Monthly Archives: March 2008

March 27, 2008 — Scott Johnson

Nick Coleman defames a hometown hero

Nick Coleman is a third-rate columnist for a second-rate newspaper. He wields his Star Tribune metro column like a hatchet, performing acts of destruction that seem to fulfill some dark needs. Coleman’s column illustrates how a newspaper such as the Star Tribune can become a corrosive force on the civic life of the community it serves. In his column today, Coleman defames the Vets for Freedom and executive director Pete »
March 27, 2008 — Paul Mirengoff

Airbrushing Rev. Wright, Part Two

A few days ago, I noted how the Washington Post had seemed to airbrush Reverend Wright out of a story regarding the Clinton campaign’s reaction to the fact that Barack Obama was speaking about race relations while Hillary was talking about economic issues. The Post claimed that the Clinton campaign was pleased because Obama was discussing “the loft[y] subject of social harmony.” Yet it seemed far more plausible that the »
March 27, 2008 — John Hinderaker

Free Mumia!

A panel of the Third Circuit Court of Appeals reversed Mumia Abu-Jamal’s death sentence this morning. Abu-Jamal was sentenced to die for murdering a Philadelphia policeman in 1982. The court ordered that Mumia receive a new sentencing hearing, or else be sentenced to life in prison. I haven’t yet read the court’s opinion, and the linked AFP article doesn’t say what the grounds were. What I really want to point »
March 27, 2008 — John Hinderaker

Floor Fight, Here We Come

Last night, Greta van Susteren interviewed Hillary Clinton on Fox News. This was the most interesting exchange: VAN SUSTEREN: And if he says, no, I won’t do it, that leaves Michigan and Florida out. And does that leave you out? CLINTON: No. Not at all, because we are going to make sure those votes get counted, one way or another. VAN SUSTEREN: How? CLINTON: Well, you know, you can always »
March 27, 2008 — Scott Johnson

Saddam’s man in Southfield

Debbie Schlussel has much more on Murthanna Al-Hanooti, Saddam’s man in Southfield, Michigan. Al-Hanooti brokered the trip that took Democrats Jim McDermott, David Bonior, and Mike Thompson to Iraq in 2002, courtesy of Saddam Hussein. He was indicted yesterday for working as a spy for Saddam Hussein’s intelligence service. Among other things, Al-Hanooti is the former head of CAIR’s Michigan chapter. Al-Hanooti’s indictment coincides with the third installment of the »
March 27, 2008 — Scott Johnson

Duck, Mrs. Clin–uh, Mrs. Nixon

The New Nixon is having great fun contrasting Pat Nixon’s 1969 trip to Vietnam with Ms. Hillary’s renowned trip to Bosnia — almost as much fun as Michelle Malkin is having with Senator Clinton’s trip itself. Today Sandy Quinn has an interview with the Army pilot who accompanied Mrs. Nixon together with a related photo. »
March 27, 2008 — Scott Johnson

The Greenhousing of Yale Law School

Yale Law School Professor Charles Reich gave us The Greening of America. Now Linda Greenhouse gives us the Greenhousing of Yale Law School, as the long-time New York Times Supreme Court reporter signs on as the law school’s journalist-in-residence and senior fellow. Greenhouse is recognized in the aptly named “Greenhouse effect,” in which favorable coverage provided by the mainstream media is credited with the “growth” or evolution of judges to »
March 27, 2008 — Scott Johnson

Across the border

Todd Bensman is the outstanding San Antonio Express-News reporter who investigated and wrote the four-part series “Breaching America,” about the travel of “special interest aliens” from the Middle East across U.S. borders. We noted Todd’s work again most recently in “Axis of evil: Coming soon to a neighborhood near you.” Now Todd returns with a post at his own site providing a compilation of terrorists known to have crossed either »
March 26, 2008 — Paul Mirengoff

The latest on Connerly’s crusade

The Washington Post reports that Ward Connerly has succeeded in placing an initiative against state action involving racial preferences on the ballot in Colorado, and is attempting to gather the signatures needed for such an initiative in Arizona, Missouri, Nebraska, and Oklahoma. Given his success in the very blue states of California, Washington, and Michigan, Connerly »
March 26, 2008 — Scott Johnson

The impotence of Power

Reader Stephen Klasing writes: About 10 days ago, Samantha Power appeared on the radio program Extension 720 with Milt Rosenberg on WGN AM in Chicago. She had already stepped down from the Obama campaign, and her appearance on the show was — ostensibly — for the purpose of promoting her book. But the most of the conversation focused on Obama’s foreign policy positions (and worldview) and Power’s justifications for those »
March 26, 2008 — John Hinderaker

Higher Education in Minnesota

We learned yesterday that veterans of the United States Army and Marine Corps who have fought for their country and have been awarded the Bronze Star, the Silver Star, the Navy Cross and other decorations are too controversial to be allowed inside a public high school in Minnesota. Some of those high school students, whose tender sensibilities needed to be protected from America’s vets, will go on to attend Southwest »
March 26, 2008 — Paul Mirengoff

An oil for stooges deal

Federal prosecutors have alleged that Saddam Hussein »
March 26, 2008 — Paul Mirengoff

Does Obama have a “Jewish problem”?

Marc Ambinder argues that “there is no evidence that Barack Obama has a ‘Jewish’ problem.” Actually, he asserts this; what he argues is that Obama doesn’t have a “Jewish” problem by virtue of his association with Gen. Tony McPeak. Even here, Ambinder’s reaasoning is questionable. He compares Obama’s association with McPeak to John McCain’s association with John Hagee, an anti-Catholic. But McPeak is Obama’s campaign co-chair and one of his »
March 26, 2008 — Paul Mirengoff

The kind of numbers Hillary Clinton needs more of

For every two Hillary Clinton suppoters among Democrats who say they will vote for Barack Obama if he’s the Democratic nominee, nearly one says he or she will vote for John McCain in that event. The actual breakdown in this Gallup poll is 59 percent for Obama and 28 percent for McCain. Obama supporters show more party loyalty. 72 percent of them say they would vote for Clinton in November; »
March 26, 2008 — Scott Johnson

Really tricky

Samantha Power made her name as an advocate of human rights and the author of a Pulitzer Prize-winning book on the subject. Although she has resigned her formal position as an adviser to Barack Obama, it is reasonable to assume that she will return to serve if Obama is elected president. Paul covered Power’s foreign policy thought in a series of posts accessible here. An April 2003 Boston Phoenix symposium »
March 26, 2008 — Scott Johnson

The most prevalent form of degradation, part 2

Yesterday we noted some of the commentary on the revisionist account of World War II by novelist Nicholson Baker in his new book Human Smoke. Baker draws an equivalence between the German and Allied sides in the war in which he derogates the leadership of Churchill and Roosevelt. In a letter to the editor of the New York Sun Baker denies that he draws such an equivalence. Rather, according to »
March 25, 2008 — Scott Johnson

A joyful noise in Minnesota

As John reports below and Ed Morrissey reports here, tonight’s Vets for Freedom National Herooes Tour rally at Fort Snelling was special. (Check out Vets for Freedom here; support the tour here.) Have Americans who have already served and sacrificed ever had to rally support at home on behalf of their colleagues still in harm’s way to let them win? Shouldn’t those of us who benefit from their service be »