DAY BY DAY IS BACK!

LT SMASH has a story about Bob Hope, and much more.

JIM BENNETT RESPONDS TO ANNE APPLEBAUM on the differences between American and British media:

Applebaum is a keenly observant commentator who has lived in both nations and is well connected with a wide range of intellects on both sides of the pond. I respect her work. However, I would at least qualify her opinion in this matter by saying that, though as a snapshot of here and now I can’t disagree with her, I think she is missing the bigger story.

Separate as the British and American information universes have been until now, a process of convergence has begun that will continue until there is only a single Anglosphere information universe. In this, the differences between right and left (for example) become more important than the distinctions of national origin. This process is already foreshadowed in the leading edge of the information universe, which at this point in time is the blogosphere — the world of the Web logs, or blogs. . . .

They will likely set the tone more and more for the coming generation. Furthermore, the rise of the blogosphere will likely affect Britain disproportionately to America.

This is because Britain has had a particularly small and closed intellectual class compared to America, a result not only of the island’s smaller size and population, but because of its comparatively small and closed university system. If you went to Oxford or Cambridge, you really did get to meet the majority of the people that would constitute the political nation for your generation. In America, in contrast, a Harvard or Yale degree obviously helped, but you knew that for the rest of your career you would also be dealing with many people from Michigan or Oklahoma, or maybe West Texas State Teacher’s College, or even no university at all, and that such people could very well be more important than you. . . .

Combined with the Internet revolution, the democratization of Britain is leading to an expanded worldview, one that is already seeing both its right and left aligning much more closely with their American counterparts than ever before. Even British anti-Americanism, once the prerogative of the patrician Tory sneer, has succumbed to Anglosphere convergence, and must import Michael Moore as cheerleader.

Interesting.

UPDATE: John Leo, in a piece on journalistic quote-altering, notes:

The BBC, probably the most relentlessly anti-American organization in Britain, recently altered a transcript of one of its own stories, thus misquoting itself. The story dealt with Park Jong-lin, a 70-year-old veteran of the Korean War who “served in the North Korean army fighting against the imperialist American aggressors and their South Korean accomplices.” In the altered version quote marks now surround “imperialist American aggressors” and the BBC’s reference to “accomplices” was changed to “allies.”

Prediction: Because Internet bloggers now watch the wayward BBC carefully, more touched-up transcripts will come to light. The BBC, by the way, falsely reported the Jessica Lynch rescue as a made-for-TV special faked with U.S. soldiers firing blanks for the cameras. (Change that transcript!)

I think it’s a safe prediction.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Bob Bartley describes the problem well, whether at the BBC, Reuters, or The New York Times:

The opinion of the press corps tends toward consensus because of an astonishing uniformity of viewpoint. Certain types of people want to become journalists, and they carry certain political and cultural opinions. This self-selection is hardened by peer group pressure. No conspiracy is necessary; journalists quite spontaneously think alike. The problem comes because this group-think is by now divorced from the thoughts and attitudes of readers.

Yes, and it’s sufficiently insular that it won’t be revisited without considerable pressure. Blogs are providing some of that, but I think the market will provide more.

WILL JAMES LILEKS FORGIVE ME? I’m dissing Target over at GlennReynolds.com.

JAMES LILEKS WRITES:

In the Sunday book pages of the Strib was an article about the women of Afghanistan. It was discussing the new-found freedoms of women in the post-Taliban society, about girls queuing for school after years of oppression. Quote: “No matter what one’s political misgivings about the war might be, the sight of those girls was a thrilling shock.”

That sentence stuck in my head, and made me think back to October 01, to all the discontent over the Afghan campaign. We’ve forgotten what that was like – the marches in Europe, the predictions of mass casualties, the accusations of empire-building, how it was all about (cue Twilight Zone theme) an oil pipeline, how it would become a quagmire, how it was a quagmire, how we should have used international law to bring OBL to justice. It was the dress rehearsal for Iraq. The same blind sputtering fury; the same protests with Bush = Hitler posters and giant mocking puppets; the same inability to accept that a byproduct of the campaign would be a freer society for the very people the protesters supposedly cared about.

Any mass executions at the Kabul soccer stadium recently? No?

Wonder why.

No thanks to the people who purport to care, that’s for sure.

“HOW DO I GET MY WORK DONE?” A lot of bloggers and surfers will find this thread interesting.

My advice: Break things down into small chunks.

PRISONS ARE A GROWTH INDUSTRY:

The nation’s prison population grew 2.6 percent last year, the largest increase since 1999, according to a study by the Justice Department.

The jump came despite a small decline in serious crime in 2002. It also came when a growing number of states facing large budget deficits have begun trying to reduce prison costs by easing tough sentencing laws passed in the 1990s, thereby decreasing the number of inmates.

“The key finding in the report is this growth, which is somewhat surprising in its size after several years of relative stability in the prison population,” said Allen Beck, an author of the report.

I wonder how many people are in there for nonviolent crimes — or for things, like marijuana possession, that shouldn’t be crimes at all? It’s not clear from this report. But TalkLeft’s post on the subject suggests that it’s a lot.

MICKEY KAUS is on a hot streak.

But Mickey, when are you going to do a Gearbox review of the Mazda RX-8? USA Today likes it, Business Week calls it “supercool,” the Washington Post calls it “transcendental”, and the Insta-Wife think’s it looks “hot.” But I won’t know what I think until I read your review!

I sure liked my 1980 RX-7.

JOURNALISM TODAY: Two letters from Romenesko that are worth reading:

From ANDREW MILNER: So we hand out bylines to proven plagiarists and fabulists, tell anyone who criticizes this that they’re “completely lacking a sense of humor” and then scratch our heads wondering why 90 percent of the public hold our profession in utter contempt. Maybe respect from the masses begins with a little professional self-respect.

—

From JOHN CALLAHAN: Letter after letter talking about the Esquire/Glass/Blair deal, and only a single letter — one lousy letter — about Reuters’ hatchet job on Deanna Wrenn’s Jessica Lynch story? Let me get this straight: Reuters takes a local piece about a young woman and soldier returning home, turns it into a not-so-subtle anti-administration screed that one first amendment expert called “politically incendiary” (and the expert, UCLA Law Professor Eugene Volokh, was being charitable — you really have to read this piece to believe it), and Karen Heyman is the only one with anything to say?

It’s no surprise that journalism’s reputation has suffered in recent years. It’s moderately surprising that journalists — so quick to point out misbehavior by other institutions — are so slow to catch on to the damage to their own profession. Here’s a link to Volokh’s comments on the Reuters scandal — which isn’t nearly as big a scandal as it ought to be.

THE GLOBALIZATION OF GAZA: Michael Totten wonders whether a Palestinian state is likely to create more terrorism, rather than reducing it.

HOWARD KURTZ has issued an endorsement in the Californial recall / election.

I think it was the thong that won him over.

UPDATE: I think the thong is what scared Arnold out of the race, too.

SOME CONFIRMATION for the “flypaper” theory:

He said there is evidence that terrorists and religious extremists from outside Iraq have entered the country to engage coalition forces, but no evidence indicates they are being sponsored by other governments.

“This is what I would call a terrorist magnet, where America, being present here in Iraq, creates a target of opportunity,” Sanchez said on CNN’s “Late Edition.”

“But this is exactly where we want to fight them. …This will prevent the American people from having to go through their attacks back in the United States.”

Does this mean it’s a good idea? No (though I think it is) but it’s evidence that it’s part of the strategy.

MARTIN LEE WRITES:

A constitutional convention to confirm Hong Kong people’s aspirations for democracy and allow for a truly democratic government is a necessary next step. With our inheritance from Britain of the rule of law, individual freedoms and tolerance for political differences, there is no society better prepared for and more deserving of democracy. And, as the world saw when our population took to the streets, there can no longer be any doubt about how strongly Hong Kong people value their liberties and desire a system that can protect them.

One day, of course, it would be nice to see liberties — and a system that can protect them — extended to the whole of China. Which, I suspect, is precisely what Beijing fears.

NAPOLEON IS CONQUERING AGAIN. Well, sort of.

Of course, so is Lance Armstrong, and in a bigger way.

READER S.E. BRENNER SENDS THESE COMMENTS ON COVERAGE OF THE HUSSEIN BROTHERS’ LIVES, as annotations to a story on their deaths:

(more…)

JUST NOTICED that quite a few people hit the PayPal and Amazon tipjars while I was on vacation. Thanks!

FOR IDI AMIN, COMEDY WAS EASY but dying is hard. Killing came easily to him, too.

Meanwhile a letter in the Washington Post notes:

The Hussein sons remind me that Idi Amin had a son much like them, swaggering around Kampala armed, raping and killing with viciousness and, of course, impunity. I wonder whether he has been living comfortably in Jiddah.

I wonder, too. As Mark Steyn notes, “At least in this instance, unlike their more recent subventions, the House of Saud began giving money to a mass murderer after he’d stopped killing. ”

CONGRESS HAS PASSED THE anti-prison-rape law that was discussed here a while back. I doubt it will solve the problem, but it may help. And at least it’s a sign that somebody’s taking the problem seriously. That’s good, given the past remarks of people like California Attorney General Bill Lockyer, who clearly doesn’t.

IT’S TIME TO ACCESSORIZE YOUR EPISTEMOLOGY! All the cool kids are doing it.

MANAGEMENT PROBLEMS WITH THE SECRET SERVICE are a long-time InstaPundit staple. Now Michelle Malkin is all over them as well:

Shame on the Secret Service. This week, it investigated renowned editorial cartoonist Michael Ramirez like he was some left-wing homeless crackpot who had sent President Bush an anthrax-laced death threat — all because Ramirez drew a provocative cartoon that was clearly intended to defend the president.

Meanwhile, the Secret Service can’t even keep a loony-tunes stowaway from conning his way onto a White House press charter plane in Africa or prevent a known wacko named the “Handshake Man” from slipping past security and personally delivering an unscreened letter to Bush at a public event in Washington, D.C.

The Secret Service’s response to “threats” aimed at the President sometimes looks more like an effort to reinstate the old English offense of “encompassing the death of the King” than serious effort to spot dangerous people. And the Secret Service’s proximity to the President has shielded it from the scrutiny that it deserves.

YES, I’M BEHIND ON EMAIL — and as this weekend’s light blogging illustrates, I’m not at the computer that much. My computer-savaged spine, shoulders, elbows, etc. have all recovered miraculously (as they always do) with a week’s vacation, and I’m not quite ready to start savaging them again. Meanwhile, Bigwig notes the nature of the problem:

I don’t get Lileks or Reynolds levels of mail. I don’t get anywhere near that much mail, it’s just that what I do get is already more than I can respond to, and if the email looks like my address was just one of many in a BCC line, then I’m almost certainly going to ignore it.

Half the mail that is addressed to me personally doesn’t get anything more than a once over. I just don’t have the time to write both emails and posts. Heck, the only way I can even write this one is to put Scotty M. on top of a pillow in my lap and type over him. He’s talking to my elbow at the moment, something about where his damn pacifier is. I’ve done this often enough that Ngnat has a term for it. She calls it the “Daddy Bed.”

So, my apologies for everything I’ve missed, and will miss. If you absolutely must make sure that I read and respond to your email, there is one way to guarantee that I will do so.

He’s right with his solution to the problem. . . . I just note this because occasionally people are personally affronted if I don’t make a timely response to their email. I do my best, but I get hundreds a day, and this is a hobby, not my job. Most people understand this, and have good manners. For the rest, well — there’s always Bigwig’s solution. Or another, less printable, one.

MCI IS ACCUSED OF DEFRAUDING OTHER PHONE COMPANIES to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars:

Federal prosecutors have opened an investigation in the United States and Canada into accusations that MCI, the nation’s second-largest long-distance carrier, defrauded other telephone companies of at least hundreds of millions of dollars over nearly a decade, people involved in the inquiry said.

The central element of MCI’s scheme, people involved in the inquiry said, consisted of disguising long-distance calls as local calls to avoid paying special access tariffs to local carriers across the country. Those tariffs are the largest single source of MCI’s costs for carrying calls and data transmissions.

Interesting story. I suspect that putting the case in front of a jury will prove a challenge, though.

CHIEF WIGGLES BLOGS FROM IRAQ — and he’s not very impressed with the efforts of Amnesty International and the Red Cross.

STEVEN DEN BESTE OFFERS A STRATEGIC OVERVIEW OF THE WAR TO DATE. It’s long, and thorough. But you probably figured that already. . . .

Why hasn’t the Bush Administration produced something like this? Probably because it contains statements that, while true, would have unfortunate diplomatic ramifications if made by Administration officials. But pundits and analysts of the war would be well-advised to read Den Beste’s post.

UPDATE: Meanwhile, here’s an interesting item pointing out that guerrilla resistance in Germany continued until 1947. How come we’re not hearing this comparison in mainstream media?

ANOTHER UPDATE: This was mentioned in a story I linked earlier, but here’s a Chuck Schumer press release attacking the Bush Administration for coddling Saudi Arabia. That’s a far cry from DNC commercials of the Niger-Uranium sort, but Schumer’s often an early indicator of what Democrats think will get them traction. Stay tuned.

SWISS RECALCITRANCE is producing a “buy American” push in Congress:

Rep. Duncan Hunter, California Republican, also said Switzerland, a neutral nation, blocked delivery of grenades to British military forces during the conflict because it opposed the war.

“The British went into battle in Iraq without a full grenade load,” Mr. Hunter said in an interview.

Regarding the JDAM parts, Mr. Hunter said Swatch Group AG, and its Micro Crystal division in Gretchen, Switzerland, refused to send key components used in the bomb guidance equipment used on the JDAM after the Iraq war began.

The Swiss company’s president blocked the parts to Honeywell, which was a subcontractor for Boeing Co. in making the tail kits for the satellite-guided bombs, 6,600 of which were dropped with great effect during the period of major conflict in Iraq.

If these stories are true, they should certainly cost these companies — and perhaps Switzerland as a whole — procurement business. But whether this should translate into “buy American” legislation isn’t so clear.

Then, of course, there’s the question of why we’re acquiring bomb parts from the “Swatch” folks. . . .

UPDATE: Reader Bob Pence emails:

By not providing parts, Swatch endangered many Iraqis. A given bomb, depending on the importance of the target and the degree of shortage, may have dropped with or without the JDAM tail for precision guidance. Without it, the bomb might miss its target by a few meters and destroy a mosque or an apartment block, but also we wouldn’t just drop one bomb – we would drop enough to guarantee the target was destroyed. Without precision guidance that’s a lot of extra bombs possibly aimed at the Ace of Spades but having a bad effect on people who were never even dealt into the game.

Fortunately we found a domestic supplier, probably at higher cost mostly because of the short turnaround needed. When it comes to display parts like that, there are also some likely Japanese and South Korean suppliers. I suspect that Boeing is even now processing an engineering change document for that assembly listing multiple vendors – none of them in driving distance of Lake Geneva.

This is the kind of thing that makes me want to go down to the nearby mall that has a Swatch Store and smash the display cases there. Or hand out protest fliers. The “neutral” Swiss have a shameful history of war profiteering, yet they have here stooped lower, conceivably denying us bullets and forcing us to use shotgun blasts in their place.

Moves Italy up another notch on European vacation destinations.

Lake Lucerne is lovely this time of year. But so is Lake Como.