January 27, 2007

A REPORT from the Code Pink rally.

UPDATE: In Madison, Vive Saddam.

ANOTHER UPDATE: A lengthy report from a reader -- click "read more" to read it.

MORE: Another report. And here's a Pajamas Media roundup.

Read More �

LITVINENKO UPDATE:

British officials say police have cracked the murder-by-poison case of former spy Alexander Litvinenko, including the discovery of a "hot" teapot at London's Millennium Hotel with an off-the-charts reading for Polonium-210, the radioactive material used in the killing.

A senior official tells ABC News the "hot" teapot remained in use at the hotel for several weeks after Litvinenko's death before being tested in the second week of December. The official said investigators were embarrassed at the oversight.

The official says investigators have concluded, based on forensic evidence and intelligence reports, that the murder was a "state-sponsored" assassination orchestrated by Russian security services.

And yet, Putin pretty much gets a pass for this.

NEWS FROM AFGHANISTAN, courtesy of Major John Tammes.

MORE ON ORGAN DONATIONS: Virginia Postrel reviews Kieran Healy's new book in The New York Times. Excerpt:

The book’s major shortcoming is its failure to address the fastest growing source of organs: living donors. More than two-thirds of the people on the national waiting list — about 68,000 — need kidneys. There are nowhere near enough brain-dead accident victims to fill that demand, regardless of family beneficence or organizational efficiency. Fortunately, nobody has to die to supply a kidney. They can come from living donors, who can live perfectly normal lives with a single kidney and who now account for nearly 40 percent of all kidney transplants. With the kidney shortage at crisis proportions, the debate over financial incentives is really a debate over whether living adults should be allowed to sell their own organs or, at the least, receive a tax credit or some other indirect compensation.

Although he barely mentions living donors, Healy’s sociological message resonates through that debate. Financial incentives would operate within complex organizational structures, as well as contract and liability law. Bureaucratic institutions, notably hospitals and insurers, would shape the environment in which transplants take place. Many kidney sellers would still have humanitarian motives. “The idea that markets inevitably corrupt,” Healy writes, “is not tenable precisely because they are embedded within social relations, cultural categories and institutional routines.” Commerce isn’t antithetical to culture; it is part of it.

Read the whole thing.

JOHN KERRY does it again. Like Jimmy Carter, he'll never forgive America for rejecting him, and he'll console himself with the approval of America's enemies.

UPDATE: Video here.

Don Surber: "This is the best Massachusetts can send to the Senate?"

Jules Crittenden: "Sorry, I don’t feel like writing any more about this guy right now."

Ann Althouse: "Anticipated next scene: Kerry proffers some mind-bending explanation of how his use of the words 'international pariah' didn't mean what Fox News manipulated unintelligent plebes into believing."

WELL, YES: "Google's decision to censor its search engine in China was bad for the company, its founders admitted yesterday. . . . Asked whether he regretted the decision, Mr Brin admitted yesterday: 'On a business level, that decision to censor... was a net negative.'" And not just on a business level.

This kind of thing is why I'm less pessimistic than Jack Goldsmith and Tim Wu regarding the future of Internet freedom.

UPDATE: Big roundup on this at BoingBoing.

AFFIRMATIVE ACTION: Princeton, Berkeley, and Asians.

THE SARAJEVO MOMENT: "Maybe it is already, and the fact is that the fretters exaggerate the impact of the thinkable catastrophe. My lunch companion, for example, argued that a small nuclear weapon exploded in New York, while a horror for the city and its inhabitants, would have roughly the same impact on the financial markets as a moment of delirium on the part of Ben Bernanke."

HOLLYWOOD'S TERRORISM PROBLEM:

In the history of our time as told by the movies, the war on terror largely does not exist.

Which is passing strange, you know. Because the war on terror is the history of our time. The outcome of our battle against the demographic, political and military upsurge of a hateful theology and its oppressive political vision will determine the fate of freedom in this century.

Television — more populist, hungrier for content and less dependent on foreign audiences — reflects this fact with shows such as "24" and "The Unit." But at the movies, all we're getting is home-front angst and the occasional "Syriana," in which "moderate" Islam is thwarted by evil American interests. But the notion that this war is about our moral failings is comfort fantasy, pure and simple. It soothes us with the false idea that, if we but mend ourselves, the scary people will leave us alone. . . .

In all fairness, moviemakers have a legitimately baffling problem with the nature of the war itself. In order to honestly dramatize the simple truth about this existential struggle, you have to depict right-minded Americans — some of whom may be white and male and Christian — hunting down and killing dark-skinned villains of a false and wicked creed. That's what's happening, on a good day anyway, so that's what you'd have to show.

Moviemakers are reluctant to do that because, even though it's the truth, on screen it might appear bigoted and jingoistic. You can call that political correctness or multiculturalism gone mad — and sure, there's a lot of that going around. But despite what you might have heard, there are sensible, patriotic people in the movie business too. And even they, I suspect, falter before the prospect of presenting such a scenario.

(Via Michael Barone, who has further thoughts.)

UPDATE: Related item here.

EUGENE VOLOKH: "OK, I made up the 'who are also Firefly fans,' but the rest is true."

POLITICIZING THE U.S. ATTORNEYS?

Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is transforming the ranks of the nation’s top federal prosecutors by firing some and appointing conservative loyalists from the Bush administration’s inner circle who critics say are unlikely to buck Washington.

The newly appointed U.S. attorneys all have impressive legal credentials, but most of them have few, if any, ties to the communities they've been appointed to serve, and some have had little experience as prosecutors.

Hmm. But doesn't that pale beside this?

One of President Clinton’s very first official acts upon taking office in 1993 was to fire every United States attorney then serving — except one, Michael Chertoff, now Homeland Security secretary but then U.S. attorney for the District of New Jersey, who was kept on only because a powerful New Jersey Democrat, Sen. Bill Bradley, specifically requested his retention.

Were the attorneys Clinton fired guilty of misconduct or incompetence? No. As a class they were able (and, it goes without saying, well-connected). Did he shove them aside to thwart corruption investigations into his own party? No. It was just politics, plain and simple.

That's because it's a political office.

BIG MEDIA FOLKS used to make fun of bloggers for wasting time on shallow, superficial reports about their sex lives instead of doing hard news coverage. Now the situation has reversed.

THERE'S LOTS MORE GOING ON in the Duke (non) Rape case, and K.C. Johnson is on top of it.

MYSTERIOUS SOURCE JAMS SATELLITE COMMUNICATIONS: "Paris-based satellite company Eutelsat is investigating 'unidentified interference' with its satellite broadcast services that temporarily knocked out several television and radio stations. The company declined to say whether it thought the interference was accidental or deliberate. The problem began Tuesday afternoon, blocking several European, Middle East and northeast African radio and television stations, as well as Agence France-Presse's news service. All transferred their satellite transmissions to another frequency to resume operations."

REMEMBER KOSOVO, where we've had troops for years? Things are finally happening.

LOOKING AT THE FUTURE OF WEB 2.0 in the latest Blog Week in Review podcast.

MICKEY KAUS ON UNRELIABLE NARRATIVES:

The video shows Iraqi troops beating three men who'd been caught with a bag full of mortars in their car. I don't defend the beatings, which at least one American tries fecklessly to stop, but calling people captured with mortars "civilians" is a bit of a distortion, no?

But, sadly, a typical one.

January 26, 2007

CORRECTING NEIL LEWIS ("This is deceptive reporting, whether by incompetence or design") and much more on the Libby trial, at Tom Maguire's.

RALPH PETERS: "For an enthusiastic visitor to Turkey for three decades, it's been heartbreaking to watch its society and economy come to life - only to fall prey to Islamist vampires."

YOUTUBE WILL SHARE REVENUE with video creators.

PROFESSOR BAINBRIDGE reunites his blog. Er, blogs. Or something.

CHINESE CENSORSHIP, AND MORE: My review of Jack Goldsmith and Tim Wu's book, Who Controls the Internet? Illusions of a Borderless World, forthcoming in the Stanford Law & Policy Review, is now available online here.

UPDATE: Yes, it's unusual to use the "F-word" in a law review article. But it fit. (Bumped.)

EXPLOSION IN ISLAMABAD: Roundup here.

BOB OWENS IS TAKING HIS MESSAGE to the top.

SCARY RACIST SYMBOLS, unashamedly flaunted.

ALEX TABARROK explains supply and demand to someone who really ought to know that stuff.

CATHY YOUNG on Jimmy Carter, Brandeis University, and anti-Semitism.

ROBERT GATES: Anti-surge resolution "emboldens the enemy."

TYLER COWEN on income inequality.

NEWS FROM AFGHANISTAN: "In the south, NATO commandos are having success in finding out where Taliban commanders are, and killing or capturing them. There are about three dozen Taliban commanders in the south, and if enough of them can be taken out of action, this years Taliban offensive will collapse. . . . Sensing weakness, more warlords are publicly denouncing the Taliban, and urging young men not to join up."

POPULAR MECHANICS WINDS UP its long-term test of the Toyota Highlander hybrid. They like it. I've had mine for about 15 months, and about 24,000 miles and I've liked it too: Roomy, comfy, and zippy, with excellent mileage. Of course, I paid under two bucks a gallon for gas today, but still . . . .

ANN ALTHOUSE: Is it getting obvious that Sharpton can't stand Obama?

DONALD SENSING LOOKS AT THE NEW IRAQ STRATEGY, and likes what he sees.

Meanwhile, a question for Chuck Hagel, et al.: "Rather than back a non-binding resolution of disaproval, why didn't the gutsy Senators, like Chuck Hagel, who are riding the surf of public opinion opposed to the troop surge and taking on a president with approval ratings at the freezing level vote aginst General Petraeus' confirmation? Their convictions hold that he has endorsed a wholly unjustified escalation and will be leading troops on a futile mission. They want a role in the conduct of the war and with the need to win Senate confirmation of Gen. Petraeus the Constitution has given them one, but they have taken a pass. " If Petraeus succeeds, they'll be bragging that they voted for him. If he fails, they'll note that they opposed the surge. As John F. Kennedy noted, political courage is scarcer than physical courage . . . .

UPDATE: Criticism of the old strategy, here.

IN THE MAIL: Ian Shapiro's Containment: Rebuilding a Strategy against Global Terror.

$600K FOR FIRED PROFESSOR:

Virginia State University has agreed to pay $600,000 to Jean R. Cobbs, whom it fired as a tenured professor in 2005 and whose claims against the university have been backed by several academic groups.

Cobbs and her supporters have said that she was dismissed for her political views (she is an outspoken black Republican at a historically black college where her views place her in a distinct minority) and for backing other professors (of a range of political views) in disputes with the Virginia State administration. In announcing the settlement of her case, the Virginia Association of Scholars — one of the groups backing Cobbs — said that information obtained by Cobbs’s lawyer showed that the university’s provost, W. Eric Thomas, replaced Cobbs with a woman with whom he is living.

Sounds like a lawyer's dream.

AN IMMORTAL TURN OF PHRASE FROM DENNIS KUCINICH: "You know how they say, Don't ever ask how laws or sausages are made? Well, I can attest to the wisdom of that with the exception of kielbasa made with tofu."

DON SURBER: McClatchy reporter should have questioned Jay’s intelligence.

AN AMUSING Ahmadinejad caption contest.

JOHN MCGINNIS AND ILYA SOMIN: Should International Law Be Part of Our Law?

TOM DELAY WANTS TO BE PRESIDENT?

Well, I want to be an astronaut. And my chances are better than his. . . .

PLAGIARISM CHARGES AIMED AT SAM BROWNBACK: Seems like pretty weak tea to me.

Some thoughts of mine on plagiarism, including a defense of Joe Biden, can be found here. And read this, too.

UPDATE: The "Toqueville quote" is apparently spurious anyway.

MARK STEYN: "The institutional performance of government departments other than Defense has been abysmal. This is one of the greatest failings of United States foreign policy."

AND WE HAVE A WINNER: I've been testing out compact fluorescent bulbs in my house, with not very good results even though I started with high-end, expensive bulbs. But my latest test involved the G.E. "soft white fluorescent 75," which is fairly cheap. I test these in a fixture over my kitchen table -- it's a pretty severe test because the light shines straight down onto a table with a white tile top, with no shade, etc., to soften it or improve the color. Most bulbs look bad there, but the G.E. bulb looked great -- the Insta-Wife, who's even pickier about light quality than me, couldn't tell the difference. Actually, switching back to the 60 watt clear incandescent that's usually in the fixture, you could tell that the fluorescent bulb, despite its claim to be as bright as a 75 watt incandescent, isn't really quite as bright as the 60. But it's a minor difference, and the quality of the light is good: warm and natural. By contrast, a Sylvania "soft white 100" that I bought at the same time is absolutely ghastly. I don't know what makes the difference, but it's quite dramatic. Anyway, I'm going to start replacing bulbs around the house with the G.E., because it looks fine.

UPDATE: Various people ask where I got these: I bought mine at Target. Reader Nicholas White says they're available on Amazon -- I bought a four-pack, but these look to be the same. And reader Matt Fisher emails: "I went to Sam’s club last week and bout 2 five packs of GE soft white 100 CFL’s and think they are great. Plus they are only a little more than $2.00 a bulb." Now that I know where to look, I found those on Amazon, too.

MY MINDLESS MINION JIM TREACHER has joined the Hillarysphere at my command, and wants your help.

A LOOK AT Hillary Clinton and Margaret Thatcher, and their differences.

January 25, 2007

WORST PART of Hillary running for President? The Clinton scandals are back!

A court-appointed bankruptcy trustee asked a federal judge this week to schedule a new court date in a case against Tony Rodham, the brother of Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., accused of failing to repay $109,000 in loans from a carnival company whose owners received controversial pardons issued by President Bill Clinton in the last hours of his presidency.

According to documents filed in the case, Rodham received the loans, before and after the pardons were granted, from United Shows of America, Inc., owned by Edgar Gregory and his wife, who had been convicted of defrauding several banks.

ABC has more, and no doubt all sorts of stuff like this will be popping up over the next couple of years. Oh, well, I got a book out of 'em last time.

AT THE 70TH ANNIVERSARY OF ROOSEVELT'S COURT-PACKING SCHEME, Prof. Alasdair Roberts emails that he has collected some political cartoons on the subject from 1937.

BLACKFIVE SEES something afoot in Iraq.

JONATHAN ADLER REVIEWS Chris Mooney's The Republican War on Science, in Regulation. You can download his review, Don't Politicize Science (Unless You're on My Side), for free.

Adler has more on this at The Volokh Conspiracy.

OVER 10,000 PEOPLE have signed Hugh Hewitt and N.Z. Bear's NRSC Pledge, vowing not to support any Republican Senator who votes against the surge.

Dean Barnett, meanwhile, has posted some FAQs.

UPDATE: A response to critics. I have to note that my own support for this effort is of limited value -- I've never donated to the NRSC or, as far as I can remember, to any Republican Senatorial candidate. But folks like Hugh Hewitt make up the core of this movement, and they're quite different.

MOHAMMED SAYS IT'S QUIET IN BAGHDAD: Maybe too quiet.

A REPORT FROM DAVOS:

This year there is a weird imbalance here between thinkers and doers.

Usually you can count on a healthy tension between the dreamy thinkers (for these purposes, anyone who writes or talks for a living, such as economists, journalists and most politicians) and the pragmatic doers (in Davos, business people).

The former come up with wild theories and grand plans. The latter say it will never work in practice.

But now, not least in Davos, it is the eggheads who are fretting and the men in Brioni suits who are looking on the bright side.

In the dinners and the discussions, the journalists and economists and politicians raise all the questions about inequality between winners and losers, deplore the absence of political leadership and compare this age of globalisation gloomily with the one that collapsed with the first world war.

The business people reply, by and large: “Come off it”.

It is not that they are being complacent, the business people say. Far from it. They are realists. They see things from the ground up. They see progress in each shampoo bottle bought in eastern Europe, in improvements to Africa's health care, in the broadening of choice everywhere.

You see this in the United States, too, where the financial markets are much happier than the pundits. I think -- and, even more, I hope -- that the business people are right here.

UPDATE: Related item here: "When you pick up a newspaper, turn on the television or radio news you would think by the drumbeat that things are awful: Iraq, Iran, Afgan, Global Warming, America's loss of status, on and on it goes. Meanwhile the markets day after day vote on the overwhelming economic resiliency and strength and breadth of the economy."

ANOTHER UPDATE: Over at The Speculist, some thoughts on why the world seems to be getting better even as the news keeps seeming worse: part one, and part two.

ANN ALTHOUSE ON SCIENCE: "Shouldn't gay rights advocates care when they sound like the religious fundamentalists they usually deride?"

BAN KI-MOON'S first coverup?

UPDATE: Reader Ric Manhard emails: "Can we call it 'Ban Ki panky?'" Why not?

MICAH SIFRY:

It's taken me a little longer than I had hoped to pull together the data on how the Republican presidential candidates are doing in terms of bottom-up support for their campaigns online, for which I apologize. Here's the headline: They're almost invisible on the web. Compared to the Democratic presidential field, which I posted on a few days ago, the Republican contenders* are playing bush league ball online. Not even Triple A.

To give you just one example, if you add up all the friends all the Republican candidates have on their MySpace pages, and compare it to all the friends the Ds have, the totals will amaze you: 4,007 to 51,471. If I take fringe candidates Ron Paul and Tom Tancredo out of that equation, the Republican total drops below 2,000.

Same with total incoming blog links, which for the Republican are woeful in part due to the fact that most of them don't have serious websites yet.

There are some pockets of excellence, but overall the Republican effort is way behind the Dems.

GREG GUTFELD further embroils the fray by which he rules.

READER BRIAN HALL EMAILS:

The Gulf News here in the UAE has an interesting story about Palestinians being told by Shias to leave Iraq or "prepare to die," yet the supposedly Jewish controlled American media (not CNN, Fox, ABC, CBS, MSNBC, NYT, Wash Post) doesn't report on it. I posted about it here.

Interesting. I don't know why it hasn't gotten more attention here.

TURNAROUND IN BAGHDAD? Nibras Kazimi writes in The New York Sun:

The wider Sunni insurgency — the groups beyond Al Qaeda — is being slowly, and surely, defeated. The average insurgent today feels demoralized, disillusioned, and hunted. Those who have not been captured yet are opting for a quieter life outside of Iraq. Al Qaeda continues to grow for the time being as it cannibalizes the other insurgent groups and absorbs their most radical and hardcore fringes into its fold. The Baathists, who had been critical in spurring the initial insurgency, are becoming less and less relevant, and are drifting without a clear purpose following the hanging of their idol, Saddam Hussein. Rounding out this changing landscape is that Al Qaeda itself is getting a serious beating as the Americans improve in intelligence gathering and partner with more reliable Iraqi forces.

In other words, battling the insurgency now essentially means battling Al Qaeda. This is a major accomplishment.

Read the whole thing. I certainly hope this is right.

A LOOK AT KOREA as a source of historical analogy.

I'VE MENTIONED J.D. JOHANNES' INDEPENDENT IRAQ DOCUMENTARY, OUTSIDE THE WIRE, before, but now he emails that it's available through Amazon. He writes: "Pretty cool...for me at least." It's pretty cool for anyone.

You can see an online trailer here.

A LOOK AT HILLARY'S BLOGAD BUY, from William Beutler.

IN THE MAIL: William Easterly's The Elusive Quest for Growth: Economists' Adventures and Misadventures in the Tropics. I ordered it on Megan McArdle's recommendation.

A POLITICAL BLOGGING SCHOLARSHIP: I wish they'd had these when I was in school. Of course, we would have had to have had blogs first. And the Web.

IS THE MCCAIN CAMPAIGN WORRIED ABOUT ROMNEY? Well, if they're smart they are. Plus, Dan Riehl looks at Romney.

CANCELLING THE YEAR OF THE PIG IN CHINA, so as not to offend Muslims.

OBAMA QUESTIONS:

The question of how Obama chooses to define and approach race looms large as he moves closer to formally launching his campaign next month. Although he rides a wave of enthusiasm among Democrats who like his vision of a different kind of politics and see him as an alternative to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (N.Y.), it is not clear that his multiracial message can excite black voters hungry for affirmation of their top concerns. . . .

Complicating matters is that Obama appears certain to encounter fierce competition for the black vote from the other leading Democratic presidential contenders. Black Democrats prefer Clinton 3 to 1 over Obama, and four out of five of black Democrats view her favorably, much higher than the 54 percent who have a favorable view of Obama, according to combined findings from two Washington Post-ABC polls taken in December and January. Clinton also enjoys close ties to top black elected officials, and her husband, former president Bill Clinton, remains extremely popular among African Americans.

Indeed. Plus, Howard Kurtz on Kerry's long goodbye:

Kerry began to talk. And talk.

He talked about Mesopotamia in the year 685, the tribal warfare, how people were beheaded. He trod a long, winding path to today's Iraq, then detoured to talk about Syria.

As he continued to speechify, CNN cut away, then MSNBC.

Kerry kept talking. He turned to Vietnam, then back to Iraq. MSNBC checked in again, then CNN. Would he now get to the point?

The on-screen headlines said that Kerry would announce his withdrawal, but he did not.

Finally, half an hour later, the Massachusetts senator, his voice breaking, disclosed that he would, in fact, not be a candidate for president in the next election.

A flashback to the often droning, ponderous Kerry of 2004 was impossible to avoid.

I still don't understand why people thought he was the guy to nominate. And -- as I noted back then -- it's a measure of Bush's own weakness as a candidate that he beat Kerry by such a comparatively narrow margin.

WHY I'M CONSIDERING VOTING FOR HILLARY: Jay Nordlinger says it all:

I have a friend who, in a phone conversation last weekend, said the unsayable. Come to think of it, this friend makes a specialty of saying the unsayable. That is one reason he is invaluable.

He said, “The Democrats have to win in 2008 — I mean, the whole enchilada: House, Senate, and presidency.” You ought to know that my friend is a staunch conservative Republican. “Why?” I said. “Why do they have to win?” He answered, “Because that’s the only way they will be fully onboard the War on Terror. They won’t fully support it otherwise, because they will always be trying to trip up the Republicans. If you want the Democrats onboard the War on Terror, they have to be in charge. Period.”

It's getting harder to argue with that. And hey, maybe Hillary really will turn out to be "the most uncompromising wartime President in the history of the United States." Plus, Markos doesn't like her.

MESSAGE TO SAFETY NAZIS: Life is inherently distracting.

DIEBOLD PUTS PHOTO OF VOTING MACHINE KEY ON WEBSITE: Key made from photo opens machine.

THE SECRET WAR AGAINST IRAN:

With the Shia majority in Iraq now running the country, the Arabs now have to confront Iran directly. And that they are doing. Saudi Arabia is supporting the Palestinian Fatah organization against the Iranian supported Hamas. Saudi Arabia is also using its money to support Sunni Arab, and Christian, factions in Lebanon, against Hizbollah, the Shia minority and its Iranian backers. Saudi Arabia is also giving support to the Sunni Arab majority in Syria. For decades, the Saudis tolerated the Shia minority that ran Syria. No more. The situation has changed, especially with Iran gaining speed in its effort to build nuclear weapons.

The Saudis are even, secretly, cooperating with the Israelis. Iran has always been seen as a greater danger to Israel than the surrounding Sunni Arab nations. Hizbollah, which is a Lebanese Shia organization, made a name for itself during its disastrous attack on Israel last Summer. Although Hizbollah lost by every measure, they won in the arena of public opinion. Both the Israelis and Saudi Arabs (and Sunni Arabs in general) hated that. . . . The Saudis are committing over $100 billion to this battle, and doing it out of the purest of motives; self interest.

Interesting.

K.C. JOHNSON has more on the Nifong debacle.

MICKEY KAUS: "Comprehensive Immigration Reform" is just like the Iraq war.

NANOTECHNOLOGY and misleading symbolism.

SOME DATA ON DIVERSITY, from Tom W. Bell.

January 24, 2007

POLLING WITH THEIR FEET: Frank Martin observes:

I've never understood how on one hand people overseas will tell the pollsters how much they hate America - and Americans, and yet our streets seem to be increasingly filled with people from all around the world who have risked life and limb and broken the law of their country and ours to get here.

I mean, if I dont like a restaurant, I dont stand in line for 4 hours to get in, I just go somewhere else. I sure dont stand in line for four hours and then say how much I hate the place.

I wonder if theres a sort of 'natural reflex' to just tell the pollsters what they want to hear, rather than tell them what you actually think.

Think about it, when the western United States was being settled, I dont think there were people saying how much they hated Oregon and California when they were selling everything they had and walking away from Ohio and other parts of the east. " I hate Oregon, so lets take our life in our hands and try to go there", followed by headlines that said " Oregon more unpopular than ever says poll of former residents of Ohio".

face it, if there is a line of people stretching across to continent walking to oregon, then any poll saying "oregon unpopular..." is clearly based on faulty data, right?

You'd think.

UPDATE: Various readers suggest that the world is made up of two kinds of people: Those who "get" America and those who don't. The former immigrate; the latter stay home and are polled.

THE STATE OF THE UNION, in three presidencies.

JIMMY CARTER APOLOGIZES.

CENSORING FOR JIMMY CARTER at Brandeis.

I'VE LINKED TO AUDRA AND THE ANTIDOTE on numerous occasions. You might be interested to know that Audra Coldiron has brain cancer, and is now blogging about it. She's a terrific person, and I wish her the best. Send her your prayers and good thoughts.

Our podcast interview with Audra is here.

FRONT-LINE WARRIORS against Islamic fundamentalism. (LATER: A reader cautions that these photos might be NSFW some places. I'm beginning to wonder if the Taliban fled to corporate HR departments, instead of Waziristan.)

READER STEVE BRISENDINE says that I should have mentioned this coffeemaker in my big coffeemaker roundup. First I've heard of it, but it gets good reviews.

A RECORD HIGH FOR THE DOW: What does the market know that I don't know?

SENATOR WARBUCKS?

JOE MALCHOW: "Want to talk about politicizing war?"

DANIEL DREZNER:

Gingrich intrigues me -- he's far more complex and interesting a thinker than the nineties stereotype of him suggested. And if Hillary Clinton can remake herself as someone who's learned from past mistakes, I see no reason why Gingrich can't as well.

However, I can't shake the feeling that because I'm so interested in a Gingrich, he's doomed to fail.

I know that feeling.

CHINA VOWS TO "PURIFY" THE INTERNET: (Via BoingBoing.)

A STATE-OF-THE-UNION ENERGY CONSERVATION REALITY CHECK:

Twenty percent less gas in 10 years? Sounds nice, but what will it really take to make it happen? I didn’t hear any answers to that question, beyond the standard ethanol speech, which is all well and good, but there’s still little discussion of the Energy Return on Energy Invested (EROEI). People who claim that a gallon of ethanol replaces a gallon of gas are forgetting a few truths: To grow the corn (our current feed stock for ethanol), you need nitrogen-based fertilizers that demand copious natural gas inputs, and you need lots and lots of diesel to run the tractors, combines and trucks it takes to get the corn to market. And then you have to refine it. Fact is, corn-based ethanol has a fairly poor EROEI (some studies suggest that we’re burning nearly a gallon of fossil fuels to make a gallon of ethanol).

Other feedstocks show more promise: switch grass, biomass, wood chips and (so I hear) chicken fat. But we’re not there yet, and it’s hard to believe that we’ll be able to cut our gas use by 20% in 10 years on ethanol alone.

Ethanol, at the moment, is pretty much liquid pork. That could change, but I remain unimpressed.

UPDATE: A downside to ethanol?

Soaring international demand for corn has caused a spike in prices for Mexico's humble tortilla, hitting the poor and forcing President Felipe Calderon's business-friendly government into an uncomfortable confrontation with powerful monopolies.

Tortilla prices have jumped nearly 14 percent over the past year, a move the head of Mexico's central bank called "unjustifiable" in a country where inflation ran about 4 percent.

Economists blame increased U.S. production of ethanol from corn as an alternative to oil. The battle over the tortilla, the most basic staple of the Mexican diet, especially among the poor, demonstrates how increasing economic integration is felt on the street level.

Feeding people is more important than feeding cars. If we're going to emphasize ethanol, it should come from waste biomass, not corn, Charles Grassley's lobbying notwithstanding. (Via ThreeSources).

ANOTHER UPDATE: Complicating the story, at Cafe Hayek.

QUESTIONS on the latest anti-gun research from Harvard.

A NEW IOWA POLL: Rudy Giuliani and John Edwards are in the respective leads.

HUGH HEWITT IS ENCOURAGING PEOPLE to pledge not to support any Republican Senator who votes to oppose the surge. There's a pledge website here.

The pledge reads:

If the United States Senate passes a resolution, non-binding or otherwise, that criticizes the commitment of additional troops to Iraq that General Petraeus has asked for and that the president has pledged, and if the Senate does so after the testimony of General Petraeus on January 23 that such a resolution will be an encouragement to the enemy, I will not contribute to any Republican senator who voted for the resolution. Further, if any Republican senator who votes for such a resolution is a candidate for re-election in 2008, I will not contribute to the National Republican Senatorial Committee unless the Chairman of that Committee, Senator Ensign, commits in writing that none of the funds of the NRSC will go to support the re-election of any senator supporting the non-binding resolution.

It will be interesting to see if this makes an impact. This is the sort of grassroots pressure that Democrats have been feeling for a while, but it's new to Republicans. I think that Hugh's right to start this drive. Opposition to the surge is wrong (see what Petraeus said) and it's also political suicide for the Republicans.

THE BBC REFERS TO "Instapundit's Stephen Green" in its roundup of State of the Union reactions. But though I'd like to claim him, he's his own man.

Meanwhile, the speech polled well: "78 percent of speech viewers reacted positively; 67 percent think Bush's policies will move country in right direction." I don't think it'll make much difference, though. Some perspective here.

UPDATE: Heh: "If only all those layers of taxpayer-funded editors could be trusted to figure out which blog he actually runs."

MOHAMMED FADHIL REPORTS from the streets of Baghdad.

UPDATE: Plus, an email from Michael Yon: "We need to kill Sadr."

WE WON'T HAVE JOHN KERRY to kick around any more: "Senator John F. Kerry plans to announce today that he will not run in the 2008 presidential race, and will instead remain in Congress and seek reelection to his Senate seat next year, according to senior Democratic officials."

OUCH: "The Democratic response by Virginia Sen. James Webb was also memorable, in a different way. Whenever a politician puts out to the media that he has thrown away the speechwriters’ draft and written the remarks himself (as Webb did), it is often a sign of approaching mediocrity. This was worse." Of course, it's a speechwriter talking, and not just any speechwriter.

MAX BOOT: "Although most of the foreign policy debate in the U.S. has been riveted on Iraq, some within the Pentagon have been touting recent events in Somalia as an alternative model of how to fight Islamo-fascists. Everyone recognizes that there will be scant appetite in the near term for sending huge numbers of U.S. troops to occupy any more Middle Eastern countries. Might not the U.S. be able to achieve its goals by taking advantage of local allies backed by American airpower and small numbers of commandos and intelligence agents?"

Yes, but there are some caveats.

NEWBERY AND CALDECOTT AWARD WINNERS announced.

ADAM BONIN BOOTED FROM REDSTATE: I've worked with him on the FEC blogging freedom stuff and found him to be quite a reasonable guy.

OLD CONVENTIONAL WISDOM: "Rumsfeld and Bush should have listened to the generals."

NEW CONVENTIONAL WISDOM: Shut up, generals.

BAD NEWS FOR David Shuster.

JACKSONIANS ON THE WAR: Disappointment over unwillingness to fight hard enough? That sounds right to me, as I've observed a similar phenomenon and commented on it in the past. It's certainly Bill Quick's complaint: "a half-assed, one-hand-tied-behind-our-backs, safe haven, 'war' he has neither the guts nor the intention to wage to the fullest, or to completion." I'm not quite sure that was Webb's point, though.

UPDATE: An alternate text for Webb. Heh. Webb's brave, but not that brave.

WITH BUSH TALKING BIOFUELS, it's worth reminding people of how the numbers crunch on a variety of alternative fuels.

IN THE MAIL: Jan Crawford Greenburg's new book. She says Clarence Thomas is much more influential than generally thought. Orin Kerr says her book is a "must read."

RUTH MARCUS: "Listening to Democratic reaction to Bush's new health insurance proposal, you get the sense that if Bush picked a plank right out of the Democratic platform -- if he introduced Hillarycare itself -- and stuck it in his State of the Union address, Democrats would churn out press releases denouncing it." And if he announced a troop surge that Harry Reid was urging just last month, they'd denounce that. Oh, wait . . . .

NIFONG UPDATE: The ethics charges against him growing out of the Duke (non) Rape Case just got a lot stronger.

UPDATE: Much more here.

PATROLLING IN KHADIMIYA: At Hot Air.

These reports are much better than we're getting elsewhere. Don't miss 'em.

FLY AROUND GOOGLEEARTH WITH THE SPACE NAVIGATOR: Video and a review, here.

JULES CRITTENDEN offers a State of the Union response. It's not much like Jim Webb's.

And Arnold Kling comments on Bush's health care proposals.

JONATHAN CHAIT ON THE NEW YORK MONEY PEOPLE: "We could argue about whether Clark's analysis is anti-Semitic; I think it is. But I don't see how you can say it's obviously true."

UPDATE: A reader emails:

New York Money People? That's me!

I live on Park Avenue in Manhattan, run a hedge fund, consort with the upper strata private school crowd in NYC, and am the son of Holocaust survivors.

I have yet to meet a single "rich Jew" (I am one myself) who has had a kind word for W, the war, or anything at all related to the GOP.

Rich Jews in my building have donated money to Clark!

His comments are weird and scary, apart from being utterly untrue.

It's been a while since I ran with that crowd, but this seems right to me.

A QUESTION for Yale. (Via The Corner).

EUGENE VOLOKH: Does your love life comply with state regulations?

I'M ONE OF THE WEB CELEB 25, according to Forbes. Tellingly, I found out via Power Line.

January 23, 2007

STEPHEN GREEN SUMS UP:

Overall tonight's SOTU was Bush's best. I've been (more or less) drunkblogging these things for five years now, and they've almost always left a bad taste in my mouth. One, I'm happy to say, easily remedied by another sip or two of vodka. However, Bush's best SOTU will also prove his least effective. The best he can hope for out of the new Congress is that the Blue Dog Dems help him maintain our tax cuts. Other than that, this Presidency is domestically done.

Foreign policy is all Bush has left - all any seventh-year President has, really. Tonight he said the things he always says, but will he follow through this time? Will he use his lame-duck status as cover to get things done, or will he just be lame?

Indeed.

There's loads of stuff on the SOTU, and Webb's response, at The Corner, too.

John Hinderaker was surprised: "In contrast to his 'surge' speech a week or two ago, I thought President Bush was back on his game tonight. . . . It was a good night for President Bush. Will it matter? I doubt that very many people who are on the fence were watching. But for the President's long-term supporters and for all who are serious about winning the war that has been thrust upon us, it was an inspiring, confidence-renewing performance." Bush's supporters needed that about now.

MCCAIN, interviewed on the surge: "It's a change in strategy, not just a surge."

He adds, "A few weeks ago, Senator Reid said he would support a short-term surge. I'm sorry he changed his mind."

OVERALL TAKE: Everybody's acting more grownup than I had feared. That's good, as these are serious times.

JIM WEBB: Opening with the 400th anniversary of Jamestown? Er, okay. Comes across as stiff and awkward -- not surprising, as the "response" format is awkward and unnatural.

Oh, hell, I was going to liveblog this, but Dan Riehl has already blogged it based on the released text, and Webb seems to be following that.

But Webb clearly wants to sound tough on terror while advocating withdrawal from Iraq. He does that about as well as anyone could. Quickly jumps back to the economy and talks about Teddy Roosevelt.

Domestically, Bush will fill that bill in the next two years, I suspect. Now he's invoking Eisenhower, again.

What, are there no Democratic Presidents Webb admires? (LATER: Michael Oliver emails: "Glenn, he did mention Andrew Jackson early in the speech. Maybe it's just 20th century Democrats he doesn't like." Good point.)

A better-than-average SOTU response, by the low standards of those.

UPDATE: Everyone's a critic:

They're saying Jim Webb wrote the Democratic response himself. Maybe he should get a speechwriter. Where a normal person would say the parties have "disagreed" or "differed," he says they've "stood in contradiction."

I guess novelists are use to this sort of complaint. And a reader emails:

Jim Webb told the Air America/Randi Rhodes lie that the majority of the military doesn’t support the effort.

So once again, it seems Democrats get to lie without consequence or question.

There's not much support for that notion -- it's certainly not what Michael Yon just reported from the front -- and it suggests that for Webb's generation it will always be Vietnam. [LATER: CNN has the same problem: Check the photo caption.]

MORE: Jonah Goldberg: "I'm still kind of a two cheers for Jim Webb kind of guy, but I just don't think he did a very good job at all (contrary to the Fox panel's collective opinion). It was definitely more interesting than a lot of Democratic responses (or GOP responses in the 90s). But it was, I thought, something of a mess."

He, too, wonders where Webb got that "majority of the military" bit.

MORE STILL: The poll Webb is probably relying on, and why it's rather dubious, discussed at Callimachus. I know that the Pajamas Media folks talked with Mark Blumenthal and other pollsters about polling military attitudes and concluded that it's effectively impossible to get a reliable poll. And, in fact, the "poll" doesn't purport to be scientific. But if you're going to take it seriously, see what military people say about the media . . . .

STILL MORE: And here's more on that poll at The Mudville Gazette, though as far as I know it's only conjecture that this was Webb's source.

What the hell, I'll liveblog it too

I NOTICED that Nancy Pelosi quickly started applause when Bush delivered the line about crossing the aisle when there's work to be done.

She jumped to her feet when Bush mentioned balancing the federal budget, too. But not when he said "we can do so without raising taxes."

Boy, the earmark thing is right up front. Cool. (Stephen Green: "Even Congress applauded Bush's promise to halve earmarks by the end of the session. Yeah, let's see where that goes, Mr. Reid.") (LATER: Jon Henke emails from Sen. McConnell's office: "It is, frankly, a major feather in the cap of Porkbusters and the blogosphere. It was bloggers who brought this to public attention and into the President's State of the Union address." That's nice. Let's watch for follow-through.)

No Pelosi applause for school choice! But she leaps to her feet for "affordable health care." Not for private insurance, though.

Pelosi rockets to her feet for reducing gasoline consumption 20% in the next 10 years. But Charles Grassley looks overjoyed at "renewable fuels." Pork marinated in ethanol?

Pelosi doesn't jump up for Bush's recognition of "the serious challenge of global climate change." Why not?

Terror: On "We must take the fight to the enemy," it's Cheney who jumps up. (He can do that?) Pelosi follows much more slowly.

On terror, Bush's understated delivery, quoting Zarqawi et al., is pretty effective, especially for him. Pelosi jumps to her feet again at the end of this section; I wasn't expecting that.

Bush's "root causes" section ("free people are not drawn to violent and malignant ideologies") seems like the part he's most into. Cut to Condi looking pretty intense, too. His discussion on Iran's response to 2005 elections by fomenting trouble in Lebanon, etc., is the kind of spelling-out the Administration should have been doing all along.

He does a good job of spelling out the consequences of losing in Iraq. Cut to shot of Joe Biden looking bored. (Who's picking these crowd shots -- I'm watching ABC -- Karl Rove?) Unfortunate Bush smirk during applause.

Best line: "Whatever you voted for, you did not vote for failure." Pelosi rockets to her feet when he asks Congress to support the troops, and those on their way.

What's a "volunteer civilian reserve corps?" Not very clear, even after he explains. (Meghan Hammond emails: "volunteer civilian reserve corps 'sounds like the first step to the draft' says my brother" -- I don't think so, but this is the price Bush pays for not being clearer.)

Lots of applause for not allowing Tehran to acquire nuclear weapons.

Stephen Green criticizes: "All this 'surge' talk strikes me as unnecessary and probably unwise. I don't remember any stories about FDR talking up D-Day before the fact, and trying to weasel support out of Congress for it." FDR had a different Congress.

Bush on Africa: Asks for a lot. He's done a lot, but won't get much credit, for fighting AIDS and malaria there. Lots of applause, though.

Big windup on "the spirit and character of America." Not bad, and mercifully brief.

Sum-up: Not bad, especially for Bush, who's no great shakes as a speaker. His recent speaking events have been weak even by his standards, but this was one of his better speeches. Will it help him? Not so clear. He seemed more comfortable and cheerful while working the crowd than he's seemed lately, too. [LATER: Charlie Gibson thinks the same thing.]

On substance? The war on terror stuff was good, but his speeches on that are always good, on substance if not delivery. Follow-through has been the weak point. Domestically? He'll be the best Democratic President since Bill Clinton.

UPDATE: Robert Mayer says that Bush is bringing back democracy as an element in foreign policy.

And Justin Beckley emails: "Is it just me, or does it not look great for America when a coach at Georgetown converts an aspiring med student into a basketball phenom?"

Mary Katharine Ham: "All right, so the best part of the night, by far, is the candid shot Fox has of Bush shaking hands after the speech. The audio's really good, and you get to hear all the butt-kissing up close. Dennis Kucinich leans in again. The Nutroots will make you pay, Dennis." [LATER: The netroots noticed.]

MORE: Reader Debbie Eberts emails in response to Justin Beckley: "The reader who was cranky about Dikembe Mutombo becoming a basketball phenom instead of a doctor. Um, did he not read the whole paragraph - 'Mutombo's foundation has funded a large portion of a $27 million dollar hospital opening in Kinshasa, which will be the first new hospital in the Congo in 40 years.' Maybe Mutombo can do more good for health care as a well-paid and famous basketball player than he would have as a doctor. Frankly, I think that speaks very well of America. Lighten up." He probably didn't read that, because I added the link so that readers who didn't watch the speech would know what he was talking about.

MORE STILL: Dean Barnett liked the actual speech more than his SOTU FAQs linked below predicted.

My favorite SOTU is still the one where I was shacked up with the Insta-Wife at a secure, undisclosed location and missed the speech entirely. By that standard, Bush has slipped. . . .

STEPHEN GREEN is now liveblogging the State of the Union.

UPDATE: More liveblogging here.

Also, Andrew Noyes at Beltway Blogroll will be liveblogging, and so is Captain Ed.

I'm watching my first State of the Union in HDTV. So far, I have to say, it's not making that big a difference . . .

ANOTHER UPDATE: Mary Katharine Ham is liveblogging, too.

And actually, HD is pretty kind to Bush, but not so kind to Nancy Pelosi, John McCain, or John Kerry. Cheney, strangely, looks exactly the same. Mike Chertoff looks sickly. And a lingering shot of Ted Kennedy "resting his eyes" was just scary. Hillary Clinton, like Cheney, looks no different.

SOTU FAQS from Dean Barnett. "The President is acting a lot like Clinton did after the ’94 elections. He’s moping around, trying to somehow convince people that he’s still relevant."

Clinton's presidency was saved by a terrorist attack. Let's hope history doesn't repeat.

A PLAME BOMBSHELL involving David Gregory?

BUSH IS REPORTEDLY GOING TO PUSH BATTERIES and plug-in hybrids tonight. This may help:

The company boldly claims that its system, a kind of battery-ultracapacitor hybrid based on barium-titanate powders, will dramatically outperform the best lithium-ion batteries on the market in terms of energy density, price, charge time, and safety. Pound for pound, it will also pack 10 times the punch of lead-acid batteries at half the cost and without the need for toxic materials or chemicals, according to the company.

I hope it's true, but I'll need a bit more convincing. (Via Slashdot).

STEPHEN GREEN WILL BE LIVE-BLOGGING THE STATE OF THE UNION: "Cocktail-enhanced, of course."

Of course.

PORKBUSTERS UPDATE: Earmark reduction will figure in the State of the Union Address. From the pre-release:

Earmarks are provisions included in legislation that are often not subject to legislative or public scrutiny and that often lead to wasteful Federal spending. Earmarks have tripled in number over the last decade and have increased spending by billions of dollars. The President applauds Congress' progress in requiring the disclosure of the sponsors, costs, recipients, and justification for each earmark, and calls on Congress to go further by enacting comprehensive earmark reform that brings greater transparency and accountability to the Congressional budget process, including:

* Stopping the practice of concealing earmarks in so-called report language instead of placing them in the actual language of the bill.

* Cutting the number and cost of all earmarks at least in half by the end of this session.

N.Z. Bear is pleased, and plans to send over some PorkBusters mugs. Perhaps the President can offer Trent Lott a cup of coffee in one the next time he visits . . . .

LISTEN TO THE GENERALS: Gen. Petraeus on the surge:

Sen. Edward Kennedy asked him why an extra 21,500 would make a significant difference.

Petraeus replied that the important factor was how extra troops are used, not their numbers.

Here's what I said: "I don't think the number of troops is nearly as important as what we're doing with them."

Will we be doing the right thing? I'm not sure, but I suspect Petraeus is a better judge than me on that topic.

UPDATE: At least me and the General have our stories straight, which is more than you can say for some . . . .

ANOTHER UPDATE: Interesting milblog comment:

Seems you can’t walk five feet in DC without somebody proclaiming the mission in Iraq a failure. Ok, that’s all fine and good, but I’m struck by what seems to be an utter lack of perspective regarding the distinction between “failure” and “success.”

Those opposed to the war (both old-school opponents and the new ones) often talk derisively about how optimistic supporters of removing Saddam were. Trotting out sarcastic references to the claim that we’d be greeted as liberators (we were), and that the push into Baghdad would be a “cakewalk” (it largely was), those opponents now are the first to cite to our current efforts there as failure.

What would a “well-run” occupation and creation of a sovereign civil gov’t look like? How long would that [take]? Even if the administration did all the things its critics say it should have, Shiia would still be in a newfound position of power and Sunni/Baathist would be relegated to minority status. Al Qaeda and other foreign fighters would still be coming into the country, and attacks would still be occurring. Would they be occurring less frequently? Perhaps. Or alternatively, they’d not be as centralized around Baghdad.

Either way, to think that a “well-run” occupation would have eliminated these problems is just ignorant and belies an unserious approach to what we’re actually doing in Iraq.

It certainly didn't prevent problems back during Reconstruction.

ANOTHER HOME INVASION THWARTED:

The victim reportedly heard the squealing of tires outside of his residence on Marlette Avenue, north of Bethany Home Road,about 5:20 a.m.

He noticed a man peeking through his window and grabbed his gun to investigate, where he found a man in body armor in the yard, police said. He also found flashlights, masks, gloves and a semi-automatic handgun scattered around the yard.

The victim held the man at gunpoint until police could arrive. Monti Lyle Jackson, 20, was taken into custody on suspicion of home invasion, according to officials.

I guess this is more of that "vigilantism" that Robert Spitzer was talking about.

HEZBOLLAH IS RIOTING, AND BEIRUT IS BURNING: Michael Totten has the scoop.

I LINKED TO THIS BEFORE, but linked to the wrong Amazon page, one that told people it wouldn't be out for months. But now Unreasonable Searches and Seizures: Rights and Liberties Under the Law is actually out, and this link actually works.

I'VE SAID BEFORE that hard news is the "killer app" for big media, since it's something they can do that bloggers can't do as easily. But not everyone agrees:

The Boston Globe is closing its foreign bureaus as part of the newspaper's efforts to trim costs, editor Martin Baron said today.

The move follows the recent decision by the New York Times Co.'s New England Media Group, of which the Globe is the biggest holding, to offer buyouts to employees to cut some 125 jobs, including 19 in the newsroom and editorial pages. In a memo to staff, Baron said shutting the foreign bureaus avoids cutting about a "dozen or so" additional newsroom jobs.

I said earlier that the Blogosphere has more reporters in Iraq than many major media outlets. And certainly more now than the Boston Globe.

HERE'S MORE on Steve Cohen and the Congressional Black Caucus. Tennessee political blogger A.C. Kleinheider is offended.

Better watch out. If they treat our Tennessee representatives too badly, we'll send 'em Stacy Campfield. . . .

UPDATE: Bob Krumm:

Usually, these caucuses are little more than the congressional equivalent of high school clubs. But ask yourselves, would your high school allow a club that purposefully limited its membership to whites? Of course not. So why should your tax dollars be used to support a group with a racist membership policy?

Other caucuses are less restrictive in their membership:

The Congressional Croatian Caucus does not require Croatian ancestry, the Congressional Entertainment Caucus is not limited to former entertainers, the Congressional Internet Caucus does not mandate that its members maintain a blog, the House Cancer Caucus is not just for cancer survivors, and veterans aren’t the only eligible members of the Reserve Components Caucus.

I'll bet that if Bill Clinton were a House member they'd let him join.

PATRICK HYNES: Hats off to Hillary. Talk about Strange New Respect.

THE KERBALA ATTACKS AND IRAN: Omar has a report.

ED MORRISSEY: "Richardson could be ’08’s most dangerous candidate."

BUMPER-STICKER WISDOM: "Don't Believe Everything You Think."

ADVICE TO HILLARY CLINTON'S ADVISORS: "Come on, you fools, just humanize her. Don't tell the press you're trying to humanize her!"

It's good advice. A major weakness in the Clinton Administration was the tendency of staffers to brag to the press about how they were spinning things, thus undermining their own spin. That seems to have carried over.

AGAINST NET NEUTRALITY:

Robert Kahn, the most senior figure in the development of the internet, has delivered a strong warning against "Net Neutrality" legislation.

Speaking to an audience at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California at an event held in his honour, Kahn warned against legislation that inhibited experimentation and innovation where it was needed.

Kahn rejected the term "Net Neutrality", calling it "a slogan". He cautioned against dogmatic views of network architecture, saying the need for experimentation at the edges shouldn't come at the expense of improvements elsewhere in the network.

(Kahn gently reminded his audience that the internet was really about interconnecting networks, a point often lost today).

Read the whole thing. I've been generally favorable toward net neutrality, but here's the other side.

BUT THEY SUPPORT THE TROOPS:

An American GI assigned to one of the harshest posts in Iraq had a simple request last week for a Wisconsin mattress company: send some floor mats to help ease the hardship of sleeping on the cold, bug-infested ground.

What he got, instead, was a swift kick from the company's Web site, which not only refused the request but added insult to injury with the admonition, "If you were sensible, you and your troops would pull out of Iraq."

Army Sgt. Jason Hess, stationed in Taji, Iraq, with the 1st Cavalry Division, said he emailed his request to Discount-mats.com because he and his fellow soldiers sleep on the cold ground, which contains sand mites, sand flies and other disease carriers.

Jeez.

UPDATE: Be sure to read this followup post, which corrects a minor error and provides some additional background.