Feb 6, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
A New York Sun lead editorial says about all that needs to be said about John Kerry:
[I]f Tuesday night was an indicator of where the Kerry campaign is headed, we predict the senator from Massachusetts is in for a rocky ride. And not only because the message is weak, in a country where lots of us enjoy miracle cures and cheap gasoline because of "the drug companies" and "big oil," and where a lot of middle-class workers have retirement accounts or union pension funds swelled with stock in energy and drug companies. But because the messenger is, well, hampered by his own circumstances.
How John Forbes Kerry can credibly campaign against "the economy of privilege" is beyond us. He was in Skull and Bones at Yale. He lives in a $10 million townhouse on Louisburg Square in Boston's Beacon Hill. He summers in Nantucket. Forbes estimated his net worth at $550 million, more than Jay Rockefeller.
Maybe between the guilty rich and the angry poor Mr. Kerry can cobble together a coalition to defeat Mr. Bush in November.Our guess is that there are far more of a third category of people--optimists who are happy that America is a place where hard workers with some luck can build vast fortunes. [January 29, 2004]
Feb 6, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
From the New York Sun:
An Iranian diplomat was arrested in Nigeria under suspicion that he was spying on Israel, Reuters reported.The Shin Bet confirmed the report. A police source in Nigeria told the news agency that the man was arrested on January 23rd after he was caught taking pictures of the Israeli embassy in the capital Abuja, with a digital camera. "A digital camera was found in his possession, with surveillance pictures of the embassy and several other international and local official buildings in the capital," a senior Israeli security source told Reuters. A Nigerian police spokesman said last Thursday that an Iranian was being questioned after taking photographs of strategic buildings in the capital.
This is the same Iran one of whose "diplomats" Argentina wants to arrest for blowing up a Jewish community center. Meanwhile, according to UPI, here's what Saudi "diplomats" are doing in the U.S. (Thanks, James Taranto.):
On Thursday State Department Spokesman Richard Boucher confirmed that 16 Saudi nationals who had been accredited to the embassy in Washington had been asked to leave. "We were able to determine that they were not, in fact, working as diplomats in the Saudi Embassy, but rather were teaching in Northern Virginia and therefore were not entitled to diplomatic status. Since they were on diplomatic visas, ... we had to tell them your visa status is no longer valid. We gave them till Feb. 22 to clean up their affairs and leave the country," Boucher said. The place of instruction is the Institute of Islamic and Arabic Sciences in America in Fairfax, Va. Phones at the institute were not answered Monday. The institute's Web site says it was established in 1989 and is affiliated with al-Imam Muhammad Ibn Saud Islamic University in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Feb 6, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
Michael Kinsley on Democrats "desperately seeking electability":
"Democrats are cute when they're being pragmatic. They furrow their brows and try to think like Republicans. Or as they imagine Republicans must think. They turn off their hearts and listen for signals from their brains..."
Feb 5, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
You've probably heard that former weapons inspector David Kay doesn't think Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. But here's what else he thinks:
"We were almost all wrong, and I certainly include myself here," he said. "My view was that the best evidence I had seen was that Iraq indeed had weapons of mass destruction." ... Mr. Kay said he doesn't think members of the administration pressured analysts to shape evidence to make the case for war. "I deeply think that is the wrong explanation," Mr. Kay said, adding that numerous analysts had come to him in recent months to apologize about incorrect estimates. [NYSun, Jan 29, 2004]
Kay testified before the Senate Armed Services committee:
In the course of doing that, I had innumerable [intelligence] analysts who came to me in apology that the world that we were finding was not the world that they had thought existed and that they had estimated. Reality on the ground differed in advance. And never--not in a single case--was the explanation, "I was pressured to do this." The explanation was very often, "The limited data we had led one to reasonably conclude this. I now see that there's another explanation for it." [CNN, Jan 28, 2004]
James Taranto adds:
Earlier in the week a New York Times editor "sexed up" the paper's coverage of Kay, leading the paper to publish this embarrassing correction Tuesday:
Because of an editing error, a front-page article yesterday about David A. Kay, the C.I.A.'s former weapons inspector, misstated his view of whether the agency's analysts had been pressured by the Bush administration to tailor their prewar intelligence reports about Iraq's weapons programs to conform to a White House political agenda. Mr. Kay said he believed that there was no such pressure, not that there was. (His view was correctly reflected in a quotation that followed the error.)
Feb 5, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
How's this for cynical whitewashing of tyranny and amoral stability-worship:
Commerzbank, Germany's third largest bank... seemed particularly eager to curry favor with Tehran. At a session on "fiscal framework, regulations and contracts," Commerzbank's representative at the conference, Richard Greer said, "Since that moment in 1908 when oil was found in Iran, great benefits have passed on to the people of that country, despite great difficulties and foreign aggression." He later said, "At Commerzbank we see Iran as an island of stability."
Mr. Greer later recounted a story from his recent trip to Iran. As he was discussing the current turmoil in the Middle East with his hosts, one Iranian official remarked, "We have already had our revolution." Mr. Greer then remarked, "That stability we see in Iran is a product of that revolution."
The 1979 revolution that brought the Ayatollah Khomeini to power was followed the following year by the outbreak of war with Iraq and the beginning of Iran's relationship with Hezbollah and campaign to assassinate former high ranking officials from the Shah's government living abroad.
When asked whether he believed the demonstration of July 9, 2003, to commemorate the five year anniversary of the state's crackdowns on student protesters, was a possible sign of instability, Mr. Greer was dismissive. "The July 9 demonstrations is a sign of letting off steam. Half the population is very young and there is high unemployment." [NYSun, Jan 29, 2004]
Feb 4, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
Andrew Sullivan observes:
I'm beginning to worry that the president has lost his political touch. He's still under 50% on the re-elect question in most polls.
And the base is very restless. The domestic spending explosion and the immigrant temporary-worker program have hardly helped him cement his core supporters. However, if I were to come up with one single idea to enrage the base--after all the spending criticism--I'd come up with doubling spending on the one federal agency the right loathes the most. And sure enough, the president is now pouring more money into the NEA. Does he think National Public Radio listeners are going to rally to him over this? Has he lost his mind?
