DEAN BARNETT: “I’m very concerned about the ascendancy of Bush 41 apparatchiks in the current administration. If I wanted a second Bush 41 administration, I would have voted for G.H.W. Bush in ’92. . . . Any breathing room we give our enemies will be used to develop greater destructive powers. And whether I’m eager for war or not, it’s upon us. Donald Rumsfeld realized that as far back as the 1990’s. The Scowcroftian Realists still don’t realize it today.”

TERROR IN THE UK: “. What I can say is that today, my officers and the police are working to contend with some 200 groupings or networks, totalling over 1600 identified individuals (and there will be many we don’t know) who are actively engaged in plotting, or facilitating, terrorist acts here and overseas. The extremists are motivated by a sense of grievance and injustice driven by their interpretation of the history between the West and the Muslim world. This view is shared, in some degree, by a far wider constituency. If the opinion polls conducted in the UK since July 2005 are only broadly accurate, over 100,000 of our citizens consider that the July 2005 attacks in London were justified.”

Kind of makes it hard to argue that the threat is “overblown.”

UPDATE: More:

Prime Minister Tony Blair said today that the threat from home-grown Islamic terrorism would last “a generation,” reinforcing a highly unusual warning by the head of the MI5 domestic intelligence agency that some 1,600 suspects in 200 terrorist conspiracies were under surveillance.

Overblown?

TPM MUCKRAKER LOOKS AT ethically-challenged Democrats in ascendancy:

The Democrats swept into the majority in Congress vowing to fight the culture of corruption. Bad news for the muckraking biz, right? Thankfully, less-than-squeaky pasts don’t appear to be a factor in the Dems’ reasoning as they divvy up leadership posts and committee chairs.

There’s a list of members and their ethical problems.

HOWARD DEAN’S OFFICE SHOOTS BACK:

After the Republicans have admitted to a thumping, why is it that the only one complaining on the Democratic side is James Carville, who today in addition to trashing Howard Dean, praised the RNC, the outfit that brought us the racist ad that defeated Harold Ford, James’ supposed candidate for Chair?

I think it would be kind of cool to have Harold Ford, Jr. and Michael Steele as their respective party chairs.

TIM MONTGOMERIE: “The Republican Party needs to wake up to the power of the BBC as a media player in America. Its online services, in particular, are widely read in the US and BBC foreign coverage informs how many US journalists see the world. I sat in the White House three years ago and recommended that the GOP develops a strategy to work with London-based media. I met other GOP officials with the same message earlier this year but nothing GOP appears to have been done.”

OVER AT HOT AIR, a Veterans’ Day weekend interview with one of Jimmy Doolittle’s raiders: “We’re at war. We ought to get on a war footing and get the job done.”

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL says that “The House GOP needs a new generation of leaders.”

JON STEWART: Democratic majority kingmaker?

TIM BLAIR: “This site formally withdraws any previous criticism of Presbyterians.”

GENERAL RICHARD MYERS talks about Donald Rumsfeld.

Meanwhile, Laura Lee Donoho emails: “My son emails me from Iraq that he and his fellow troops are in a funk about the resignation of Don Rumsfeld. This is the first time in a long time that President Bush has really pissed me off.”

And she’s posted some further thoughts here.

UPDATE: Newt Gingrich: “‘If the president had decided to replace Secretary Rumsfeld he should have told us two weeks ago.” Tom Bevan agrees.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Will Rumsfeld’s departure hurt reeinlistment rates?

When all is said and done in connection with the Pentagon management shakeup, the Baker commission report and the Dems actively taking control of the legislative branch, I for one will be watching the reenlistment rate among the troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. I suspect many troops will opt to return to civilian life if they feel that they no longer have support from the policymakers, rather than be jerked around by people who think like John Kerry. And if the re-up rate goes down, original enlistments will probably decrease, too. Nobody wants to fight in a war that the movers and shakers don’t want to win. That was true in Korea and Vietnam, and it’s true now.

Any new trends should be apparent by March or so, if they are to happen. I guarantee you that any such change will be spun by the lamestream media as Bush’s fault, probably accompanied by NYT and WaPo opinion pieces bemoaning what a dumb thing it was to get rid of Rumsfeld.

It sure would be interesting if Charlie Rangel’s (D-NY) idea of reinstating the draft had to be implemented by a Democratic congress in order to maintain military force levels. I wonder what the political fallout from that would be in ’08.

As an aside, I also think that diminished capacity of our conventional forces, especially the Army and Marines, tends to make nuclear war more likely, because weakness encourages the enemy to attack, and when you must fight, you fight with what you have.

Nothing promotes war like weakness.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Okay, here’s a theory: Rumsfeld’s out. Gates is supposed to succeed him. Dems try to block Gates out of sheer obstructionist behavior. Gates is withdrawn and in comes . . . Joe Lieberman as SecDef! With his seat going to an appointee of the GOP governor.

Nah, if they were that smart they’d still control Congress.

GENERAL RICHARD MYERS talks about Donald Rumsfeld.

Meanwhile, Laura Lee Donoho emails: “My son emails me from Iraq that he and his fellow troops are in a funk about the resignation of Don Rumsfeld. This is the first time in a long time that President Bush has really pissed me off.”

And she’s posted some further thoughts here.

ME, ERIC UMANSKY, AND AUSTIN BAY: On the post-election edition of Blog Week in Review.

HOW THE REPUBLICANS CAN LOSE IN 2008: Just have Bush go wobbly now.

THE REVOLUTION DEVOURS ITS CHILDREN:

Some big name Democrats want to oust DNC Chairman Howard Dean, arguing that his stubborn commitment to the 50-state strategy and his stinginess with funds for House races cost the Democrats several pickup opportunities.

The candidate being floated to replace Dean? Harold Ford.

A “Jesus-loving gun-supporting” chair of the DNC? I say, bring it on! It’ll be fun to watch the reaction at Firedoglake.

Plus, it’ll free up Dean to run for President in 2008. Yeearrrgh!

UPDATE: More on Ford here: “He’s clearly a smart, talented guy who, like Steele in Maryland, acquitted himself very well in this year’s campaign but came up short.” I think that’s right. Steele was a Republican running in a state that leans Dem; Ford a Dem running in a state that leans GOP.

IN THE MAIL: A book that argues that the danger of terrrorism is overblown.

I hope that’s right, but, er, isn’t that what Larry Johnson was arguing in the summer of 2001?

RADLEY BALKO:

Mollahan is, to say the least, “ethically challenged.” There’s no sensible reason for him to retain his seat on the most powerful committee in the House of Representatives. If Nancy Pelosi is serious about “draining the swamp,” she’ll kick Mollohan off the appropriations committee before she pounds her first gavel.

As for Byrd, his history of earmarking excesses makes Ted Stevens look like Ron Paul. Earmarking is little more than legalized corruption. It’s buying votes. Not only did Robert Byrd perfect the practice, he’s the one who put a “secret hold” on a bill that wouldn’t have even eliminated the practice, but would merely have added a bit of transparency to it. Democrats who rightly railed against the “Bridge to Nowhere” can’t be taken seriously if they sit back and let Byrd resume diverting millions of taxpayer dollars to wasteful pork projects in West Virginia. Harry Reid should remove him from the Senate Appropriations Committee.

It won’t be easy — Byrd in particular is likely to raise holy hell. But if you’re going to change the culture of corruption in Washington, you’d go a long way toward demonstrating your seriousness by starting with your own party.

It would also be nice to see the lefty blogs pick up on this, and give Pelosi and Reid the cover they need to do the right thing.

UPDATE: Several readers have written to point out that Pelosi is set to pass over Rep. Jane Harman to make Rep. Alcee Hastings chair of the Intelligence Committee. Hastings is of course a formal federal judge who was impeached and removed from the bench by a Democratic Congress in 1989 for taking bribes. Apparently, the Congressional Black Caucus is demanding a chairmanship for Hastings to compensate for the loss of influence caused by Rep. William Jefferson’s removal from the Appropriations Committee — also due to corruption.

This, within 72 hours of the election. Meet the new boss…

Not the only libertarian to be suffering buyer’s remorse. . . .

AN EXAMINER EDITORIAL on the Republican leadership:

The GOP majority’s electoral fate was sealed by the corrupt political culture embodied in the Bridge to Nowhere and the congressional leadership’s inability or unwillingness to put a stop to anonymous earmarking.

So what now? The first order of business is fresh leadership. Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind., has announced for House Minority Leader. Pence is a charismatic Reaganaut who has often led the conservative majority of the GOP in opposition to the Bush administration’s Big Government Republicanism on issues like spending and entitlements.

Pence clearly understands the GOP’s problem. . . .

On the Senate side, nothing would better demonstrate a new GOP commitment to its conservative principles than the promotion of Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., who more than anybody else in the Senate in recent years demonstrated an unswerving devotion to advancing conservative principles and programs.

Coburn particularly makes sense when it is understood that the Senate minority leader is not so much a legislative position as it is first and foremost a bully pulpit for articulating the case for reducing federal spending and intrusiveness, shining more light in the dark corners of Washington’s entrenched bureaucratic corruption and projecting creative ways of expanding individual choice and freedom for all Americans. Coburn has some rough edges, to be sure, and Old Bulls like Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, and Trent Lott, R-Mo., have fought him at every turn. But listening to Old Bulls in great part is what got the GOP in its present straits.

Old bulls spouting old bull . . . .

HAPPY BIRTHDAY to the Marines!

I NOTED EARLIER that Ann Althouse is depressed about the elections, and looking around it seems that a lot of people feel that way. Well, I understand that, God knows. But one iron rule of elections is that you win some and you lose some. And people tend to exaggerate their importance and, if they’re on the losing side, catastrophize.

I remember lots of gloom-and-doom and catastrophization in the gun rights community ten or twelve years ago. Defeat seemed inexorable, the media were all on the other side, the politicians who were supposed to be on the right side of the issue couldnt’ be trusted, the electorate seemed easily manipulated, and — well, enough. Sound familiar?

Ten years later the Democrats won’t touch the gun issue, right-to-carry laws are passing in state after state, and the “assault weapons ban” — once seen as the camel’s nose in the tent — has expired. How did that happen? Not because of gloom and doom, but because people worked to make it happen: worked politically, worked in terms of communications and media, worked in terms of not getting discouraged but just plugging away. Want the electorate to come around to your views? You’ve got to persuade them. Over the years, I’ve seen this hold true for one issue after another.

Is this a “detached and academic” perspective? Well, I am an academic, after all, and I’d probably be detached about the end of the world, which this isn’t. Maybe I “lack fire,” but I think it’s a realistic perspective, borne of experience. It’s okay to feel bad for a while. Maybe it’s even therapeutic. But ultimately, things happen because people want to make them happen, and work to make it so.

Meanwhile I note that Rush Limbaugh, who was complaining about my pre-mortem before, now says he feels “liberated” because he’s able to say things like . . . what I said back before the election. Well, better late than never, but one problem with the GOP is that it lost touch with the things it was supposed to stand for, and a little more tough love from Limbaugh before the election might have done some good.

AMERICAN TROOPS fear the loss of Rumsfeld. “Indeed, some members of the 101st Airborne Division and other troops approached by The Times as they prepared to fly home from Baghdad airport yesterday expressed concern that Robert Gates, Mr Rumsfeld’s successor, and the Democrat-controlled Congress, might seek to wind down their mission before it was finished.”

CLAUDIA ROSETT wonders why the U.N. is meddling in U.S. politics by trying to block the Bolton nomination. ” It’s the job of those wearing the hats of UN staffers to serve the member states, not advise them on choosing their ambassadors. Would Kofi Annan and his deputy, Mark Malloch Brown (who as the UN’s #2 has done plenty of his own opining about U.S. domestic politics), care to tell us whether anyone else carrying a UN calling card has been making the rounds of U.S. senators to offer opinions on Bolton’s confirmation?”

ANN ALTHOUSE IS DEPRESSED: “It’s the failure of Americans to support the war. It’s the folding and crumpling because things didn’t go well enough and the way we conspicuously displayed that to our enemies. They’re going to use that information. For how long? Forever.”

It’s okay to be depressed. It’s just not OK to give up.

Austin Bay takes a less negative view.

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED at The New York Times!

JOHN TAMMES ROUNDS UP news from Afghanistan.

WELL, IT WAS A “NEW DIRECTION” IN 1972: Democrats seek war advice from George McGovern.