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'', 'yes')
November 28, 2007 Harman was apparently inspired to act by a foiled 2005 prison-based plot in Los Angeles to attack synagogues during Jewish holidays.
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INSERT INTO wp_bdprss_items_v3 (item_feed_id, item_url, item_name, text_body, item_update_time, item_time, item_date) VALUES ('56', 'http://spectator.org/archives/2008/12/01/now-the-advent', 'Now the Advent', '<p> <em>Rejoice, rejoice: Emanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.</em> </p> <p> Here's the situation, people: Politics right now is depressing. The national news is depressing. The government bailouts are depressing. The internecine fights among Republicans are depressing. The internecine fights among conservatives are depressing. The thought of Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State is profoundly depressing. The craziness of Wal-Mart shoppers who would trample a store worker to death is depressing. The horrible terrorism in India is far worse than depressing. </p> <p> <em>Rejoice, rejoice: Emanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.</em> </p> <p> This has been an awful year for conservatives. John McCain won the Republican nomination. John McCain ran an utterly inept and dishonorable campaign, and the leftist Barack Obama won the presidency. A Republican president and his appointees at the Federal Reserve and at Treasury badly mishandled a rolling credit crisis, exacerbated rather than healed a panic, and engineered a series of outrageous bailouts and buyouts while saddling generations of taxpayers with the bill. </p> <p> William F. Buckley died. Tony Snow died. Peter Rodman died. Alexander Solzhenitsyn died. Jesse Helms died. One year and a day ago as I write this (a year and two days ago as you read it), Henry Hyde died. And Bob Novak has been stricken with a brain tumor and we pray for his recovery. </p> <p> <em>Rejoice, rejoice: Emanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.</em> </p> <p> Russia has gone authoritarian again, aggressive, and vicious. Iran is going nuclear. China continues to be repressive. Pirates (pirates, in this day and age!) successfully ply the Indian Ocean -- and, to a lesser extent, oceans worldwide, including in the Americas. </p> <p> <em>Rejoice, rejoice: Emanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.</em> </p> <p> Israel -- ah, yes, Israel. Israel is beleaguered. Always. But perhaps even more now than usual. Its prime minister is a lame duck, on his way out of office amidst a scandal. Its strongest international supporter, the United States, is hobbled by doubts caused by a financial panic, and the incoming U.S. president's commitment to Israel (a few bits of rhetoric aside) is in some doubt. And Iran rattles its sabers at Israel while Hamas sits perched in Gaza.<br /> <em><br /> Rejoice, rejoice: Emanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.</em> </p> <p> The world is too much with us, late and soon. The center has not held, and the worst are full of passionate intensity. We are not now that strength which in old days moved earth and heaven. We wind up wounded, and not even dead. I have to turn my head until my darkness goes. The lone and level sands stretch far away….. </p> <p> And yet…. And yet…. </p> <p> <em>Rejoice, rejoice: Emanuel shall come to thee, O Israel….<br /> Oh Come, thou Wisdom, from on high.</em> </p> <p> And yet we in the Christian tradition believe that the things of this world pale in comparison to the marvelous things of the spirit which are to come. Especially here in the United States, where we just celebrated Thanksgiving, we see this bleak time of year and can only be grateful, and hopeful, and confident in the Advent of grace and light. In the Jewish tradition, too, Isaiah's teachings (and others) tell of redemption -- in some forms of Judaism, in the shape of a person as Messiah, who has not come yet but surely is coming; and in other forms of Judaism, in a Messianic age. Either way, if Christmas is a uniquely Christian celebration, then Advent, in its broader meaning of an expectant preparation for redemption, is a season where Christians and Jews can share Isaiah's belief that "all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God…announcing peace, heralding good tidings." </p> <p> We believe, because we already have seen manifold examples of survival despite suffering, of obstacles overcome, of hope rekindled, of joy emerging miraculously from sorrows. In the civic realm, we Americans especially believe, because we have been so mightily blessed already. From Valley Forge we made it to Yorktown. From the burning of James Madison's White House we found victory outside of New Orleans. We bungled Dred Scott but issued the Emancipation Proclamation. Pearl Harbor begat Iwo Jima and D-Day. Sputnik spurred us to Apollo and the Moon. Malaise gave way to Morning in America. And, lest we forget how spectacular a triumph it actually was, we helped a Wall come down while leaving its Soviet sponsors on the ash heap of history. </p> <p> But again, the civic realm is as nothing next to the gifts of the spirit our faith tells us to believe in. Or, what is more quotidian but still in many ways more important than affairs of state, we spend this season, from Thanksgiving all the way through the New Year's arrival, celebrating hearth and home. The love of human for human may be a weak imitation of the love of our Lord, but it springs from the same source and is itself powerful enough for wondrous things. And if even that love is not enough, Isaiah tells us that "the Lord God shall wipe the tears off every face." </p> <p> Our blessings as Americans -- freedom, plenty, beautiful lands, great leaders when times were tough -- sustain us, and our faith and faiths sustain us even more mightily. We know we have always had a rendezvous with destiny, and that knowledge gives us solace and strength. Advent is upon us. O come, o come, Emanuel. </p> <hr /> <p> . </p> <p><a href='http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/pY0bgVg9VODK7_0-429Ioww1iAM/a' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'><img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/pY0bgVg9VODK7_0-429Ioww1iAM/i" border="0" ismap="true"></img></a></p>', '1228167677', '1228167677', '2008-12-01')
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INSERT INTO wp_bdprss_items_v3 (item_feed_id, item_url, item_name, text_body, item_update_time, item_time, item_date) VALUES ('56', 'http://spectator.org/archives/2008/12/01/not-so-blue-in-florida', 'Not So Blue in Florida', '<p> TAMPA -- To the considerable embarrassment of everyone in Florida to the right of WHOOPIE!!, a majority of the state's voters, 51.4 percent of them to be exact, fell for the little hustler from Chicago on Nov. 4, voting for unspecified change. Now I believe in Flori-DUH. </p> <p> I joined some Republican pals the evening of the 4th at a "victory" party at a local Hilton that turned out to be more of a wake. It had the look and feel of the loser's locker room (though, fortunately, not the smell). I left before Obama gave his victory speech and accepted his Rookie of the Year award on the same stage in Chicago (an historical first). </p> <p> Al Franken wasn't the only clown running Nov. 4. Some of the others were funnier and got more votes. But for all the success of Barack "P.T. Barnum" Obama in Florida, there's no reason to believe the outcome signals any seismic move to the left in Florida. </p> <p> Obama didn't have much in the way of coattails in Florida. In the Florida Legislature there was no change in the party lineup of the Senate, where Republicans still hold a 26-14 advantage. The Democrats picked up just one seat in the Florida House, where they still trail 76-44. </p> <p> Florida had about a million new voters on the rolls in November. Thanks to Team Obama, Democrats were more successful in signing up these civic rookies by a ratio of two to one. A large fraction of these new voters were young and intoxicated by Obama. Lots of them voted only for President and left the down-ballot offices for others to decide. </p> <p> Floridians voted on no less than 10 state constitutional amendments and said no to every one of them that even looked like it would cost any money. A "marriage-is-for-one-man-and-one-woman" amendment passed with 62 percent of the vote. Clearly a lot of Floridians remain fiscally and socially conservative. So why did a majority of Floridians vote for a snake-charmer with a radical past and one of the most liberal voting records in the U.S. Senate? </p> <p> The answer to this one in Florida is the same as the answer for the nation. Voters were mad at Washington a lot more than they were at local government. Lots of state office holders in Florida are fiscally conservative, like Florida voters tend to be. So these guys and gals didn't get turned out. And Floridians didn't vote more government on themselves through the amendments. </p> <p> The natural redness of Florida was insufficient to overcome the perfect political storm that would have made it difficult to impossible this year for even an articulate Republican with well-considered positions on the issues and a competent campaign to win the presidency. As none of this describes John McCain and his lame, veering sometimes toward incoherent, national campaign (not dumping here on some fine local grassroots campaigns), there was little hope at the top from the beginning. </p> <p> As the two major political themes at the national level are peace and prosperity, going into an election with an unpopular war started by a president of your party and an economy in free fall is not the best way to three-peat. Considering everything he was up against, and the problems he created for himself on his own, it was remarkable that McCain kept it within the margin of stupidity both in Florida and nationally. He even led nationally and in Florida for a bit after he introduced Hurricane Sarah to the nation and before the economy tanked. </p> <p> Not only were Republicans fighting against a lot of bad national and international news, but they ran their usual ham-handed campaign. The Republicans even lost the tax issue (THE TAX ISSUE!!) to the party of government and taxes. Who would have thought that even possible when this campaign began just a few years ago? </p> <p> Obama was successful in co-opting the Republican message of fiscal conservatism by promising 95 percent of people a tax cut. Don't hold your breath, but he promised it. He also crooned that hoary siren-song of bipartisanship and "bringing us all together." These sweet-nothings don't amount to much in practice, but they're always popular on the campaign trail. </p> <p> Of course Obama has been far less bipartisan during his short career than McCain has been in his long one. But with the left-stream media acting as chorus and megaphone for Obama's campaign, voters would have to work very hard to learn this. Obama's campaign themes and slogans amounted to little more than political stool softeners. But with the media whooping him up, and with the unprecedented amount of money Obama raised, Obama's campaign ads were basically on a continuous loop everywhere. (Please do not adjust your set.) </p> <p> Depending on whose numbers you care to believe, Obama outspent McCain in Florida on media by up to seven to one. He was on television here in the days and weeks before the election more than the NBC peacock was. </p> <p> The message in all of this is that believable, conservative candidates who can articulate why the conservative way is the best for the lives all of us lead -- white, black, Hispanic, men, women -- can win in Florida, whether they're running for state offices or for President of the United States. </p> <p> Media pundits -- including a depressing number who insist on calling themselves conservatives -- as always after a Republican defeat, are trotting out that pernicious and tired old paraphrasing of Horace Greeley, to wit: "Go Left, young Republican, go left." </p> <p> Pay them no mind. Conservatism is still the best description of how the world works when it works well. And when it's presented well on the campaign trail, except in the most hopelessly deep-blue precincts, it's still a winner. It will win again in Florida. </p> <p><a href='http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/v4RIj0zaCVQNDIiizM0Z56fs640/a' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'><img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/v4RIj0zaCVQNDIiizM0Z56fs640/i" border="0" ismap="true"></img></a></p>', '1228167677', '1228167676', '2008-12-01')
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INSERT INTO wp_bdprss_items_v3 (item_feed_id, item_url, item_name, text_body, item_update_time, item_time, item_date) VALUES ('56', 'http://spectator.org/archives/2008/12/01/murder-and-mayhem-in-mumbai', 'Murder and Mayhem in Mumbai', '<p> A consistent theme of most of the world press has been what it considers the unusual nature of the terrorist attack in Mumbai, India. The fact is that the terrorist organization used what it had most readily available and organizationally useful: trained men and light arms. </p> <p> The men who attacked multiple targets simultaneously were merely executing in a low-tech fashion the ordinary targeting associated with their political ambitions. Their operational and political logic is quite easy to divine. Their intent was to seek out foreigners, preferably British and Americans, symbols of Hindi economic success and decadence, a Jewish center in Mumbai, and lastly but most specifically, the local Anti-Terrorist Squad (ATS). </p> <p> On September 13, 2008, on the occasion of a series of bombings of markets and businesses in New Delhi, an e-mail threat reportedly was delivered by the organization "Indian Mujahideen" that in the future they would attack the ATS in Mumbai for harassing Moslems. Three other bombings in Jaipur, Bangalore and Ahmedabad already had been attributed to the IM since the previous May. In all 130 people had been killed. </p> <p> There have been clear indications that the leadership of the IM wanted to embarrass the security forces of India's great financial and entertainment center of Mumbai by establishing and maintaining for as long as it could a military-type presence in this immense city. Bombings could not accomplish its sophisticated, if brutal, ambition and at the same time challenge the ATS directly. An actual special operations-type strike was required. </p> <p> India, and Mumbai in particular, provides an environment of historical religious division that offers a ready support structure for terrorist operations. Diplomatically stated, Mumbai's police do not have a reputation for incorruption. Covert information gathering on security matters from cooperating local police, plus the widespread potential of materiel support from the city's long-time organized crime element and impoverished Moslem community, created access both to essential intelligence and physical assistance. </p> <p> Much has been made of the possibility of terrorist personnel and equipment being off-loaded from an unidentified cargo ship. Transportation from the coast of such a force with all its weapons, ammunition, explosives and other equipment and supplies does require considerable local assistance. It would have been easier, and carry less security risk, if stockpiles had been created beforehand easily accessible to an infiltrating fighting force. </p> <p> Similarly, both the Taj hotel and the Oberoi had professional security protection whose circumvention or countering necessitated a detailed casing operation beforehand. All this adds up to careful planning made possible by well-developed local assets providing accurate information. What carried all the earmarks of a well-trained operation was actually a carefully thought out covert operations procedure -- information for which was available through many public sources. </p> <p> It is the execution phase of this activity that indicated the personnel involved had professional-level training and well-disciplined motivation. The Indian Mujahideen, of which the Daccan Mujahideen (the group taking responsibility) is said to be just another useful nomenclature, had already been cited by Indian government authorities as an operating instrument of Lashkar-e-Toiba. The LET has been said to be a Pakistani intelligence-aided instrument originally created to operate against Indian rule in Kashmir. </p> <p> The connection to Lashkar-e-Toiba is also indicated by the lightning strike force tactics that had been used in the past by LET-associated Moslem terrorists in their attacks on Kashmiri targets. There are many terrorist elements that have been aligned with al Qaeda, gaining both financial and material aid. LET is considered one of these -- though quite independent of al Qaeda's directives. </p> <p> Ultimately the bloody attacks in Mumbai were aimed at a propaganda objective. The lavish international lifestyle of the Indian city that has become the subcontinent's finance center and film capital has taken a direct hit. The attacks have also embarrassed Pakistan's President Zardari, who had only recently sought to reinvigorate peace talks with India. </p> <p> Disruption of normal life in this most cosmopolitan of Indian cities also sends a message around the globe that nations cannot ignore the Islamic ambitions in South Asia. The mayhem in Mumbai is a forceful reminder that <em>jihad</em> is not limited to any particular region, but has worldwide objectives. </p> <p><a href='http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/X4q6KGHqdud5HIlUH_0UJZLmLoE/a' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'><img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/X4q6KGHqdud5HIlUH_0UJZLmLoE/i" border="0" ismap="true"></img></a></p>', '1228167677', '1228167675', '2008-12-01')
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INSERT INTO wp_bdprss_items_v3 (item_feed_id, item_url, item_name, text_body, item_update_time, item_time, item_date) VALUES ('56', 'http://spectator.org/archives/2008/12/01/a-slow-crash-and-burn', 'A Slow Crash and Burn', '<p> Most of us have a certain image in mind of the term "heart attack." We envision a grab for the left chest or upper left arm, a grimace of pain, and a collapse to the floor. "Why you have to go eatin' all that pork?" Richard Pryor's heart demands of him as it slams him down to his knees. </p> <p> Mine wasn't like that. Instead, I felt a tiny irritation in my chest, but enough that it made me want to lie down on my side. Then once I lay down, my heart would stop -- literally stop. Still no real pain. I tried telling myself, "Okay, Larry, you've said you wanted to die, so just let go." Wouldn't work. Every time my heart stopped it would panic me and I'd sit back up to find myself in the same old irritation. Whereupon I'd lie down, my heart would stop, and I'd sit up in another panic. </p> <p> This could have gone on for hours. I kept it up for about 45 minutes, then called 911 for my faithful EMTs from the North Andover Fire Department. </p> <hr /> <p> THE MAIN IRRITATION WITH THE EMTS is telling them what's going on. You can't just say, "Okay, drive me to the hospital and I'll fill in the docs." No, the faithful drivers of the medical truck have to know what's happening, too, because they might have to place an IV, a simple task which will likely save your life. </p> <p> So we get this done, and get to Lawrence General, our local hospital, and find a sharp young resident who realizes this situation is beyond is powers, his equipment, and his expertise. He gives me a shot of morphine laced with Atavan -- mmmm! -- and sends me by fast ambulance to the great central workhouse for coronary bypass operations, Brigham & Women's Hospital in central Boston. </p> <p> There I get what is called a "CABBAGE," short for "coronary arterial bypass graft." I can't say for sure, but I believe I'm part of a class of some dozen or more patients who are being grafted that night. I get the basic: a triple bypass, where the docs peel a long vein from the inside of a leg, then fashion a three-part veinous crown to replace the old coronary arteries, which have failed through clogging or some other mechanism. </p> <p> They split your chest right down the middle of the breastbone -- most of us have seen scars like this. From the inside, it's about as bad as you can imagine. A nurse explains to me that the breastbone is naturally flexible, but that, once it's cut and stitched back together, it has to be unnaturally stiff just to hold everything in place. </p> <p> Result? You can't breathe. Not for weeks, you can't breathe. You gasp and suck at the oxygen hose, and you still can't breathe, then one day about a month out, you manage one genuine breath. And then it gets better and better, very gradually. </p> <hr /> <p> I PICTURE MY CHEST AS THE CLASSIC faux photo of Nessie, the Loch Ness Monster, with three big loops sticking up. I've been in three different hospitals so far, all adding a bit more to my recovery. Sally has read me the riot act. No more smoking, no more isolating in my tiny kingdom of sleeping pills and pain relievers. This literally tears at my heart, that I should have blown 23 years of sobriety on pills. </p> <p> But I did. No denying it. I'll be back at my desk in a couple of weeks. For now, I'm just terrorizing a nurse by typing on her computer. Maybe I'll get one more column in before my discharge. We'll see. </p> <p><a href='http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/XvrawdtiJ26PKXtUeXciO55gWlg/a' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'><img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/XvrawdtiJ26PKXtUeXciO55gWlg/i" border="0" ismap="true"></img></a></p>', '1228167677', '1228167674', '2008-12-01')
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INSERT INTO wp_bdprss_items_v3 (item_feed_id, item_url, item_name, text_body, item_update_time, item_time, item_date) VALUES ('56', 'http://spectator.org/archives/2008/12/01/mean-streets', 'Mean Streets', '<p> ST. LOUIS -- It is not unusual for me to get hit up for change a half dozen times between the time I leave my downtown office to grab a bite to eat and return. The record is ten. By and large, these panhandlers are not the noble economic victims the mainstream media likes to romanticize on the six o'clock news -- the formerly middle class two-parent families whose jobs were lost due to cruel free market policies and whose homes were taken away by greedy, predatory bankers. Rather they are largely single men with chronic drug and alcohol habits, and a miscellany of mental illnesses. A few are unregistered sex offenders, others prone to violent attacks, and some can be found standing on street corners cursing the principalities of the air and scaring the Dolce & Gabbana suits off of young female associates. </p> <p> Downtown is also crowded with young urban pioneers who, at least until the recent economic downturn, were settling here in droves. After being pronounced dead in the 1970s, downtown has returned to life due largely to state historic rehabilitation tax credits. Two grocery stores and a brand new bookstore are opening, and soon a ballpark village housing restaurants, shops and high-end condos. For the first time in decades, the city has seen an uptick in population, due largely to these loft-dwellers. </p> <p> All of these new homeowners, however, present a dilemma for the Democratic mayor's office. How to pretend to be compassionate toward those "unfortunate person[s] caught in the horrible cycle of poverty," and, at the same time, make downtown a desirable place for the young, taxpaying, creative class to live? How to strike a balance between basic civil liberties for street persons, and important issues of quality of life, public health and safety? Thus far the balance has tipped in favor of the homeless. When the mayor's office had police crackdown on vagrants before the popular Fourth of July celebrations in 2004, it was sued in federal court. The case was eventually settled with the city agreeing to pay some two dozen homeless men $1,200 each. </p> <p> The homeless weren't a problem for previous administrations since few taxpayers lived downtown. Business executives ventured outside their office towers only at lunch hour and in the safety of packs. Then the tax credits kicked in and developers began buying up and rehabbing abandoned buildings, and, finally, the ultra-progressive loft-seekers arrived. Their compassion and pity for the homeless, however, lasted about as long as Britney Spears' marriage. </p> <p> Suddenly the homeless were a serious problem. It wasn't just the aggressive, threatening panhandling. It was more the public urination, the public drunkenness, the way the homeless passed out in the doorways of multi-million dollar loft buildings, and the drug dealing in downtown parks. The homeless congregated in the downtown area because that was where one found the city's one major homeless shelter -- the New Life Evangelistic Center. St. Louis's main business district long ago migrated from downtown to Clayton, in St. Louis County, but you will find no homeless there, since office space is at a premium, and panhandling is actively frowned upon. </p> <p> New Life is a queer amalgamation of things. It is a mission, a television and radio station, a church, and a dilapidated homeless shelter. It doesn't do any of these things well. New Life is run by the creepy Lutheran preacher and perennial candidate for Missouri governor, Larry Rice. The Rev. Rice operates 11 television stations, nine radio stations and 23 homeless shelters in the U.S. with operations overseas in India, Nigeria and Haiti. According to records filed in federal court, his nonprofit has assets between $40-50 million, plus $5 million in disposable assets. His businesses are run largely by the homeless who work long hours and are unpaid. As Rice told one reporter, "A paycheck does not solve people's problems." To make a few bucks they are forced to panhandle, which Rice encourages, since its increases the visibility of the poverty problem. </p> <p> Meanwhile most St. Louisans support the Rev. Rice -- as long as he keeps his vagrants downtown and off their well-manicured suburban lawns. They might even give a panhandler a buck or two, but their compassion ends there. Any attempt to build a homeless shelter in the suburbs would be met with howls. And these suburbanites have even less compassion for the downtown loft-dwellers, some of whom are attempting to get New Life designated a "detriment to the neighborhood" and shut down. They knew what they were getting into when they moved downtown, the suburbanites say, the implication being that downtown is the homeless's territory. If you don't like drug addicts, public drunkenness, public urination, etc., buy a condo in the 'burbs. </p> <p> THERE ARE SIGNS that popular opinion may be shifting. News of violent attacks has begun leaking out of the homeless shelter. In the past year there have been reports of a chainsaw attack, a rape, a murder and several violent beatings in Rice's shelters. The local alternative weekly is full of letters from readers demanding to know what professional qualifications Rice and his homeless staff have to care for the non-spiritual needs of addicts and the mentally ill. </p> <p> Rice himself seems oblivious to the <a href= "http://blogs.riverfronttimes.com/stlog/2008/10/violent_attack_at_homeless_shelter_has_critics_on_offensive_new_life_evangelistic_center_larry_rice_st_louis_crime.php"> criticism</a>. As he told the <em>Riverfront Times</em>, it is only he and his courageous staff standing between the general populace and "people turned away from other places." "You'd think maybe the loft-dwellers would recognize that and not shoot themselves in the foot. Without us here these people would be sleeping in the parks and on the loft-dwellers' doorsteps." </p> <p> Of course, what the homeless desperately need are professional rehabilitation services and mental health care, and for well-meaning, but misguided citizens to stop subsidizing their self-destructive behavior. This can best be accomplished in mental health facilities, not in a television station/homeless shelter/campaign headquarters. </p> <p> Unfortunately, most addicts and most mentally ill persons are in no condition to check themselves into such facilities. And a series of 1970 court decisions prohibited involuntary commitment unless a person was found to be a danger to himself or to others. At the same time, vagrancy laws were struck down in order to encourage alternative urban lifestyles and to celebrate a diverse street life. According to the National Mental Health Information Center, in 1969 state and county mental hospitals housed 369,969 patients; in 2002 that number was down to 52,612. A good percentage of mentally ill are doing well as outpatients, but if there seem to be more "crazy people out there" than before deinstitutionalization, it is because there are. </p> <p> This has created to an advantageous niche for quacks like the Rev. Rice. As for the homeless, "Hundreds of thousands of the deinstitutionalized mentally ill have died prematurely from accidents, suicide, or untreated illnesses," <a href= "http://www.city-journal.org/html/7_3_a2.html">noted</a> Dr. E. Fuller Torrey in <em>City Journal</em>. "All too frequently, the consequences of this failed social experiment have been tragic and fatal." A local blogger <a href= "http://www.martello.org/blog/">put it</a> more bluntly: "How many more people have to die and lie in hospital until Larry realizes that his organization does more harm than good?" But then the principle "first do no harm" would be foreign to witchdoctors and mountebanks. </p> <p><a href='http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/8kP2X2ufpT5KrjTJhtYFcBgCeQw/a' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'><img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/8kP2X2ufpT5KrjTJhtYFcBgCeQw/i" border="0" ismap="true"></img></a></p>', '1228167677', '1228167673', '2008-12-01')
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INSERT INTO wp_bdprss_items_v3 (item_feed_id, item_url, item_name, text_body, item_update_time, item_time, item_date) VALUES ('56', 'http://spectator.org/archives/2008/12/01/synecdoche-new-york', 'Synecdoche, New York', '<p> Like <em>Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind</em> (2004), for which he wrote the screenplay, Charlie Kaufman's <em>Synecdoche, New York</em> is a play about time and memory, and in particular the ways in which time both wounds and heals and memory becomes almost infinitely corruptible. Also like the earlier film, it makes use of the realistic bias of the medium to produce a quasi-surrealistic parable which has the power, like the best examples of surrealism, itself to become a kind of artificial dream or memory in the mind of the audience. At the narrative level, it is an essay about the particularities of life. How important are they, after all? A man's wife leaves him, but there seems to be no shortage of willing females to take her place -- though the man is severely depressed and, by most reckonings, not very attractive even apart from the fact that he suffers from various disgusting illnesses. One of them gives him another daughter. If you love, does it really matter that much precisely <em>who</em> you love? How about if you <em>are</em> loved? </p> <p> "Synecdoche" is the rhetorical device of substituting the part for the whole ("hands" for workers) or, loosely and by extension, the whole for the part or other forms of metonymic substitution. It is also, in this context, a pun on name of the city in upstate New York, Schenectady, where the hero, Caden Cotard (Philip Seymour Hoffman) is living with his wife, Adele (Catherine Keener), and their daughter Olive (Sadie Goldstein) when the film opens. Caden is a professor of theatre whose own production of Arthur Miller's <em>Death of a Salesman</em> is about to open. The big idea of the production is to cast young actors in the roles of Willie and Linda Loman, so that the failure and futility that characterizes their aged selves will be seen as implicit in their young and (therefore) hopeful selves. In other words, time itself is to be filleted out of the play like the skeleton of a fish in order to reveal -- well, what? A timeless life. </p> <p> Instead of Synecdoche, maybe the film should have been called Tautology. Or, better still, Oxymoron. One of its central images is the house on fire that is never consumed. Hazel (Samantha Morton), one of women who are powerfully if inexplicably attracted to Caden, buys the house -- she's told it has a motivated seller -- and lives in it for years, apparently, ultimately growing old there and dying ("Might be smoke inhalation," says the paramedic) all the time that it remains, like the burning bush in the Bible, a paradoxical negation of time and the normal laws of the universe. But it is also a negation of what we normally take to be -- the wise might say wrongly -- the central fact of human life, which is that it is just one damned thing after another. No! says the Cadenesque and Kaufmanesque view. It's the same damned thing over and over again, an endless rehearsal for a play which is never presented. </p> <p> For that is what Caden's life becomes in the telling of Mr. Kaufman, who both wrote and directed the picture. Once Adele leaves him, taking Olive with her, to go to Berlin and become a famous painter, Caden wins a MacArthur "genius" grant, and with the money decides to produce a play on such a massive scale that it will become indistinguishable from life itself -- in particular, <em>his</em> life. The point then becomes both to confuse the multiple Cadens, the star of the play as well as its author and producer, as well as to jumble up the times of his life, so that it is soon hard to tell whether it has been weeks or decades since Adele has left and the play has begun. At some point he marries Claire (Michelle Williams), the star of <em>Salesman</em>, and has a daughter with her, so that she becomes a second Adele and the daughter a second Olive. He also hires an actor named Sammy (Tom Noonan) who has been following him around, he says, for 20 years to play himself. Sammy knows Caden better than Caden does. </p> <p> Meanwhile, the original Olive becomes an exotic, tattooed dancer who dies when her tattoos become infected. On her deathbed, where Caden visits her, she tells him that she has to hear him ask for forgiveness for leaving her before she dies. He tries to persuade her of the account of events that we have seen -- in which Adele left him and took her away to Berlin when she was a little girl. But Olive rejects this and vigorously opposes it with the rival narrative of Maria (Jennifer Jason Leigh), Adele's friend and her own substitute father, as she tells it, which she obliges him to mouth word for word: "Can you ever forgive me for abandoning you to have anal sex with my homosexual lover, Erik?" he says obediently, though there is no Erik and he is not a homosexual. </p> <p> Whereupon, she says, no, she can't forgive him, and promptly dies. </p> <p> How far either she or Caden are simply making up the story of their own lives we never know, though it soon comes to seem a matter of little moment. More important is the fact that Olive and everybody else are in some sense as much the directors and impresarios of their lives as Caden is of his. This is the reflection that gives rise to the film's moral, which is that "there are nearly thirteen million people in the world" -- actually, it's only about half that -- " and none of those people is an extra. They're all the leads of their own stories. They have to be given their due." To me this sounds like a counsel of despair, as does its corollary that the simulacrum is not reliably to be distinguished from the original. </p> <p> In what might have been an affecting scene near the end, for example, Caden and Hazel in age embrace like an old married couple. "I wish we had had this when we were young," says Hazel wistfully. "And all the years in between." But in the context of the film, such a wish hardly makes any more sense than Caden's wish for Adele to come back. They've had the life they have had -- insofar as they, or we, even know what those lives have been -- because of choices they have made. Regrets make no sense. But if there is nothing to regret, how can there be anything to love? The film seems to end by adopting Adele's view that "This whole romantic love thing, it's just a projection anyway." If that were true, who would ever go to the movies? In the same way, if life were just an elaborate stage extravaganza, who would ever go to the theatre? This is a movie to kill the thing its author loves. </p> <p><a href='http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/VaQTKnyNrIMJ_XwRgwYLgOikElM/a' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'><img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/VaQTKnyNrIMJ_XwRgwYLgOikElM/i" border="0" ismap="true"></img></a></p>', '1228167677', '1228167672', '2008-12-01')
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INSERT INTO wp_bdprss_items_v3 (item_feed_id, item_url, item_name, text_body, item_update_time, item_time, item_date) VALUES ('56', 'http://spectator.org/archives/2008/12/01/very-incomplete-rm-will-update', 'Only Trying to Help', '<p> <strong>DEPTHS OF DESPAIR</strong><br /> Re: Jeffrey Lord's <a href= "http://www.spectator.org/archives/2008/11/25/three-democrats-and-a-funeral"> Three Democrats and a Funera</a>l: </p> <p> Not too long ago, I asked an old political Democratic pro what was the real lure to being in politics, running for office, and then staying in office.<br /> <br /> Without even taking a breath, he stated: "Power!" It was the love of power.<br /> <br /> I wondered how he might define a "statesman" for me, but chose not to ask such a direct question. </p> <p> What's new pussycat?<br /> -- <strong>R. Philips</strong><br /> Corrales, New Mexico </p> <p> If you're trying to make us feel better Mr. Lord, it isn't working.<br /> -- <strong>Mike Showalter</strong><br /> Austin, Texas </p> <p> <strong>DREAM SCENARIO</strong><br /> Re: R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr.'s <a href= "http://www.spectator.org/archives/2008/11/26/suddenly-last-summers"> Suddenly Last Summers</a>: </p> <p> I offer one modest proposal for the Obama administration: kill the Community Reinvestment Act. This act is in large measure the cause of the fall's financial meltdown.<br /> <br /> The CRA is a Democrat welfare program that puts pressure on banks subject to it -- many of which failed -- to loan money to people who can't afford to pay it back. It provides a huge pool of money for donations to democrat candidates via Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Those are the place where Democrats put their helpers as payment for favors and give them huge sums of money to force banks to make bad loans. This act erased probably $150 billion of wealth in a mere two months.<br /> <br /> An elegantly simple solution is to require that banks make loans that are adequately collateralized to people who demonstrate an ability to repay them.<br /> -- <strong>Jay Molyneaux<br /></strong> </p> <p> The one notable fact about the Obama cabinet and "financial team" is how many were responsible for the current financial mess. While undermining the national economy they all personally profited and will continue to at the expense of the American people and their freedoms. This is not so much a team to save capitalism or the economy, but to reward Democrat avarice, corruption and economic incompetence that will destroy working Americans incomes and savings for years to come. Shades of Jimmy Carter are on the horizon with the appointment of Paul Volker.<br /> <br /> Much like fascist appeaser and Joe Kennedy's poodle FDR (not to be confused with Obama's close friend and corrupt Fannie Mae head Franklin Delano Raines), Obama is setting in place a rogues gallery of corrupt politicians and naive academicians who desire to impose crushing taxes on workers, deficit spending that makes the last quarter century look parsimonious, nationalize private savings and limit Constitutional liberties while rewarding America's foreign enemies. What FDR did to encourage the rise of fascism Obama will do for Hitler's heirs the Islamic-fascists while making life harder for ordinary Americans.<br /> <br /> For those who thought punishing Republicans smart thanks for the "audacious change." Time for conservatives to begin enjoying the political wilderness for years to come -- happy days are here again for the arrogant, effete and anti-American elite.<br /> -- <strong>Michael Tomlinson</strong><br /> Camp Habbaniyah, Iraq </p> <p> <strong>A MATTER OF VALUES<br /></strong>Re: Quin Hillyer's <a href= "../../archives/2008/11/20/should-congress-have-a-cao">Should Congress Have a Cao</a>? </p> <p> Ah, the American dream, living in New Orleans, brought to you via immigration. It is a story of an individual, who within his crowd of fellow Vietnamese kept a focus, a sharp focus on his personal dream, his search for freedom, his desire for peace, his love to maintain family. </p> <p> Cold cash Jefferson has values too. </p> <p> Here’s a story of two different sets of values coming before those citizens who will vote which set they desire...at this time. </p> <p> My country ‘tis of thee, sweet land of liberty! </p> <p> Gumbo, a Louisiana specialty.<br /> -- <strong>R. Philips<br /></strong>Corrales, New Mexico </p> <p> <strong>JUDGE HECKLER</strong><br /> Re: Wendy E. Long's <a href= "http://www.spectator.org/archives/2008/11/26/the-law-on-terror">The Law on Terror</a>: </p> <p> Were I to have suggested a response AG Mukasey to the state court judge heckler, it would have been "You, Sir, are a buffoon." Sadly, our age is marked by exquisite tolerance of buffoonery, which feeds upon the response of genteel silence. The apotheosis of this may be found in the pending Minnesota Senate race.<br /> <br /> Simple naming of buffoons and buffoonery, as with regular naming of ignorance, seems right and civilized to me and a good first step in resistance. I know that naming ignorance has kept Obamaniacs their distance from me this last year; much to my enjoyment.<br /> -- <strong>Reid Bogie</strong><br /> Waterbury, Connecticut </p> <p> <strong>COURTED VOTES</strong><br /> Re: Mark Tooley's <a href= "http://www.spectator.org/archives/2008/11/26/thanksgiving-obama-and-the-pil"> Thanksgiving, Obama, and the Pilgrims</a>: </p> <p> It is disappointing that, after our august men and women of the cloth argue their case and lose in the open public forum, they seek to go behind the closed doors of that state's court and disembowel the deliberative process.<br /> <br /> It is in bad faith that opponents are attempting to defeat Prop 8 by arguing that an amendment to the constitution must be struck down because it is "unconstitutional" according to that same constitution. This totally ignores what amendments are all about. A free and self-governing people must be free to make changes in their basic laws and make binding statements on what the founding principles mean.<br /> <br /> To say, as some do, the people of California have no authority to institute Prop 8 in that state's constitution means turning their backs on the ideal that a constitution and government derive their authority from the governed. To uphold the reverse may be a lot of things; but it has nothing to do with a democratic republic.<br /> -- <strong>Mike Dooley</strong> </p> <p> <strong>IS THERE A MAN AMONG YOU?<br /></strong>Re: Doug Bandow's <a href= "http://spectator.org/archives/2008/11/25/european-fantasies">European Fantasies</a>: </p> <p> I completely agree with Doug Bandow's analyses, down to the last period. </p> <p> Now if he can just find three Europeans who also agree, we could have us a real revolution on our hands. </p> <p> We over here will pay the price for the Eurocrats' warm and fuzzy-noodled dreams of domination. And we will pay -- one way or another. </p> <p> Pity.<br /> -- <strong>A. C. Santore</strong> </p> <p> <strong>SUMMING IT UP<br /></strong>Re: James Bowman's review of <a href= "http://spectator.org/archives/2008/11/25/happy-go-lucky">Happy-Go-Lucky</a>: </p> <p> "There's nothing more resented than a good example." </p> <p> Perfect encapsulation of why some people despise Sarah Palin. </p> <p> Great review, as always.<br /> -- <strong>Lee</strong> </p> <p> <strong>MISSED EXTRA POINT</strong><br /> Re: Robert Stacy McCain's <a href= "http://www.spectator.org/archives/2008/11/26/the-law-on-terror">A Tide of Tradition</a>: </p> <p> It will be SEVEN in a row when Auburn whips Satan’s Spawn on Saturday.<br /> <br /> War Damn Eagle!<br /> -- <strong>Sam Alexander</strong> </p> <p><a href='http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/gQuMgf6docm_q2RqWLIkt-TsPC4/a' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'><img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/gQuMgf6docm_q2RqWLIkt-TsPC4/i" border="0" ismap="true"></img></a></p>', '1228167677', '1228167671', '2008-12-01')
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INSERT INTO wp_bdprss_items_v3 (item_feed_id, item_url, item_name, text_body, item_update_time, item_time, item_date) VALUES ('56', 'http://spectator.org/archives/2008/11/26/suddenly-last-summers', 'Suddenly Last Summers', '<p> WASHINGTON -- There is a condign symmetry about this financial crisis. A government-induced crisis is getting a government-insured resolution. The excesses of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae are being mopped up by huge federal spending made all the more massive by all the reckless endeavors of the politicians, the regulators, and the financiers who frivoled with the intemperance of Freddie and Fannie. Now President-elect Barack Obama has perhaps faced up to the mess. He has not shied away from bringing former Secretary of the Treasury Larry Summers onto his economic team as head of his National Economic Council. </p> <p> Mr. Summers was a proper critic of Freddie and Fannie, having noted this past summer that "The illusions that the companies were doing virtuous work made it impossible to build a political case for serious regulation." This virtuous work was extending mortgages to those who could not afford those mortgages. The toxic mortgages were then bundled in with healthy mortgages and sold around the world by Wall Street geniuses like some enormous chain letter whose day of reckoning came some months ago. </p> <p> The endeavor was a fantasy that had to end badly and so it has. Yet at a certain level the constituent elements of the Democratic Party are given to fantasy and excess. Consider the most vocal critics of Mr. Summers. They are not bankers or economists. They are feminists, often feminist scientists, who forced him out of the presidency of Harvard for his recognition that women of genius are not as plentiful as men of genius in the sciences and math. Now what he cited was a fact. Mr. Summers drew no invidious conclusions and offered no program that would limit the number of lady scientists. He just noted the data in a forum supposedly open to free discourse. Kaboom -- the women of the fevered brow drove him from office. Remind me not to read a book aloud in Harvard Yard. </p> <p> Now, in this time of economic crisis, the women of the fevered brow attempted to keep Mr. Summers out of the Obama government despite his demonstrated economic acumen -- and remember these feminists claim to be a force for justice and fairness. How long do they want to ban a man like Mr. Summers from public life? </p> <p> It was rumored that Mr. Obama wanted Mr. Summers back as head of Treasury. Perhaps the angry feminists kept Mr. Summers out of his old office. The man the President-elect has announced as his secretary of treasury, Timothy Geithner, is probably a suitable replacement. The economic team Mr. Obama is assembling strikes me as pretty good, but the way it was assembled is a bit worrisome. Are all the fanatics in the Democratic Party going to be able to get a hearing with this president? He is going to have to maintain both feet on the ground in the months ahead. The delusional malcontents that a Democratic presidential candidate courts in an election can cause a Democratic administration grave problems. </p> <p> Now that brings to mind the visuals that the President-elect is using when he addresses the American people. He appears enhaloed by American flags, not one or two but a whole ring of flags. Moreover, he speaks from a lectern proclaiming "Office of the President-Elect." In point of fact, there is no Office of the President-Elect, and Mr. Obama is not even in an office. He is on a stage. Arguably, a stage has been his office during much of his public life, given the fact that he is America's first motivational speaker to become president. Actually, I doubt that this is the point Mr. Obama is trying to make. He is engaging in theater. Yet this dramatic setting is implausible. According to statute, he will not actually be president-elect until the Electoral College meets on the Monday after the second Wednesday of December to elect him according to the votes cast on November 4. </p> <p> My advice to our incoming president is to avoid the implausible stage effects. There is plenty of drama out there, for instance a real war and a real economic crisis. Now he has appointed former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker to be chairman of a new presidential advisory board to oversee our emergence from this economic mess. Mr. Volcker is one of the great figures of his generation, known for slaying inflation in the early 1980s and a dozen other contributions to the commonweal. It is a sign that our first motivational speaker might actually know what he is talking about -- when he is talking seriously. </p> <p><a href='http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/YhLfA3Vbvu7CLCGi_95TmYfiSs0/a' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'><img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/YhLfA3Vbvu7CLCGi_95TmYfiSs0/i" border="0" ismap="true"></img></a></p>', '1228167677', '1228167670', '2008-12-01')
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INSERT INTO wp_bdprss_items_v3 (item_feed_id, item_url, item_name, text_body, item_update_time, item_time, item_date) VALUES ('56', 'http://spectator.org/archives/2008/11/26/the-law-on-terror', 'The Law on Terror', '<p> It was not just any after-dinner speech. </p> <p> Last Thursday night, at the annual gala of the Federalist Society, Attorney General Michael Mukasey delivered a keynote address that will go down as a speech of historic proportions: a solemn, powerful, and disarmingly blunt apologia for the Bush Administration's legal positions and actions in War on Terror. </p> <p> The tough, no-nonsense, stoic former Chief Judge of the U.S. District Court in Manhattan, who inherited from his predecessor, Alberto Gonzales, a Justice Department that had become a shooting target for liberal critics in Congress, the legal academy, and the media, answered those critics head-on. </p> <p> And he put down a marker for the incoming Obama administration: given the dangers involved and the stakes for the security of Americans, there will have to be a better reason than the empty criticisms voiced to date to justify an Obama departure from the Bush legal architecture. </p> <p> The familiar refrain that the War on Terror has trampled constitutional rights, civil liberties, and even the rule of law itself rests "on a very dangerous form of amnesia that views the success of our counterterrorism efforts as something that undermines the justification for continuing them." Because the Administration's strategy has been "successful based on what matters most" -- that in the more than seven years since September 11, 2001, Al Qaeda hasn't launched another terrorist attack on American soil -- the critics seem to assume that Al Qaeda "never posed much of a threat after all." </p> <p> But the threat that materialized on 9/11 was as unprecedented as it was real. The fact that "19 lightly armed terrorists could murder nearly 3,000 Americans" in the "most catastrophic attack on our homeland since Pearl Harbor," Mukasey said, created a new kind of "asymmetric warfare" that forced President Bush and his advisors to reassess and revise not just the military, but also the legal, tools to fight back. The Bush response, as he summarized it, was to: </p> <p> • <strong><em>Declare war:</em></strong> Some critics still argue that "war" in this situation is unjustified. One does not declare war on isolated instances of crime. But systematic terrorism can't be addressed after the fact, as America did as late as the 1990s, just by sending the FBI to collect evidence and then prosecuting the perpetrators. Indeed, Osama bin Laden was already under indictment for the bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. On September 11, 2001, the Bush Administration finally recognized the war that Al Qaeda and other groups had declared years earlier. </p> <p> • <em><strong>Capture and detain the enemy:</strong></em> Unlike ordinary criminals who are apprehended, indicted, and often freed on bail, terrorist warriors captured by the U.S. military should not be returned to the battlefield (or released to join it). They needed to be detained, and where appropriate in military judgment, transferred to the U.S. naval station at Guantanamo Bay. </p> <p> • <em><strong>Reorganize government to keep Americans safe from attack:</strong></em> Domestic security agencies throughout the executive branch were brought under the umbrella of the new Department of Homeland Security, and a "Director of National Intelligence" was established to coordinate intelligence efforts in tracking and preventing terrorist attacks. The FBI was restructured to gather intelligence beforehand, not just gather evidence after, attacks. </p> <p> • <em><strong>Enhance intelligence gathering:</strong></em> The lightning pace of technological advances in recent years required new legislation -- the Patriot Act and modernization of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act -- to allow analysts, investigators, and intelligence professionals to access data about the enemy's communications and movements. </p> <p> Typical of the critics of these and other Bush legal policies, Mukasey said, was the head of a nonpartisan legal organization who gave a speech condemning the "oppressive, relentless, and lawless attack by our own government on the rule of law and our liberty." Mukasey noted that the lawyer didn't rely for his criticisms on the text of the Constitution, statutes, treaties, or laws. Instead, he cited the <em>New York Times</em>, the <em>Washington Post</em>, and the <em>New York Review of Books</em>. There has been a widespread condemnation of the Bush War on Terror by critics who fail to distinguish between "whether a course of action is permitted as a matter of law, and whether that course of action is prudent as a matter of policy." </p> <p> And even when legal arguments are raised against the Bush policies, they fail to acknowledge that there is an equally, if not more, powerful legal justification to support the Bush course in uncharted waters when Americans' safety and security is at stake. For example, the Bush position that such non-citizens held abroad cannot use the U.S. civil courts to challenge their detention is grounded in the text of the Constitution, historical practice, and -- before several months ago -- Supreme Court precedent. </p> <p> As Mukasey noted, even the majority of the Supreme Court in the recent <em>Boumedienne</em> decision (allowing Guantanamo inmates to file habeas corpus petitions in U.S. federal courts challenging their detention) acknowledged that the Court had never before held that noncitizens detained by our government outside the United States had any rights under our Constitution. (Hitler's "willing executioners" would doubtless have been pleased to assert their rights under the U.S. Constitution to challenge their detention while awaiting trial at Nuremberg.) </p> <p> Now that a 5-4 majority of the Supreme Court has given those detainees such "rights" (the text of Constitution actually calls the writ of habeas corpus a "privilege," and says that it "shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it"), the first federal court rulings handed down last week ordered 5 of the first 6 detainees released. In an op-ed piece published in the Wall Street Journal the morning after his speech, Mukasey said the general problem with these hearings is the attempt to apply "a civil litigation framework to wartime decisions that often must be made on the basis of the best available intelligence." Accordingly, he warned, courts are going to arrive at different answers in the some 250 Guantanamo habeas cases now pending. And "I fear," he said, that some of those answers will "create risks for our national security." </p> <p> Bush antagonists in Congress have asked the Attorney General to appoint a special counsel to open a criminal investigation into the actions of the President, cabinet members, administration lawyers, and intelligence officers in connection with CIA interrogation of captured members of Al Qaeda. Mukasey said they've presented no evidence that these government officials acted with "any motive other than a good-faith desire to protect the citizens of our Nation from a future terrorist attack," and there is no indication that any government official "sought to authorize any policy that violated our laws." </p> <p> IRONICALLY, IN THE MIDDLE of Mukasey's speech about opponents of the War failing to make their case in law or reason, he was interrupted by a heckler -- a state court judge -- who stood and shouted at him, "Tyrant! You ARE a tyrant!" Pausing briefly to look in the direction of the heckler, but returning immediately to his speech, Mukasey was too much of a gentleman to quash the outburst by saying that such wild charges and name-calling illustrated precisely the point of his remarks. </p> <p> The Attorney General made it almost to the end of his speech, and then, suddenly and inexplicably, he faltered and collapsed. Shock and concern over his collapse overshadowed his final point: that the Bush administration had tried "to make sure that our counterterrorism efforts stood on a sound institutional and legal footing so that the next Attorney General and the new Administration have what they need to assure the safety of the Nation."<br /> <br /> The Obama administration, as he noted, will review those institutions and legal decisions that have kept us safe for the past seven years. He expressed "hope" that the Obama administration "understands the threat we continue to face and that it shares the priority we have placed on remaining on the offense to prevent future terrorist attacks." </p> <p> As we left the ballroom after the Attorney General was rushed to the hospital, those present had a dual sense of uncertainty -- about his condition and about the future course of the War on Terror. </p> <p> As to the former, thankfully, the word came within hours that the Attorney General was well. As to the latter, one can say only one thing for sure: the Mukasey speech is one that history will vindicate, in one way or another. </p> <p><a href='http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/JcYNRKL41Jw17zMaFrOAZyPQmWM/a' target='_blank' rel='nofollow'><img src="http://feedads.googleadservices.com/~a/JcYNRKL41Jw17zMaFrOAZyPQmWM/i" border="0" ismap="true"></img></a></p>', '1228167677', '1228167669', '2008-12-01')
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INSERT INTO wp_bdprss_items_v3 (item_feed_id, item_url, item_name, text_body, item_update_time, item_time, item_date) VALUES ('56', 'http://spectator.org/archives/2008/11/26/the-pilgrims-financial-crisis', 'The Pilgrims' Financial Crisis', '<p> The Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth Rock in 1620 were an idealistic lot. They were part of the broader Puritan movement believing that the Anglican Church, recognized in law as the official church of England, had strayed from true Christianity. The Puritans were devoted to the Bible as the only true source of Christian doctrine and practice and objected to Anglican traditions and practices that had been added over the years from outside of the Bible. </p> <p> The Puritans more generally wanted to reform and purify the Anglican church from within. But the Pilgrims were a subset of Puritans that wanted to separate themselves from the Anglican church entirely and practice their own true form of Christianity on their own. The Anglicans in turn persecuted the Puritans as heretics rebelling against the officially recognized Church of England and their obligations to it under the law. </p> <p> This is what led the Pilgrims to leave England seeking full religious freedom. First they migrated to the Netherlands, which practiced religious tolerance of alternative religions. But the English Puritans wanted their children to grow up in an English culture, not as Dutchmen. That is why after a few years they sought to establish their own colony in the New World, where they could control their own government, religion and culture. </p> <p> Due to unexpected delays, wandering off course, and searching for the best settlement site, the <em>Mayflower</em>, carrying 102 settlers, finally anchored at what was to become the settlement of Plymouth on December 21, 1620, the dead of winter. William Bradford, destined to become the second governor of the colony and the longest serving, wrote in his diary while still on the ship and contemplating "this poor people's present condition": </p> <blockquote> <p> Being thus passed the vast ocean, they had now no friends to welcome them, nor inns to entertain or refresh their weatherbeaten bodies; no houses or much less towns to repair to, or to seek for succor….And for the season it was winter, and they know that the winters of that country [are] sharp and violent, and subject to cruel and fierce storms, dangerous to travel to known places, much more to search an unknown coast. Besides, what could they see but a hideous and desolate wilderness, full of wild beasts and wild men—and what multitudes there might be of them they know not….If they looked behind them, there was the mighty ocean which they had passed and was now as a main bar and gulf to separate them from all the civil parts of the world….What could now sustain them but the spirit of God and his grace? </p> </blockquote> <p> In these precarious conditions, it was natural for them to work together and share their food and shelter. Even so, 45 of the original 102 died that first winter, including 13 of the original adult women, with one more passing away in May. During 1621, they discovered a couple of English speaking Indians, who had learned the language from fishermen hauling off fish from the New England coast, but who had not settled. This included the famed Squanto, who showed the settlers how to best hunt, fish, plant, and mine essential commodities in the New World, served as their exploration guide, and developed their relations with the surrounding Indian tribes. </p> <p> By 1623, four additional ships of settlers had arrived. The colony had initially prospered just collecting wild growing food, and securing plentiful game such as turkeys and deer providing venison, supplemented by their own agriculture. Given their religious devotion, their concern for personal wealth was not a top issue for them, and even in that time idealistic notions of communal property and sharing communal resources as offering an ideal society of happiness had a strong appeal for those striking out to start a new civilization from scratch. </p> <p> But as the colony grew, this initial quasi-socialist community of share and share alike was not working to produce enough for essential basic needs, let alone the prosperity that was expected in the new world. Available wild supplies of food, in particular, were no longer enough. Bradford again wrote in his dairy, </p> <blockquote> <p> All this while no supply [of wild corn] was heard of, neither knew they when they might expect any. So they began to think how they might raise as much corn as they could, and obtain a better crop than they had done, that they might not thus languish in misery. At length, after much debate of things, the Governor (with the advice of the chiefist amongst them) gave way that they should set corn every man for his own particular, and in that regard trust to themselves; in all other things go on in the general way as before. And so assigned to every family a parcel of land, according to the proportion of their number, for that end….This had very good success, for it made all hands very industrious, so as much more corn was planted than otherwise would have been by any means the Governor or any other could use, and saved him a great deal of trouble, and gave far better content. The women now went willingly into the field, and took their little ones with them to set corn; which before would allege weakness and inability, whom to have compelled would have been thought great tyranny and oppression. </p> </blockquote> <p> As indicated, this experiment in private agriculture was hugely successful, with the colony's agricultural output soaring. But the settlers still increasingly complained that the colony's remaining communal practices and lack of complete private property were constraining and unfair. Bradford wrote further in his diary in 1623, </p> <blockquote> <p> The experience that was had in this common course and condition, tried sundry years and that amongst godly and sober men, may well evince the vanity of that conceit of Plato's and other ancients applauded of by some of later times; that the taking away of property and bringing in community into a commonwealth would make them happy and flourishing, as if they were wiser than God. For this community…was found to breed much confusion and discontent and retard much employment that would have been to their benefit and comfort. For the young men, that were most able and fit for labor and service, did repine that they should spend their time and strength to work for other men's wives and children without any recompense. The strong, or man of parts, had no more in division of victuals and clothes than he that was weak and not able to do a quarter the other could; this was thought injustice….And for men's wives to be commanded to do service for other men, as dressing their meat, washing their clothes, etc., they deemed it a kind of slavery….Let none object this is men's corruption, and nothing to the course [meaning communal policy] itself. I answer, seeing all men have this corruption in them, God in his wisdom saw another course fitter for them. </p> </blockquote> <p> Thus was capitalism born in America, sentimental notions of socialism having been tried and failed, not only as a matter of economics, but also because it was seen as a regime of unjust restrictions on personal liberty. The colony adopted private property and free trade, ending its own critical financial crisis, and creating the trademark bountiful American prosperity, which drew waves of new settlers seeking the American dream that had already been born. </p> <hr /> <p> THE COLONY OF JAMESTOWN, established even earlier in Virginia in 1607, was quite different. Its settlers were not idealistic separatists seeking religious freedom, but entrepreneurs seeking riches. The English government wisely contracted out settlement of the New World, in this case chartering the Virginia Company of London in 1606 to finance and maintain settlements in Virginia, through funds raised from private investors. The company obtained and fitted out three ships carrying 105 passengers, which departed England for the New World in December, 1606. </p> <p> Arriving in the more hospitable spring season of 1607 in the more friendly Virginia climate, its venturers immediately started searching for the gold and other easy riches the Spanish had so readily found in their New World explorations. But Virginia did not offer such quick riches. With the settlement party composed more of businessmen and aristocrats not accustomed to the manual labor necessary for survival in the New World, the settlement was soon in danger of failure. The aristocrats expected others to provide for their basic needs. Those capable and willing to build shelter, hunt for game, and raise food were not willing to yield to the heavy effective taxation that would be needed to provide for the entire settlement through their own work alone. Thus Jamestown faced a similar financial crisis as the later Pilgrims. </p> <p> Fortunately, the renowned and practical adventurer Captain John Smith was elected President of the colony in 1608. His focus was survival for the colony and its settlers, rather than quick riches. He established extensive relations with the surrounding Indian population to gain a quick source of food. This led to his celebrated romance with the Indian princess Pocahontas. </p> <p> Then, to deal with his non-working aristocrats, Smith adopted as Colony policy the principle of "He who does not work does not eat." With the resulting newfound incentives, colony productivity and output soared, along with the survival rate among the settlers, which climbed to over 90%. This brings to mind the workfare Reagan sought to establish in California and Washington, which saw fruition in the welfare reforms the Congressional Republican majorities adopted under Speaker Newt Gingrich in 1996. </p> <p> This new capitalist policy solved the financial crisis of Jamestown as well. By 1613, enterprising colonist John Rolfe, who later married Pocahontas, introduced tobacco farming. This proved to be "black gold" for the colony, with a lucrative market for the crop quickly developing in Europe, which led to an explosion of prosperity in Virginia. Waves of new settlers flowed in here as well, seeking again the new American dream of prosperity and freedom. In his later writing promoting settlement of the New World, Smith wrote, "Here every man may be master and owner of his owne labor and land….If he have nothing but his hands, he may…by industrie quickly grow rich." </p> <hr /> <p> TODAY, WE KNOW as well how to solve our own financial crisis and restore American prosperity. Besides the experience of the early colonists, we have the more direct recent experience of the historic Reagan economic boom. If we cut tax rates for workers, corporations, investors and entrepreneurs, we increase the reward and consequently the incentive for productive activity, as in Plymouth and in Jamestown. If we reduce unnecessary regulatory burdens, then we reduce costs on the economy, and so also increase the reward for pro-growth engagements. Removing regulations in particular that prevent production of oil, gas, and nuclear power would provide a reliable supply of low cost energy also stimulating economic growth. We also need stricter anti-inflation monetary policies for the Fed, whose loose monetary policies in recent years was the fundamental cause of the housing bubble, that lies at the root of the meltdown of major financial institutions we are suffering now. Reduced government spending burdens also reduces unnecessary costs for the economy. Free trade further promotes prosperity for all. </p> <p> This is all simple, direct, undeniable logic, proven by thousands of years of human economic experience. The bigger problem for America now is not the financial crisis, but that our political fashion is stuck on stupid, wanting to take us in exactly the opposite direction of where we need to go to restore our prosperity. Instead of Reaganomics, our new political leaders want to pursue Hugo Chavez economics. Their badly misled followers are lost in a soft-headed dreamworld. But their leaders know where they are going. What they are after is not maximum prosperity for all, but voter dependency to cement their political power. </p> <p> The American people will eventually figure this out, rediscover the timeless principles of human economics, and reject the comparative poverty of government redistribution in favor of the traditional American prosperity and freedom established by our nation's founders.
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