Monthly Archives: April 2008

May 1968 and all that

We are nearing the 40th anniversary of the famous student uprising in France. In the heart of Paris’ student quarter, on Rue Saint Jacques, the city is displaying a collection of excellent photographs of the May 1968 events — students constructing barricades from burned-out cars, pulling up cubes of pavement with which to do battle against the police, and so forth. The photos are accompanied by short captions which generally »

It’s getting better all the time

Stealing time from the completion of the second volume of his monumental Age of Reagan, my friend Steven Hayward has completed the thirteenth edition of his Index of Leading Environmental Indicators. According to Steve’s 2008 report, the environmental apocalypse has receded even further into the future than when he started his series thirteen years ago; the United States remains the world’s environmental leader and is likely to continue as such. »

John McCain and the temperament issue

Yesterday, the Washington Post ran a front-page story about John McCain’s temperament. It contained what, on its face, is substantial anecdotal evidence that McCain has a bad temper and a strong vindictive streak. The reliability of this evidence has been placed in serious question. Mark Salter, McCain’s close confidant, acknowledges the legitimacy of the issue (“If one half of it were true, it would give me pause”), but claims the »

The audacity of the real “Audacity”

Stanley Kurtz is on a search to discover the authentic text of the Jeremiah Wright sermon that brought Barack Obama over to Reverend Wright’s church, as Obama recounts in Dreams From My Father. Obama recalls Wright condeming this world “where white folks’ greed runs a world in need.” Kurtz argues: A longer and decidedly more political text [than one posted online last month], can be found in What Makes You »

CAIR’s first congressman

The Council on American-Islamic Relations holds itself out as a civil rights group and has insinuated itself into programs sponsored by government agencies as a bona fide spokesman for America’s Islamic community. Knowledgeable observers have nevertheless long had their doubts about CAIR. CAIR was, in fact, among the more than 300 unindicted co-conspirators of the Holy Land Foundation named by the government in the Holy Land Foundation prosecution. The HLF »

Spot the Trojan horse, part 2

Max Boot and John Podhoretz each comment on the New York Times’s long page-one story by David Barstow on the Pentagon’s public relations efforts, and each is worth reading. Boot writes: Why did the Times decide this story is so important? After all, it’s no secret that the Pentagon–and every other branch of government–routinely provides background briefings to journalists (including columnists and other purveyors of opinion), and tries to influence »

Clintons’ Inferno

Today’s New York Times runs an entertaining article on the Clintons’ formulation of the degrees of disloyalty among former Clinton administration officials, attorneys, and supporters. The article by Mark Leibovich is innocuously headed “Clintons sort friends: Past and present.” Dante’s Inferno provides a deep meditation on human evil through its construction of the nine circles of hell. Dante’s Inferno contrasts markedly with the Clintons’ Inferno. Like the Clintons, Dante deemed »

Paris never disappoints but Parisians sometimes do

In an earlier post, I explained why Paris never disappoints me. The same cannot be said of Parisians. At times, Americans have been disappointed by displays of French anti-Americanism. I witnessed no such open displays and there appears to be little hostility towards American visitors. However, I saw several incidents that suggested the Parisian attitude towards America itself is, to put it kindly, unfortunate. In the most jarring case, I »

Hopkins-Calzaghe Post-Mortem

Glenn Reynolds once noted that he has a great wife; I do too, as evidenced most recently by her willingness to spend part of her birthday evening watching a light-heavyweight title bout. We previewed the fight between undefeated Welshman Joe Calzaghe and the ageless and indestructible Bernard Hopkins here. The fight turned out to be a good one, with too much clutching and grabbing to be considered great. But there »

Michael Yon’s witness

The New York Post has published a good review by J.R. Michael — a/k/a Greyhawk of the Mudville Gazette — of Michael Yon’s Moment of Truth in Iraq. Michael’s review is “Expert witness.” Michael writes: Liberals who claim Yon is biased will be surprise[d] to know that the journalist’s confrontations with the US Army – over the Farah photo and criticism of leadership – nearly prevented his return to Iraq. »

Give Up, Or Else!

In Basra, Iraqi government forces have taken control of the “last bastions of the cleric Moktada al-Sadr’s militia.” In Baghdad, too, government troops killed militants presumably loyal to Sadr in Sadr City. In response to this string of setbacks, Sadr, the courageous cleric who is believed to be holed up somewhere in Iran, issued a “final warning” to the Iraqi government: give up, or else! Astonishingly, the “mainstream” press, which »

Remembering Jimmy Regan

In a tribute to Sergeant James Regan — an Army Ranger killed in Iraq during his second tour of combat following two in Afghanistan — Duke and Army played a lacrosse game at his home town high school yesterday. (Regan played lacrosse at Duke before joining the Rangers.) The two teams ended up raising over $150,000 for the Lead the Way Fund that Regan’s parents set up to help families »

Paris never disappoints

Before leaving for Paris, I wrote: Paris is my favorite of all the cities I’ve visited. However, each time I’m there, it becomes a bit less favorite. I haven’t been in Paris now for six years, my longest absence since 1982, and those years have been eventful and somewhat difficult ones there. So, while I won’t actually be doing any fact finding, I’m looking forward to gathering impressions. I’m happy »

I’m back

after ten great days in Paris, with side trips to Fontainebleau and Mont Saint-Michel. It’s a sad commentary that, even when still on European time, I can’t beat Scott to the punch in the morning. I’ll provide my impressions of Paris in a moment, but first, at the risk of shameless promotion, I want to convey my impressions of Power Line. I stayed off the site entirely between April 9 »

Spot the Trojan horse

At Democracy Project Bruce Kesler takes a look at the 7,000-word New York Times story on “the hidden hand” of the Pentagon behind television military analysts of the Iraq war. According to the Times: Records and interviews show how the Bush administration has used its control over access and information in an effort to transform the analysts into a kind of media Trojan horse — an instrument intended to shape »

Exodus

Justin Taylor writes in response to our Passover post last night: I noted with interest today the post today linking to Hinderaker’s earlier (and spot on) response to Dr. Hawass’s statement about the exodus being a myth. I was glad you linked to James Hoffmeier’s Israel in Egypt. His other major book is Ancient Israel in Sinai: The Evidence for the Authenticity of the Wilderness Tradition. Both are published by »

Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition

Frank Loesser wrote “Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition” in April 1942. It was only the second song for which he had written both the words and the music; the first had preceded it by three years. Yet it turned him into a celebrity. In her biography of her father, Susan Loesser writes: Schoolchildren sang it in assembly; housewives hummed it while they ironed; the Office of War Information, »