Saturday, August 23, 2008

With Success, Silence.

It is quite astounding how the TV press coverage of Iraq has dropped off; it's almost as if the war does not exist. Kudos to the New York Times and the Washington Post for their continued extensive coverage of Iraq. From a recent report from the Times as General Petraeus prepares to leave Iraq:

The arrival of the 30,000 extra soldiers, deployed to Baghdad’s neighborhoods around the clock, allowed the Americans to exploit a series of momentous events that had begun to unfold at roughly the same time: the splintering of Moktada al-Sadr’s militia, the Mahdi Army; the growing competence of the Iraqi Army; and most important, the about-face by leaders of the country’s Sunni minority, who suddenly stopped opposing the Americans and joined with them against Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia and other local extremist groups.


The surge, clearly, has worked, at least for now: violence, measured in the number of attacks against Americans and Iraqis each week, has dropped by 80 percent in the country since early 2007, according to figures the general provided. Civilian deaths, which peaked at more than 100 a day in late 2006, have also plunged. Car and suicide bombings, which stoked sectarian violence, have fallen from a total of 130 in March 2007 to fewer than 40 last month. In July, fewer Americans were killed in Iraq — 13 — than in any month since the war began.

The result, now visible in the streets, is a calm unlike any the country has seen since the American invasion toppled Saddam Hussein in April 2003. The signs — Iraqi families flooding into parks at sundown, merchants throwing open long-shuttered shops — are stunning to anyone who witnessed the country’s implosion in 2005 and 2006.


However, TV is the manner by which most Americans get their news, and relative silence on Iraq by the MSM networks when the violence has dropped so dramatically will produce a dated and skewed view of Iraq in advance of the November election.

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Robama Hood.

Bill McGurn
itemizes Mr. Obama's mission to bring "fairness" to our society by (i) windfall-profits taxes on Big Oil to be redistributed as energy assistance payouts, (ii) having The Rich® pick up the tab for the escalating benefits of Social Security, and (iii) hitting The Rich® again with higher taxes to bring "balance" to the Force Tax Code. And if these actions result in lower government revenues? Hit The Rich® with an increase in capital gains taxes!

The Rich® is a registered trademark of the Barack Obama for President Campaign. To see who is currently included in this nefarious group, check the "Who's Rich?" thermometer graph at the Obama Campaign website. Updates are provided after every Obama campaign appearance or press interview.
The New Old Politics.

David Brooks writes that one of the most recalcitrant opponents to "a different politics" are the Mainstream Meatpackers, who prefer the easy stories of fad, conflict, controversy, and gotchas.

Monday, August 18, 2008

The Question Is: Why?

Obama and the Dems are now replaying Clinton-speak on abortion: "legal, safe, and rare".

But this raises a question: if there is no moral significance to abortion - that the fetus does not have rights of protection as an independent being as the Left claims - why does reducing the number of abortions have any significance? Isn't it no more important than calling for the reduction in the number of appendectomies? Would advocating for reducing the number of abortions (40 million since Roe) be based only on reducing a number of such medical procedures that carry some residual amount of risk to patients, or to lower public health care costs?

Or is such a call for reducing abortions an tacit admission that there is a moral dimension to every one of them that cannot be removed with legalisms?

Sunday, August 17, 2008



Michigan Football Preview.

Given the dignity and decorum of the past month's happenings in Michigan Football - the new Head Coach in court and the U's big buyout of his previous contract - we thought it would be instructive to see what Michigan's tens of millions is getting. Above is some video that was recently taken at a Wolverine scrimmage...