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...