CRYSTAL MORNING: A video remembering 9/11, from Evan Coyne Maloney.

IN THE MAIL: Ronald Dworkin’s new book, Is Democracy Possible Here?: Principles for a New Political Debate. Dworkin is unhappy with the present polarized state of political debate, and of course he’s right to be. On the other hand, when a lefty author writing on this sort of theme gets a lukewarm review from Publisher’s Weekly it’s a bad sign. Perhaps there will be a civil discussion in the Amazon discussion forum for the book.

CLAUDIA ROSETT says that five years after 9/11, we need to be doing more.

DAVE HARDY ON MAYOR BLOOMBERG:

Regarding Mayor Bloomberg’s “sting” of gun dealers — The total conviction count is one dealer pleads to disorderly conduct. Bloomsberg’s police seize the gun store inventory, then return it quietly a week later.

He sues out of state dealers, two have filed counter-suits, and he offers to settle against the others for supervision — for which NYC will pay.

Comes now the Queens’ Ledger to proclaim it a great success.

I guess the standards for success are pretty low in Queens.

DISASTER PREPAREDNESS: My mention of Consumer Reports’ article on the subject led to an email from a staffer at the magazine, who noted that they have this online guide to disaster and emergency preparedness too. No subscription required.

MEGAN MCARDLE looks at “potentially truly appalling statistics” on median household income. “You can’t compare apples to oranges just because the apples are prettier.”

This statement suggests that she doesn’t have much of a future in the newspaper business.

UPDATE: Don’t miss this post from Stuart Buck, either.

THE INSTAWIFE HAS THOUGHTS on women learning to shoot.

UPDATE: Video of Helen shooting, here.

STOP THE PRESSES: Armitage says he was source of Plame leak. “The confirmation of Mr. Armitage’s role, long the subject of media speculation, shows that the initial disclosure of Ms. Wilson’s identify did not originate from the White House as part of a concerted political attack, but was divulged by a senior State Department official who was not regarded as a close political ally of Vice President Dick Cheney.”

Over three years of the press hyperventilating about nothing. And, I might add, pretty obviously nothing. But it served its goal, which was to drive Bush down in the polls, so I don’t think the hyperventilators regret it much.

At least I get the satisfaction of saying I told you so.

JIM PINKERTON: “Reporters, meanwhile, like to say that they are there, in the battle zone, to ‘tell the story’ — although most people know, or at least most people believe, that reporters are there to shape the story, to shape opinion in a certain way. Therefore, depending on one’s point of view, journalists are either an asset, or a liability; but they are anything but neutral.”

STRATEGYPAGE ON THAILAND:

The 32 months of violence in the Moslem south have so far caused nearly 4,300 casualties (40 percent of them fatal). During that period, there were some 5,500 incidents of Islamic terrorist violence. That’s an average of 5-6 a day, among a population of 2.4 million (some 80 percent Moslem). The violence was largely directed at the 400,000 or so non-Moslems. The terrorist attacks have had the effect of doubling the normal murder rate in the south. A religiously inspired crime wave, so to speak. But the terror is very real as well, especially for non-Moslems. Since most of the deaths are among the non-Moslem minority, the death rate for that community has risen to about 15 per 100,000 per year. The rate in the U.S. is about 6 per 100,000 people per year.

While the number of bombings has increased this year, the casualty rate has gone down. This is largely because of the thousands of additional soldiers and police sent to the south. These security forces are everywhere down there. But the damage has already been done, and thousands of non-Moslem Thais have fled the south. The main objective of the Islamic terrorists is to expel all non-Moslems from the south, and then set up a religious dictatorship.

Sounds like ethnic cleansing by terror. Why isn’t the UN protesting? If this sort of terror were directed at Muslims in Israel, or the United States, it would be an international cause celebre.

UPDATE: Grim has more on Thailand.

DID ABC GIN UP THE WHOLE CONTROVERSY over the 9/11 film?

I LINKED THE OTHER DAY to Ron Bailey’s piece on Norman Borlaug. It’s worth also linking to this piece by Malcolm Gladwell on another unsung hero of the 20th Century, Fred Soper.

THE CARNIVAL OF CARS is up!

PORKBUSTERS UPDATE: The Federal Funding Accountability and Transparancy Act, S. 2590 has unanimously passed the Senate.

Take that, secret-holders! Bill Frist reports:

The passage of this legislation is a triumph for transparency in government, for fiscal discipline, and for the bipartisan citizen journalism of the blogosphere.

Without the efforts of ordinary Americans empowered by the Internet, including many hardworking members of the iFrist Volunteers, this legislation might easily have been successfully obstructed. Instead, the unprecedented synergy between online grassroots activists and Senate leadership provides a new model for participatory democracy in action.

I look forward to reconciling S. 2590 with its counterpart in the House and delivering this deserving legislation to the desk of President Bush for his signature.

Onward and upward. Or, in the case of pork spending, hopefully downward.

PROGRESS FOR AMERICA ROLLS OUT a new war on terror ad.

ANDY ROTH POSTS a huge McCain-Feingold iron curtain roundup. Lots of bloggers are unhappy.

NEW INVESTMENTS in citizen journalism.

STRATEGERY: ” Kos Willing To Trade Dem Control Of Senate For Lamont Moral Victory.” And I think Republicans would be willing to make that trade, too!

Though reading the post I’m not quite sure that Kos really meant that.

BLOGGING FROM BELARUS: Robert Mayer interviews a Belarusian student who’s been punished for speaking out against the Lukashenka regime.

A LOOK AT THE RIGHT TO SELF-DEFENSE, and various attacks thereon:

Needless to say, the “gunfights after every traffic accident” which were predicted by the gun control advocates have not transpired in any state adopting such “no retreat” measures.

But make no mistake, they continue to fight such legislation. Their latest tactic? Identifying the death of any armed home invader or rapist at the hands of his intended victim as a “murder,” they have launched a Web site opposed to these new self-defense laws, dubbed www.licensetomurder.com. . . .

At the risk of belaboring the obvious, these are lies. Shooting in self-defense is not “murder.”

No, it’s not. (Via Dave Hardy).

BOYCOTTING MILLER BEER, at Hot Air. I’ve been boycotting Miller for years, because it’s not very good. . . . I say, support your local brewery!

THE MANOLO looks at Dictator Chic, and without ignoring the important role of “the super hotty she-devils.”

Plus, Ahmadinejad is no Qaddafi: “Qaddafi, he’s not just the despot, he is the Arab Superfly, White Shaft in Africa! And, and you, you’re just the crazy Mr. Ahmadinejad, the scourge of the first period homeroom.”

I hope somebody translates that into Farsi.

ANN ALTHOUSE: “We’re going to mark the 9/11 anniversary in an especially shabby way this year. . . . If you haven’t caught up with the spirit of 2006, you might want to keep the TV off for the next few days and stay away from the internet.”

SCHEMAXPERT is a program that “dynamically and accurately creates XML documents from XML schemas.” To be honest, I have only a vague understanding of what that means, or why it’s useful. But my lovely and talented sister-in-law has been laboring over SchemaExpert for months, so if you understand that more than I do, be sure to check it out!

JEFF GOLDSTEIN celebrates the clarifying impact of elections.