Quote of the moment

"Never attribute to malice what can easily be explained by bad script writing" -- Clint Warlick, writing about "Star Wars"

It's not a good idea, it's just the law

Many people, both in and out of the blogosphere, have lined up (at least for argument’s sake) on both sides of the question as to whether Bush needs additional authorization for an attack on Iraq.

Some have argued the pace of modern geopolitics is such that Bush (or, presumably, any other president) cannot wait for so archaic a procedure as waiting for Congress to declare war on a supposed attacker, but must strike with the force available to him immediately. Such arguments are not to be dismissed out of hand. We should note, however, that the Constitution explicitly declares the power to declare war to reside in Congress.

Now, again, many have argued, in this and other contexts, that the Constitution is an archaic document that should be accorded no respect whatsoever, but simply be ignored whenever it conflicts with our current vision of the good life. Of course, those who so argue seriously generally differ on what specific parts of the Constitution should be ignored.

It is sometimes said that the strength of the Constitution is shown by the fact that it has been formally amended only twenty-even times in over two hundred years. I would suggest that this fact demonstrates not so much the Constitution’s strength, as the willingness of both politicians and their constituents to ignore it, a willingness that goes back at least to the first Adams administration. Indeed, looking at the Adams/Jefferson succession, it may be said that those out of power, who appear to be principled defenders of the Constitution, become perfectly willing to violate it for their own purposes once in power.

Formal amendment of the Constitution, like impeachment, is one of those avenues provided by the writers of the Constitution that have become invested with a mystic horror. Although people may argue whether, say, Clinton deserved impeachment and conviction, the suggestion that the fact of impeachment (rather than the deep and passionate political divisions over whether he deserved it) would tear apart the country was ridiculous on its face. A country in which no one may formally upbraid its president, deservedly or otherwise, is one which has passed from Republic to Empire, complete with emperor-worship. Similarly, those who truly believe that some or all of the Constitution is outdated should be working to have it amended. If they fear that amendments would be partisan, or less enlightened that its existing text (which is possible, although it can also be argued that that enlightened spirit was intended to restrict less enlightened future generations), they should work to oppose that, or concede that in fact their position cannot count on popular support. At the risk of stimulating angry controversy, I would point out that the positions of both "pro-choice" and "pro-life" advocates would be looked at rather differently, if those position were clearly stated in the text of the Constitution, rather than depending on the interpretation of that text by the Supreme Court.

Both Democrats and Republicans ought to demand strict adherence to the Constitution’s text, if only out of a purely partisan fear that whatever shortcuts and end-runs they take will be turned against them when they are out of power.

But she doesn't keep kosher

I've finally figured it out.  My cat is a Jewish grandmother.

Nezumi-chan lies on the floor, waiting for me to come over and pet her.  When I don't, she gives me a look that says, "Go on with whatever you're doing that's so important.  I'll just lie here being neglected".

I should get one of those automatc backscratchers to pet her 24x7.  Then maybe she'd be happy.

Unholy war

From the Daily Telegraph (registration required), we have the news that a Muslim preacher in Britain has offered a warning that Muslims outside the U.K. will attack the U.S. and, perhaps, the U.K. in tyhe event of a war with Iraq.

It is slightly amusing that Sheikh Omar Bakri places the likelihood of al-Qa'ida attacks on the U.K. as being small, since they are "irrelevant" and "not worth" attacking

He said Britain was unlikely to be targeted. "It is a practical issue. Al-Qa'eda have limited resources and it is not worth the sacrifice of mujahideen [holy warriors] to hit targets in Britain.

"Britain is irrelevant. What would they hit? Big Ben? It's not worth it."

In truth, the Muslim population in the U.K., which cannot be assimilated due to the tribal nature of England (which, in justice, is considerably less than the tribal and racist attitudes of European nation) is tolerated by the U.K. because they are useful to the various manifestations of the po-mo and the left.

Fuel cells -- marvel or mess?

Lately I've been seeing references to fuel cells as the new wonder electric technology.  Such references invariably tout that the modern-day fuel cell can run on natural gas or even gasoline, obviating the need for those nasty, polluting Otto-cycle IC engines.

Now, I know that on-demand rectification of methane (natural gas) is possible; I haven't seen references to rectification of gasoline, but that seems to be a natural extension of the technology.  But are we really talking a fuel cell that uses carbon, or are we talking about a fuel cell with a rectifier attached on built in?  (And in the latter case, what happens to the carbon component of the fuel?)

Anyobe have any links for me to follow?

But nobody can SPEAK Russian

Peter Baker definitely wants to characterize the rise of skinhead stilyagi in Russia as right-fascist, and he may very well be correct.

It's what the Washington Post doesn't tell us that may be important, though.  Since I don't have another source for this to give me a binocular view, I don't what that may be.

I disagree with what I say, and I won't defend my right to say it

Occasionally, one comes across a quotation so bizarre that one is tempted by the cliché of pinching oneself to ensure that one is not dreaming.

Thus Steven Den Beste quotes "Demosthenes" as saying

I've already explained why I stay pseudonymous, but in reality it's pretty simple- I don't want my arguments here to affect how people treat me in real life (unless I let them... some of my real life friends do know about the blog, but it's my decision), and more importantly I don't want interpretation of my arguments weighed by how people perceive my beliefs and interests- I'd prefer the arguments to stand on their own, and the reputation of Demosthenes to grow and exist apart from my reputation and credentials in real life.

Den Beste is a reliable writer.  But, this quote is so bizarre that some evidence that it is true is required.  And, it is.

Two different interpretations of this are possible:

1. That Demosthenes is anxious to avoid the social cost of being known as holding the opinions expressed on his website
2. That Demosthenes wants to act as an advocatus diaboli, and wishes to not have people confuse his expressiing ideas with his holding them.

In case #1:  T.S., Eliot.  Actions have consequences.  Being a stupid lefty is among those actions.

Case #2 is ruled out by his frequent avoidance of the issues hand, his trying to change the subject, his admiration of other leftists, and self-congratulory references to his own knowledge and wisdom -- in short, standard left-fascist "debating" techniques.

Answer

Dean Esmay, who name is known in the blogosphere (although I am embarassed to admit that I did not know that he has a weblog), wrote to me saying

Hi. Read your comments on No Watermelons Allowed. I found them thoughtful.

I wonder if you might have some things on this:

http://www.deanesmay.com/archives/000206.html

...that you'd be willing to share, publicly or privately?

I'm certainly willing to comment publicly, but his article is so spot-on that I see little need to do so.

One of his comments that does not need correcting (for it is already correct), nor even really amplification, but that certainly deserves repetition 

Yes, religions have sometimes been the cause of wars. Sometimes, ethnic conflicts have been the cause of wars. But I don't see how anyone who views the vast sweep of human history can deny one salient fact: wars are almost always about conquest or money, not religion. Sometimes religion is injected into the equation. But I submit that, more often than not, religion is either peripheral or nonexistant in most human conflicts.

Which is so, I would say.  Very few genuinely religious wars have been fought; indeed, I would put the initial Islamic expansion through the Middle East under the Rightly-Guided Caliphs into that category as an almost unique experience (yes, I know that "almost unique" is an abomination).  Religion has often been the pretext for wars (the opening phase of the Thirty Years' War, for example, although that could also be seen as a dynastic contest between Habsburgs and Wittelsbachs), but seldom the actual motivating force.

...save for the First Church of Marx and Lenin.  I do differ slightly with Esmay's saying

Then of course there's Communism--an officially atheistic form of government. You can't have a higher wall of separation of church and state. You also can't point to regimes that were more bloody and repressive. Mao, Stalin, Pol Pot, Kim--these names all loom large in the history of mankind's bloodiest killers. And mankind's most rabid secularists.

In fact, there's damned little difference between Marxism-Leninism and other religions.  It has a body of scriptures, a major and some minor saints, an wicked apostate, and a group of adherents educated (or perhaps "indoctrinated" is a better word) in its theology, but incapable of interacting in any meaningful way with unbelievers.

The Marxist religion has certainly been the twentieth century's bloodiest.  Some Islamist fanatics may wish to usurp that title in the 21st century, but they haven't yet, and may be severely disappointed in the results if they try.

Two Chinas, one holocaust

Of course we're all aware (thanks in part to N.Z. Bear), that President Chen of Taiwan has called for a referendum on Taiwanese independence, and in doing so has mightily pissed off Beijing.

Both Beijing and Taipei have long maintained that there is but one China.  In recent years, however, as Nationalist refugees from the mainland have died off, and the rest of the world has refused to uphold the charade any longer, there has been a movement to recognize Taiwan as independent de facto.  Beijing still gets its panties in a wad, however, at the suggestion that the government at Taipei is legitimate in any way, shape, or form, or that Taiwan is a separate country from the P.R.C.

The U.S., in the meanwhile, has restricted the military materiel that Taipei can buy, and carefully sabotaged its nuclear weapons reseach program, to ensure the Chinese cold war does not suddenly heat up.  The defects in Taiwan's defense posture caused by U.S. insistence that it not pose an open threat to China has been balanced by a U.S. commitment to aid in defending the island from Chinese aggression.  With the Iraqi confrontation heating up, however, there is increasing question if we could defend Taiwan even if we wished.

Certainly, China has no possibility of forcing a landing in Taiwan, or even of maintaining a blockade against the wishes the U.S.; the Chinese navy is a collection of Soviet-era antiques.  It has been suggested though, that sufficiently determined China could force U.S. acquiescence by a threat of first use of nuclear weapons.

Anything short of an immediate rollover by Taiwan, however, would certainly destroy its economy for decades to come.  As Taiwan is, sub rosa, a major trading partner with China, this destruction would bring down the Chinese economy, and very likely throw the world into a depression, the likes of which has not been seen since the 1930s.

This proposed referendum is a geopolitical game of chicken; the initiative rests with Chen.  A vote for independence would lead to a Chinese-Taiwanese war; a vote against independence would result in renewed pressure by Beijing on the U.S. to allow Taiwan to be reabsorbed.  The acceptable solution is for the referendum not to be held.  Chen knows that.

The mother of all sieges

This International Herald Tribune article suggests that Saddam Hussein is planning to concentrate his forces in Iraqi cities – not necessarily to win the war, but to secure the victory through propaganda.

His plan is sound in that there is simply no way that U.S. forces could winkle his troops out without massive civilian casualties. Aerial bombardment might seriously degrade his C⁴I capacity, but such bombardment – as evinced by the Afghan campaign – is not bloodless. Moreover, in the absence of a coup by anti-Hussein forces, or by elements of the Iraqi army and intelligence community unwilling to accept the hardships of a war of sieges, we must send in ground troops – no one can truly be said to command a position until they can plant a troop's boots on it. Current U.S, military doctrine, IIRC, calls for a force ration of 10:1 in urban warfare. Whilst the number of troops involved can be reduced by "force multipliers" – quality of soldiers, weaponry, command factors, etc. – we are realistically still talking about a numerical advantage of 2.5:1 here. This level of engagement will result in a minimum of thousands of American, and tens of thousands of military and civilian Iraqi casualties.

And this is where Hussein plans to win the propaganda battle. Real and faked footage of the dead and maimed, of the destruction of "harmless civilian facilities" (remember the "Baby Milk Factory", will be broadcast by Baghdad to the eagerly awaiting alphabet-soup networks and to the Axis of Stupid (the E.U./U.N.). Hussein will try both to get the international left, "horrified" by Iraqi casualties, to protest the war and "take action" against the U.S., and to truly horrify the American mainstream with dead, maimed, and tortured troops, until they demand a withdrawal to protect the well-being of American troops.

Haiti

StratFor summarizes its analysis of Haiti thus

Recent politically motivated violence in Haiti's fourth-largest
city is a manifestation of the dwindling popularity of President
Jean-Bertrand Aristide. Although he is not in immediate danger of
being ousted, Haiti could become even more unstable in the
future. This could have a wide-ranging impact on both U.S.
counter-drug efforts and refugee flows from the Caribbean
country.

Frankly, I don't know what to say about Haiti.  It's seven million unbelievably poor people stuffed into the smaller part of an island without natural resources.  Corruption, save at the highest levels, is necessary merely to survive.  Most Haitians won't survive the ravages of AIDS (now estimated as manifesting in over 5% of the population -- not sub-Saharan African levels, but not good, either).

Maybe a reader has a recommendation; I sure don't.

Semper ubi sub ubi

From StrategyPage we get the following tidbit

August 5, 2002; U.S. military doctors learned early on in Afghanistan that the smallest cut could quickly turn into a serious infection. So the policy has been to warn the troops to get a large dose of antibiotics for the slightest scratch. The reason is simple; sanitation is primitive in that part of the world and the constantly blowing dust tends to contain fecal matter. The concept of outhouses and field latrines (a hole in the ground, covered over after the troops have filled it up) never caught on it a big way. So there's plenty of infectious crud in the air. Afghans are also susceptible to this, but with an average lifespan of about forty years, only the strong (infection resistant) survive. But even sturdy adult Afghans can get bad infections, so Special Forces medics find that carrying a large stock of antibiotics will win Americans friends.

This is a moderate "D'oh!" to anyone with a modest knowledge of history, and especially military history (which, by definition, excludes almost everyone outside of the U.S., the editorial boards of the New York Times, Washington Post, and Los Angeles Times, and most Democrats).  Despite watermelons attempting to contrast the pristine streams of yesteryear with the sluggish, polluted waters of today, water-borne pathogens have been a serious problem since the first tribe settled down to practice agriculture (and pissed in the river upstream from their village).  World War II was the first war in which American troops' deaths from disease and infection did not exceed the number of combat deaths (partially due to improved sanitation, but also due to the effect of sulfa drugs on a genetically inexperienced population of bacteria).

This, incidentally, demonstrates the need for the kind of "nation-building" that progressives find boring and unenvironmental. However, teaching both the troops and the Afghans field sanitation, drilling some wells, and building concrete septic systems away from drinking water supplies, will bring a revolution to Afghanistan that a hundred thousand copies of the colleted works of Jean-Paul Sartre and Herbert Marcuse never could.

A real anti-war argument

Unlike the contemptible Hesiod, Jim Henley at Unqualified Offerings has some real anti-war arguments. Let’s take a look at those.

He writes:

The Clinton Administration throughout the nineties, and the Bush Administration since, have said right out that simply cooperating with the inspection regime would not get them to support lifting sanctions - only Saddam's loss of power would convince them to do that. And everything the US has said and done for the last ten years indicates that it expects Saddam to die as part of the "regime change."

Deterrence requires two components:

1. A sure penalty for noncompliance.
2. A clear benefit to compliance.

US policy toward Iraq has lacked factor 2 for a decade. Current, stated policy is

1. If Saddam uses, acquires or conceals weapons of mass destruction, he dies.
2. If Saddam foreswears use, acquisition and concealment of weapons of mass destruction, he dies.

Here's another policy we have going:

1. If Saddam subsidizes the families of Palestinian suicide bombers, he dies.
2. If Saddam stops subsidizing the families of Palestinian suicide bombers, he dies.

Ask yourself: According to the US government's stated policy ("regime change" no matter what), what benefit does the USG offer Saddam for ceasing to subsidize suicide bombers?

Answer: None.

Now, the position that Henley seems to be implicitly taking here is unlikely to delight the Warblogger Watch crowd, and is in fact opposed to his own declared position as a "non-interventionist libertarian isolation". But let’s look at this argument and its implications as an anti-war argument.

Henley is absolutely correct that this policy amounts to "Saddam Hussein must die". Such an attitude can only be justified by the counter-argument that Hussein is so utterly untrustworthy that whatever protestations he might make are utterly unbelievable, that he actually cannot be negotiated with because his word is meaningless. I will leave to the readership to decide whether Hussein is actually so untrustworthy.

We (the U.S.) have also introduced a problem into this situation by declaring at the beginning what the minimum acceptable concessions by Hussein’s replacement would be. As any bazaar haggler knows, one doesn’t begin by saying and meaning, "I’ll pay fifty dinars for this lamp, but not an isar more". The error here is twofold; if one could have gotten the lamp for forty dinars, one has just overpaid. If, on the other hand, the lamp seller really won’t part for it for less than sixty dinars, one ends up with no lamp. This is tolerable if one can just move to the next stall in the bazaar; it is less tolerable if there is only one lamp seller (or vicious tyrant of Iraq) to deal with.

If the only charge were that the U.S. has engaged in spectacularly inept diplomacy, then I will plead nolo contendere (on the U.S.’s behalf) and throw the country on the mercy of the court. However, after that has been said, the question still remains, "But what do we do about Iraq?" It’s perfectly valid – and quite possibly correct – to argue that our history of negotiation with Iraq sucks. But, unless we also advance the argument that the world must lie in the bed that previous U.S. have badly made, this becomes irrelevant to question of what happens.

The difficulty here is in Henley’s non-interventionism. If we drop back on our demands to Hussein (or tell some Iraqi general, "Here’s the deal: overthrow Saddam and meet these conditions, and we’ll you all the goons, guns, and gold that you think you’ll need"), then we are still intervening. Henley worries that we have no realistic carrot, and he is right to do so, but putting forward these demands also requires a realistic stick. Unless we are going to say to Hussein, "Do whatever you please, just don’t do it here", then in any discussion with him (or even a successor) we must say, "We want these thing or else’, and "or else" needs to a bit more than "We’ll sponsor a really nasty resolution about you at the U.N.". The proposal "Do whatever you please, but not here" is actually non-interventionist and isolationist (the principle here is that the U.S. government’s responsibility to protect and serve is limited to the people of the U.S., and can only be extended outside it if it is determined that, say, China is panting to occupy the Ungava Peninsula).

Henley states that he "rather likes" Seth Farber’s (a/k/a The Talking Dog) idea of "Club Med for Dictators", but goes on say that

The problem with TD's humane solution is that the busybodies have ruined it for everyone - after Pinochet's and Milosevic's post-abdication troubles, no dictator can count on retiring unmolested, no matter what agreements he thinks he has in place.

This is not true; Farber’s proposal implies that going outside of "Club Ted" would be at the ex-dictator’s own risk. This is actually a fairly non-interventionist proposal; to follow ex-dictators around with SOF bodyguards would be interventionist. Here, we are deciding that Saddam Hussein partying it up in Waikiki is preferable to Saddam Hussein partying it up in Baghdad, and giving him that choice; whether he should be allowed to take it does not come into consideration.

I fear that Henley’s non-interventionism is confused in his own mind with not fighting the Third Gulf War.

Vetinfo

My referrer log makes it more obvious today: someone is Googling on abcess tooth in cat. That makes a lot more sense.

I’m not a vet, nor do I even play one on TV. Dr. Michael Richards, however, is a vet, and a very good one. Go to his website and click on "Catindex".

Search requests, not too bizarre

Search requests in my referrer log today:

• sexy women in string bikinis
• how to draw a horse
• man vs nature
• abcess tooth
• thank you ma'am
• public goods public bads
• Wham bam thank you
• NO COOK ICE CREAM

These aren't as weird as I usually get, but today seems to be the Day of the Google.

(Incidentally, I'm having trouble with FTPing to my website today; I have no idea if or when this will ever appear there).

(UPDATE:  Having spoken with my ISP, it seems that there is a comedy of (billing) errors going on.  Hopefully, you will see this on 9 August.)

Anna Nicole Smith

Could someone please start stalking this sow?  Then we could tell her that the way to avoid being stalked is to move to Antarctica and lie low for ten years.  She'll probably believe it.

I promise to contribute to the Anna Nicole Smith Stalker Legal Defense Fund.  I'll even kick in for a bribe to get someone to stalk her.

The limits ofofficial help

Fritz Schranck of Sneaking Suspicions asks me politely where I think he was going wrong in his analysis of the Alexandria situation.

Now, I think that he is assuming that, had the police been able and/or willing to enforce Crosby's control of the parking spaces in question, others would have been sufficiently respectful of, or intimidated by, the majesty of the law that they would not have vandalized the cars properly using them.  (If I am wrong about my assumption, of course, he is welcome to correct me.)  He is almost certainly correct insofar that the amount would have been less than it is.

On the other hand, such vandalism is, well, vandalism.  As such, it is against the law.  We might contend that the apprehension of the vandals is unlikely, that the resources necessary to do so would be better employed elsewhere.  We might even be correct in such arguments.  And, of course, the same arguments could be applied to the initial circumstance of usurping Crosby's parking spaces.

Yet, such arguments have been made and accepted, the question remain:  what other steps might Crosby take to secure her rights?  Schranck seems to me to be arguing that she ought not to take any steps; that the admittedly imperfect self-help scheme, offering less than the official police might, ought not to be tried for that reason.

I am certainly not an anarchocapitalist.  The whole basis for the liberal state, however, rests on the argument that it can and will secure the rights of those who are too weak, or otherwise incapable, of securing them themselves.  Once this argument is undermined by nonfeasance (however justified and proper), what additional arguments can be supplied for the state's existence?

Counterchicken Central

Hesiod, in a contemptuous dismissal of Kevin Holtsberry, insisted that "warbloggers" are really "chickenbloggers" who refuse to deal with serious and realistic arguments against war with Iraq.

Except that he doesn't make any, or even point to any.  He's essentially doing what he accuses the "warbloggers" of doing, but the other direction.

No film at 11...or any other time

Via Kathy Kinsley comes news of Glenn Frazier, John Weidner, dipnutScott Koenig, Fred Pruitt, Craig Schamp, and even Michael Ledeen, all asking essentially the same question: "WTF is happening in Iran, and why aren’t the major media players reporting on it?"

It is, quite simply, their attempt at implementing Orwell’s dictum, "Who controls the past, controls the future. Who controls the present, controls the past".

The next regime in Tehran need not, and may not, be reflexively pro-American. On the other hand, it will be publicly and actually more pro-American than the current one (it could hardly be less). It will also be anti-Islamofascist. Suman Palit is of the opinion that an "I³" axis of India, Iran, and Israel is not out of the question. Others dispute this; but it is beyond imagine that a secular Tehran would offer Hussein, the al-Sa’uds, or Musharraf any aid out of pan-Islamist feeling.

That Islamofascism could be threatened – and could in turn threaten them and their incomes – is deathly frightening to the suits and talking heads of the major broadcast outlets, here and abroad. That the U.S. might benefit – however inadvertently and indirectly – is even more intolerable.

Therefore, any such events in Iran must be swept under the rug. As "regime change" only comes from the West in their view (preferably guided by the wise and benevolent Left and its EUnuch fellow-travelers), burking the news of demonstrations and riots in Iran can only deprive them of the support that is a prerequisite of their success. Even if, they think, by some quirk of fate these wogs people of color show the determination and poor judgment to succeed, perhaps parading the ayatollahs as if they were still in charge will allow them to make a comeback, or at the very least prevent the U.S. from taking advantage of the situation.

Thirty years, this might have worked. Alas for their pretensions, there are now too many alternate sources of information for this to work. All those mentioned in the first paragraph know it. I know it. And now you, the reader, know it.

(UPDATE:  As Scott Koenig points out, he's Indepundit, not Isntapundit.  ::sigh:: We need fewer pundits and more brains.  At least, I do.)