AMUSING POLITICAL DEVELOPMENTS in Britain. And read this post, too.

UNSCAM UPDATE: Shocking developments in the Oil-for-food investigation:

Congressional investigators say that France, Russia and China systematically sabotaged the former United Nations oil-for-food program in Iraq by preventing the United States and Britain from investigating whether Saddam Hussein was diverting billions of dollars. . . .

The paper also accuses the United Nations office charged with overseeing the program of having “pressed” contractors not to rigorously inspect Iraqi oil being sold and the foreign goods being bought. The program office, headed by Benan Sevan, who is also under investigation by a committee appointed by the United Nations, turned a blind eye to corruption charges, the paper says, because it apparently saw oil-for-food “strictly as a humanitarian program.”

Representative Christopher Shays, the Connecticut Republican who chairs the subcommittee, said in an interview that there was no doubt that the abuses were systemic and that blame for the widespread corruption must be shared by Security Council members, the United Nations office that administered the program, and the contractors hired by the United Nations to inspect Iraq’s oil exports and aid purchases.

Okay, it’s not that shocking.

STRATEGYPAGE on the battles in Iraq:

October 2, 2004: As promised, the government began its campaign to retake control of Sunni Arab towns and cities that had fallen under the control of al Qaeda, criminal gangs and Baath Party gunmen. For the last two days, some 4,000 American and Iraqi troops have surrounded and regained control of Samarra, a Sunni Arab city with 100,000 residents, a hundred kilometers north of Baghdad. So far, about a hundred Iraqis have been killed, some 75 percent of them gunmen who have resisted the Iraqi police and American troops. Iraqi troops quickly seized major mosques in the city, preventing them from being used as fortresses by anti-government forces. At least one kidnap victim was released by advancing troops, and others will probably be found as well. A third of troops involved are Iraqi, and this includes a new Samarra police force, drawn from other parts of Iraq and led by more experienced and reliable commanders.

The nearby town of Tikrit, Saddam’s home town, did not go the way of Samarra mainly because of local politics. The local power brokers in Tikrit make a deal with the coalition and kept it.

That’s the good news. Here’s the cautionary note:

The real battle for Samarra [will] take place in the next few months. The people fighting American troops at the moment, and getting killed, are the dummies. The smart guys just hide their weapons and wait for an opportunity to take over the town again. If the new police force cannot hunt down and arrest most of the smarter gangsters and terrorists in the next few months, Samarra will lapse into anarchy again.

There’s also this:

A recently published survey of attacks on police and troops in Iraq revealed what had long been taken for granted, over 80 percent of the attacks took place in just four Sunni Arab provinces. The other 14 provinces were pretty quiet, most a dozen or fewer incidents a month. Interrogation of captured gunmen has made it clear that most of the attacks are planned, and the attackers recruited, by the gangs that have found refuge in the “outlaw” towns like Samarra and Fallujah. Especially in light of last week’s terror bombing that killed and wounded some 200 children in Baghdad, the new government, and most Iraqis, are determined to put down the gunmen, terrorists and gangsters, and restore law and order.

And because of these bombings, a degree of force that might have aroused resentment among Iraqis is now more likely to produce satisfaction.

COMING NEXT, AN EFFORT TO REHABILITATE PHLOGISTON CHEMISTRY: Jim Lindgren notes that an attempt at demonstrating that CBS’s forged documents might have been done on a typewriter has fallen apart.

This is hardly a surprise, of course. But it wouldn’t be much of a vindication for CBS even if, through some miracle, the documents turned out to be genuine. It’s quite clear now that CBS acted without concern for the genuineness of the documents, and in fact in the teeth of opinions from its own experts that the documents were probably bogus. No amount of after-the-fact lawyering can change that evidence of journalistic bias and ineptitude, though CBS’s namecalling of its critics, and general stonewalling, compounds the offense and moves it from negligence to the category of ‘reckless disregard.”

UPDATE: Former 60 Minutes producer Don Hewitt would seem to agree:

“I never would have done the story,” said Hewitt, who retired in June as the show’s executive producer after 36 years.

“I would have been very wary injecting myself into a campaign. You’ve got to be very careful that you’re not perceived as doing the job that one of the two candidates should be doing himself.” . . .

During the radio show, Hewitt said he’s sorry that “60 Minutes” and Rather were perceived as doing Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry’s job for him “by bringing up an old issue, and they weren’t careful enough to not make mistakes. And the minute you make one mistake, you’re dead.”

He also thinks that Kerry was “stupid” to make Vietnam the centerpiece of his campaign.

THE PERFIDIOUS FRENCH:

Add to this the recent bizarre phrase from French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin. The head of the Figaro press group went to see him about the kidnapping of two French journalists in Iraq; Raffarin assured him they would soon be freed, reportedly saying, “The Iraqi insurgents are our best allies.”

Hmm. Kinda supports the thesis of this new book, doesn’t it?

INTERESTING ARTICLE ON NANOTECHNOLOGY AND “GRAY GOO” — with an expectation that fears will spread in light of the upcoming Michael Crichton movie Prey.

Here’s a thought: How about we base our debates on technology policy on facts, not scary movies? The article is quite good, though.

I’ve written on the subject here, here, and, of course, here.

UPDATE: Top link was bad before. Fixed now. Sorry.

VIK RUBENFELD is blogging from the Liberty Film Festival. He’s even got photos.

PATRICK HYNES wonders if “hate fatigue” is breaking out.

LOTS OF INTERESTING POSTS from Tom Maguire — just keep scrolling.

A LESSON FOR CBS: Fox News published bogus Kerry quotes earlier today, and has already retracted and apologized.

UPDATE: More here: It’s somewhat hard to see how this stuff saw print. (Saw pixels? Got on the website, anyway.)

READER DANIEL LARSEN EMAILS:

Bush’s interview with Bill O’Reilly, aired Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday was amazing, and O’Reilly wasn’t exactly throwing him softballs. I just watched the videos, and if Bush had been like that last night, Kerry would have been toast. Yet, so far as I can tell, there’s been next to no blogosphere reaction. Watch it and call some attention to it, could ya?

(Click the “videos” tab)

I don’t have time right now — just finished mulching, and now I have to cook dinner. But there’s the link, for anyone who’s not as occupied with domestic chores.

MT. ST. HELENS IS ERUPTING: Localblogged here.

Video at The Daily Recycler.

JOYCELYN ELDERS GOT NOTHIN’ ON THIS BABY:

He is the conservative bastion of the US supreme court, a favourite of President Bush, and a hunting partner of the vice-president. He has argued vociferously against abortion rights, and in favour of anti-sodomy laws.

But it turns out that there is another side to Justice Antonin Scalia: he thinks Americans ought to be having more orgies.

Challenged about his views on sexual morality, Justice Scalia surprised his audience at Harvard University, telling them: “I even take the position that sexual orgies eliminate social tensions and ought to be encouraged.”

I wonder why he didn’t mention this in the confirmation hearings? (Via Ann Althouse).

UPDATE: Many people are angrily emailing that Scalia was joking. (Some send this story which says so). Well, yeah, that’s what I figured. I didn’t really think that many people would see Scalia as pro-orgy. Not that there’s anything wrong with that!

LT SMASH has thoughts on Afghanistan and outsourcing.

WRITING IN THE NEW REPUBLIC, MARTIN PERETZ is down on Kerry:

It’s not just that he has exaggerated what has gone wrong in Iraq. His entire speech was premised on the assumption that there were European troops and Muslim troops and United Nations gendarmes who would have gone to war with us against Saddam had Bush only waited another few days, weeks, months in the spring of 2003. That is a lie. And now, he holds out the same false promise. It is true, he admits, that there is a Security Council resolution calling on U.N. members to provide soldiers and trainers and a special brigade to protect the U.N. mission in Iraq. “Three months later,” he admits, “not a single country has answered that call.” Of course, Bush is to blame. And what should Bush do? He should “convene a summit meeting of the world’s major powers” and “insist that they make good on that U.N. resolution.”

There is something risible in Kerry’s faith in these hopeless transactions brokered by Kofi Annan and in the United Nations itself, which is staging yet another tragic, do-nothing performance on Darfur. He surely knows there is no cavalry of Europeans and Arabs about to ride to Iraq’s rescue (especially since he intends to withdraw American troops, hardly a move that will give other nations confidence). He surely knows there are no foreign funders willing to bear the financial burden, either. But, if he admits that, then much of his critique of Bush’s Iraq policy collapses, and with it his confidence in the honorable community of nations–the kind of phrase of which liberals are fond. Except that the nations to which it refers are neither honorable nor a community nor, in many cases, even nations. Kerry may want to rely on their goodwill, but I don’t.

Ouch. Meanwhile Alex Flowers emails with some questions:

About that global test…

1) Is there an old copy of it floating around we can get our hands on?
2) Is it multiple choice or essay form?
3) Is the test written in French, German or English?
4) Who determines if we can retake the test?
5) Is it pass/fail or is it more like the SAT?

Thanks in advance.

I’m pretty sure that the answer to (3) is “French.”

UPDATE: Reader Randy Pickett has found a copy:

Global Test for Pre-emptive Military Action by the U.S.

1. Is the U.S. President a Republican?
2. Could this action possibly stabilize oil production?
3. Are France and Germany supplying the intended target with weapons or advice?
4. Would any small time thugocracy with a seat on the Security Council feel threatened?
5. Are family members of high ranking U.N. bureaucrats benefiting financially from the status quo?
6. Is this action likely to enhance America’s power in the world?
7. Would this action further the goals of free market/free trade advocates?
8. Would this action make the U.N. look weak and inconsistent?
9. Would this action divide the countries of the European Union?
10. Would this action be seen as offensive to a world religion (other than Christianity and Judaism)?

Must’ve been in the frathouse files.

MORE: Interesting observation from reader Brian Faughnan:

I think that while Kerry might have helped himself a point or two last night – pushing some undecideds into his camp – we should also at least consider the question of whether his promises to (essentially) stay the course in Iraq will push any of his support on the left into the Nader camp. Between his promise to win in Iraq, to expand the military by two divisions and to consider pre-emptive war against Iran and North Korea, it must at the very least beefen-up Nader’s stump-speech a little. And as they say, in a close race, it may not take all that many votes to shift a swing state from one camp to another.

Hmm. In that sense, the Nader percentage may be the best indicator of whether Kerry’s tougher talk was credible with the electorate.

STILL MORE: Eric Muller thinks the “global test” stuff is being taken out of context. I don’t know — the language about “proving to the world” seems to me to support the less-friendly reading.

INTERESTED IN LABOR LAW? Then check out the new Labor Profs blog, a sort of companion to TaxProfs. Which is about, er, tax.

And both are part of the Law Professor Blogs Network. Because who doesn’t want to know what law professors think about, well, everything?

IT’S THE THIRD ANNUAL BLOGGER BOOBIETHON — meaning that you can stare at pictures of major-league yabos and tell yourself that it’s all for charity. There’s even a page of male bloggers’ chests, for those who are so inclined.

SINCE KERRY REPEATEDLY INVOKED VIETNAM LAST NIGHT, I guess that stories like this one are fair game.

MORE COMMENTS ON JIM LEHRER’S DEBATE PERFORMANCE. And a contrary view here.

TRAFFIC: A shade over 8,320,000 pageviews in September. I imagine this will fall off some after the election.

JAMES LILEKS HAS WRITTEN THE AGENDA for Kerry’s proposed summit. I like it! He also has observations on the “global test” bit:

I’d really like to live in John Kerry’s world. It seems like such a rational, sensible place, where handshakes and signatures have the power to change the face of the planet. If only the terrorists lived there as well.

Read the whole thing.

MEMO TO THE NEW YORK TIMES: This comparison won’t help Kerry:

Mr. Bush slouched and stayed coiled tight, but Mr. Kerry seemed at times to be waltzing with his partner, the lectern. Mr. Kerry moved his hands almost continuously, at one point folding them over his heart like a French mime as he explained that he felt “nothing but respect” for Tony Blair and British soldiers serving in Iraq.

(Via the vigilant SoxBlog, where many things were noticed: “If Ed Gillespie called Kerry a French mime, John Edwards would sue him.”)

A RATHER MODEST BUSH DIP on the TradeSports and Iowa Electronic Markets futures exchanges. Seems about right to me.

UPDATE: Reader Dick Sears says I misread the graph:

I think you made a small error this morning.

There was no Bush debate dip, modest or otherwise. He did lose ground against where he had risen to during the debate, but all that meant was that he was back to where he’d been at the start of the debate.

I followed Tradesports and Iowa closely before, during, and after the debate to see who they “thought” was winning.

Tradesports most recent trades immediately before the debate started at 9:00 were 65.0 for Bush and 36.4 for Kerry. Bush gained steadily during the debate. For example, by 10:00 it was 67.4/33.7, with the same repeated at 10:35. But by 11:35, it was back pretty much where it had started, 65.5/36.0. This morning it was 65.0/35.9.

Iowa was perhaps closed for the day last night, because its 65/32 never wavered during the debate. But this morning it was 68.2/32.8.

So, if anything, I would say Bush had a modest gain.

The stock market seems to agree, except who ever knows why it does what it does?

Not me, and I’ve got the porfolio to prove it. More on the futures markets, and what they mean, here.

BAREFOOT AND PREGNANT in Europe.

A READER NOTES that the Iowa Electronic Markets and the Tradesports Future markets haven’t moved much. Has there been time? Maybe.

UPDATE: Debate transcript here.

ANOTHER UPDATE: People are already mining the transcript for, er, hidden gold. Or is that plutonium?

YET ANOTHER UPDATE: More of that. Treblinka square?

More here.