Monthly Archives: December 2005

Happy New Year…

…to all of our readers, and best wishes for 2006. We’ve taken the night off; posting to resume tomorrow. »

Der Spiegel Reports Possible Strike On Iran

According to the Jerusalem Post, Der Spiegel has assembled reports from various German media that supposedly point toward preparations for a military strike against Iran: The United States government reportedly began coordinating with NATO its plans for a possible military attack against Iran. The German newspaper Der Tagesspiegel collected various reports from the German media indicating that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization are examining the prospects of such a strike. »

They do believe in magic

Recently, I suggested that liberals believe in magic. It turns out that Jimmy Carter and his CIA actually used it. »

On the fast track to irrelevance

Michelle Malkin recalls some of the New York Times’ many low points in 2005. JOHN adds: And that’s not all; while Scott, Paul and I have been partying wildly, Michelle has been hard at work, eviscerating the NY Times’ latest pseudo-story before it hits the streets. Michelle cements her reputation as the blogger who never rests! »

La Preme de la Preme

Back by popular demand, here is my English Premiership All Star team for the first half of the season: Shay Given — Newcastle Ledley King — Tottenham John Terry — Chelsea Jamie Carragher — Liverpool Steven Gerard — Liverpool Frank Lampard — Chelsea Danny Murphy — Charlton M.G. Pedersen — Blackburn Marlon Harewood — West Ham Wayne Rooney — Manchester Utd. Yakubu — Middlesboro For those who like fullbacks, my »

Year ends on high note for Everton, sort of

Everton finished 2005 with a 1-0 victory at Sunderland, snapping a four game losing streak. That’s the good news. The bad news, which could fill the sports section of a newspaper, includes (1) the fact that Sunderland, hands down the worst team in the Premiership, outplayed us, (2) at the season’s half-way mark, we’re in 16th place, only three points outside the relegation zone, (3) our goal difference is the »

Media Lowlights of 2005

The Media Research Center has published its annual Notable Quotable awards for 2005. It’s a terrific compendium of media bias, with lots of media clips included. Here is the winning entry in the “God Save This Court From Extremists” category: “An Advocate for the Right.” — Headline over a New York Times “news analysis” of Judge John Roberts’ judicial philosophy, July 28. vs. “Balanced Jurist at Home in the Middle.” »

Magna cum Saudi

Thursday’s Investors Business Daily ran an important editorial on Harvard and the Solomon Amendment: “Magna cum Saudi.” It takes up a number of issues we have discussed here and effectively juxtaposes them for illumination. Here is the editorial in full: Representatives of autocratic theocracies that finance terror, oppress women and consider homosexuality a capital crime are welcomed at Harvard and other campuses. But not the U.S. Marines. At many of »

A word from Major E.

Major E. has sent us a copy of his letter to the editor of the Washington Post regarding its story on Bill Roggio. Major E. writes the Post: I am disappointed in your piece about Bill Roggio. It had bias and errors that should have been obvious to any of the many editors and fact-checkers with which your newspaper is blessed. I spent eight months on the ground in Iraq »

Tomorrow’s Cartoons Today

BODY: Tomorrow’s Day By Day strip skewers the Washington Post’s attack on Bill Roggio. To my knowledge, the Post has not responded to any of the criticisms of the inaccuracies in its report. Click to enlarge: »

NSA surveillance, FISA, and Article II — another look

Orin Kerr at the Volokh Conspiracy responds to the Wall Street Journal column by Robert F. Turner regarding the legality of the NSA intercept program. Kerr believes, as I do, that the question of whether the program violates FISA is a difficult one, and that the answer depends on details about the program that we mostly don’t know. However, Kerr contends that if the intercept program does violate FISA, it »

You’ve really got a hold on me

Hillary Clinton’s office denies that Senator Clinton placed a hold on the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh, one of President Bush’s choices for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. But someone did, and until that Senator steps forward, it’s reasonable to suspect that Hillary is behind it, and that this is an act of retaliation for Kavanaugh’s role in Ken Starr’s investigation. Meanwhile, as far as »

Throw ‘Em in the Slammer

The Justice Department has launched a criminal investigation of the leaks to the New York Times regarding the NSA’s anti-terror programs. Great news. This makes two; the leaked story about secret detention facilities in Europe is also under investigation. I doubt that anything short of the sight of bureaucrats doing jail time will slow down the torrent of illegal leaks from the federal agencies, so let’s get on with it. »

His least favorite things

When Arnold declined to grant clemency to Tookie Willliams, the city fathers of Graz, Austria withdrew the honor they had accorded the city’s favorite son. Now comes Mark Steyn with the rest of the story: “Like it is: Tookie goes to Austria.” Don’t miss this one. (Thanks to reader Joel Goldberg.) »

Crossings

Not much has gone right with the turnover of the Rafah Crossing to the Palestinian Authority under the deal brokered by Secretary Rice last month. Yesterday all hell broke loose at the crossing: “EU observers flee as angry PA police storm Rafah crossing.” The AP reports: Palestinian policemen angry over the killing of a fellow police officer stormed the Gaza-Egypt crossing Friday, firing in the air and forcing European monitors »

Waiting for Lefty

It has been four days since the Washington Post published its misleading story by Jonathan Finer and Doug Struck on blogger Bill Roggio. We linked to Roggio’s response earlier this week. The Post has yet to respond to Roggio’s points in print or to run any corrections. Today Pittsburgh Post-Gazette columnist and blogger Jack Kelly calls the Post out: “WaPo’s preemptive strike against Bill Roggio.” Kelly calls the article “the »

Dana Priest’s Global Show-n-Tell

Today’s Washington Post page-one round-up disclosing a little new and summarizing a lot of previously reported “highly classified” national security information is by Dana Priest: “Covert CIA program withstands new furor.” Here are the article’s opening paragraphs: The effort President Bush authorized shortly after Sept. 11, 2001, to fight al Qaeda has grown into the largest CIA covert action program since the height of the Cold War, expanding in size »