start button, the agency said.
These concerns come on top of industry objections to TWIC. Trucking and shipping interests have warned that the TWIC is a piecemeal, overpriced approach to transportation security.

We still haven't secured our ports. This is not just a terrorism issue, many of the major ports are are near hotbeds of cargo theft. Of course, making sure the port drivers aren't reduced to living on cat food would help with security too.

The Answer, My Friend, is Swinging in the Breeze

Abu Aardvark:Saddam's Execution

Finally, executing Saddam on the Eid al-Adha (also known as the "Feast of Sacrifice") is staggeringly stupid. I did find one Shia MP endorsing the idea because Saddam's execution should be a national holiday... but I haven't seen any Sunnis (in Iraq or elsewhere) sharing the sentiment. Since the main objection to his execution is its likely impact on the Iraqi Sunni community, doing the deed on the Eid seems calculated to inflame that community and to galvanize those who would put a sectarian and religious narrative on his murder. Where a primary goal of American policy is (or should be) splitting the nationalist Iraqi insurgency from the al-Qaeda jihadists, this choice seems calculated to drive them together and to offer resonance for those who would want to claim his execution as a martyrdom. Just really stupid timing, unless driving the Sunni community away from the political process and inflaming the sectarian war is in fact the point.

Abu Aardvark:What the timing of Saddam's execution suggests

All that said, the incredibly rapid pace and odd timing of the deed demands explanation. Today's Times confirms what al-Jazeera reported yesterday, that the timing was determined with American participation - so the Shia line that they wanted Saddam's execution to be a national holiday rings hollow. One possibility is simply security related: doing it this quickly and under cover of darkness was aimed at preventing any spectacular attack on the site or elsewhere pegged to his death. That's possible. But my hunch is that there is something more going on.

Saddam in custody was useful primarily as a bargaining chip with the Sunni community - a carrot to keep the ex-Baathists engaged in the process. His removal suggests that the Americans have decided to bring that effort to an end, and are indeed about to embark on the much-debated new strategy. Saddam's extremely rapid execution strikes me as clearing the decks rather than as any kind of culmination. There was no real effort even to cash in the chip: no public ceremony, no political momentum around it. He was simply discarded. And that strikes me as the single most important political fact about these events.

More important than the "surge" or "escalation" or "dribble" of new American troops, Saddam's execution seems to suggest that the target will indeed be some variation of the Shia Option - aligning with Shia parties to try and crush the Sunni insurgency first. I don't think this is a very good idea, as I've written before, but then I don't think the US has any good options in Iraq anymore.

I know the first news article I read implied that in Iraq the date of the execution was the day the Sunnis in I raq began the 3-day holiday (with the Shi'a starting their observance a day later). I wondered if that was a poke in the eye to the Sunnis. Guess it was (of course the Sadrists carrying out the deed is probably a bigger insult, but anyhow). I'd feel a whole lot better about if our guys weren't going to be taking fire to protect the Shi'ite "government" from the Insurgency (kind of sad when you have a majority of the population and you still have to hide behind an outside army).

EDIT:Democracy Arsenal: Saddam's Execution: Oops, Wrong Day Indeed, it was a Sunni but not a Shi'a holy day.

Cassandra?

AP:Thousands flock to see Saddam's grave

Staff Sgt. David Earp, who also fought in 1991's Operation Desert Storm, said the execution worried him.

"In my opinion, something big is going to happen," said Earp, of Colorado. "There will be a response. Probably not today because they know we are looking for one, but soon."

Where will foreign policy go after Iraq

American Future: The Coming of Neo-Multilateralism

Even if President Bush decides to stick by his guns (literally and figuratively) and manages to pull a rabbit out of his hat, I believe that the doctrine that bears his name will be jettisoned by his successor, be he (or she) a Republican or a Democrat. The doctrine's demise will mean there will be no further efforts to defeat terrorism by using force to spread democracy. Chastened by the cost in lives and treasure, a majority of Americans want to withdraw our troops from Iraq, a preference indicating a willingness to accept an ill-defined stalemate (or even defeat) in Iraq. As in the early 1970s, the spirit of our time is "Come Home America." In the view of at least one pundit, "With hindsight we may see 2006 as the end of Pax Americana."

Where does this leave us after Bush's term in office is over? Barring an unpredictable event—in particular, a terrorist attack on the scale of 9/11 or greater on U.S. soil—the signs point to a retreat to neo-isolationism, as happened after the Vietnam war.

No administration will use neo-isolationism to describe its foreign policy. Whether the next administration is Republican or Democratic, some other word or phrase will be invented to describe a policy that will amount to neo-multilateralism. Whatever it's called, this policy will eschew military interventions carried out unilaterally or by ad hoc coalitions of the willing.

The central feature of neo-multilateralism will be an American rapprochement with the UN, a process that will be made easier by Kofi Annan's departure. Many observers—here and even more so in Europe—will cheer this development, as Gulliver will be chained.

I won't be among them. As most recently evinced by its inaction over Darfur and the watered-down sanctions against Iran (Security Council Resolution 1737), the UN Security Council is structurally incapable of confronting threats to humanity. Whether the issue is genocide carried out by Khartoum or Tehran's nuclear weapons program, the Security Council epitomizes ineffectiveness. Given the agendas of Russia and China, there is no reason to hope that this will change.

Terrorist and militant groups, not just certain governments, will be among the primary beneficiaries of American neo-multilateralism. An America that's tightly-bound to the UN will feel compelled to abide by the rules of international law. These rules are supposed to apply to all parties to a conflict but, in reality, don't. The most recent example of the asymmetric application of international law was this past summer's war between Israel and Hezbollah. The vocal, widespread claim that Israel used "disproportionate force" wasn't matched by outrage over Hezbollah's installation of its rocket-launchers in civilian areas and its intentional targeting of civilians in northern Israel.

Like the UN Charter, the rules of war—in particular, rules of engagement—were agreed upon at a time when warfare meant fighting among states. That isn't the type of conflict present in today's world, nor is it likely to be in the foreseeable future. Instead, asymmetric warfare pitting a state against terrorist and militant groups will continue to be the most frequent type of violence.

As I discussed in considerable detail in an earlier post, the U.S., in order to minimize civilian casualties in Iraq, has conformed to strict rules of engagement. I concluded that post with these words:

Without maintaining that our forces have never deviated from these rules of engagement, it's clear that our intent has been to fight a "civilized" war. From a humanitarian standpoint, this objective is commendable. However, fighting with one hand tied behind our back (to borrow a phrase from the Vietnam era) has undoubtedly resulted in greater American casualties and made it more difficult to prevail against an enemy that obeys no rules. The limitations, by enhancing the ability of the insurgents and terrorists to carry on the fight, have probably resulted in more, not fewer, civilian casualties. If our rules of engagement were formulated, in part, to present a better face to the "international community," they have failed. Nobody has commended us for our good behavior.

The rules of engagement we've followed in Iraq raise an issue than couldn't be more fundamental. If our twenty-first century conflicts are going to pit us (or, I might add, Israel) against extremist groups whose tactics know no bounds and we allow our conduct to be constrained by the dictates of international law, as defined by such multilateral institutions as the UN, we are condemning ourselves to fighting protracted conflicts that erode American willpower, as has happened with Iraq. If we give precedence to conforming to international norms over winning, it won't escape the notice of militants, who will use every opportunity to weaken us.

The neo-multilateral foreign policy I foresee, because it will exclude unilateral American military interventions, means that interventions against terrorists and militants will rarely, if ever, take place. And when and if they do, the "international community" will employ rules of engagement that are advantageous to the instigators of violence.

Because the Iraq war has been so terribly mismanaged, the "Pax Americana"—a phrase that implies the ability and willingness of the United States to act unilaterally—may indeed be over. If it is, the only possible replacement is a "Pax United Nations." Those who favor this change may live to regret it.

I think the likely outcome of defeat in Iraq is not a chastened U.S. that cheerfully sends its protection money to the U.N. every month and sends its troops the fool's errand of the week with the Boys in Blue Helmets, rather I think the outcome is going to be Pissed Off country that is going to have little patience for international adventures. Any such involvement is going to bring the recriminations over Who Lost the Middle East to the surface, thus grinding activity to a halt while the tribes of the chattering class sling poop at each other. We could also see "To Hell with Them" hawks ascendant, but I think for at least a few years we are going to be occupied licking our wounds and assigning blame.

Laugh or Cry

Blog Them Out of the Stone Age:The Urge to Surge

I haven’t had time to write it up (and with Winter Quarter coming like a freight train can’t imagine I’ll ever find the time), but for weeks now I’ve been mentally composing a long, discursive post on the Bush administration’s dogged assertion — and apparently sincere belief — that it can still win big in Iraq. In this it is supported by a number of gifted military historians, most notably Eliot Cohen and Fred Kagan.

Since I have great respect for Eliot and Fred, I’ve tried hard to see things their way. But they don’t even begin to persuade. Their arguments strike me as basically elaborate, occasionally eloquent embroideries of the old platitude, “When the going gets tough, the tough get going.”

And their urge to surge strikes me as particularly untenable. It’s what the United States did in Vietnam from 1964 through 1968. It’s what the Italians did in 1915-1917, the result being no fewer than twelve Battles of the Isonzo River before the Germans cleaned their clocks at Caporetto. The Germans, for their part, got the urge to surge in March 1918, and the result was complete defeat within eight months.

But those are just three historical examples. Eliot and Fred could dispute each one of them and come up with three counterexamples in a New York minute. We’re all smart guys who know a lot about military history and strategic studies.

My three examples essentially buttress a gut level conviction, which I’ve held ever since July 2002 — when the Bush administration began laying the domestic groundwork for the Iraq war — that this adventure was needless and would/will end badly. Eliot and Fred had and have the equal but opposite gut level conviction. Unfortunately, they also have the ear of the president, whose own gut level convictions have for six years had him bounding from disaster to disaster with a kind of animal joy.

emphasis added

Prophetic?

Mark Heard Lyrics Project:NOTHING IS BOTHERING ME

No news is good news but news is here to stay
Tightening the thumb-screws from day to day
I hear the tale of a distant fray
War is hell but it's half-a-world away

I'm alright
Nothing is bothering me
I'm just trying to keep the weight of this world
From dawning on me

We get the picture from week to week
The rich get richer and inherit the meek
Long since started preying on the weak
Am I the guilty party if I turn the other cheek

I'm alright
Nothing is bothering me
I'm just trying to keep the weight of this world
From dawning on me

Mark Heard: Victims of the Age 1982