Monthly Archives: May 2003

May 27, 2003 — Scott Johnson

Expanding the Northern Alliance?

Professor King Banian is the leader of the intrepid spirts manning the fort at SCSU Scholars. Professor Bananian has kindly expressed his best birthday wishes to Power Line and protested his exclusion from the Northern Alliance of Blogs over which Commissioner Hugh Hewitt presides. We are pressing the case for expansion to include SCSU Scholars as well as Mitch Berg’s Shot in the Dark. Since the guys at Fraters Libertas »
May 27, 2003 — John Hinderaker

Constitutional Right to Veil Argued in Florida

Sultaana Freeman is a Muslim woman who refused to remove her veil for the photograph on her Florida driver’s license. The license was initially issued, but she later received a letter from the State, telling her that her license would be revoked if she failed to appear for a second, unveiled photo. A trial on her alleged Constitutional right to refuse to remove her veil begins today in Orlando. The »
May 27, 2003 — Scott Johnson

The news from Sydney

Rocket Man had a productive correspondence with David Horowitz over the holiday weekend. FrontPage has posted Rocket Man’s item regarding the news of American foreign policy developments that you have to go to Sydney to pick up. As my favorite disk jockey at KFAI says when he plays the same song over again, here it is once more once: “Australia conveys U.S. ultimatum to Iran.” »
May 26, 2003 — Scott Johnson

Death wish

As it does with all manner of left-wing nuts and nuttiness, the Minneapolis Star Tribune takes Nonviolent Peaceforce straight. What is Nonviolent Peaceforce? A group devoted to nonviolent conflict resolution that is raising money by selling worthless “peace bonds” on the promise of sending its members into “war zones to protect local activists, search for peaceful solutions, document human rights abuses or monitor the conflicts.” The group’s novelty is that »
May 26, 2003 — John Hinderaker

Saddam Double-Crossed by Cousins?

Iraqi sources have told the French newspaper Le Journal du Dimanche that several key Iraqi military leaders, including three of Saddam Hussein’s cousins, conspired with the CIA to abandon the defense of Baghdad and order their troops not to resist the American attack, in exchange for safe passage out of Iraq (and perhaps other consideration). The same Iraqi leaders are also reported to have spread the rumor that Saddam had »
May 26, 2003 — Paul Mirengoff

The Buck Stops Here

This piece by Tim Hames in the Times of London considers the idea, now fashionable in Europe, that President Bush has abandoned the Wilsonian approach that supposedly has long dominated Amercan foreign policy and reverted to the hyper-nationalist approach of Theodore Roosevelt. Hames finds the thesis clever, but not compelling, and suggests that “if Bush should be compared with anyone it is Harry Truman.” Courtesy of Real Clear Politics. »
May 26, 2003 — Paul Mirengoff

No longer “voting like Puerto Ricans”

This piece by Robert Novak, perhaps our least favorite conservative, argues that President Bush faces a dilemma with his so-called road map to peace. On the one hand, according to the notoriously anti-Israel Novak, the road map offers Bush the opportunity to “forge his place in history” by providing the leadership necessary to bring peace to the Middle East. On the other hand, he risks losing support from Jews if »
May 26, 2003 — Scott Johnson

Memorial Day with James Milam

Please don’t miss this inspirational story from the Nashville Tennessean: “Cub Scout crawls grave to grave, honoring the dead.” (Courtesy of reader James Phillips via InstaPundit.) »
May 26, 2003 — Scott Johnson

The pride of America

I’m afraid I would have missed this astounding report by embedded journalist Jim Lacey of his time with the 1st Brigade of the 101st Airborne Division were it not for our friends at No Left Turns. But it is not too late today to read, to remember, and to express our gratitude: “The men who won the war.” Lacey pays tribute to the soldiers’ wit, their intelligence, and their bravery; »
May 26, 2003 — John Hinderaker

A Festival of Anti-Americanism

The Cannes Film Festival has ended amid a critical consensus that the films premiering there were the weakest group in memory. This might have something to do with the intellectual aridity of a festival which consisted largely of varieties of anti-Americanism: French anti-Americanism, Danish anti-Americanism, Iranian anti-Americanism, and American anti-Americanism. The festival’s Palme d’Or went to “Elephant,” an American-made film about the Columbine High School shootings. The French apparently never »
May 26, 2003 — John Hinderaker

Assad Questions Existence of al Qaeda

Syrian dictator Bashar Assad expressed doubts about the existence of al Qaeda in an interview published in Kuwait yesterday. “Is there really an entity called Al Qaeda? Was it in Afghanistan? Does it exist now?” Assad asked. He noted that Osama bin Laden “cannot talk on the phone or use the Internet, but he can direct communications to the four corners of the world? This is illogical.” (That’s what Dafydd »
May 26, 2003 — John Hinderaker

Happy Birthday, Power Line

This weekend marks our first anniversary. I had read about blogs, and had been reading Andrew Sullivan and one or two others, and thought blogging sounded like fun. Last Memorial Day weekend, I went to Blogger and in a matter of a few minutes had set up a blog. The only hangup was a name; stumped, I asked my thirteen-year-old daughter and her friend Liz for advice. In a moment »
May 26, 2003 — Scott Johnson

Reflections on Memorial Day

The Washington Times editorial today addresses “Memorial Day.” The editorial asks, “What tribute can we possibly pay to those among us who gave — and who are still giving — so much for the cause of liberty? How do we properly memorialize them today?…Yet, Memorial Day is more than giving to the living. It is also remembering the dead — who they were, where they fell and why they fought. »
May 26, 2003 — John Hinderaker

Moroccans March to Oppose Terror

A crowd estimated by Moroccan authorities at one-half million marched in Casablanca today to protest against terrorism. The Moroccan government sponsored the march, and that estimate is no doubt high; independent estimates were much lower. But there is no doubt that thousands of Moroccans participated. Some reports said that Muslim fundamentalist groups were absent from the demonstration; others said that some fundamentalists tried to join the march but were turned »
May 25, 2003 — John Hinderaker

Bikers Rally to Support Veterans

Thousands of bikers have gathered in Washington, D.C. for the sixteenth annual Rolling Thunder celebration, intended to pay tribute to America’s soldiers on the eve of Memorial Day. The photo below was taken earlier today. »
May 25, 2003 — Paul Mirengoff

Some unpleasant truths about racial preferences

The June issue of Commentary includes an excellent piece by Jonathan Kay of the National Post called “The Scandal of ‘Diversity.'” We cannot link to this piece, which I think is important enough to summarize at length. Kay begins by discussing a study by the political scientist Stanley Rothman on the effect of diversity on educational quality at American universities. Rothman?s study is based on a survey of students at »
May 25, 2003 — Scott Johnson

Battle lines being drawn

When New York Times reporter Chris Hedges gave his anti-American diatribe as a commencement speech at Rockford College, he was met with a chorus of boos and other expressions of disapproval. The sickening, high-minded smugness of Hedges’ speech was of course striking, but most striking to me was its sheer rudeness to the Rockford College graduates and their families. The reaction of his audience hasn’t exactly caused any introspection on »