How does the man do it?

Mark Steyn: the man is a first-class column machine-gun stud. I can't imagine how any single human could produce stuff of this quality day in and day out.

And I didn't think anybody was going to be able to make me smile today, much less laugh. But Mark did:

Do you remember a fellow called Robert Wendland? No reason why you should. I wrote about him in this space in 1998, and had intended to return to the subject but something else always intervened — usually Bill Clinton’s penis, which loomed large, at least metaphorically, over the entire era. Mr Wendland lived in Stockton, California. He was injured in an automobile accident in 1993 and went into a coma. Under state law, he could have been starved to death at any time had his wife requested the removal of his feeding tube. But Rose Wendland was busy with this and that, as one is, and assumed there was no particular urgency.

Then one day, a year later, Robert woke up. He wasn’t exactly his old self, but he could catch and throw a ball and wheel his chair up and down the hospital corridors, and both activities gave him pleasure. Nevertheless Mrs Wendland decided that she now wished to exercise her right to have him dehydrated to death. Her justification was that, while the actual living Robert — the Robert of the mid-1990s — might enjoy a simple life of ball-catching and chair-rolling, the old Robert — the pre-1993 Robert — would have considered it a crashing bore and would have wanted no part of it.

You'll be sorry if you don't read the whole thing.

Tell me it ain't so!

Would you believe that 11 illegal aliens could board an U.S. airliner with minimal ID? Bryan Preston posts this scary report on Michelle Malkin's great new Immigration Blog.

The good news is that an air marshal's vigilence led to the capture of these illegal aliens, and they are now detained pending a deportation hearing (and after they're deported they'll probably bounce right back in, but that's another story). The bad news is that they got on that plane in the first place. As Bryan reports it:

Good for the air marshalls on this one, but bad for airline security. Read that second paragraph again--how did the illegals get on that plane? By presenting a "Mexican voter registration card that contained a name, age and photo." That should not be sufficient ID to board a plane in the post-911 United States. And yet it is.

Chances are, by the way, that the "voter registration card" in this story is actually a matricula consular card. Those cards are issued by the Mexican government to...well...just about anyone:

Management of Chaos

Nice report, TigerHawk. A teaser excerpt:

So where does the war stand now, according to al Qaeda? A leading al Qaeda operative has written a book, the title of which translates loosely to “The Management of Chaos.” According to al Qaeda, the current stage of revolution is the stage of “vexation and exhaustion” of the enemy. They have a notion of how to do this to the Americans and to their 'puppets'.

You vex and exhaust the Americans, according to al Qaeda, by making them spend a lot of money. The United States is a materialist society, and if forced to spend too much money it will “cut and run.”

The means to this end is to force the Americans to spread themselves thinly. Al Qaeda wants to strike everywhere, not just spectacular high value attacks. This will cause the Americans to defend a lot of places at high cost.

In addition, al Qaeda wants to force Americans to carry the war into the heartland of the Middle East [We have obliged them in this. - ed.] There are two reasons why al Qaeda sought an American invasion in the Middle East. First, it will be very costly for the United States and will therefore drain our treasury. Second, bringing the war to the heartland will have a polarizing effect within Muslim society. Doran believes that they borrowed this “polarization” idea from Palestinian organizations of the 60s and 70s. Americans striking back “without precision” will polarize Muslim society between supporters and proponents of jihad.

It is not necessary, according to al Qaeda, that they get the great masses on their side. The goal is to win over “an important segment of the youth.” Their propaganda is directed to young men. One of their propagandists says that “if we can win over only 5% of one billion Muslims, we will have an unbeatable army.”

Now go read the whole thing. There will be a test afterward. The lecture was by Professor Michael Doran.

That Lance

The Lance in Iraq blog of 1st LT Lance Frizzell has become a regular part of my blog-reading routine. Read it for a few days and I suspect you'll be hooked as well. Today he posted some commentary about the importance of winning over the Iraqi teens, along with a selection of endearing pictures like the one I've reproduced here. Don't miss it!

Hat tip to Lance for the pointer to this article on the significance of the Iraqi teens...

A big prize

Dr. Boyle is a radiologist who also happens to have an excellent blog. He's not happy about what he's heard on the media about the interpretation of Terri Schiavo's CT scans. His central points are:

-- The TV talking head docs pontificating on the CT scans are neurologists, not radiologists...and neurologists don't interpret CT brain scans, radiologists do.

-- He does not believe it is possible to reliably diagnose persistent vegetative state from CT scans.

And he's willing to put his money where his mouth is:

Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?

To prove my point I am offering $100,000 on a $25,000 wager for ANY neurologist (and $125,000 for any neurologist/bioethicist) involved in Terri Schiavo's case--including all the neurologists reviewed on television and in the newspapers who can accurately single out PVS patients from functioning patients with better than 60% accuracy on CT scans.

I will provide 100 single cuts from 100 different patient's brain CT's. All the neurologist has to do is say which ones represent patients with PVS and which do not.

If the neurologist can be right 6 out of 10 times he wins the $100,000.

I Said What I Meant, And I Meant What I Said

My points are what I first said about the image from Terri Schiavo's CT scan:

1) It is NOT as bad as the neurologists and bioethicists play it up to be; and,

2) There are many elderly patients with various levels of mental functioning who have severe atrophy that is difficult to distinguish from Terri Schiavo's atrophy

I stand by what I said. And I'm putting my money where my mouth is.

First, I can't help but applaud Dr. Boyle's activism here. Whether he's right or wrong, good for him for standing up and so forcefully making his case.

But on a different level, I find this quite troubling. Dr. Boyle is making a credible case (and standing behind it with his personal fortune!) that Terri's 'diagnosis' is even more flawed than I had heretofore believed. Making it even more likely that Terri has (had?) some hope of partial recovery through appropriate (but untried) therapy. And making it even more horrible that the courts have condemned her to die by starvation and dehydration. How could we let this happen in the U.S.? This is a series of actions of the type I'd expect to find in a place like North Korea or Yemen, not here...

Hat tip to Michelle Malkin for the pointer to this story...

We should worry

Peggy Noonan, writing in today's Opinion Journal, warns Republicans not to be dismissive of Hillary's run:

Republicans--I have been among many--are now in the stage of the Hillary Conversation in which they are beginning to grouse about those who keep warning that Mrs. Clinton will be a formidable candidate for president in 2008. She won't be so tough, they say. America will never elect a woman like her, with such a sketchy history--financial scandals, political pardons, the whole mess that took place between 1980 and 2000.

I tell them they are wrong. First, it is good to be concerned about Mrs. Clinton, for she is coming down the pike. It is pointless to be afraid, but good to be concerned. Why? Because we live in a more or less 50-50 nation; because Mrs. Clinton is smarter than her husband and has become a better campaigner on the ground; because her warmth and humor seem less oily; because she has struck out a new rhetorically (though not legislatively) moderate course; because you don't play every card right the way she's been playing every card right the past five years unless you have real talent; because unlike her husband she has found it possible to grow more emotionally mature; because the presidency is the bright sharp focus of everything she does each day; because she is not going to get seriously dinged in the 2008 primaries but will likely face challengers who make her look even more moderate and stable; and because in 2008 we will have millions of 18- to 24-year-old voters who have no memory of her as the harridan of the East Wing and the nutty professor of HillaryCare.

The Hillary those young adults remember will be the senator--chuckling with a throaty chuckle, bantering amiably with Lindsey Graham, maternal and moderate and strong. Add to that this: Half the MSM will be for her, and the other half will be afraid of the half that is for her. (You think journalists are afraid of the right? Journalists are afraid of each other.) And on top of all that, It's time for a woman. Almost every young woman in America, every tough old suburban momma, every unmarried urban high-heel-wearing, briefcase-toting corporate lawyer will be saying it. They'll be working for, rooting for, giving to the woman.

I am of course exaggerating, but not by much.

Of course underestimation of a political opponent is an absolutely classic mistake to make. I dismiss Hillary's opinions and world view (as expressed through the prism of her overriding ambition) all the time; 'tis but a small step from there to being dismissive of her political skills. I can easily see this happening -- much as happened to Mr. Bush in 2000. I'm with Peggy; I hope the Republican powers-that-be don't make the mistake of 'misunderestimating' Hillary Clinton.

Because the consequences would be very hard to bear...

Quote for the day

# It will be of little avail to the people that the laws are made by men of their own choice if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood.

   Alexander Hamilton

A young Afghani

Waheed at Afghan Warrior posts and interesting Q & A.

Katz on Terri

This note resonates strongly with me. A hat tip to American Thinker. I reproduce the short note in its entirety:The essence of the Terri Schiavo case is simple, all ink and hot air to the contrary. We, as a society, the government and people of the United States of

America, have not managed, for whatever reasons, to permit a mother, deluded or not, to put water onto the lips of her dying child, brain dead or not.

Everything else, every legal, moral, theological, constitutional, or philosophical argument, is a sideshow, diverting attention from the essential issue of this case.

We have wounded our national character. By our actions, or inactions, we have placed ourselves one notch less, above the Nazis.

We, as a people, have so shamed ourselves, that we cannot look Mary Schindler, Terri Schiavo's mother, in the eye, and give her one good reason why WE did not allow her to give water to her dying child.

How we came to this shameful point in our national existence is a question that demands examination, and rectification. For our sake.

For Mary Schindler, and her severely impaired child, Terri Schiavo, it is too late. We did not find it in our collective hearts and souls, in our actions, to have mercy on them.

May We, and G_d, forgive us.

Martin Katz

Pocket doors

Don't miss Pocket Doors and My Manhood!

Quote for the day

He who loses wealth loses much; he who loses a friend loses more; but he that loses his courage loses all.

   Miguel de Cervantes

Tethers in space

First, let me say that I'm very happy to see NASA taking the route of a prize, much like the X prize, to promote a speculative new technology. For a relatively small sum (at least by U.S. government agency standards!), they will either harness the competitive energies of the civilian sector, or they will get (for free) the collective judgment that the objective is impossible. Good move, and very un-government-like. I applaud it.

In the specific case of tethers, they've set a very tough objective — especially because the primary objective of the prize is a space elevator (a tether from the Earth's surface to a satellite in geosynchronous orbit). If all of this is just blarney and blather to you, take a gander at this short Wikipedia article on the subject.

Personally, my main concern with a space elevator tether system is their vulnerability to micro-meteorite and "space junk". Lives and an investment of billions of dollars could be taken out by an empty Coke can (figuratively speaking) whizzing around in orbit. Not a pretty picture...

A role for Iraq

Tigerhawk found some interesting facts about Arab book production and consumption, and speculates on the reasons why and how Iraq could change things. Basically his idea is that Iraq could turn into an engine for the translation and production of information in Arabic languages. This engine would be enabled by a free and open press, and an Arabic population that also happens to know English. Interesting stuff...

Sweet irony

Osama bin Laden can't be a stupid man. Therefore he must realize that the train of events that his infamous attacks of 9/11/2001 set in motion are taking the world down the exactly opposite course than the one he intended. What sweet irony!

Imagine this... Sometime in the past few months, perhaps shortly after the Iraqi elections. Osama is crouched in some rude hut in the wilds of Afghanistan, or perhaps northeastern Iran. Up until this moment, he's been thinking that despite a few tactical reverses, his war on America is enjoying some strategic success. Then there is "the moment" — one I'd give anything to personally witness — when it dawns on him that the world's reaction to the 9/11 attacks is going to defeat his movement.

Perhaps I exult prematurely. But I think not.

Quote for the day

Patriotism is when love of your own people comes first; nationalism, when hate for people other than your own comes first.

   Charles de Gaulle

Cedar Fire photo

The Cedar Fire of October/November 2003 was by far the closest call we've ever had to having our home and property burn. For those of you who aren't familiar with the chapparal ecological system we live in, I can say it like this: basically we live in an area where we are completely surrounded by large piles of very dry, highly inflammable fuel. Without human intervention, we're told that lightning-started fires would burn chapparal areas typically every 15 to 30 years. The area immediately surrounding our home hasn't burned for over 30 years, which means that we have a huge and extremely dangerous "fuel load" in our area. The vastness of the chapparal area means that cleaning it up and disposing of the fuel really isn't practical. Not to mention that you'd destroy all the native plants and animals in the process. So...we're left in this ever-more-precarious situation, exacerbated by the seven years of drought (but thankfully the drought is over due to the above-normal rain this year).

But we do it anyway, because we love the chapparal...

The blue dot on the map is the approximate location of our home; the green smudge is where the city of San Diego is located (about 25 miles from our house). The red rectangles are the locations of the burning areas at the moment this picture was taken (an infrared sensor on the satellite provided the data for this). You can see a burning area due south of our home; that's the Otay Fire. The large oblong group of red rectangles north of our home is the Cedar Fire, burning in all directions from its center. Further north is the Escondido Fire. We didn't have this information at the time of the fire, but we did know that our home was directly in between the Cedar Fire (burning south toward us) and the Otay fire (burning north toward us). It was not a pleasant situation. I wrote a contemporaneous account and photos on my personal web site. On that web site's home page you can find links followup accounts and photos as well.

Click on the photo for a bigger version.

Gravitational lensing

This astrophotograph captures a phenomenon that very graphically demonstrates Einstein's insight that gravity can bend the path of light. What looks like four stars (or galactic nuclei) in the picture are actually four separate virtual images of the same quasar, which is located far behind the galaxy whose faint image is all around the four quasar images. The intense gravity in the dense core of the galaxy acts like a gigantic lens that just happens to be directly between us and the distant quasar. Result: these four images of the quasar. You can read all about it here, with pointers to more information.

Desert wildflowers

Yesterday and Sunday two weeks ago we made a trip out to our local Anza-Borrego desert to see the wildflowers. They were by far the best we have ever seen — carpets of lupine, golden poppies, and dozens of other kinds of flowers. At a place called the Carrizo Badlands overlook, we stepped out of the car into the middle of hundreds of acres that were literally blanketed with wildflowers in their prime. The hillside in this picture is just a hundred yards or so from the roadside. The concentrated flowers also made for a concentrated wildflower perfume; a odiferous treat on top of the visual treat. Later in the day we hiked up Smuggler's Canyon, which was also in prime. We also four-wheeled up Oriflamme Canyon, where the different elevations and environments served up even more varieties of wildflowers. It was quite a day...

Click on the picture for a bigger version.

New Estonian government

A local analyzes the political situation (which is complicated!). From Baltic Blog.

No compelling reason

If you care at all about the Terri Schiavo sitution, Mr. Steyn's latest column is not to be missed. He starts like this:

A couple of decades back, north of the border, it was discovered that some overzealous types in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police had been surreptitiously burning down the barns of Quebec separatists. The prime minister, Pierre Trudeau, shrugged off the controversy and blithely remarked that, if people were so upset by the Mounties illegally burning down barns, perhaps he'd make the burning of barns by Mounties legal. As the columnist George Jonas commented:

''It seemed not to occur to him that it isn't wrong to burn down barns because it's illegal, but it's illegal to burn down barns because it's wrong. Like other statist politicians, Mr. Trudeau . . . either didn't see, or resented, that right and wrong are only reflected by the laws, not determined by them.''

That's how I feel about the Terri Schiavo case. I'm neither a Floridian nor a lawyer, and, for all I know, it may be legal under Florida law for the state to order her to be starved to death. But it is still wrong.

This is not a criminal, not a murderer, not a person whose life should be in the gift of the state. So I find it repulsive, and indeed decadent, to have her continued existence framed in terms of ''plaintiffs'' and ''petitions'' and ''en banc review'' and ''de novo'' and all the other legalese. Mrs. Schiavo has been in her present condition for 15 years. Whoever she once was, this is who she is now -- and, after a decade and a half, there is no compelling reason to kill her. Any legal system with a decent respect for the status quo -- something too many American judges are increasingly disdainful of -- would recognize that her present life, in all its limitations, is now a well-established fact, and it is the most grotesque judicial overreaching for any court at this late stage to decide enough is enough. It would be one thing had a doctor decided to reach for the morphine and ''put her out of her misery'' after a week in her diminished state; after 15 years, for the courts to treat her like a Death Row killer who's exhausted her appeals is simply vile.

There seems to be a genuine dispute about her condition -- between those on her husband's side, who say she has ''no consciousness,'' and those on her parents' side, who say she is capable of basic, childlike reactions. If the latter are correct, ending her life is an act of murder. If the former are correct, what difference does it make? If she feels nothing -- if there's no there there -- she has no misery to be put out of. That being so, why not err in favor of the non-irreversible option?

Poor Kofi

A hat tip to Austin Bay Blog for the lead to the London Times article. And as usual, Michelle Malkin goes right to the point. From the story:

Depending on the findings of the report, by a team led by the former US Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker, Annan may have to choose between the secretary-generalship and loyalty to his son.

American congressional critics of the UN are already pressing him to resign over the mismanagement of the oil for food programme, and even his supporters have been dismayed by the scandals on his watch, including the sexual abuse of children by UN peacekeepers in Congo.

One close observer at the UN said Annan’s moods were like a “sine curve” and that he appeared near the bottom of the trough.

I can't best Michelle Malkin's forthright plea: Kofi A. Annan, will you please go now?

Quote for the day

We're all in this alone.

   Lily Tomlin

Long-Eared Owl

You can read the long and detailed report, or you can just read the relevent excerpt below:

Bill Haas' continuing quest for the Long-eared Owl has disclosed that mysterious species in 15 squares, most recently in Lawson Valley (R17). Extensive undisturbed oak woodland is the key habitat for the Long-eared Owl, revealed by Bill's searches to be far more widespread in San Diego County than anyone guessed before this project began. Phil Nelson saw the species at Tamarisk Grove (I24) on 17 and 18 March but since then they have deserted this traditional site.

Who knew?

After-action report

I can't put it any better than BlackFive:

AFTER ACTION REPORT: Raven 42 action in Salman Pak

Over the next few days you will see on the television news shows, and in the print news media the story of a Military Police Squad who are heroes. Through those outlets, I doubt that their story will get out in a truly descriptive manner. I can't express to you the pride, awe, and respect I feel for the soldiers of call sign Raven 42.

On Sunday afternoon, in a very bad section of scrub-land called Salman Pak, on the southeastern outskirts of Baghdad, 40 to 50 heavily-armed Iraqi insurgents attacked a convoy of 30 civilian tractor trailer trucks that were moving supplies for the coalition forces, along an Alternate Supply Route. These tractor trailers, driven by third country nationals (primarily Turkish), were escorted by 3 armored Hummers from the COSCOM*. When the insurgents attacked, one of the Hummers was in their kill zone and the three soldiers aboard were immediately wounded, and the platform taken under heavy machinegun and RPG** fire.

The actual report isn't all that long, and is well worth reading. One item of note: some of our soldiers just happened to be women, and they did a fine job. Here's a piece from the middle of the AAR:

The sergeant runs low on ammo and runs back to a vehicle to reload. She moves to her squad leader's vehicle, and because this squad is led so well, she knows exactly where to reach her arm blindly into a different vehicle to find ammo-because each vehicle is packed exactly the same, with discipline.

As she turns to move back to the trenchline, Gunner in two sees an AIF jump from behind one of the cars and start firing on the Sergeant. He pulls his 9mm, because the .50 cal is pointed in the other direction, and shoots five rounds wounding him. The sergeant moves back to the trenchline under fire from the back of the field, with fresh mags, two more grenades, and three more M203 rounds. The Mk 19 gunner suppresses the rear of the field.

Now, rejoined with the squad leader, the two sergeants continue clearing the enemy from the trenchline, until they see no more movement. A lone man with an RPG launcher on his shoulder steps from behind a tree and prepares to fire on the three Hummers and is killed with a single aimed SAW shot thru the head by the previously knocked out gunner on platform two, who now has a SAW out to supplement the .50 cal in the mount.

The team leader sergeant--she claims four killed by aimed M4 shots.

The Squad Leader--he threw four grenades taking out at least two AIF, and attributes one other to her aimed M203 fire.

The gunner on platform two, previously knocked out from a hit by the RPG, has now swung his .50 cal around and, realizing that the line of vehicles represents a hazard and possible getaway for the bad guys, starts shooting the .50cal into the engine blocks until his field of fire is limited. He realizes that his vehicle is still running despite the RPG hit, and drops down from his weapon, into the drivers seat and moves the vehicle forward on two flat tires about 100 meters into a better firing position. Just then, the vehicle dies, oil spraying everywhere. He remounts his .50 cal and continues shooting the remaining of the seven cars lined up and ready for a get-away that wasn't to happen. The fire dies down about then, and a second squad arrives on the scene, dismounts and helps the two giving first aid to the wounded at platform three. Two minutes later three other squads from the 617th arrive, along with the CO, and the field is secured, consolidation begins.

Quote for the day

Ninety-eight percent of the adults in this country are decent, hard-working, honest Americans. It's the other lousy two percent that get all the publicity. But then - we elected them.

   Ninety-eight percent of the adults in this country are decent, hard-working, honest Americans. It's the other lousy two percent that get all the publicity. But then - we elected them.

Al Qaeda on the rocks?

This is the very first piece I've seen from the Muslim mainstream press with anything like this tone and tenor. For me, it's one of the clearest visible indicators of change. Read the whole article, but here's how it concludes:

The biggest setback for the Islamists, however, is a shift of mood in the Is lamic heartland. The elections in West Bank and Gaza, Afghanistan and Iraq; Lebanon's freedom movement; the beginnings of change in Egypt, Yemen and Saudi Arabia — all have helped generate new interest in democratic reform.

Also important are the efforts by Mahmoud Abbas to transform Palestine from an emotional cause into an issue of practical politics. Today, even Hamas, the most radical of Palestinian movements, is obliged to end its boycott of normal politics, and is getting ready to compete in the parliamentary elections.

While bin Laden's message of hatred and terror still resonates in sections of the Muslim communities and the remnants of the left in the West, the picture is different in the Muslim world. There, people are demonstrating for freedom — even (in Egypt a few weeks ago) for more trade with Israel.

This is a new configuration in which Islamist terrorism, although still deadly dangerous, has only a limited future.

Talking Turkey

From Austin Bay:

The huge NATO airbase complex at Incirlik, Turkey, played a key role in the Cold War, in the Persian Gulf War, and in enforcing the northern “no-fly zone” against Saddam.

Now it’s being prepared to provide logistical support for potential “operations” to the east. The article says Afghanistan and Iraq. But other nations may read this quote from Defense News in different ways– peacekeeping requires logistical support (eg, the UN faces a huge logistics burden when it deploys 10,000 peacekeepers to Sudan later this year). Iran will read it as a building military threat. Kyrgyzstan may see it as either a peacekeeping lifeline– or the launchpad for western troops. Syria is only “slightly east” of Adana (more south, actually).

What the report means is that Turkey and the US are preparing “operational options.” It also says the contretemps –wrought by Turkey’s refusal to allow US troops to base out of Turkey in the March 2003 attack on Saddam– is now history.

Assuming this report is accurate, this is most excellent news — and further evidence of the pro-democracy momentum being generated by the Bush doctrine, his re-election, and the "tough love" diplomacy of Condi Rice.

Akaev falls

Registan.net has been doing a great job of keeping up with events in the (to us in the U.S.) remote regions of Asia. In recent days, the situation in Kyrgyzstan — long a center of repression with a crazy man running the place — has been boiling, and just yesterday the good guys appear to have one. As many bloggers have noted, we shouldn't be thinking the job there is done — there are too many thugs in the area who could establish another thuggish regime to replace Akaev's. And at least one pundit has noted with suspicion that Putin rushed to support one of the now-freed revolutionary leaders...a man with a dark and thuggish past himself. So we shall see what happens. For the moment, though, the news is just wonderful. Registan.net's roundup is an excellent place to start. Below is an excerpt from it, describing one of the moments of victory for the people:

Soon the bravest protesters came inside the gate and approached the soldiers with their arms raised, though it did not look like the soldiers were armed. General Chotbaev, who was responsible for guarding off the White House, said that he did not want for there to be any bloodshed and asked the protesters who went inside the gate to leave. He said it “was his job” and “there was nothing he could do”. The protesters asked the General to order his soldiers to leave the grounds or to join the protestors. He refused and left saying there could be no further discussion about that.

A few stones came flying on the soldiers while protesters cried not the hit the soldiers, but some angry youth did, risking hitting their comrades who were trying to talk the soldiers into a peaceful resolution.

As protesters saw that the soldiers looked calm and not extremely hostile, more and more crossed the gate and came in. The soldiers retreated slowly. Very soon there was a large crowd on the steps of the White House cheering and celebrating victory. Stones came breaking windows and people were pounding on the front doors that were locked from the inside. Soon the doors opened and the cheering crowd ran into the building. As they came, they broke glass, chandeliers and ripped down curtains. Some were on the stair case in the entrance hall, cheering, hugging each other and taking pictures. There was a large water pipe lying on the floor and some water - it appeared like the military planned to use water hose against the protesters.

As people went round the building, the soldiers and General Chotbaev left, taking their injured, arms and boxes with them. General Chotbaev said: “I decided to vacate the building for the sake of security of both sides”.

Quote for the day

Americans, indeed all freemen, remember that in the final choice, a soldier's pack is not so heavy a burden as a prisoner's chains.

   Dwight D. Eisenhower

Terri's revolution

Bill Kristol has an excellent new column in the Weekly Standard in which he nails the problem many people have with our current left-leaning judiciary (in aggregate, because of course there are outstanding exceptions). Don't miss this one! Here's how he begins:

THANK GOD FOR OUR JUDGES. (Oops! Sorry. No offense, your honors. I didn't mean to write "God." Or at least I didn't mean anything specific or exclusionary or sectarian or unconstitutional by writing "God." It's just an expression I occasionally use. It does go way back in U.S. history. I hope it's okay.)

Anyway. Thank God for our robed masters. If it weren't for them, Christopher Simmons might soon be executed. In September 1993, seven months shy of his 18th birthday, Simmons decided it would be interesting to kill someone. He told his buddies they could get away with it because they were still minors. He broke into the house of Shirley Crook in Jefferson County, Missouri, bound her hands and feet, drove her to a bridge, covered her face with tape, and threw her into the Meramec River, where she drowned. He confessed to the crime, and was sentenced to death according to the laws of Missouri.

Last month the Supreme Court saved Simmons's life. The citizens, legislators, and governor of Missouri (and those of 19 other states) had, it turned out, fallen grievously and unconstitutionally behind "the evolving standards of decency that mark a maturing society." Five justices decided that the Constitution prevented anyone under the age of 18 from being sentenced to death. So Christopher Simmons will live.

It appears, at this writing, that Terri Schiavo will not.

And here's what he suggests we do:

So our judges deserve some criticism. But we should not be too harsh. For example, it would be wrong to suggest, as some conservatives have, that our judicial elite is systematically biased against "life." After all, they have saved the life of Christopher Simmons. It would be wrong to argue, as some critics have, that our judges systematically give too much weight to the husband's wishes in situations like Terri Schiavo's. After all, our judges have for three decades given husbands (or fathers) no standing at all to participate in the decision whether to kill their unborn children. It would be wrong to claim that our judges don't take seriously legislation passed by the elected representatives of the people. After all, our judges are committed to upholding the "rule of law"--though not, perhaps, the rule of actual laws passed by actual lawmakers. And it would be wrong to accuse our judges of being heartless. After all, Judges Carnes and Hull of the 11th U.S. Circuit told us, "We all have our own family, our own loved ones, and our own children."

So do we all. They deserve a judiciary that is respectful of democratic self-government and committed to a genuine constitutionalism. The Bush administration should nominate such judges, and Congress should confirm them. And the president and Congress should lead a serious national debate on the distinction between judicial independence and judicial arrogance, and on the difference between judicial review and judicial supremacy. After all, we are a "maturing society," as the Supreme Court has told us. Perhaps it is time, in mature reaction to this latest installment of what Hugh Hewitt has called a "robed charade," to rise up against our robed masters, and choose to govern ourselves. Call it Terri's revolution.

Where do you sign up? At the ballot box, of course. This may turn out to be an issue that will convert some liberals to the conservative cause...

In love with death

Peggy Noonan does her usual excellent job of narrating how many of us feel about a topic; this time it's the Terri Schiavo situation. Please read the whole thing. This excerpt goes to her central point:

I do not understand the emotionalism of the pull-the-tube people. What is driving their engagement? Is it because they are compassionate, and their hearts bleed at the thought that Mrs. Schiavo suffers? But throughout this case no one has testified that she is in persistent pain, as those with terminal cancer are.

If they care so much about her pain, why are they unconcerned at the suffering caused her by the denial of food and water? And why do those who argue for Mrs. Schiavo's death employ language and imagery that is so violent and aggressive? The chairman of the Democratic National Committee calls Republicans "brain dead." Michael Schiavo, the husband, calls House Majority Leader Tom DeLay "a slithering snake."

Everyone who has written in defense of Mrs. Schiavo's right to live has received e-mail blasts full of attacks that appear to have been dictated by the unstable and typed by the unhinged. On Democratic Underground they crowed about having "kicked the sh-- out of the fascists." On Tuesday James Carville's face was swept with a sneer so convulsive you could see his gums as he damned the Republicans trying to help Mrs. Schiavo. It would have seemed demonic if he weren't a buffoon.

Why are they so committed to this woman's death?

They seem to have fallen half in love with death.

What does Terri Schiavo's life symbolize to them? What does the idea that she might continue to live suggest to them?

Why does this prospect so unnerve them? Again, if you think Terri Schiavo is a precious human gift of God, your passion is explicable. The passion of the pull-the-tube people is not.

I do not understand their certainty. I don't "know" that any degree of progress or healing is possible for Terri Schiavo; I only hope they are. We can't know, but we can "err on the side of life." How do the pro-death forces "know" there is no possibility of progress, healing, miracles? They seem to think they know. They seem to love the phrases they bandy about: "vegetative state," "brain dead," "liquefied cortex."

Next stop: Kyrgyzstan

Courtesy of My Way News:

BISHKEK, Kyrgyzstan (AP) - Hundreds of opposition demonstrators stormed the presidential compound in Kyrgyzstan on Thursday, seizing the seat of state power after clashing with riot police during a large rally.

Thick plumes of black smoke rose from the vicinity of the government headquarters hours after the takeover as many of the protesters milled about, and a fire truck arrived at the scene.

Imprisoned Kyrgyz opposition leader Felix Kulov was freed as protesters took control of key government facilities, the Interfax news agency reported, citing opposition sources.

Kulov, once a vice president under embattled President Askar Akayev, was imprisoned in 2000 on embezzlement charges that supporters said were politically motivated. His release could be a key element in unifying the Kyrgyz opposition, which until now has lacked a single clear leader.

The whereabouts of Akayev were not known. He had been scheduled to meet Thursday with an envoy from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, seeking to help mediate the crisis.

Deep trouble

Claudia Rosett, the Wall Street Journal's columnist extraordinaire, sums it up very nicely in her latest column. Read the whole thing, but here's her conclusion:

In presenting his grand soufflé of a reform plan, Mr. Annan promised to work hard. We now face months of leaks about the latest in Mr. Annan's personal telephone diplomacy, leading up to his reform jamboree this September in New York. While this goes on, it would be useful to keep in mind that the real push for a better world on Mr. Annan's watch has come not from the U.N. but from a Bush administration that Mr. Annan has done plenty to thwart and revile. Mr. Annan includes high-sounding words in his report about U.N. "support" for elections in Iraq. They ring hollow when you consider that had Mr. Annan and the U.N. prevailed instead of Mr. Bush, Iraqis would still be living under Saddam (and the U.N. would still be running the rotten Oil for Food program).

How to reform the U.N. is a big question, in need of real debate and workable proposals from some quarter. What we got from Mr. Annan as he presented this latest menu for U.N. improvement was his warning that no one should pick and choose among his proposals "a la carte." Great. If he really wants all or nothing, the next move is to toss this report, and start looking for a secretary-general who can get it right.

Quote for the day

I hate liberality - nine times out of ten it is cowardice, and the tenth time lack of principle.

   Henry Addington

Blonde

Ed (a blonde man) finally decides to take a vacation. He books himself on a Caribbean cruise, and proceeds to have the time of his life -- until the boat sank. He found himself swept up on the shore of an island with no other people, no supplies... nothing... only bananas and coconuts. After about four months, he is lying on the beach one day when the most gorgeous woman he has ever seen rows up to him.

In disbelief, he asks her, "Where did you come from? How did you get here?"

"I rowed from the other side of the island," she says. "I landed here when my cruise ship sank five months ago.""Amazing," he says. "You were really lucky to have a rowboat wash up with you."

"Oh, this?" replies the woman. "I made the rowboat out of raw material I found on the island. The oars were whittled from gum tree branches. I wove the bottom from palm branches. And the sides and stern came from a Eucalyptus tree."

"But, but,... that's impossible," stutters Ed. "You had no tools or hardware. How did you manage it?"

"Oh, that was no problem," replies the woman. "On the south side of the island, there is a very unusual strata of alluvial rock exposed. I found if I mined it and fired it to a certain temperature in my kiln, it melted into forgeable ductile iron. I used that for tools and used the tools to make the hardware."

Ed is stunned.

"Let's row over to my place," she says.

After a few minutes of rowing, she docks the boat at a small wharf. As Ed looks onto shore, he nearly falls out of the boat. Before him is a stone walk leading to an exquisite bungalow painted in blue and white.

While the woman ties up the rowboat with an expertly woven hemp rope, he could only stare ahead, dumbstruck. As they walk into the house, she says casually, "It's not much, but I call it home. Sit down please. Would you like to have a drink?"

"No, no, thank you," he says, still dazed. "I can't take any more coconut juice."

"It's not coconut juice," the woman replies. "How about a Pina Colada?"

Trying to hide his continued amazement, he accepts, and they sit down on her couch to talk. After they have exchanged their stories, the woman announces, "I'm going to slip into something more comfortable. Would you like to take a shower and shave? There's a razor upstairs in the cabinet in the bathroom."

No longer questioning anything, Ed goes into the bathroom. There, in the cabinet, is a razor made from a bone handle. Two shells honed to a hollow ground edge are fastened on to its end inside of a swivel mechanism.

"Wow! This woman is amazing!" he muses, "What next?" He looks in the shower stall and sees a nozzle with hand drilled holes fed from an overhead cistern of sun-warmed rain water. So he showers, using her hand made soap.When he returns to the living area, she greets him wearing nothing but flowered vines --strategically positioned-- and smelling faintly of gardenias.

She beckons for him to sit down next to her.

"Tell me," she begins suggestively, slithering closer to him, "We've been out here for a really long time." She pauses, then continues. "You've been lonely. There's something I'm sure you really feel like doing right now, something you've been longing for all these months. You know..."

She stares demurely into his eyes.

He can't believe what he's hearing:

"You mean...", he swallows excitedly, "I can check my email?!"

Planetary luminance

All previous evidence for the existence of planets around other stars has been indirect. Generally this evidence has been either detecting fluctuations in the star's luminance (because the planet partially occults the star during part of its orbit) or by detecting the "wobble" in the star (via atomic line frequency shifing) caused by the orbiting planet.

But now Spitzer has directly detected the light reflected from an orbiting planet. This is a technical tour de force which also happens to be a first.

I quote the NASA press release in its entirety:

NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has for the first time captured the light from two known planets orbiting stars other than our Sun. The findings mark the beginning of a new age of planetary science, in which "extrasolar" planets can be directly measured and compared.

"Spitzer has provided us with a powerful new tool for learning about the temperatures, atmospheres and orbits of planets hundreds of light-years from Earth," said Dr. Drake Deming of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md., lead author of a new study on one of the planets.

"It's fantastic," said Dr. David Charbonneau of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge, Mass., lead author of a separate study on a different planet. "We've been hunting for this light for almost 10 years, ever since extrasolar planets were first discovered." The Deming paper appears today in Nature's online publication; the Charbonneau paper will be published in an upcoming issue of the Astrophysical Journal.

So far, all confirmed extrasolar planets, including the two recently observed by Spitzer, have been discovered indirectly, mainly by the "wobble" technique and more recently, the "transit" technique. In the first method, a planet is detected by the gravitational tug it exerts on its parent star, which makes the star wobble. In the second, a planet's presence is inferred when it passes in front of its star, causing the star to dim, or blink. Both strategies use visible-light telescopes and indirectly reveal the mass and size of planets, respectively.

In the new studies, Spitzer has directly observed the warm infrared glows of two previously detected "hot Jupiter" planets, designated HD 209458b and TrES-1. Hot Jupiters are extrasolar gas giants that zip closely around their parent stars. From their toasty orbits, they soak up ample starlight and shine brightly in infrared wavelengths.

To distinguish this planet glow from that of the fiery hot stars, the astronomers used a simple trick. First, they used Spitzer to collect the total infrared light from both the stars and planets. Then, when the planets dipped behind the stars as part of their regular orbit, the astronomers measured the infrared light coming from just the stars. This pinpointed exactly how much infrared light belonged to the planets. "In visible light, the glare of the star completely overwhelms the glimmer of light reflected by the planet," said Charbonneau. "In infrared, the star-planet contrast is more favorable because the planet emits its own light."

The Spitzer data told the astronomers that both planets are at least a steaming 1,000 Kelvin (727 degrees Celsius, 1340 Fahrenheit). These measurements confirm that hot Jupiters are indeed hot. Upcoming Spitzer observations using a range of infrared wavelengths are expected to provide more information about the planets' winds and atmospheric compositions.

The findings also reawaken a mystery that some astronomers had laid to rest. Planet HD 209458b is unusually puffy, or large for its mass, which some scientists thought was the result of an unseen planet's gravitational pull. If this theory had been correct, HD 209458b would have a non-circular orbit. Spitzer discovered that the planet does in fact follow a circular path. "We're back to square one," said Dr. Sara Seager, Carnegie Institution of Washington, Washington, co-author of the Deming paper. "For us theorists, that's fun."

Spitzer is ideally suited for studying extrasolar planets known to transit, or cross, stars the size of our Sun out to distances of 500 light-years. Of the seven known transiting planets, only the two mentioned here meet those criteria. As more are discovered, Spitzer will be able to collect their light -- a bonus for the observatory, considering it was not originally designed to see extrasolar planets. NASA's future Terrestrial Planet Finder coronagraph, set to launch in 2016, will be able to directly image extrasolar planets as small as Earth.

Shortly after its discovery in 1999, HD 209458b became the first planet detected via the transit method. That result came from two teams, one led by Charbonneau. TrES-1 was found via the transit method in 2004 as part of the NASA-funded Trans-Atlantic Exoplanet Survey, a ground-based telescope program established in part by Charbonneau.

Artist's concepts and additional information about the Spitzer Space Telescope are available at http://www.spitzer.caltech.edu/Media.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., manages the Spitzer Space Telescope mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Science operations are conducted at the Spitzer Science Center, at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. Caltech manages JPL for NASA. For more information contact Nancy Neal Jones, Goddard Space Flight Center, 301/286-0039; or David Aguilar, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, 617/495-7462.

The good guys win one

Hat tip to Michelle Malkin for the pointer to a blog I'd never seen before (the Ace of Spades), with this excellent news.

As several observers have noted (including Ms. Malkin), this is one more piece of evidence that the tipping point in Iraq has been reached...

Memogate?

What? Again?!?

When I first heard about this memo, I just assumed (silly me) that there was at least some truth to it, and dismissed it (cynical me) as another piece of evidence for rampant moral corruption in politics. But many bloggers, arguably more cynical than I, immediately saw the potential for this memo being yet another dirty trick, or at the very least another twisted bit of reporting. Powerline, as usual, is prominent amongst this group. Fishkite has an excellent timeline, with pointers to other information.

And I'm left again to wonder whether there's any utterance of the MSM that I can trust...

Kyrgyzstan

Kyrgyzstan has been an area of increasing unrest since a hotly disputed election was held recently. It's not something that's widely reported, and I've had trouble finding credible sources. Here's a good one though: a great roundup from Registan.net.

Don't miss the pictures on page two of the roundup!

14.45 and counting

We're up to 14.45 inches for the calendar year. Best of all, nearly all of this rain came in the form of slow, steady drizzle or light rain — so damaging runoff was minimal, despite the high total rainfall accumulation. Our spring is in full flush; we're surrounded by greenery. The shortfall this year (from a plant's perspective) isn't the usual shortfall of water — it's sunshine!

Quote for the day

Come with rain, O loud Southwester!
Bring the singer, bring the nester;
Give the buried flower a dream;
Make the settled snowbank steam.

   Robert Frost

The new Shakers?

Mark Steyn has a piece this morning on the fact and consequences of Europe's rapidly declining birthrate. As usual it is hilarious — and it makes some very good points. An excerpt:

Shortly after 9/11, I wrote in these pages about one of the most curious aspects of the new war - the assurance given to Islamist "martyrs" that 72 virgins were standing by to pleasure them for eternity. The notion that the after-life is a well-appointed brothel is a perplexing one to the Judaeo-Christian world, and I suggested that Americans would be sceptical if heaven were framed purely in terms of boundless earthly pleasures.

But, on reflection, if the Islamists are banal in portraying the next world purely in terms of sensual self-gratification, we're just as reductive in measuring this one the same way. America this Holy Week is following the frenzied efforts to halt the court-enforced starvation of a brain-damaged woman for no reason other than that her continued existence is an inconvenience to her husband. In Britain, two doctors escape prosecution for aborting an otherwise healthy baby with a treatable cleft palate because the authorities are satisfied they acted "in good faith". You can read similar stories in almost any corner of the developed world, except perhaps the Netherlands, where discretionary euthanasia is so advanced it's news if the kid makes it out of the maternity ward. As the New York Times reported the other day: "Babies born into what is certain to be a brief life of grievous suffering should have their lives ended by physicians under strict guidelines, according to two doctors in the Netherlands.

Cruelty

Michelle Malkin has her usual swift roundup.

This is such a sad affair, on so many levels. Much of the focus recently, and very naturally, has been on the immediate issue of whether Terri should be kept alive or should be "allowed" to starve and dehydrate until she dies. There are legitimate issues and questions on both sides, and emotions are running very high amongst people who are thinking about Terri's situation. I am myself amongst those who believe there are enough questions about the circumstances surrounding the decision to remove her feeding tube to justify reinserting it while those issues are examined. As President Bush so eloquently put it: in a situation as grey and blurry as this one, there should be a presumption of life. Terri should be kept alive while we figure this out.

But there's another issue at play in Terri's case that I haven't seen much discussed, and I think it deserves to be. To wit: if, as a society, we decide that there are circumstances in which people like Terri should be "allowed to die," why would we do so in such a cruel manner?

Can you imagine the howls (from every political direction) if we condemned a murderer to die by withholding food and water? Certainly such a sentence would never stand in the United States. Why, then, would we even consider doing such a thing to an innocent? I cannot fathom the logic here at all. To me, the solution seems incredibly simple: in such a circumstance, the patient should be killed (euthanized, if you prefer the antiseptic term) in a manner that is truly as painless as possible, with an absolute minimum of suffering. Such a death is easily within our means...we have the technology to do so.

Certainly I would hope that if I ever found myself in a situation where my fellow citizens said that I must die, that is the kind of death I would want — whether the reason for that decision was my crime or my health.

Shake 'em up

Fred Barnes is always an intersting commentator, whether on TV or in his writing. Today he has a short column in the Wall Street Journal (paid subscription) talking about President Bush's recent spate of controversial appointments. Mr. Barnes believes that anyone who is surprised by these appointments simply has a basic lack of comprehension of what President Bush is all about — he sees these appointments as totally in characters...and as predictable. Some of his key points:

Anyone shocked by the nominations of Messrs. Wolfowitz and Bolton doesn't understand the president's approach to multilateral organizations. The conventional idea is that these organizations are wonderful, though perhaps flawed and infused with too much anti-American sentiment. And the chief task of U.S. representatives is to get along amicably, not buck the system and cause problems. This idea is popular in the press, the State Department bureaucracy and diplomatic circles, and with foreign-policy "experts." But not with Mr. Bush.

The president's idea is simple: No more Mr. Nice Guy. He believes international organizations have failed largely and must be challenged and reformed. He was miffed when outgoing U.N. Ambassador John Danforth rushed to the defense of Kofi Annan in the midst of the Oil for Food scandal. Mr. Annan opposed the war in Iraq and even declared it illegal. More important, he's viewed by Mr. Bush as part of the problem at the U.N.
...
The nominations of Messrs. Bolton and Wolfowitz produced shock and awe around the world. Ms. Hughes's didn't. But what's significant is that all three have agendas that reflect the president's own world view. Or, put more precisely, their agendas stem from Mr. Bush's shake-up-the-world view.

Quote for the day

The grand aim of all science is to cover the greatest number of empirical facts by logical deduction from the smallest number of hypotheses or axioms.

   Albert Einstein

Quote for the day

Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half of the time.

   E. B. White

Outrageous Chavez

I put "president" in scare quotes because Chavez was not elected in a free and fair election, Jimmy Carter's opinion on the matter notwithstanding. The London Times online has a lengthy article about Chavez's preparation for a confrontation with the U.S. — a confrontation that Chavez has been loudly accusing the U.S. of provoking. Shades of North Korea.

Anyway, in that article are these stunners allegedly uttered by Chavez. The context is not clear from the article, but a close read suggests they were copied from state TV broadcasts:

Assassination: “If they kill me, there will be a really guilty party on this planet whose name is the President of the United States, George Bush”

Bush’s Administration: “It is a mafia, a true mafia of murderers”

Cuba: “I am the second Fidel Castro of Latin America”

Capitalism: “The Devil’s economic model . . . The capitalist exploitation model has destroyed oceans, entire oceans”

Saddam Hussein: “A brother”

Condoleezza Rice: “I cannot marry Condolencia (condolence), because I am much too busy. I have heard she dreams about me”

Two years

Husayn Uthman is a young Iraqi man who keeps an interesting blog called Democracy in Iraq. Yesterday he posted his thoughts about the second anniversary of the war, and in particular about whether it was worth it. Read the whole thing, but here is his conclusion:

Our cities are smoking, our graveyards full, and terrorists in our midst. But we are not defeated. We are not down, we are not regretful. We are not going to surrender. For all that the two years have brought, the greatest thign they have given us is a future, and a view of the finish line.

Iraqis see the finish line, the finish line of freedom and democracy and a functioning nation. We can smell it, taste it, and like a sprinter, one who has broken his legs, but who has a heart full of passion, we will crawl there no matter what the cost. No matter what we must endure, we have realized what we can become, and that is the biggest result of the last two years.

Noone can take that from us. Not the terrorists, not those who want to question the good of the removal of Saddam, not those who want to reduce our glory for politics, none.

We have been brought from darkness to light. And not only has the future been made better for Iraq, but the martyrs of our nation, their blood is watering the roots of democracy across the world. We are watching our neighbors come closer to the light, and this only pushes us more, and makes us stronger in our burning desire to reach the finish line, to realize the dream that our people have had for so long.

No, we will not give up, and we will not say that the last two years were a waste. They for all their trouble have been momentus. They for us, have been a turning point in history. Whether or not you agree, this is how it looks from Iraq.

Those liberal voices who so piously intoned that the Arabs weren't ready for democracy; that they craved dictators rather than elections — I wonder how they would respond to this?

Quote for the day

I think we have more machinery of government than is necessary, too many parasites living on the labour of the industrious.

   Thomas Jefferson

A revolutionary change

Herbert E. Meyer served during the Reagan Administration as Special Assistant to the Director of Central Intelligence and Vice Chairman of the CIA’s National Intelligence Council. In this excellent article he makes the case for why revolutions in all the remaining dictatorships are inevitable. Information technology is the revolutionary enabler, he argues. Read the whole thing; it's a very interesting piece. Here's his conclusion (the emphasis is his):

Now think about the generals in today’s remaining dictatorships. They cannot be having much fun, or feeling very confident about the future. George W. Bush is secure in his second term, and he’s made freedom around the world his personal mission. Georgia and Ukraine have had their revolutions, and Afghanistan and Iraq are moving steadily toward democracy. Crowds are surging in Lebanon, Syria looks to be in Washington’s cross-hairs, and demonstrations have been taking place every day, for months, in Iran. Even little Kyrgyzstan is starting to come apart, and over in The Hague a score of Serbian generals are on trial for their lives. Throughout the world, the very idea of revolution is in the air. This is the 21st century, and ordinary people everywhere understand that the combination of democracy and free enterprise is the only thing that works. They see it, and they want it.

It would be foolish to suggest that everything has changed, and that the generals and the demonstrators will all be sitting in a circle, holding hands and singing It’s a Small, Small World. There is still the very real possibility of horrific violence in Lebanon, Iran, or in any of the countries where trouble is brewing. But it would be even more foolish to believe that nothing has changed, and that the dictatorships that were built in the 20th century will survive for long in the 21st.

It is late at night in Damascus, or Teheran, or Cairo, or maybe even Moscow, and the general is sitting in his easy chair with his tie loosened, his shoes off and perhaps with a drink in his hand. He is exhausted, but he cannot sleep. All day he has been reading reports of growing unrest, of strikes, of demonstrations against the regime he is sworn to defend. It is getting out of hand, and sooner rather than later he will be given the order to shoot. Scenes of the resulting carnage will be played and re-played on televisions around the world – including the one in his wife’s bedroom. And even if the revolution is stopped, surely it will start again before long and even more blood will flow through the streets. The general finishes his drink, turns out the lamp beside his chair, walks slowly toward his bedroom – and realizes that his two teen-agers aren’t home…

Quote for the day

No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted.

   Aesop

Iran's cruise missiles

Oh, great. Like we needed this, on top of Iran's well-understood nuclear ambitions. You just gotta wonder what these people were thinking when they made this deal!

On the bright side, without the revolution in the Ukraine, I seriously doubt we'd have gotten this admission (though one could hope our intelligence services would have ferreted it out).

The AFP's complete story:

LONDON (AFP) - Ukraine admitted that it had exported nuclear-capable cruise missiles to Iran (news - web sites) and China, amid tense diplomatic debate over Tehran's alleged quest for nuclear weaponry.

Eighteen Soviet-era X-55 cruise missiles were exported in 2001 -- 12 to Iran and six to China -- Svyatoslav Piskun, Ukraine's prosecutor general, told the respected London-based Financial Times daily.

Piskun said the missiles were not exported with the nuclear warheads that they were designed to carry.

Nonetheless, both Japan and the United States were worried about what appeared to be a significant leak of military technology, the newspaper reported.

The X-55, an air-launched missile also known as the Kh-55 and AS-15 and first introduced in 1976, has a range of 3,500 kilometers (2,175 miles), which would give China -- or North Korea (news - web sites), if it obtained the missile -- easy access to Japan, while Iran could hit its main regional foe, Israel.

Last month the Ukrainian government opened a criminal inquiry, at the request of Japan, into the illegal sale of 18 missiles by the Ukrspetsexport arms group to unspecified states via Russia.

Reports about the missile sales going to Iran emerged earlier this month.

But Piskun's statement was the first acknowledgment from the Kiev government, and is likely to heighten suspicions about Tehran's nuclear program.

The Islamic republic insists its program is aimed at peaceful civilian use but Washington claims it is designed to produce nuclear arms.

Although the X-55 is designed to carry a nuclear warhead, it can also be loaded with conventional weaponry and would not be Iran's ideal nuclear missile, Doug Richardson, editor of Jane's Missiles and Rockets Magazine, said.

Richardson told AFP the Tehran regime's own Shahab ballistic missile was better suited since it was faster than a cruise missile.

"If they're going to nuclearize a weapon, they're much more likely to do so with one of their ballistic missiles. A ballistic missile, simply because of its sheer speed, is more difficult to defend against than a cruise missile," he said, calling the Shahab "almost unstoppable".

A cruise missile, on the other hand, travels at subsonic speed comparable to that of an airplane, he added.

However, John Eldridge, editor of Jane's Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Defence, told AFP the report was a fresh sign that Iran was seeking "to beef up its offensive capability in the region".

"It's not a piece of news that hints of great stability in the region," he said.

If Iran is seeking to create an offensive nuclear capability, it could either buy complete "off-the-shelf" solutions or acquire both materials such as the X-55 and expertise to create it themselves, Eldridge said.

Currently, "both options appear to be being pursued by the Tehran government", he added.

Ukraine had a massive weapons arsenal after the fall of the Soviet Union, but it returned its nuclear warheads to Russia or destroyed them under a US-funded disarmament program.

Its remaining weaponry remains, however, a source of major concern in the West, fueled by several high-profile cases of arms trafficking including radar technology to Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s regime in Iraq (news - web sites).

two anti-aircraft missiles and a launch system were reported stolen last month from a Ukrainian naval base in the Crimean peninsula, while Turkey reported seizing a Ukrainian radio-controlled missile and missile heads en route to Egypt last June.

Enceladus

A new photo-montage from Cassini...

Wolfowitz derangement syndrome

Bush's recent appointment of Paul Wolfowitz to head the World Bank has much of Europe in a tizzy. From what I've read, much of the tizzy stems from Bush's failure to "consult with" (translate: buckle under to) the European shareholders of the bank. Those shareholders are very much in the minority, by the way...not that that matters to the liberal Europhiles over here who are having a sympathy tizzy with the Europeans. Roger Simon nicely tears holes in the tizzy's foundations, and raises some questions of his own. An excerpt:

You would think a Jewish and an Arab intellectual (both quite adult) being romantically involved would be applauded by "progressive" Europe, but I guess not. So what is the reason for their WDS -- Wolfowitz Derangement Syndrome -- other than the usual envy expressed by the ever-bilious British pol Clare Short who is quoted in the same article as saying on their TV: "America is going to do what it likes or hard cheese."

Another article in the Financial Times reports that some Europeans and "development economists" were concerned that Wolfowitz was "ill-suited" for the post, apparently because he wasn't properly educated in their specialty, as if development economics were particle physics or open-heart surgery. It's hard to take that seriously, considering the deputy defense secretary is easily one of the brainiest government officials on either side of the pond.

Ann's rebuttal

Brian Nicols wrestled a gun away from his guard last week and went on a murderous rampage, murdering a judge and three other people. The guard who lost her gun happened to be a 5 foot tall grandmother. Do you think that might have had something to do with Nicols' success? Ann thinks so. Here's an excerpt from her wonderful column, which you really should go read:

How many people have to die before the country stops humoring feminists? Last week, a defendant in a rape case, Brian Nichols, wrested a gun from a female deputy in an Atlanta courthouse and went on a murderous rampage. Liberals have proffered every possible explanation for this breakdown in security except the giant elephant in the room – who undoubtedly has an eating disorder and would appreciate a little support vis-à-vis her negative body image.

The New York Times said the problem was not enough government spending on courthouse security ("Budgets Can Affect Safety Inside Many Courthouses"). Yes, it was tax-cuts-for-the-rich that somehow enabled a 200-pound former linebacker to take a gun from a 5-foot-tall grandmother.

Atlanta court officials dispensed with any spending issues the next time Nichols entered the courtroom when he was escorted by 17 guards and two police helicopters. He looked like P. Diddy showing up for a casual dinner party.

I think I have an idea that would save money and lives: Have large men escort violent criminals. Admittedly, this approach would risk another wave of nausea and vomiting by female professors at Harvard. But there are also advantages to not pretending women are as strong as men, such as fewer dead people. Even a female math professor at Harvard should be able to run the numbers on this one.

Don't miss the rest...

al-Arifi nabbed

Abdullah Nassar al-Arifi has been on the FBI's most-wanted list since 9/11, according to Fox, though I couldn't find him when I went to the FBI's site.

Another one bites the dust!

Quote for the day

Democracy is the art and science of running the circus from the monkey cage.

   H. L. Mencken

Quote for the day

Too bad that all the people who know how to run the country are busy driving taxicabs and cutting hair.

   George Burns

Scalia's speech

Supreme Court Justice Anton Scalia delivered a speech at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars on March 14, 2005. A blog named ThreeBadFingers has transcribed the whole thing by hand. Please if you read just one thing today, make it this one. A teaser:

The very next case we announced is a case called BMW verses Bush. Not the Bush you think; this is another Bush. Mr. Bush had bought a BMW, which is a car supposedly, advertised at least as having a superb finish, baked seven times in ovens deep in the Alps, by dwarfs. And his BMW apparently had gotten scratched on the way over. They did not send it back to the Alps, they took a can of spray-paint and fixed it. And he found out about this and was furious, and he brought a lawsuit. He got his compensatory damages, a couple of hundred dollars, the difference between a car with a better paint job and a worse paint job. Plus, two million dollars against BMW for punitive damages for being a bad actor, which is absurd of course, so it must be unconstitutional. BMW appealed to my court, and my court said, “Yes, it’s unconstitutional.” In violation of, I assume, the Excessive Damages Clause of the Bill of Rights. And if excessive punitive damages are unconstitutional, why aren’t excessive compensatory damages unconstitutional? So you have a federal question when ever you get a judgment in a civil case. Well, that one the conservatives liked, because conservatives don’t like punitive damages, and the liberals gnashed their teeth.

I'm fully in favor of liberals gnashing teeth!

The NYT says there was WMD?!?

Ever since the war in Iraq began, the New York Times has been insisting there was not, and never had been, any WMD to find in Iraq. According to them, the whole WMD story was a big lie calculated to deceive Americans into supporting the effort to topple Hussein. But recently they published an article detailing the looting of a WMD site just after war started. Is this a position change?

In Slate, Christopher Hitchens does a wonderful job of tearing the grey lady a new one. Read the whole thing! Here's a sample:

My first question is this: How can it be that, on every page of every other edition for months now, the New York Times has been stating categorically that Iraq harbored no weapons of mass destruction? And there can hardly be a comedy-club third-rater or MoveOn.org activist in the entire country who hasn't stated with sarcastic certainty that the whole WMD fuss was a way of lying the American people into war. So now what? Maybe we should have taken Saddam's propaganda seriously, when his newspaper proudly described Iraq's physicists as "our nuclear mujahideen."

Coup in Syria?

Some comments on Little Green Footballs indicate that this short article is nonsense. Delicious nonsense, though...

Terri Schiavo

This article is well worth reading in its entirety. It makes a compelling case for intervention by some higher authority than Judge Greer (the sitting judge in the Terri Schiavo actions).

So how can Judge Greer ignore the opinions of so many qualified neurologists, some of whom are leaders in the field? The answer is that Michael Schiavo, his attorney George Felos, and Judge Greer already have the diagnosis they want.

Terri’s diagnosis was arrived at without the benefit of testing that most neurologists would consider standard for diagnosing PVS. One such test is MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging). MRI is widely used today, even for ailments as simple as knee injuries — but Terri has never had one. Michael has repeatedly refused to consent to one. The neurologists I have spoken to have reacted with shock upon learning this fact. One such neurologist is Dr. Peter Morin. He is a researcher specializing in degenerative brain diseases, and has both an M.D. and a Ph.D. in biochemistry from Boston University.

In the course of my conversation with Dr. Morin, he made reference to the standard use of MRI and PET (Positron Emission Tomography) scans to diagnose the extent of brain injuries. He seemed to assume that these had been done for Terri. I stopped him and told him that these tests have never been done for her; that Michael had refused them.

There was a moment of dead silence.

“That’s criminal,” he said, and then asked, in a tone of utter incredulity: “How can he continue as guardian? People are deliberating over this woman’s life and death and there’s been no MRI or PET?” He drew a reasonable conclusion: “These people [Michael Schiavo, George Felos, and Judge Greer] don’t want the information.”

Am-Bushed

Hat tip: Powerline.

Q Mr. President, you say you're making progress in the Social Security debate. Yet private accounts, as the centerpiece of that plan, something you first campaigned on five years ago and laid before the American people, remains, according to every measure we have, poll after poll, unpopular with a majority of Americans. So the question is, do you feel that this is a point in the debate where it's incumbent upon you, and nobody else, to lay out a plan to the American people for how you actually keep Social Security solvent for the long-term?
----
Q Paul Wolfowitz, who was the -- a chief architect of one of the most unpopular wars in our history --

THE PRESIDENT: (Laughter.) That's an interesting start. (Laughter.)
----
Q -- is your choice to be the President of the World Bank. What kind of signal does that send to the rest of the world?

Q Mr. President, your judicial nominees continue to run into problems on Capitol Hill. Republicans are discussing the possibility of ending the current Democratic filibuster practice against it. And Democrats yesterday, led by Minority Leader Harry Reid, went to the steps of the Capitol to say that if that goes forward, they will halt your agenda straight out. What does that say about your judicial nominees, the tone on Capitol Hill? And which is more important, judges or your agenda?
----
Q Mr. President, back to Social Security, if I may. You said right at the top today that you urged members of Congress to go out and talk about the problem with their constituents.

THE PRESIDENT: About solutions to the problem.

Q But also to talk about solutions. It's that part of it I want to ask about. Aren't you asking them to do something that you really haven't been willing to do yet?

And our mainstream media wants us to believe they're neutral? Sheesh!

Regulating blogs?

Brad Smith, one of the Federal Elections Commission's (FEC) commissioners, recently made some comments that have been widely interpreted as a thinly vieled threat to the politically active blogosphere. A close reading of his comments does indeed suggest to this reviewer that Mr. Smith actually had the intent to threaten. Scott Thomas, the chairman of the FEC commissioners, has ever since been trying to calm the storm of protest resulting from Mr. Smith's remarks. Mr. Thomas is basically trying to say that the FEC would resort to regulating the blogosphere only under extreme circumstances that (one presumes) he believes everyone would find to be in reasonable need of regulation.

This is a topic on which reasonable men can disagree. My own position is that any regulation whatsoever is unconstitutional on the face of it, and that includes all the free speech suppression provisions of McCain-Feingold.

Bob Bauer (a campaign finance expert for the Democratic Party) recently published a learned analysis of the Brad Smith kerfuffle, ending with these remarks:

But who is creeping through which door? The questions Thomas would have the agency answer—what is news? What is a "legitimate" press function?—are those, in fact, that the proponents of an unshackled Internet would not entrust to the deliberation of the government. Once the FEC has determined that these questions are rightly asked, and that it is poised to competently answer them, it has already seized control of the territory. Those permitted to pass through do so, as stated here previously, as an act of administrative grace which, granted once, may be withdrawn later. It is a matter of four votes.

This is the vast difference between a wholesale exemption for Internet communications, justified by its unique characteristics and a desire to provide for its continued, unimpeded development, and the very different decision to treat those communications much like any other, subject to regulatory whim.

Indeed.

Quote for the day

I would remind you that extremism in the defence of liberty is no vice. And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue!

   Barry Goldwater

A lost day in court

A LOST DAY IN COURT

A lady about 8 months pregnant got on a bus. Shenoticed the man opposite her was smiling at her. Sheimmediately moved to another seat. This time the smileturned into a grin, so she moved again. The man seemedmore amused. When on the fourth move, she had the manarrested.

The case came up in court. The judge asked the man(about 20 years old) what he had to say for himself.The man replied, "Well your Honor, it was like this:When the lady got on the bus, I couldn't help butnotice her condition. She sat under a sweets sign thatsaid, "The Double Mint Twins are Coming" and Igrinned. Then she moved and sat under a sign thatsaid, "Logan's Liniment will reduce the swelling, andI had to smile. Then she placed herself under adeodorant sign that said, "William's Big Stick Did theTrick," and I could hardly contain myself. BUT, yourHonor, when she moved the fourth time and sat under asign that said,............... "Goodyear Rubber couldhave prevented this accident"... I just lost it."

Quote for the day

Silence is sometimes the answer.

   Estonian proverb

Lebanon -- wow!

Depending on who you want to believe, somewhere between 800,000 and 1,300,000 people descended on Beirut today in the largest protest in the history of Lebanon. This anti-Syrian show of force was a direct counterpoint to the orchestrated pro-Syrian demonstrations late last week. The news (excellent round-up in near real-time at Publius Pundit) continues to pour in, and it's nearly all good. Lebanon looks to be going the route of the Ukraine — it's starting to look very likely that the forces of good will triumph, and in short order.

Who would ever have imagined this, even just a couple of months ago? Feels a bit like those giddy days 15 years ago when the Soviet Union was crumbling...

From Naharnet (Lebanese news):

Lebanon's opposition staged the biggest show of force in the nation's modern history from slain ex-Premier Rafik Hariri's graveside Monday, taking a thunderous oath to break Syria's ruthless stranglehold and tear apart President Lahoud's police state of "secret service phantoms."Between 1.5 and 2 million opposition activists converged on Beirut's downtown Martyrs Square and surrounding neighborhoods to mark the lapse of one month on Hariri's assassination. They shouted slogans demanding the resignation of all security commanders in Lebanon because of dereliction of duty in stopping the assassination.

The demonstration was so huge that Syria's loyalists led bySayyed Hassan Nasrallah's Hizbullah and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri's Amal movement, who pose as standard-bearers of the Shiite community were dwarfed into an overwhelmed minority.

What made the trick was the massive turnout of the Sunni sect onto the streets of the capital to defy Syria's tutelage. Crowds from densely-populated Sunni neighborhoods stood shoulder-to-shoulder with opposition activists from various Christian communities and Walid Jumblat's Druze sect, chanting "we want the truth, we want sovereignty, we want Syria out." The Sunnis make up the biggest bloc among Lebanon's eligible voters.

One poster brandished among an ocean of Lebanese flags read "long live Syria inside Syria." Another poster read "President Lahoud, rest assured your turn is coming," a reference that he might be overthrown over Hariri's assassination.

Legislator Marwan Hamadeh, who survived an assassination attempt in October, formally opened the sit-in protest by declaring that the massive opposition was "writing the end of President Lahoud's police state and its Syrian backers." He drew thunderous cheers when he announced "this is the end to the one whose regime has been extended and to those who extended his regime." Hamadeh, a former minister under Hariri's premiership, said "the days of the secret service, the days of the ghosts are numbered."

Bahia Hariri, the ex-Premier's sister who is a member of parliament, stole the hearts of the Lebanese when she took the makeshift podium to address her slain brother at his nearby grave in the courtyard of Al-Amin's mosque.

"You have accomplished Lebanon's long-elusive miracle, the miracle of national unity, the miracle of Christian-Muslim unity that has been baptized by your blood," Bahia Hariri said.

She then raised her right arm and urged the crowds to do the same, vowing "we pledge to be loyal to Lebanon, your Lebanon which you rebuild from the rubble of civil warfare. We pledge to you that Lebanon would never be torn by civil warfare again under any circumstance," she said.

Another touching expression of post-Hariri's national unity came in an address to the crowds by Joe Sarkis, the representative of Samir Geagea's Lebanese Forces.

"I want to convey to you Geagea's tribute from eleven years behind prison bars to the national unity welded together by the last tragic thirty days of Rafik Hariri's assassination," Sarkis said.

Another moving address was delivered to the crowds by An Nahar's General Manager Gebran Tueni who declared "you are the biggest party in Lebanon. You are the party of Lebanon." He left the impression that the opposition Party of Lebanon was bigger than the Party of God.

Hundreds of thousands trekked overland and by sea in bus and motorboat convoys to fill the sprawling Martyrs Square and the nearby Riad Solh Square to the brim. Thousands upon thousands assembled at rooftops and nearby highway passes in what old-timers said was the biggest demonstration since Lebanon's 1943 independence.

There were outspoken charges before the demonstration leveled by opposition leaders, accusing the Lahoud regime of standing behind the assassination.

"The secret services have become a death machine, a death mill toiling without letup," had said Hariri's parliament bloc member Walid Ido.

Ido spoke on Hariri's Future-TV network screen a few hours after ex-Defense Minister Mohsen Dalloul directly accused the Lahoud regime of involvement in Hariri's assassination, revealing that a police unit assigned to protect the ex-premier was withdrawn a few days before the crime.

"Hariri had worked out an agreement with President Lahoud to have the police unit assigned to protect and escort him as a former prime minister. The force was actually put on the job and it functioned from Hariri's Koreitem mansion," Dalloul said in an interview aired by the F-TV Sunday night.

"When Hariri's aides managed to reach the official responsible for the protection unit, he said Hariri has plenty of money and he can hire his own security apparatus," said Dalloul, a parliament member who served as defense minister in one of Hariri's governments.

"The crime took place a few days later and now officials are boasting that 'the crime is behind us,' which means they have committed the crime," Dalloul added.

P.S. The girl at right really is a Lebanese demonstrator from today's demonstration. She and many other Lebanese beauties have been prominently featured in many of the photographs accompanying the news stories of events today. I predict tourism to Lebanon is about to pick up sharply, dominated by twenty-something men. And just in case you don't know: that red, white, and green pattern so attractively displayed upon that young woman's person is the flag of Lebanon.

More from Iraq

From his blog masthead: Lance Frizzell is a Medical Platoon Leader in the National Guard, and in civilian live he's the Press Secretary for House Republicans in the Tennessee General Assembly. Now he's posting from Iraq, including photos. What got me to his site was a link to this post about reasons for the UN staying out of Iraq — with a bunch of snapshots of cute Iraqi kids.

Get it? UN rapists, stay out of Iraq.

Dave's not here

This blog is full of interesting photos (of things you don't generally see on the news!), and a running commentary of just what it's like to be in Iraq.

How to spot a dictatorship

Courtesy of the Coyote Blog:

1. Michael Moore portrays the country as a kite-flying paradise
2. Jimmy Carter sanctioned their last election
3. The UN certifies that there is no genocide
4. They sign friendship pacts with other dictatorships (also here and here and here too)
5. They are a member of the UN Human Rights commission (not 100% foolproof but getting closer every year)
6. They were once a French colony, and/or France is opposing sanctions against it (also here too)
7. Their people are impoverished and they lag the world in economic growth

Quote for the day

Leadership is a potent combination of strategy and character. But if you must be without one, be without the strategy.

   General H. Norman Schwarzkopf

The new barber

A popular Des Moines barber shop had a new robotic barber installed. A fellow came in for a haircut. As the robot began to cut his hair it asked him, "What's your IQ?"

The man replied, "130."

So the robot proceeded to make conversation about physics, astronomy, investments, insurance, and so on. The man listened intently and thought, "This is really cool."

Later, another gent came in for a haircut and the robot asked him as it began the haircut, "What's your IQ?"

The man responded, "100."

So the robot started talking about football, baseball, and so on. The man thought to himself, "Wow, this is really cool."

Later on, a third guy came in to the barber shop. As with the others, the robot barber asked him, "What's your IQ?"

The man replied, "70."

The robot then said, "So, I understand you Democrats are really excited about John Kerry!"

Aurora magnificus

This is an oldie-but-goodie — a picture of the spectacular aurora resulting from an X14-class solar flare on April 15, 2001. Click on the picture for a larger version.

This photo comes from the excellent site Astronomy Picture of the Day, which should be on your bookmarks or favorites if it isn't already...

Quote for the day

A ship is always referred to as 'she' because it costs so much to keep one in paint and powder.

   Admiral Chester Nimitz

The Giuliana Sgrena affair

Unless you've been on vacation to a distant galaxy, you know by now that:
- Giuliana Sgrena is an Italian journalist
- She was kidnapped by terrorists in Iraq
- She was 'rescued' by an Italian intelligence agent
- The agent was shot and killed by US forces outside the Baghdad airport
- Giuliana told a dramatic story of the attack, including 'handfuls of bullets,' armored vehicles, and tanks
- Giuliana has loudly accused the US of 'targeting' her

If you're a little more informed than the average joe, you may also know:
- The Italian government paid a large ransom for her release
- The coalition forces were not informed about the attempt to rescue her
- Her car has just two bullet-holes visible in photos of it
- The windows on her car are still intact

Enough review. Here's what really bothers me about this affair: why did so many people find her story credible?

My initial reaction, even before finding out that the car was relatively undamaged, was that her story just didn't add up. If she'd really been attacked with the force she claimed, she wouldn't have been in one piece, much less survived it. It's implausible on its face that American soldiers would deliberately target a journalist being rescued. My initial take, before any of the evidence started coming in, was that most likely it was a tragic accident, a friendly-fire incident. And that Giuliana was crazy.

Reading the MSM and talking with folks during the week, it quickly became clear that my reaction was not the majority reaction. The MSM was full of comments ranging from completely creduluous reporting of her story as if it were corroborated fact to outrageous commentary implying that this incident "proves" that Eason Jordan was right all along — the U.S. military is targeting journalists.

Now that Giuliana's story is unraveling, even the MSM is reporting on a little more level-headed basis. A little. But what's up with that initial reaction? Why do so many jump on such a hateful, suspicious story and embrace it as if it were a long-lost friend?

I've pondered long and hard on this one, and the only thing I can come up with isn't particularly profound...just human nature at work. I think the most likely explanation is that this story, if you're a member ofthe Bush-bashing angry left and you're willing to suspend disbelief, reinforces your own preconceived notions. In other words, this story is completely consistent with their belief about Bush, so therefore to them it seems likely to be true. It doesn't matter that the details are fishy, or that you'd have to assume evil intent by a randomly selected group of soldiers, or even that visible evidence is contradictory. The story has the "Bush team" exhibiting all the horrible evil things you believe of it, so by gosh it must be true.

I'll instantly forgive the Italians and their press for being suspicious and credulous of Giuliana's story; after all, she's one of them (Italian, I mean). The rest of the world's press, however, was similarly credulous and even more full of vitriol than the self-hating American MSM. But these are the same outlets that are non-stop Bush-bashers, so my theory is not contradicted. It's worth noting that the Italian government and most of the Italian press are amongst the first to regain sobriety. The government, through several officials, has publicly chided Giuliana for "reckless accusations" and "careless talk." Basically they've asked her to shut up. And several Italian newspapers are actively reporting on all the gaping holes in Giuliana's story. And Giuliana changes her story frequently, and it seems the changes are always in the direction of something that sounds more plausible to me.

Giuliana, please shut up. Now.

Does anyone have a better idea about why the majority's initial reaction to this story was to believe it? I'd really like to understand this, as I suspect that buried in here somewhere is an important insight into the liberal mindset...