JEN TALIAFERRO says that the election was a mandate for warbloggers. Dr. Weevil, on the other hand, thinks the anti-warbloggers deserve some credit, too.

Personally, I rather doubt that bloggers of any variety had much to do with the election results.

MARK STEYN IS LEARNING TO LOVE “ROPE-A-DOPE”

So I have the opposite problem with Mr Bush from The Guardian and Le Monde: because he’s insufficiently trigger-happy, I underestimated him. When his judicial nominees were bottled up by Democrat obstructionist ideologues, I wanted him to do to Vermont Senator Pat Leahy what Clinton did to Newt Gingrich: destroy the guy. Instead, Bush looked at a handful of vulnerable Democrat Senate seats in Missouri, Minnesota and elsewhere, and slyly moved them into play.

The result is that the judiciary committee is now back in Republican hands, and Senator Leahy’s got a one-way ticket on the oblivion express. Mr Bush has destroyed the guy without ever having to say a word about him. Meanwhile, all the states the Dems specifically targeted – from Florida to New Hampshire – are more Republican than ever. I was wrong. The Bush way is more effective.

You’ve got to admire a pundit who can admit when he’s wrong.

MALVO IS TALKING:

In the interviews after he was transferred to Fairfax County on Thursday, Malvo, 17, told investigators that the shootings were well planned and involved scouting missions. Sources said that Malvo described himself and his partner as behaving like soldiers: Using two-way radios, one would be a lookout and communicate with the other.

If conditions, such as traffic, were not right, they would not shoot, Malvo told investigators. They deliberately hopped from jurisdiction to jurisdiction to create confusion, and they watched the news coverage of their crimes, the sources said.

Interesting.

HERE’S A POLL saying that the Wellstone memorial really did hurt the Democrats, not just in Minnesota but nationally.

NATION VS. NATION: Katha Pollitt writes:

[Y]ou’ve offered a view of those who oppose Bush’s military plans that is seriously at odds with reality: The antiwar movement equals the left and the left equals the followers of Ramsey Clark, defender of Slobodan Milosevic and assorted Hutu genocidaires and other thugs, who is the founder of the International Action Center, which is closely linked to ANSWER, a front for the Workers World Party. Your picture of the big antiwar demo in October could have come straight out of David Horowitz’s column: “100,000 Communists March on Washington to Give Aid and Comfort to Saddam Hussein.”

Now, it is a fact that ANSWER called the big demonstration in Washington, it arranged for the permits, organized many buses and brought on all those speakers no one listens to. That’s not the same as controlling the movement–99 percent of the people who go to those demonstrations don’t even know ANSWER exists.

Compare this with what David Corn wrote:

This was no accident, for the demonstration was essentially organized by the Workers World Party, a small political sect that years ago split from the Socialist Workers Party to support the Soviet invasion of Hungary in 1956. The party advocates socialist revolution and abolishing private property. It is a fan of Fidel Castro’s regime in Cuba, and it hails North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Il for preserving his country’s “socialist system,” which, according to the party’s newspaper, has kept North Korea “from falling under the sway of the transnational banks and corporations that dictate to most of the world.” The WWP has campaigned against the war-crimes trial of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. A recent Workers World editorial declared, “Iraq has done absolutely nothing wrong.”

Officially, the organizer of the Washington demonstration was International ANSWER (Act Now to Stop War & End Racism). But ANSWER is run by WWP activists, to such an extent that it seems fair to dub it a WWP front.

Pollitt does mention Corn’s piece, and says that he exaggerates ANSWER’s role. But she doesn’t actually say why, and I think it rather weakens her argument that Hitchens (and by extension, Corn) is wrong about the anti-war movement. Having said that, her piece is civil and sincere, and worth reading.

UPDATE: Reader Sameer Parekh writes:

It was interesting to read Katha Pollitt’s remarks about the anti-war movement. She raises potentially valid points. However, living in San Francisco, speaking from experience, everyone I have spoken to who is against the war falls into the anti-american/anti-capitalist category. I have yet to meet someone against the war whose rationale against going to war doesn’t logically conclude with supporting socialist dictators and exterminating the Jews. That’s clearly only anecdotal evidence, maybe there is a vast silent majority of anti-war people who don’t fit into that category. I have yet to meet them.

Yes, like the anti-Israel-but-not-anti-semitic supporters of Arafat, the category of pro-American, pro-capitalist peace protesters is logically possible, but admits of relatively few actual instances.

VIOLENCE MARS ANTI-WAR RALLY:

Brussels – A protest against war in Iraq turned violent on Sunday in Brussels when dozens of youths clashed with police and attacked American-owned businesses.

Up to 100 masked rioters, many of them of Arab origin, broke away from the main body of other antiwar protesters who were marching through the city centre.

The rioters hurled stones at businesses and police, who responded with baton charges. Photographers and TV camera operators were also targeted by the rioters.

Windows were broken at a McDonald’s fast-food restaurant and at a Marriot hotel, as well as a local temporary employment agency. . . .

About 2 000 protesters comprising pro-Palestinian and anticapitalist groups joined the demonstration led by a banner reading “Stop USA”.

These guys aren’t “peace” protesters. They’re just the enemy.

(Via Martin Devon).

I’M BLOGGING ON THE WIRELESS on battery power. We’re under our second tornado warning of the evening; I barely got the computers shut down before the power went out the first time. It was brief, but after last summer’s lightning damage (which at least made Atrios happy) I’m taking no chances.

ANTI-SEMITISM AT THE FLORENCE “ANTIWAR PROTESTS:” James Morrow has the scoop on signs that bespeak not a desire for peace, but a hatred of Jews and America and a desire for the other side to win.

People who want the other side to win aren’t “peace protesters.” The traditional term for people who want the other side to win is “the enemy.” And, at the very least, in a war you don’t accord much moral stature to what the enemy wants.

A LITTLE EARLY FOR VETERANS’ DAY, but only a little: SKBubba has posted a lengthy Veterans’ Day tribute. And isn’t today the Marine Corps’ birthday?

UPDATE: Yes, it is! Happy birthday, USMC.

PUNDITWATCH IS UP! Also check out these observations on Condi Rice’s appearance on This Week from Joe User.

If that doesn’t keep you amused during my afternoon absence, you can check out this bloggers bare boobies for charity page. No, really, that’s what it is.

JIM BENNETT ASKS: Who’s laughing now? He also suggests that Bush’s crew needs to be looking at relations with Europe as it tries to craft a “legacy:”

Bush and his team, once they are able to take a long view, should meditate on the fact that America’s relations with almost any given European nation are more amicable, cooperative, and productive on a bilateral basis than they are with Europe collectively, that is, with the European Union. A real legacy must treat a dogmatic devotion to the EU as one more fixed idea, such as past notions about litigation, taxation, or international organizations, that must be re-examined, and if needed, reversed.

If Europe is really to become the rival hegemon and power bloc its enthusiasts predict, it makes sense for America to blunt this rivalry by making a generous alternative offer to compatible nations such as Britain and Ireland. If, on the other hand, Europe is about to sink into a demographic, structural, and fiscal crisis, as analysis suggests, then it likewise makes sense for America to buffer itself from this catastrophe by rescuing the nations, again Britain and Ireland, that hold the lion’s share of American financial interests.

These European issues are likely to become most aggravated in the 2005-2009 time frame. Coincidentally, this is likely to be exactly the period in which the Bush team will be addressing its legacy issues.

Indeed. I think that we should also consider trying to draw Turkey into the NAFTA orbit as an alternative to Turkish EU membership.

GERRY ADAMS: OSAMA’S SOUL BROTHER? I think he belongs in jail, myself.

UPDATE: Moira Breen says she’s “appalled” that Adams is raising money in the United States. She should be. And the United States government should be embarrassed.

GEE, D’YA THINK? “Poll suggests public credits Bush popularity, handling of Iraq as keys to Republican election success.”

TIM BLAIR FISKS a U.K. Observer piece on the U.S. elections, observing: “IT’S NOT enough for The UK Observer’s Will Hutton that people vote. They must vote the correct way, otherwise it’s a Dark Day for Democracy.” Indeed.

JAMES RUMMEL has some thoughts about the way St. Xavier University has handled Prof. Peter Kirstein’s nasty email to an Air Force cadet. I thik Rummel is right. Here’s an excerpt from his post, which I’m making lengthier than otherwise because, well, it’s on Blogger/Blogspot and God knows if it’ll be there when you follow the link later:

Everybody’s missing something, though. The President of St. Xavier University is a guy named Richard Yanikoski, and right now he probably feels like the bug under the microscope. One day he wakes up, kisses his significant other on the cheek on his way to the office, only to find that a real blizzard o’ crap is waiting for him when he gets there. What went through his mind that day? What would go through the mind of any of us in his shoes?

“Gee, what the heck did I do to deserve this abuse?”

We’ve seen the brass at universities close ranks and act like horse’s backsides themselves the last few years. Think the way that the administration at SFSU ignored the riot caused by pro-Palestinian protestors, or the way Emory dragged it’s feet and hoped that the Bellesiles scandal would just fade away. But that’s not what Mr. Yanikoski did. He looked in to the matter and saw what was going on. Instead of closing ranks and ignoring things he took action. The horse’s backside has apologized to the cadet that he wronged. Mr. Yanikoski, an innocent man caught up in something he knew nothing about, has also expressed his regrets.

People are too involved in this, angry and emotional. Not only are they expressing outrage to the horse’s backside but they’re also venting some spleen into Mr. Yanikoski’s Email tray. Even though he must be under enormous pressure, he’s refused to discuss any disciplinary action that he might take. Not only is this the policy of St. Xavier but it’s the right thing to do. After all, everybody might want to know what the consequences are for being a total ass, but we aren’t the injured party and we really don’t need to know.

If you agree with me please Email Mr. Yanikoski at and give him an “attaboy”. I think it’s important for the people in the ivory tower to learn that there’s a price to pay for being a jerk. I don’t think that someone should pay a price for trying to do the right thing when he’s got a jerk working for them.

As I say, I think Rummel’s right here. This isn’t academic fraud, it’s a rude email. I think it was important that a lot of people pointed out just how rude it was in unmistakable terms. I think that demanding that St. Xavier University fire Kirstein is too much, and rude emails aimed at the University’s President do little good and even detract from the point.

THINKING OF LEAVING BLOGGER/BLOGSPOT? Here are some thoughts on different platforms.

The complaints about the difficulty of installing Movable Type may be on-target. I wouldn’t know because Stacy Tabb helped me with it and made the whole move virtually painless. But the MT folks will install it on your server for a token fee, and some hosting companies will do that, as part of their package. (I think Bloggerzone does).

I still think that for people who are just starting a blog the Blogger/Blogspot combination is a great way to start. But once you’re up and running and have decided to get serious, the notion of shifting to something else becomes more appealing.

ANOTHER AMERICAN LAWYER story on blogs — this one about lawyer-blogging in general, and featuring Denise Howell, who even rates a photo.

UPDATE: Here’s another article on law-related blogs featuring Ernest Svenson.

CATS AND DOGS LIVING TOGETHER: Maureen Dowd’s latest column contains the sentence: “I missed John Ashcroft desperately.” It does not appear to be ironic.

MATT WELCH says that Gray Davis is reminiscent of another California politician who despite some setbacks went on to national greatness.

ANTI-AMERICAN PROTESTERS IN FLORENCE ARE “singing communist anthems.” Go figure. Most of the “anti-war” protests in Italy seem to have been the product of communist organizers, which — as David Corn has written — seems to be the case in the United States, too.

What this protest demonstrates is that it was a waste of time, at least in terms of satisfying anti-American critics of “unilateralism,” to go through the United Nations. Anti-American protesters won’t be satisfied by that sort of thing. And these are, in fact, anti-American protesters, not anti-war protesters.

UPDATE: Steven Den Beste isn’t impressed, either.

CASS SUNSTEIN IS WORRIED about conservatives “taking over” the courts. By this, I presume, he means “being appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate.”

Well, I certainly hope that Bush won’t appoint any Borks, and I’ll oppose them if he does. (You can read this article for a lengthy summary of my problems with Bork). But if Sunstein’s op-ed is the best case in opposition to conservative judicial appointments, well, it’s not much.

Sunstein seems worrried that we will see “judicial activism,” which apparently occurs when courts are willing to strike down legislation that has bipartisan support. (Absent from Sunstein’s characterization of such action as “activism” is any concern for whether such striking down is based on, you know, the legislation being unconstitutional. The flag-burning bill had bipartisan support, after all.)

Sunstein is worried, though, that the courts might start thinking about the constitution more. At least he’s worried that “conservative courts might well rule that the Second Amendment raises constitutional questions about gun control legislation.” He doesn’t bother to explain why such raising such questions might be wrong, or anything: I guess, on the New York Times op-ed page, such arguments are superfluous, though Sunstein has in the past expressed the view that the individual-rights interpretation of the Second Amendment is one that has some intellectual force behind it.

It seems to me that discussions about “activism” are beside the point. When courts enforce the Constitution, they are doing their job, whether that leads them to strike down laws or to uphold them. When courts fail to enforce the Constitution, they are not doing their job. Sunstein doesn’t offer an explanation of why conservatives might be wrong about which laws should be upheld and which should be struck down, but without such an explanation, talk of “activism” means little, and sudden enthusiasm for deference to legislatures and to precedents that Sunstein no doubt finds generally more congenial seems like special pleading.

UPDATE: John Rosenberg has some comments, too. Another law professor emailed to me that the piece seemed to have been “phoned in.” Yeah, Sunstein’s capable of better than this.

ADD THIS STORY to my earlier comments about racism on the left: racist attacks on Condi Rice:

“Does they like how you shine their shoes, Condoleezza? Or the way you wash and park the whitey’s cars.”

The Greaseman got fired. What’ll happen to this guy? Answer:

Niger Innis, spokesperson the Congress on Racial Equality, said he sees a double standard at play.

“If Rogers, instead of being a white liberal, were a white conservative like Rush Limbaugh using the type of language that Rogers was using, he’d be kicked off the air,” Innis said.

It’s a controversy that’s been brewing on radio for a while now.

Or is Dale Amon right that it’s all a question of who does the talking, not of what is said?

UPDATE: A reader points out this piece by Dinesh D’Souza, which I hadn’t read, but which has already been savaged by Arthur Silber and Michele of A Small Victory. I think his point — though it was hard to be sure — was that the Right says dumb things, too. Yeah, well, you don’t see me defending the “social conservative” crowd very much.

D’Souza’s piece is just dumb, revolving as it does around this statement: “The Democrats should stop hiding behind ‘freedom of choice’ and become blatant advocates for divorce, illegitimacy, adultery, homosexuality, bestiality, and pornography.” Actually, I’ve got nothing against these things, so long they’re consensual — “adultery” can be taken different ways, I guess. (I don’t share Peter Singer’s enthusiasm for bestiality, but since I’m happy to eat animals it’s hard for me to consider people having sex with them to be, you know, more exploitative.)

If the Republicans buy into this social-conservative line, they’ll lose. I think they know it. But this doesn’t get the Left off the hook. See, the Left has already shown itself utterly wrong with regard to communism, national defense, the economy and — by the Clinton era — worthless on civil liberties except to the extent they’re important to core Democratic constituencies. So the only real claim to moral legitimacy that the Left has, well, left is the claim that it’s tolerant. But it’s not anymore. Remarks like the one aimed at Condi Rice above are just the icing on the cake. The trend has been obvious for years.

The reader asks me to name one major leftist commentator who has made comments at D’Souza’s level. Well, I guess Neil Rogers, the DJ above, isn’t really major, though he’s probably bigger than D’Souza. And what about the many folks on the Left implying that Bush engineered 9/11? Does that count? Or Barbra Streisand’s suggestion that Bush engineered Paul Wellstone’s plane crash? Or the widespread claims (and political cartoons) during the DC sniper affair to the effect that the NRA favors the murder of small children? I could go on, but frankly anyone who really thinks that there’s nothing on the left worse than D’Souza’s remarks above is beyond rational discourse.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Jason Soon says D’Souza’s column is silly.

JOHN HILER OF MICROCONTENT NEWS HAS PICKED UP ON the story of Diana Hsieh being sued by the Front Sight folks, and the possible Scientology connection. (It’s not entirely clear that Scientology is involved directly, though it would be consistent with stuff reported here.)

Regardless of whether the Church of Scientology is formally involved, as I said in my earlier post, I’ve always had a high opinion of Front Sight in the past, but this lawsuit is changing that. And judging by Arthur Silber’s reports, it’s changing it for a lot of people in the gun community.

HERE’S A SITE that lets you show your appreciation to the U.S. Military, as part of military appreciation month. Send your online thank you note today!

I’M RATHER SURPRISED that the rumors of Trent Lott’s ouster seem to have faded. Apparently, I’m not the only one.