Monthly Archives: December 2006

Happy New Year…

…to all of our readers. May 2007 be a happy, safe and prosperous year. UPDATE: By the way, I hadn’t seen Ed Morrissey for a while, and wondered where he was spending the holidays. Now, I think we know. Marcia, better check up on Ed’s whereabouts! He was last seen on Copacabana beach: »

A Look Back on 2006

We began the first hour of our radio show yesterday by talking about the last noteworthy event of 2006–the execution of Saddam Hussein. We then moved on to a retrospective of the last 12 months, as reflected in a series of audio clips from our show. From the political–November’s election–to some of our favorite commentary on current afairs–Mark Steyn–to some of the more bizarre outposts of 2006 culture–Pink and Neil »

Where To Go From Here?

In his usual lucid manner, Michael Barone reviews the logic that brought us where we are in the Middle East, and finds it still persuasive, compared to the alternatives: I can remember reading a couple of years ago an argument that the reason George W. Bush followed the recommendations of the so-called neoconservatives »

Romney and the bloggers

The Boston Globe has a report on Mitt Romney’s early efforts to cultivate a relationship with the conservative blogosphere. The Globe acknowledges that Romney has already had some success in this regard. Hugh Hewitt, who previously has said that Romney has established a lead over John McCain and Rudy Giuliani when it comes to “new media,” comments on the Globe’s article here. The Globe quotes Michael Turk, who ran the »

Worst bleats of the year

Earlier this month I noted that New York Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger, Jr. had won the Media Research Center’s “quote of the year” award for unhinged liberal inanity. Sulzberger won for an apology: not the apology he should have made — to the Times’ shareholders — but to a college graduating class, to whom he bleated: It wasn »

The thug is dead, long live the thug

The Washington Post reports that one member of the 14-person group assembled to witness the execution of Saddam Hussein shouted “Moqtada, Moqtada, Moqtada” (referring, of course, to the radical anti-American Shiite Moqtada al-Sadr) in the moments before the former dictator was put to death. Saddam reportedly smiled and said sarcastically, “Moqtada?” The gathering reportedly was an “invitation only” affair consisting of the justice minister, top security officals, members of parliament, »

No Correction Necessary

The cover story in the New York Times Magazine of April 9, 2006, was an article on the horrors of life in El Salvador, where abortion is illegal. The article was written by freelancer Jack Hitt, whose far-left perspective is obvious if you google his name. Hitt alleged that in El Salvador, women convicted of abortion can serve long jail terms; the story’s opening paragraph said that “a few” women »

No apologies

The University of North Dakota Fighting Sioux dominated the St. Lawrence University Skating Saints in last night’s politically incorrect Ledyard National Bank tourney championship matchup in Hanover. UND prevailed 4-2, courtesy of Ryan Duncan’s third period five-on-three power play goal and his empty net goal as time expired. Congratulations to the Fighting Sioux for their tournament victories over Dartmouth and SLU. Duncan copped the tournament’s MVP honors, but if you’ve »

Not like riding a bicycle

In November, the people of Michigan amended the state constitution to prohibit discrimination or preferential treatment on the basis of race or gender in the operation of public employment, publlc education, and public contracting within the state. The effective date was to be December 23, 2006. However, shortly before that date a federal district court issued an injunction preventing the amendment from going into effect with respect to Michigan’s state »

Post Mortem

Most reporters covering the execution of Saddam Hussein pay lip service to the fact that he was a “brutal dictator,” but John Burns of the New York Times spent time in Iraq over the years, and did serious reporting from there. He observed first-hand the terror that Saddam imposed throughout his reign, and that experience shines through in his excellent article in today’s Times: Feared and Pitiless; Fearful and Pitiable. »

Let the apologies resume

Last Monday Stephen Shields wrote Joe Malchow dreaming of the championship final that has come to pass, tonight’s UND v. St. Lawrence University hockey game that will cap the Ledyard National Bank tourney in Hanover: I am feeling terribly slighted, and I am deeply saddened and disappointed. As an alum of St. Lawrence University (recently characterized at NRO by Jonah Goldberg, as, uh, »

Saddam Hussein speaks: The Woodward interview

Scott Ott has it, along with word of coming attractions: Mr. Woodward said he would not comment on rumors that he will soon publish interviews with singers James Brown and Lou Rawls, cartoonist Joseph Barbera, actors Don Knotts, Jack Palance, Glenn Ford, June Allyson, Dennis Weaver, Shelley Winters and Jane Wyatt, as well as Crocodile Hunter Steve Irwin and sportscaster Curt Gowdy, all of whom died in 2006 and may »

Who Was the Looniest of Them All?

Each week (or most weeks, anyway) during 2006, we have awarded a Loon of the Week prize on our radio show. Today, as usual, we’ll be on from 11 to 1, central, and we’ll be doing a 2006 retrospective featuring clips from some of our favorite loons. You can listen on the web, here. Meanwhile, my radio partners from Fraters Libertas are conducting a Loon of the Year contest, with »

Fighitng Sioux 4, Former Indians 1

In a fitting climax to Hanover’s Indian wars, the University of North Dakota Fighting Sioux whipped the Dartmouth Big Green hockey team last night 4-1 in the Ledyard National Bank Tournament. North Dakota native Phillipe Lamoureux in goal appears to have been a key to the game’s outcome. We wish the Fighting Sioux well in the tourney final against St. Lawrence tonight. Please let us hear from you if you »

Sensitive to CAIR

Yesterday John noted the Newsweek story by Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball reporting that Barbara Boxer has awakened to CAIR’s terrorist connections and rescinded an award granted by her office to a CAIR terrorist official. It is striking how unfamiliar Newsweek and its reporters seem to be with CAIR’s genesis out of a Hamas front group, with CAIR executive director Nihad Awad’s support for Hamas or with the damning conviction »

Famous last words

Echoing the recently deceased American President Gerald Ford in an interview with Bob Woodward, Saddam Hussein said before his death last night that he opposed the American war that deposed him, the Washington Post has learned. “George Bush is a liar. He should be the one to be hanged, not me,” said the late Iraqi president. “I can never forgive him for what he has done.” “I love peace,” Mr. »

Boxer v. Ellison

Newsweek reports that California Senator Barbara Boxer has rescinded an award that her staff made, apparently without her knowledge, to a Council on American-Islamic Relations official in her home state. The facts, as related by Newsweek, are murky, but it appears that Boxer learned of her own award to the CAIR activist, Basim Elkarra, only when she read about it on FrontPage Magazine. It also sounds as though Boxer is »