JULES CRITTENDEN ON IRAQ, BACK IN 2008:

This is not a simple war to understand, and it has been going on for decades. It has expressed itself with everything from low-grade terrorism to conventional war to nuclear threats, across multiple continents, and with many, seemingly unconnected, adversaries. Just the part of it we call the Iraq war has involved many different, and not always distinct, adversaries in numerous, overlapping conflicts. Faced with this kind of complexity, it isn’t so surprising that vague messages of “hope” and “change” resonate with the American public, and politicians vie for the right to own those terms.

The shallowness of the debate suggests our nation is in danger of failing the test of our time. The abstract circumstances of cause and consequence in this war have fostered an avoidance of reality in some quarters–and at some of the highest levels of our leadership, often quite nakedly for purposes of political gain. Would-be leaders would rather play to emotions than make the hard calculations that adulthood forces on us.

Iraq has become the central battlefield in the 21st century’s Islamic war, and may have been destined to be, with or without us. Lying geographically, ideologically, and culturally athwart the Middle East, rich in resources and boiling with rage long before we got there, it is the place where the war will either be settled or truly begun. It is a fitting role for the cradle of civilization to host a war in which the very progress of civilization is being challenged.

While there were terrible errors made in going to war in Iraq, the decision to go to war was not one of them. . . .

Five years on, the threat Saddam Hussein posed to regional stability–global stability, if you consider the resources he sought to control–has been neutralized. The toll in American and Iraqi lives to date may well have averted a far worse toll, though we can yet get the full accounting if we withdraw precipitously. The deadly influence of Iran remains limited by our presence in Iraq and by the still somewhat credible threat to use force against its nuclear ambitions. Iraqi genocide and the remaking of the map of the Middle East to the benefit of the Islamic Republic of Iran remain potent what-ifs.

The side benefits of the 2003 invasion included a briefly more compliant Iran and capitulation by Libya. The beacon of democracy shined, with successful, if sometimes problematic, democracies emerging in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Lebanon and with democratic movements making gains elsewhere in the Islamic world. Even the Palestinians had a crack at it and have learned that choices come with consequences. Those parties most threatened by civil order find themselves increasingly marginalized within the larger Islamic world, from Hamas in Gaza, to Syria and Hezbollah in Lebanon, to the Pakistani Taliban.

Yeah, well Obama pretty much threw all that away. Now he’s bringing us Iraq War II — halfhearted, on the cheap, and run by committee. And we’ll be very lucky indeed if, at the end of Obama’s presidency, things are as good in the Middle East as they were at the beginning of Obama’s presidency.

TRAIN WRECK UPDATE: Minnesota’s Biggest Obamacare Insurer Leaves Exchange. “PreferredOne was the least expensive insurer in the Minnesota’s state-run Obamacare exchange last year. It was also the most successful at signing up customers, capturing 59 percent of the state’s market for private plans, according to CBS Minnesota. And now it’s leaving the exchange, and the 30,000 people who had enrolled in its coverage.”

ALSO NO TO BECOMING VENEZUELA WITH A WORSE CLIMATE, I SUSPECT: Scotland Votes No On Independence.

SOMEHOW, IT’S NEVER A TEA PARTIER: Guy Who Threw Molotov Cocktail Into Congressman’s Office Was Active In Occupy Movement.

TEACH WOMEN NOT TO RAPE! (CONT’D):

For many feminists, questioning claims of rampant sexual violence in our society amounts to misogynist “rape denial.” However, if the CDC figures are to be taken at face value, then we must also conclude that, far from being a product of patriarchal violence against women, “rape culture” is a two-way street, with plenty of female perpetrators and male victims.

How could that be? After all, very few men in the CDC study were classified as victims of rape: 1.7 percent in their lifetime, and too few for a reliable estimate in the past year. But these numbers refer only to men who have been forced into anal sex or made to perform oral sex on another male. Nearly 7 percent of men, however, reported that at some point in their lives, they were “made to penetrate” another person—usually in reference to vaginal intercourse, receiving oral sex, or performing oral sex on a woman. This was not classified as rape, but as “other sexual violence.”

And now the real surprise: when asked about experiences in the last 12 months, men reported being “made to penetrate”—either by physical force or due to intoxication—at virtually the same rates as women reported rape (both 1.1 percent in 2010, and 1.7 and 1.6 respectively in 2011).

In other words, if being made to penetrate someone was counted as rape—and why shouldn’t it be?—then the headlines could have focused on a truly sensational CDC finding: that women rape men as often as men rape women.

Rape culture, indeed.

I LIKE IT THAT THEY’RE TAKING THE OFFENSIVE HERE: FIRE Mails First Amendment Warning to More Than 300 Colleges. “In a national certified mailing sent today, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) warns the leaders of more than 300 of our nation’s largest and most prestigious public colleges and universities that they risk First Amendment lawsuits by continuing to maintain speech codes that violate student and faculty rights. . . . The letter informs college and university leaders about FIRE’s Stand Up For Speech Litigation Project, announced in July with the filing of First Amendment lawsuits against Ohio University, Iowa State University, Chicago State University, and Citrus College in California. As the letter details, lawsuits will be filed against public colleges maintaining unconstitutional speech codes in each federal circuit. After each victory by ruling or settlement, FIRE will target another school in the same circuit—sending a message that unless public colleges obey the law, they will be sued.”

THAT’S FUNNY — IT SEEMS LIKE EVERY INSTITUTION CONTROLLED BY THE LEFT DOES: Science Has a Sexual Assault Problem.

CATHY YOUNG: Crying Rape: False rape accusations exist, and they are a serious problem.

IT’S NOT PLAGIARISM, SHE’S JUST, ER, REDISTRIBUTING INTELLECTUAL CAPITAL: Wisconsin Democratic Gubernatorial Candidate Plagiarized Large Portions Of Jobs Plan.

SO MUCH FOR DIVERSITY: Conservative Columnist for Cornell Newspaper Personally Attacked in Anonymously Distributed Flyers.

WORRIES ON TWITTER: Isn’t “Catalist,” the Democrats micro-targeting GOTV database the answer to why every Fed agency has been engaged in creepy data mining?

FOR TOMORROW’S INSTAVISION, I ANTICIPATED THE MARKET RESPONSE TO CAMPUS SEXUAL ASSAULT HYSTERIA. Here it is.

WHY #GAMERGATE MATTERS:

Finally, that framing of #GamerGate is precisely the kind of journalistic malpractice that created the firestorm in the first place. Gamers do not think girls are taking away their toys nor are they angry about women increasingly entering the industry, but they are tired of watching people who claim to be journalists pushing their particular social agenda, smearing people with the actions of the few trolls that exist in every community, and getting into bed with the subjects they cover.

Yes, the spark that ignited this firestorm involved the personal sexual activities of a female developer, but even then gamers were hardly concerned with her sexual proclivities, only the resultant conflict of interest her choice of partners had created. Rather than investigating if the accusations of malfeasance leveled against her and her partners had any merit, the games media sought to suppress any discussion of the issue at all. Were it not for that attempted censorship, the simmering pool of discontentment that had been building for so long within the community likely would not have been set ablaze. Then, rather than squelching that fire by admitting their mistakes and addressing gamers’ concerns, the gaming media effectively soaked themselves in gasoline and took a run through the flames by turning on their readers and maligning them as hateful misogynists.

As a result, we have people of all genders, races, and political persuasions banding together to demand objectivity and transparency in journalism, while pushing efforts that promote actual equality rather than the faux equality of outcomes and quotas. And despite the vehement attacks upon them, they have already succeeded in forcing several major outlets to re-examine their policies and in funding the efforts of a group the social justice crowd attempted to destroy.

The “social justice warrior” crowd isn’t about social justice. It’s about using race-and-gender talk to keep people in their place. In exchange for this, they get to cement their position on one of the lower rungs of the New Class.

PETER THIEL IS TRYING THE RIGHT THINGS: Technology Stalled in 1970: Peter Thiel says he’s trying to get entrepreneurs to go after bigger problems than the ones Silicon Valley is chasing. “[Twitter’s] specific success may be symptomatic of a general failure. Even though it improves our lives in certain ways, it is not enough to take our civilization to the next level. . . . You have to think of companies like Microsoft or Oracle or Hewlett-Packard as fundamentally bets against technology. They keep throwing off profits as long as nothing changes. Microsoft was a technology company in the ’80s and ’90s; in this decade you invest because you’re betting on the world not changing. Pharma companies are bets against innovation because they’re mostly just figuring out ways to extend the lifetime of patents and block small companies. All these companies that start as technological companies become antitechnological in character. Whether the world changes or not might vary from company to company, but if it turns out that these antitechnology companies are going to be good investments, that’s quite bad for our society.”

I had some kind-of-related thoughts here.

ED DRISCOLL: Barack Obama Transformed into Lyndon Johnson So Slowly, I Hardly Even Noticed.

AT AMAZON, deals on Generators & Portable Power for storm season.

Plus, bestsellers in Men’s Grooming.

JON GABRIEL: Obama Can’t Afford To Win In Iraq. “He can’t afford to. If the projection of American military power successfully solved the problem of Islamic terrorism, it would shatter Obama’s entire worldview.”

NOAH ROTHMAN: The Left’s War On Football. I’m torn. On the one hand, I understand they’re attacking it because it’s unacceptably masculine. On the other hand, the NFL has become such a bunch of PC pantywaists — remember when they caved to a lefty pressure campaign to get rid of Rush Limbaugh? — that I’m inclined to just let it burn.

SPYING: Apple will no longer unlock most iPhones, iPads for police, even with search warrants.

The move, announced with the publication of a new privacy policy tied to the release of Apple’s latest mobile operating system, iOS 8, amounts to an engineering solution to a legal quandary: Rather than comply with binding court orders, Apple has reworked its latest encryption in a way that prevents the company — or anyone but the device’s owner — from gaining access to the vast troves of user data typically stored on smartphones or tablet computers.

The key is the encryption that Apple mobile devices automatically put in place when a user selects a passcode, making it difficult for anyone who lacks that passcode to access the information within, including photos, e-mails and recordings. Apple once maintained the ability to unlock some content on devices for legally binding police requests but will no longer do so for iOS 8, it said in the new privacy policy.

“Unlike our competitors, Apple cannot bypass your passcode and therefore cannot access this data,” Apple said on its Web site. “So it’s not technically feasible for us to respond to government warrants for the extraction of this data from devices in their possession running iOS 8.”

Security as a selling point. I think we’ll see more of this.

SPYING: Middle-School Dropout Codes Clever Chat Program That Foils NSA Spying.

DOESN’T ADVANCE THE NARRATIVE: Media Apathetic on Abuse Charges Against Soccer Star Hope Solo.

STEPHEN GREEN EXPLAINS THINGS TO THE SLATE CROWD: No, Jillian, Spanking Is Not Sex.

WAR ON TESTOSTERONE: F.D.A. Panel Backs Limits on Testosterone Drugs. “An expert panel voted overwhelmingly on Wednesday for the Food and Drug Administration to impose strict new limitations on the multibillion-dollar testosterone drug industry, recommending that the agency tighten labels for the medicines so they are not prescribed to men who only have problems related to aging, such as low energy and libido. The F.D.A. often takes the advice of such panels.” I’m leery of this stuff, but I have a friend who went on testosterone therapy 12 years ago and who says it changed his life.

AT AMAZON, Fall Deals on Men’s Shoes.

Also, shop the Tailgating Party Store.

WILL THE IPHONE 6’S CAMERA REVOLUTIONIZE FILMMAKING? “Amidst all the hoopla over the new iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus and their motion processors, faster CPUs, and larger screens, it was also announced that Apple’s latest smartphones would have a much better camera. And while that’s great news for those looking to take less-wack selfies at the bar, the new video features that come along with it mean something else: a high-quality camera filmmakers—and those who aspire to be—can keep in their pockets.”