Monthly Archives: January 2007

January 22, 2007 — Scott Johnson

Power, Faith and Fantasy

Michael Oren is the distinguished Princeton-educated Israeli historian and author of Six Days of War. His most recent book is the just-published Power, Faith and Fantasy: America in the Middle East, 1776 to the Present. We asked Oren for a brief description of the book for Power Line readers, and he sent us the following from the jacket of a foreign edition: The United State today faces fateful decisions in »
January 21, 2007 — Paul Mirengoff

How much can we count on Hillary’s ruthlessness?

Mark Steyn addresses an argument one hears a lot these days — that Hillary Clinton will be tough on terrorists because she’s been tough on political opponents and others (think White House travel office) who stand in her way. Steyn disagrees: I yield to no-one in my respect for the Clintons »
January 21, 2007 — John Hinderaker

Maliki Turns on Sadr?

We didn’t comment a few days ago when news reports indicated that joint operations of Iraqi and American troops were finally going after Moqtada Sadr’s Mahdi Army. Tonight, the Associated Press tries to account for Maliki’s apparent change of heart: Iraq’s prime minister has dropped his protection of an anti-American cleric’s Shiite militia after U.S. intelligence convinced him the group was infiltrated by death squads, two officials said Sunday. Prime »
January 21, 2007 — Scott Johnson

A wretched stew

After I became aware of the learned critic John Simon in the late 1960’s I saw him on one of the daytime television talk shows. Jacqueline Susann was the guest; the host was David Frost, and Frost was conducting a gushing interview with Susann about The Valley of the Dolls. Was this some kind of set-up? He turned to John Simon, sitting in the first row of the audience, and »
January 21, 2007 — Paul Mirengoff

Don’t throw those labels away just yet

Arianna Huffington spouts nonsense when she claims that the war in Iraq “is not about right and left. . .” In reality, nearly every leftist wants us to pull out of Iraq straight away, while the vast majority of conservatives opposes that course. Huffington cites conservatives such as Sam Brownback who oppose the troop surge, but she presents no evidence that he’s in the majortiy of among conservatives. Moreover, being »
January 21, 2007 — John Hinderaker

Hey, as Long as We’re Talking About the ’08 Election…

…and, having ritually acknowledged that polls taken this early mean nothing, it’s interesting to note the results that have just come out from the ABC News/Washington Post and Newsweek polls, as analyzed by Real Clear Politics. The ABC poll relates to the parties’ respective nomination races, and shows Giuliani with a seven-point lead over McCain, and Hillary Clinton with a 24-point lead over Obama. I regard these intra-party polls as »
January 21, 2007 — Scott Johnson

Live from London: Daniel Pipes v. Red Ken

Sharon Chadha is the coauthor of the excellent book Jihad and International Security. This morning she writes to alert us to her report on last night’s debate in which Daniel Pipes and Douglas Murray were teamed against London Mayor Len Livingstone and Salma Yaqoob: “Clash of civilizations?” UPDATE: David Pryce-Jones also has an excellent report on the debate here. »
January 21, 2007 — Scott Johnson

Jamil Hussein, call your office

We have eagerly awaited Michelle Malkin’s report on her efforts to check out the AP’s story on the burning of the Sunnis and Sunni mosques, reported by the AP courtesy of Jamil Hussein. Today’s New York Post carries Michelle’s report: “Destroyed — not.” Subhead: “Lurid AP report on Iraq outrage doesn’t check out.” Michelle’s related post including photographs is here. Michelle reports: WE obtained summary reports and photos filed at »
January 21, 2007 — Scott Johnson

Chronicles of Mahatma Jimmy

In his 2004 book The Real Jimmy Carter, my friend Steve Hayward notes in passing that in his peanut warehouse office Carter kept a small statue of Gandhi. Steve titles the first of the two chapters he devotes to Carter’s post-presidential career “Becoming the American Gandhi.” Steve doesn’t pursue the parallel and in a sense it is unduly flattering to Carter. Nevertheless, thinking of Gandhi’s advice in the early years »
January 21, 2007 — Scott Johnson

Let’s not, and say we did, part 2

Yesterday Paul professed that he thought he could probably endure a Hillary Clinton presidency so long as he doesn’t have to take her up on her invitation to chat. But how about a Clinton/Obama administration? Mark Steyn thinks that the Clinton machine is seriously threatened by the Obama boomlet, and he may be right: “Media are gonna Barack around the clock.” The video announcement of his candidacy that confided in »
January 20, 2007 — John Hinderaker

A Busy Week In Review

It was Brian “St. Paul” Ward and I in the studio today. In our first hour, we reviewed the Democrats’ “100 hours” in the House of Representatives and assessed the significance of their accomplishments. We moved on to the more serious issue of Iraq, and the bad day the Democrats had yesterday. We talked about the handful of Republicans who are siding with them, took some calls, and concluded by »
January 20, 2007 — Paul Mirengoff

Let’s not, and say we did

Hillary Clinton has announced that she’s in the race for president. She added that she “not just starting a campaign,” she’s “beginning a conversation with. . .America.” Claiming that “the conversation in Washington has been just a little bit one-sided lately,” Clinton implored the American people: “Let’s talk. Let’s chat.” I guess she had to say something other than “please vote for me,” but I’m not sure how many Americans »
January 20, 2007 — John Hinderaker

On the Air

Listen in on the web to the Northern Alliance from 11 to 1 central time today. We won’t have a guest, so it will be all conservative commentary, all the time. We will play some entertaining clips, too, including the Right Brothers’ new single, Scott Ott’s latest podcast, the Sandy Berger songfest winner, and more. And, of course, we will award our coveted Loon of the Week and This Week »
January 20, 2007 — Scott Johnson

Scenes from a miscarriage

Thanks to John for his kind words below regarding my Weekly Standard article, “How Arafat got away with murder.” And special thanks to Standard editor Bill Kristol for his encouragment and to managing editor Claudia Anderson and assistant managing editor Victorino Matus for their work on the piece. Herewith a few notes. 1. From the first moment that the terrorist operation resulting in the murders of Cleo Noel and Curt »
January 20, 2007 — John Hinderaker

How Arafat Got Away With Murder

That’s the title of Scott’s brilliant piece in the current Weekly Standard, which is available online as of this morning. Scott brought to light the State Department’s cover-up of Arafat’s responsibility for the murder of two of its own diplomats, Cleo Noel and George Moore, several years ago, after serving a Freedom of Information Act request for State’s cables and other documents on the murders. He has continued to develop »
January 20, 2007 — Scott Johnson

The fire next time

Benny Morris is one of Israel’s revisionist “new historians” whose scholarship has been devoted to undermining Israel’s traditional founding narrative. Efraim Karsh has effectively debunked Morris’s scholarship in Fabricating History and in articles including, most recently, “Benny Morris’s reign of error, revisited.” In the New Republic, Anita Shapira characterized Morris’s work as “an anti-narrative of Zionism.” Morris continues to stand by, if not exactly to defend, his scholarship, but his »
January 19, 2007 — John Hinderaker

Coming Out of the Closet

There are many interesting things going on at the Power Line Forum. Furious debates, leisurely conversations, issues of great moment being discussed. But this morning, in Patsy’s, the forum where the arts, culture and sports are generally topics of conversation, a regular poster named IronDioPriest came out of the closet. Sad, but in today’s world, hardly unusual. What was remarkable was that one by one, his fellow posters, likewise, began »