Better Banter

Jay Nordlinger had about the same reaction as me to the debate, and gives some more detail about where the President failed last night. On a side note, I wonder the effects of spin-meisters spinning Bush's side last night. I was aghast watching Karen Hughes tell the world Bush slam-dunked the debate. Does that change anyone's mind who actually watched it? If I were a fence-sitting voter, and I watched with my own eyes Bush stumble through 90 minutes of debate, robotically repeating the same four paragraphs over and over, I'd think, "well, he didn't do too well." If I then saw everyone on his side saying what a great job he did, I'd be inclined to think, "well, then I guess their side doesn't have a whole lot to say." Maddening.

There, I'll be the one to say it. I thought the President was horrible last night. Yes, he got across a few points, and hammered them home (ad nauseum). No, he didn't say anything that will come back to haunt him, and no, John Kerry did not really get off any memorable lines that will haunt the President later either. But Bush should have wiped the floor with him. He had so much on his side. So many facts and arguments about his record and his opponents. But he offered next to nothing to the American people. Nearly everything he said echoed exactly what he's said in 30-second sound bites for months. This was the opportunity to explain what we're doing in detail, and why Kerry's 30-second sound bites are off the mark. Instead, Bush simply cycled through 30-second clips again and again. Unfortunately for my wife, I like to talk to the TV during these things. At one point I was on the floor mumbling "no, no, no..." So after an hour of listening to me...

Two scary stories in the news this morning. The first is that Russia may ratify Kyoto . Putin's government has blessed it, but it still must be ratified by their parliament. The Kyoto treaty becomes binding when it has been ratified by countries representing 55% of the world's emissions. Without Russia, emissions of ratifiying nations total 44%. Russia accounts for 17% of the world's emissions. You do the math. As if Europe weren't struggling enough with the financial demands of cradle-to-grave socialism, Industry, which pays the bills, will be taxed (literally and metaphorically) like never before. The irony, of course, is that Kyoto came into being ostensibly to prevent a global-warming apocalypse. In fact, Kyoto may spark an economic apocalypse to give Ayn Rand posthumous nightmares. And if the world's economy collapses, you can bet your last ruble that the environment won't be improving anytime soon. What could the Russians be thinking? This can...

Is Iraq a quagmire, or a tough fight? There's a big difference, and Lt. Col Powl Smith gives us an interesting comparison .

Check out the following Reuters story: GAZA (Reuters) - Ten Palestinians and three Israelis were killed in Gaza on Thursday as Israeli forces thrust deep into the largest Palestinian refugee camp after a rocket attack killed two Israeli children in a border town. It was one of the highest single-day death tolls in Gaza in months. The Israeli dead included at least one soldier and a woman jogger. The Palestinian dead included both militants and civilians, hospital officials said. The courage of the Israeli people to persevere despite the near-constant danger is amazing. How many of us would go jogging in Gaza?

Brett Rogers of OpinionPaper has issued a challenge to conservative bloggers to do two things: 1) Put up a "top" post urging visitors to get out the vote for Bush, and 2) Bring one other Bush voter to the polls on election day. A noble idea, indeed. See #1 on the left. Have been doggedly working on the other...

After reading Jed Babbin's piece in NRO today about Kerry and troop morale I realized my previous post may not have quite hit the mark. What John Kerry has demonstrated, through his words and actions, is that he does not believe in our mission in Iraq. Babbin points out that our troops do, and there can be nothing more demoralizing to our troops in the field than the knowledge that their President, entrusted with their lives, would choose to waste those lives on a mission he does not believe in. He has said it's a mistake. But he also said he would not "cut and run." Meaning he will keep troops there, for a time, for reasons that do not include "victory". Babbin notes that this will give the troops the impression that they are wasting their time and blood: To say, as Kerry does, that we should begin withdrawing our troops in six months and — with the help of the phantom allies he will get to take over in Iraq — be out altogether in four years, says...

I had a chance this weekend to view the documentary Stolen Honor , which details the effects of the anti-war movement, and John Kerry's actions in particular, on American POWs in Vietnam. Katie O'Beirne provided a nice write-up on NRO a couple of weeks ago, which is worth a read . Stolen Honor was produced by Carlton Sherwood, a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist. In it, he interviews 13 former POWs. Two received the Congressional Medal of Honor. Many were imprisoned more than seven years. What I gained from watching this documentary was a sense of perspective. John Kerry's war credentials are "unimpeachable," as the story goes. He is a "war hero," and the Bush campaign cannot touch this due to Bush's own Vietnam story (or lack thereof). While the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth put enough holes in Kerry's story to sink it, a few inconsistencies have left a glimmer of plausible deniability, meaning, in the real world of network news, the accu...

I have to agree with Stephen's post about pulling Pedro. The Grady Little parallels are obvious, but what's interesting is how the same conclusion was reached two different ways. In Game 7 of the ALCS last year, Grady left Pedro to pitch the eighth, presumably because he lacked confidence in the bullpen. The bullpen, however, though much maligned throughout the year, was damn near perfect in the postseason. Further, Pedro was not and is not a horse. He does not eat up innings. He does not complete many games. He was near the end of his rope, and Grady was just hoping there was a little more left. After a little trouble, it should have been obvious he was done, but Grady did not take the hint, and the Yankees won the pennant. After the season, Grady was fired. Not entirely because of Game 7 but because he was not a manager who looked at numbers. Theo Epstein wanted a guy who would run the club like an NFL coach and know every matchup, and prepare moves and countermoves based ...

The Yankees are in Boston this weekend. Political posting may take a back seat to a truly partisan rivalry.

A town that was a haven for American draft dodgers thirty-plus years ago has created a monument depicting a Canadian welcoming two scared American men. I can manage no further comment.

Andrew McCarthy has contributed an essay on the war in Iraq which should be required reading for all Americans. McCarthy takes John Kerry's premise that the war is a "diversion" from the war on terror, and makes the case that Kerry is right, although not in the way that Kerry thinks. McCarthy argues that the "war on terror" is inappropriately named, and is truly a "war on militant Islam." This mislabeling has in part led to our difficulties in Iraq, both real and perceived. He makes a compelling argument for why the WMD argument was always the wrong one, and why those weapons truly didn't matter. The Bush Administration's line on why the war was justified though no WMDs showed up was that Saddam was a murderous dictator. While true, it is still not why we should have gone to war. If we were waging a "war on militant Islam", it would be very easy to make the case that Saddam has been at least as enabling of militant Islam as the ...

Curious as to liberal reaction to "Rathergate" I checked in with our friends at The Nation . John Nichols, who writes The Online Beat blog column, takes what I consider to be a sensible approach to the scandal. He is furious at CBS for being so sloppy, because it now makes Bush's Guard service almost untouchable. Here's where he starts to go down a questionable path: After more than a month of virtually round-the-clock assessment of Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry's Vietnam service, major media has a responsibility to reexamine the president's controversial service record. The round-the-clock coverage was due to two factors: 1) Senator Kerry has used his Vietnam service prominiently in his campaign, almost to the extent that it is his sole qualification for office. 2) There was new information being publicized, in the form of a book by John O'Neill, and an organization called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. George Bush has not paint...

In light of Kerry's "new" position that he never would have deposed Saddam Hussein, what can he possibly have to say about stories like this one in the Sacramento Bee ? UPDATE: Brett Rogers of Opinion Paper notes this story also, and has some Google stats on the media coverage (or lack thereof) it's been getting. He contrasts this with what happens when an Iraqi critical of the U.S. speaks out.

Just when you think John Kerry has taken every possible position on Iraq, he comes up with another one. Today, Kerry said flat out that he would not have overthrown Saddam Hussein had he been President. This would have been a clear loser position for the Massachusetts Senator even a year ago. But with the bad news coming more frequently from Iraq, it appears that Kerry has decided to make his move. He is gambling that his anti-war, bring-the-troops home message will resonate with swing voters (if they were swing voters while things were not so bad, how can they not side with him when things are ugly?). In taking this side, he must paint the war as a catastrophe. Unfortunately, this means that any news coming out of Iraq, good or bad, for the next six weeks will be politicized like never before. It means that in order for John Kerry to win, America has to lose. It's a crisp, October day, and the press is buzzing in Washington. U.S. forces have just acheived an incredible vi...

"Out on the road today, I saw a DEADHEAD sticker on a Cadillac, A little voice Inside my head said, 'Don't look back. You can never look back.'" -- Don Henley Well, I got him beat. Driving home this afternoon I saw George W. Bush stickers on not one, but TWO Volkswagens. Several years ago, my former boss, who was an avid Volkswagen collector, and a colleague, another VW owner and enthusiast, were at a party and having a conversation about... Volkswagens. I think I had accidentally stumbled into the conversation, and finding no easy way out, just stood there, glazed over. At one point they began discussing the various "types" of VW drivers, and one of them looked at me and said, "Howard's kind of a 'Jetta' guy, I think." This, of course, being because the Jetta is the most conservative and "square" VW (apparently). This stuck in my head because I thought they were batty. Sure, a Jetta driver may be conservative i...

The Manila Times has a story about a Japanese man who worked with a biological weapons unit during WWII. Now an old man, he is speaking out about his atrocities, so that they will not be forgotten. We tend to flip around the acronym "WMD" fairly casually these days, particularly since none have been found in Iraq. This article is a reminder of what Saddam's regime, at some point in the not-too-distant past, was striving for. And this is the reason we could take no chances, and could give Saddam no benefit of the doubt as to his capabilities or intentions.

My good sense told me "don't post a thing" regarding the Red Sox win Friday night. I thought maybe if I didn't do any idiot-Red-Sox-Fan predicting, I wouldn't hurt the team, but in my heart I knew better, and I also knew I had to risk it... for the sake of the blog. I would like to declare for the record that I do not begrudge the Yankees any of their money, as I am a capitalist. I would also like to concede Stephen's point that many of those who are anti-Yankees spout leftist drivel. In fact, I commented to a friend recently on the topic of anti-Americanism, and explained that it was very much like hating the Yankees. They have the success, the history, the legends, the ballpark, the mystique, and of course all the money. No other team quite measures up in this regard, so the reaction is envy. But no one wants to admit being envious, so they become a little mean, a little irrational, and work up a good jealous hatred. They become like Europeans. Of cour...

Not gloating, just reporting.

During the Democratic primary season, when every other word out of even the most serious presidential contenders referred to the Vice President's former company, I had an idea. I would write a musical, called "Halliburton! Halliburton!" in which the protagonist tries to get serious answers out of liberals. Each time he gets close to exposing them for what they are, the chorus (yes, there would be an old-school Greek chorus) would start singing the Halliburton theme song and drown out any further questions. I haven't quit my day job. But each time the Halliburton cry crops up in the media, I get that song in my head (I came up with the refrain and melody while mowing my lawn one day) and smile. Today is such a day. Stuck in an electoral quagmire of his own making, John Kerry is now coming out with a Halliburton-themed ad. The attack this time is on Cheney's deferred compensation. Yes, he's still being paid by Halliburton. However, his compensation has ...