Dec 16, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
From Cox and Forkum:
This cartoon was intended to run yesterday but was displaced by news of Saddam's capture. Pro-democracy/anti-terrorism demonstrations occurred in Baghdad last week, but you might not know that if you only watched network news. Except for the FoxNews channel, the major media did not give the demonstrations significant coverage.
The blogosphere, however, did a great job of taking up the slack. In particular, InstaPundit provided a number of good links (here, here, here and here). Highlights include: Report from Iraqi blooger Healing Iraq with photos, photos, and more photos; Report from Iraqi blooger Iraq the Model with a follow-up comment on his disappointment with the media, western and Arab; Donald Sensing posted screen captures of FoxNews television coverage.Dec 16, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
Writes Mark Steyn:
One of the reasons America has an illegal immigration problem is because it has a legal immigration problem. If, like that hapless British Army wallah, you do things by the book, go to a US consulate in a foreign city and get issued with an "Advance Parole", you lay yourself open -- for years to come -- to being suddenly plunged, entirely arbitrarily, into a bureaucratic nightmare that destroys your life. Compare that to the courtesies extended to illegal aliens....if you slip across the border, rent an apartment, get a job and a driver's license courtesy of outgoing California Governor Gray Davis, the entire Democratic Party and a good half of the Republican Party will bend over backwards to respect you as a fine upstanding member of the Undocumented-American community and facilitate your access to all the benefits the state has to offer. Entering America illegally is a rational choice.
If a non-criminal foreigner wishes to immigrate into America--and an American is willing to hire him--the process of immigrating should be little more than a matter of "rubber stamp" paperwork, as opposed to a sometimes decade-long process. Immigrants should not be permitted to enter if they simply intend to be future members of the welfare state.Dec 16, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
From Yahoo News, "France Pledges to Help Reduce Iraq's Debt ":
France said Monday it will work with other nations to cancel billions of dollars in Iraqi debt and suggested that Saddam Hussein's capture would open the way toward mending relations with Washington....
Observe that France's decision followed the "U.S. decision last week to lock out Russia, Germany and France from bidding on $18.6 billion in U.S.-financed reconstruction projects in Iraq." France understands that Bush means business.Dec 16, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
Mark Steyn in UK Telegraph, December 15th 2003:
...The one consistent feature of the post-9/11 era is the comprehensive failure of the international order. The French use their Security Council veto to protect Saddam. The EU subsidises Palestinian terrorism. The International Atomic Energy Agency provides cover for Iran's nuclear ambitions. The UN summit on racism is an orgy of racism.
The New York Times, sleepwalking through the 21st century on bromides from the Carter era, wants the UN to run Saddam's trial because one held under the auspices of the Americans would "lack legitimacy". Au contraire, it's the willingness of Kofi Annan, Mohammed el-Baradei, Chris Patten, Mary Robinson and the other grandees of the international clubrooms to give "legitimacy" to Saddam, Kim Jong-Il, Arafat, Assad and co that disqualifies them from any role in Iraq...
Dec 16, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
The E.U. opposes the death penalty for man responsible for murdering hundreds of thousands of men, women, and children--and tortured even more. But, at the same time their intellectuals oppose "Eurocentrism"--Americans "imposing" Western values on relatively primitive cultures. It is time at last to put the false doctrine of "multiculturalism" to good rhetorical use by allowing the Iraqis to stone Saddam to death.
Comments Thomas Sowell in "What Should Be Done With Saddam Hussein?":
Since stoning people to death is a tradition in parts of the Middle East, that might be the most appropriate way to execute Saddam Hussein. If each relative of someone murdered by Saddam were allowed to throw a stone, the line might stretch back for miles. Television pictures of that line, broadcast throughout the Arab world, could completely undermine any notion that this is just an American vendetta against Moslems.
Presiding over a matter of this magnitude and applying traditional laws and practices could help establish the credibility of the new Iraqi authorities. To our inevitable critics in Europe and elsewhere, we could say: "This is not the American way of doing things. But this is the Iraqis' country."
Dec 15, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
Rachel Polonsky an academic specialising in Russian literature has an excellent piece on Russia published recently in the UK's Spectator on the struggle between the ex-KGB agent, and Russia leader, Putin and those Russians who want to create a free society in Russia:
A photograph released in mid-November showed Mikhail Khodorkovsky, head shaved, staring through the bars of a cage into a CCTV camera at the closed hearing that denied him bail. Accompanying the picture was a warning from the deputy prosecutor, who spoke as though Khodorkovsky had already been convicted. ‘Those who are not yet jailed must think hard about what they are doing,' he said. Russia's new rich may not have had to think hard about this public political blackmail by a member of the judiciary, but they thought fast. The day after the publication of this graphic indication of the consequences of powerful dissent, the President appeared before the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs. In regard to state-business relations, Putin declared, there will be no going back to the past. The tycoons greeted this remark with ‘stormy applause', as the editors of Communist party proceedings used to say...No one mentioned Khodorkovsky. After the meeting, many businessmen vocally distanced themselves from the President's humiliated enemy, and lined up to pledge commitment to United Russia. Many others kept quiet.
...We have flattered Putin enough. There is no reason to believe that a corrupt, repressive corporate state will produce significant economic and social improvements for the third of the Russian population that lives in absolute poverty. Political freedom, justice and official accountability are more than just optional decorations for a market economy.
...There might be a public investigation into the ‘apartment bombings' of 1999, in which 300 Russians were killed in their sleep, to establish whether, as much evidence suggests, the FSB planted them to create a pretext for the Chechen war which made Putin popular. Liberal Duma deputies who proposed such inquiries would not, like Sergei Yushenkov and Yuri Shchekochikhin, be murdered. The survivors of the bombings would speak publicly about their suspicions; those who have dared to speak would return from political asylum...
Definitely worth a read.Dec 15, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
Gloom and doom--no more hefty bonuses for suicide bombings. From Yahoo News ["Palestinians Mark 'Black Day' of Saddam Capture"]:
Disbelief and gloom seized many Palestinians Sunday at news of Saddam Hussein's capture as Israel fired off a telegram of congratulations to Washington...."It's a black day in history," said Sadiq Husam, 33, a taxi driver in Ramallah, West Bank seat of the Palestinian Authority....Saddam paid over $35 million to the kin of Palestinian suicide bombers, militants and bystanders who died in an uprising that began in 2000.
Arafat himself had opposed the 1991 Gulf War that ousted Saddam's forces from Kuwait. Palestinians cheered when Iraqi Scud missiles crashed into Israeli cities.
But not to worry, there are always fellow terrorist supporters--opps, I mean "freedom fighters"--in other Arab countries, Old Europe, and that beacon for world dictatorship--the U.N. The article also quotes one of the wonders of the Palestinian "education" system (which duplicates that of a few American, Cuban, and European universities):
"The war will start now in Iraq said 16-year-old Yusef Khalil in Gaza. "Saddam helped our people and we will not forget him."
As another example of non-objective reporting here is what an ABC News Reporter had to say on Saddam's support of "Palestinians killed in the conflict", i.e., suicide bombers:
Until the outbreak of the war against Iraq, the strongman sent millions of dollars to Palestinians killed in the conflict with Israel.
Killed by whom? Themselves. Comments Mark Steyn in the Irish Times (December 15, 2003):
In the honour/shame culture of the Arab world, it will be much harder now to pass [Saddam] off as the mighty warrior. He had a pistol, but chose not to use it on himself. The Palestinians may be jumping up and down in the street insisting he's still a great man, but in the end the sugar daddy who put up 25,000 bucks for the family of each suicide bomber had no desire to experience the glory of martyrdom himself: he's eager for you to strap your teenage daughter into the Semtex belt, but, like Osama and Yasser and the rest of the gang, he's disinclined to lead by example. For Middle East dictators who've enjoyed a wholly undeserved political stability for a quarter-century, the humiliation of Saddam Hussein is a cautionary tale.
Dec 15, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
Writes Mark Steyn in The Irish Times, December 15th 2003 on "Another Setback for Bush":
...[Senator John Kerry urged that] now would be an excellent opportunity to hand everything over to the UN, the Hague, the Arab League, the Westchester County League of Women Voters, and other respected bodies. Kerry doesn't get it: if it had been left to Kofi Annan, the French, Germans, Russians, Canadians, Arabs and all but two of the nine Democratic Presidential candidates, Saddam Hussein wouldn't be being inspected for lice by American medics, he'd still be sitting on his solid gold toilet in his palace reading about the latest massive anti-Bush demonstrations in Le Monde. The Iraqi people don't want to place their future in the hands of an "international community" that found it more convenient to allow Saddam to go on torturing them.
Dec 14, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
Mark Steyn points out on the U.S. government making "the axis of weasels ineligible for Iraqi reconstruction contracts" is that the U.S. is "not talking about frosting the French, Germans, Russians and Canadians out of Iraq entirely." Anyone from those countries are free to invest and develop Iraq, what is at issue according to Steyn is:
...whether the American Defence Department should use American taxpayers' money to offer American government contracts in Iraq to companies from countries that actively obstructed and continue to obstruct American policy in Iraq....The best thing for the people of Iraq, according to Mr Martin and , and Herr Schroder and M de Villepin, was that Saddam should be allowed to go on killing and torturing them for another decade or three...The assumption was that there would be no price to pay: after the war things would revert to normal...
....On Iraq, France, is on the other side - Saddam was their man, to the end. Germany is in a state of semi-derangement - a third of Germans under 30 believe that America organised the 9/11 attacks...One can think of several terms for folks...but "allies" isn't one of them - unless "allies" is now a synonym for, respectively, saboteurs, poseurs, nutters and enemies. ["Payback time for the axis of weasels" Mark Steyn, UK Telegraph]
Dec 14, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
From Yahoo News ["Arabs share little of world joy over Saddam's capture"]:
Though officials in Kuwait hailed the arrest of the dictator who ordered the invasion of their emirate in 1990, those in other Arab states were subdued...
Perhaps worrying that they--who are dictators--might be next?
Many people in the streets of Cairo and Beirut openly cursed a victory for a United States they see as an arrogant and unjust power, while some even refused to believe their eyes and ears.
Refusing "to believe their eyes and ears"--i.e. rejecting the facts--is the only way that the principled support of freedom becomes "arrogance", retaliation against a genocidal maniac becomes "injustice", unsettling the status quo of appeasement of dictatorships becomes "unsettling world peace", and suicide bombers of innocent children become "freedom fighters."
...Eyes riveted to the television screen in a Cairo coffee shop, customers worried about this "American victory" and feared it would ensure the re-election of President George W. Bush next year...
Obviously Dean backers.
...Mustafa Bakri, the pro-Saddam editor in chief of the independent Egyptian weekly Al-Osbou, said on the television: "It's a black day in the history of the Arabs. It's a humiliation."
Only for Saddam Hussein and those Arabs--and "Old" Europeans, Chinese, Russians, CNN and BBC reporters, etc.--who supported him. For those Arabs who actually support freedom it is a day to rejoice--another dictator is effectively dead.
..."It's Bush, Blair, Berlusconi, Aznar and Sharon who should be put on trial," said Bakri, who organized several solidarity trips from Cairo to Baghdad before US troops invaded in March.
Have you considered bringing this up with the Hague? (The Hague--the so-called European "world" kangaroo court--would even guarantee not to kill Saddam. Now as for George W. Bush...)
...In Beirut, Doha Shams, a journalist with the leftist newspaper As-Safir, said: "It's great to be finished with Saddam but when will Bush's turn come? He is threatening world peace."
How did he do this? By allieing himself with over 50 plus countries and capturing the Butcher of Baghdad?
..."Thank God that he has been captured alive, so he can be tried for the heinous crimes he has committed" against the Iraqi and Kuwaiti peoples, said [Kuwaiti Information Minister Mohammed Abulhassan], who was Kuwait's UN representative at the time of the invasion.
No thank the American Armed forces.Dec 14, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
From Cox and Forkum:
Dec 14, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
From FoxNews ["World Leaders Thrilled at Saddam's Capture", December 14, 2003]:
...Iraq's interim government has established a special tribunal to try Saddam and other members of his regime for genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. The United States still hasn't decided what to do with Saddam, though Blair said Saddam could be "tried in Iraqi courts for his crimes against the Iraqi people." Ahmad Chalabi , a member of Iraq's Governing Council, said Saddam would be tried.
...In Yemen, Mohammed Abdel Qader Mohammadi, 50, said he was surprised Saddam didn't fight his capture. "I expected him to resist or commit suicide before falling into American hands. He disappointed a lot of us, he's a coward."
...The Spanish government, another supporter of the war, also hailed the news. "The time has come for him to pay for his crimes," said Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar, an outspoken supporter of the war to oust Saddam, despite widespread opposition at home. "He is responsible for the killing of millions of people over the last 30 years. He is a threat to his people and to the entire world," Aznar said.
And the French? From Cox and Forkum:
Dec 14, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
From Howard Dean's website:
This development provides an enormous opportunity to set a new course and take the American label off the war. We must do everything possible to bring the UN, NATO, and other members of the international community back into this effort.
Sure, why should America--and George W. Bush--get the credit? Why not let those who opposed the war, like the French, Germans, the U.N., and Howard Dean get some credit and glory too!
Comments Senator Joe Lieberman, (D-Conn.) on Howard Dean via his website:
Saddam Hussein was a homicidal maniac, a brutal dictator, who wanted to dominate the Arab world and was supporting terrorists. He caused the death of more than a million people, including 460 Americans who went to overthrow him. This is a day of glory for the American military, a day of rejoicing for the Iraqi people, and a day of triumph and joy for anyone in the world who cares about freedom, human rights, and peace....This news also makes clear the choice the Democrats face next year. If Howard Dean had his way, Saddam Hussein would still be in power today, not in prison, and the world would be a more dangerous place.
From Cox and Forkum:
Dec 14, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin:
Martin, who took over as prime minister last Friday, replaced Jean Chretien, under whose tenure relations with the White House had soured over his refusal to join the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq. But in his run up to the date he took the keys to the Prime Minister's Office, Martin repeatedly emphasized his desire to cultivate "more sophisticated" relations with his U.S. counterparts.
What does "sophistication" consist of?
...Although no Canadian troops were deployed to Iraq, Canada has so far pledged $300 million toward rebuilding Iraq. [CTV]
From Cox and Forkum:
Dec 14, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
From Mark Steyn:
A captured Saddam with a tongue depressor in his mouth. His tongue can't be half as depressed as the French, John Kerry, Howard Dean, The Guardian et al. They've all been saying for months that the Coalition needs to hand over more power and authority to Iraqis. Handing over Saddam to be tried in Baghdad is an excellent start. Or do they now want him on a plane to the Hague?
Dec 14, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
From FoxNews ["Saddam Captured 'Like a Rat' in Raid", December 14, 2003]:
Without firing a single shot, U.S. forces captured Saddam Hussein as he hid in the bottom of a hole at a farmhouse near Tikrit on Saturday...Asked about Saddam's state at the time of his capture, Sanchez said: "He was a tired man, a man resigned to his fate." Saddam is talkative and is being cooperative, the general said. He is being held at an undisclosed location...Washington hopes Saddam's capture will help break the organized Iraq resistance that has killed more than 190 American soldiers since Bush declared major combat over on May 1 and has set back efforts at reconstruction..."We are celebrating like it's a wedding," said Kirkuk resident Mustapha Sheriff. "We are finally rid of that criminal." "This is the joy of a lifetime," said Ali Al-Bashiri, another resident. "I am speaking on behalf of all the people that suffered under his rule."
From Cox and Forkum:
Here is what Bush had to say:
Good afternoon. Yesterday, December the 13th, at around 8:30 p.m. Baghdad time, United States military forces captured Saddam Hussein alive. He was found near a farmhouse outside the city of Tikrit, in a swift raid conducted without casualties. And now the former dictator of Iraq will face the justice he denied to millions.
The capture of this man was crucial to the rise of a free Iraq. It marks the end of the road for him, and for all who bullied and killed in his name. For the Baathist holdouts largely responsible for the current violence, there will be no return to the corrupt power and privilege they once held. For the vast majority of Iraqi citizens who wish to live as free men and women, this event brings further assurance that the torture chambers and the secret police are gone forever.
And this afternoon, I have a message for the Iraqi people: You will not have to fear the rule of Saddam Hussein ever again. All Iraqis who take the side of freedom have taken the winning side. The goals of our coalition are the same as your goals -- sovereignty for your country, dignity for your great culture, and for every Iraqi citizen, the opportunity for a better life.
In the history of Iraq, a dark and painful era is over. A hopeful day has arrived. All Iraqis can now come together and reject violence and build a new Iraq.
The success of yesterday's mission is a tribute to our men and women now serving in Iraq. The operation was based on the superb work of intelligence analysts who found the dictator's footprints in a vast country. The operation was carried out with skill and precision by a brave fighting force. Our servicemen and women and our coalition allies have faced many dangers in the hunt for members of the fallen regime, and in their effort to bring hope and freedom to the Iraqi people. Their work continues, and so do the risks. Today, on behalf of the nation, I thank the members of our Armed Forces and I congratulate them.
I also have a message for all Americans: The capture of Saddam Hussein does not mean the end of violence in Iraq. We still face terrorists who would rather go on killing the innocent than accept the rise of liberty in the heart of the Middle East. Such men are a direct threat to the American people, and they will be defeated.
We've come to this moment through patience and resolve and focused action. And that is our strategy moving forward. The war on terror is a different kind of war, waged capture by capture, cell by cell, and victory by victory. Our security is assured by our perseverance and by our sure belief in the success of liberty. And the United States of America will not relent until this war is won.
May God bless the people of Iraq, and may God bless America. Thank you.
It will be interesting to see how, in the next few weeks, the "anti-war" coalition (United Nations, fascist Howard Dean, CNN's Christine "spokeswoman for al-Qaeda"Amanpour, Al "Presidential Joke" Sharpton, etc.) will try to twist the capture of Saddam into another one of Bush's failures. (Bush does have failures--most recently his condemnation of the free Republic of Taiwan; however, the war on Saddam's dictatorship, for the most part, was not one of them).Dec 13, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
Suppose you have just turned 10 years old, and the President has decided to come to your birthday party.
You'd be excited, right? And if he decided to say a few words, you'd no doubt be honored, in a 10-year-old way.
But suppose he chose your birthday party to give a speech--you might begin to think he cared more about the propaganda opportunity than about you. And if he went on for two hours with his speech, well, you'd probably conclude that he had nothing but contempt for you and your birthday, and was trying to humiliate you.
No, it wasn't George W. Bush, it was Fidel Castro:
"This revolution does not depend on one individual, or two, or three," Castro declared in a speech of more than two hours at a birthday celebration in the courtyard of Elian's school in the child's hometown of Cardenas, about 85 miles east of Havana. [Havana Journal]
If this tells you what such a man is like, consider what it means for him to hold total, absolute, and arbitrary political power.Dec 12, 2003 | Dollars & Crosses
From Cox and Forkum:
Howard Dean was already considered a frontrunner for the Democrat presidential nominee before Al Gore endorsed him this week. Now he's virtually a shoe-in, which is all the more reason to take a close look at the policies he's advocating. Last week we criticized Dean for his unwillingness to deal forcibly with terrorist-sponsoring states. In the same Chris Matthews' interview, Dean also revealed his desire to use the power of the FCC to inject his vision of "democracy" into big media, all at the expense of free speech. This is otherwise known as censorship.
DEAN: I would reverse [deregulation] in some areas. First of all, 11 companies in this country control 90 percent of what ordinary people are able to read and watch on their television. That's wrong. We need to have a wide variety of opinions in every community. We don't have that because of Michael Powell and what George Bush has tried to do to the FCC.
MATTHEWS: Would you break up Fox? (LAUGHTER)MATTHEWS: I'm serious.
DEAN: I'm keeping a...
MATTHEWS: Would you break it up? Rupert Murdoch has "The Weekly Standard." It has got a lot of other interests. It has got "The New York Post." Would you break it up?
DEAN: On ideological grounds, absolutely yes, but... (LAUGHTER)MATTHEWS: No, seriously. As a public policy, would you bring industrial policy to bear and break up these conglomerations of power?
DEAN: I don't want to answer whether I would break up Fox or not, because, obviously (CROSSTALK)MATTHEWS: Well, how about large media enterprises?
DEAN: Let me-yes, let me get... (LAUGHTER)DEAN: The answer to that is yes. I would say that there is too much penetration by single corporations in media markets all over this country. We need locally-owned radio stations. There are only two or three radio stations left in the state of Vermont where you can get local news anymore. The rest of it is read and ripped from the AP.
MATTHEWS: So what are you going to do about it? You're going to be president of the United States, what are you going to do?
DEAN: What I'm going to do is appoint people to the FCC that believe democracy depends on getting information from all portions of the political spectrum, not just one.
MATTHEWS: Well, would you break up GE? (APPLAUSE)DEAN: I can't-you...
MATTHEWS: GE just buys Universal. Would you do something there about that? Would you stop that from happening?
DEAN: You can't say-you can't ask me right now and get an answer, would I break up X corp...
MATTHEWS: We've got to do it now, because now is the only chance we can ask you, because, once you are in, we have got to live with you. (LAUGHTER)DEAN: No.
MATTHEWS: So, if you are going to do it, you have got to tell us now. (CROSSTALK)MATTHEWS: Are you going to break up the giant media enterprises in this country?
DEAN: Yes, we're going to break up giant media enterprises. That doesn't mean we're going to break up all of GE. What we're going to do is say that media enterprises can't be as big as they are today. I don't think we actually have to break them up, which Teddy Roosevelt had to do with the leftovers from the McKinley administration. (CROSSTALK)MATTHEWS: ... regulate them.
DEAN: You have got to say that there has to be a limit as to how-if the state has an interest, which it does, in preserving democracy, then there has to be a limitation on how deeply the media companies can penetrate every single community. To the extent of even having two or three or four outlets in a single community, that kind of information control is not compatible with democracy.
