Lost in the headlines is this report from the State Department showing that the number of terrorist acts in 2003, worldwide, was the lowest since 1969. Do critics of America's foreign policy believe this to be a fluke? A historical coincidence? Luck?

Back in '69, radical chic was all the rage and terrorists, often called war protesters or radicals, were lauded by much of the Eastern establishment as latter-day freedom fighters. Although few politicians today would actually praise the likes of the Weathermen, partisans looking for ways to attack the Bush administration's war on terror rarely hesitate to demean the president, the armed forces, and America's place in the world. Has John Kerry ever given a speech in which he didn't mention Vietnam? Everyone is nostalgic about his youth, but the best try to learn a few things along the way. Which Boomer is looking forward, and which is stuck in the past?

Kennet Silber argues that a successful campaign against terrorism requires Americans to cultivate three "anti-terror" virtues: courage, patience, and rationality. Some key illustrations of his points:

On Courage: "Before September 11, Al Qaeda leaders calculated, mistakenly, that fear would hobble the U.S. response to the attack. The terrorists have been slow to grasp their error. Early this year, a letter evidently from Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, al Qaeda's man in Iraq, described Americans as 'the biggest cowards that God has created,' and yet noted, with grim puzzlement, that 'America … has no intention of leaving, no matter how many wounded nor how bloody it becomes.'"

On Patience: "The quintessential American desire to cut through the nonsense and fix things quickly is beneficial in many aspects of life. Yet, the War on Terror requires not just bold strokes but also slow, painstaking work. Terrorist groups must be infiltrated. Sleeper cells must be monitored. The indoctrination conducted in radical madrassahs and the propaganda spewing from Al Jazeera must be countered by steady, persistent education and information."

On Rationality: "Placing a high value on rational thought contributes to the moral outrage one feels against Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups. For instance, the doctrine that suicidal murderers are rewarded with 72 virgins in paradise is offensive not only because it is heartlessly brutal and strangely lascivious but also because it is astonishingly stupid. Such mindlessness in the ideologies of terror provides the terrorists with certain tactical benefits, such as a supply of human cannon fodder. But a poor grasp of reality is no advantage in a long war. Their irrationality will contribute to the terrorists' undoing."

I hadn't thought of rationality so much as a virtue as a frame of mind or goal in reasoning. Whatever it is, clear thinking will be needed as we press ahead with our efforts to preserve our liberties. To fail to do so would be irrational indeed.

A small stream separates Germany and the Czech Republic, and the differences in the two border towns of Deutschneudorf and Nova Ves point to the importance of developing the institutions of civil society as part of the democratization of formerly communist lands. After floods washed out a bridge over the stream, the mayor of the German town simply ignored the rules and regulations, found an old Russian pontoon, and placed it over the water to be used as a foot bridge. He then filed plans with Czech and German bureaucracies only to learn that the Czechs objected because he failed to complete a technical study of the bridge; in response, their German counterparts ordered a halt to the project.

That was two years ago, and the bridge is still in use. His Czech counterpart, Mayor Jana Dvorakova, a member of the Communist Party, said that she would never have moved without official approval, but that she's happy the bridge is there. That is, left up to her own initiative, there would be no bridge today.

What's more, the German mayor, Heinz-Peter Haustein, nailed the situation in the European Union, which the Czechs join this Saturday:

"'The bureaucracy in Europe is terrible,' Mr. Haustein said. 'The E.U. has rules on how bananas should be grown, and what shape they should be. Bill Gates could never have started a business in his garage here, because the relevant authorities would have shut him down.'"

Indeed. The freedom to think creatively, even to construct something as simple and necessary as a foot bridge, is killed off, punished, or at least denied any reward in the bureaucratic state. Mayor Haustein is right: Bill Gates's German alter ego, Wilheim Torhaus, wouldn't have revolutionized software and, by extension, the world. At least Mayor Haustein knows that something is wrong and is willing to act first and seek permission later in such mundane matters. Someone should let him know that, if he comes to America, his attitude might translate into money.

Many of us have thought for years that the UN was, at its base, a way for dictators to improve their image and diplomats to make a comfortable living doing nothing. It's procrastination on steriods at its best, defense of brutality at its worst.

Not that the mess such an organization causes isn't corrupting in and of itself. But with news coming out daily about the top-to-bottom scandal in the Iraqi Oil-for-Food Program, the organization's viability is at stake as never before. Anyone desirous of the spread of freedom should pay particular attention to the stonewalling of the G.A.O. now occuring throughout the UN's bureaucracy. If Kofi Annan keeps his job, we'll know nothing's going to change.

Today's Washington Times carries the extraordinary story of seven Iraqi men who, as scapegoats for Saddam's failing regime after the first Gulf War, suffered the surgical removal of their right hands to "show what happens to those who undermine our economy." The amputations were performed by physicians who had the procedures photographed in order to further ingratiate themselves with the dictator.

The seven are now in Houston, where, gratis, they're getting $50,000 state-of-the-art bionic hands and physical therapy. On May 29 they'll travel to Washington, D.C., and the reporter says they've been treated like martyrs or heroes everywhere they've gone around Houston.

All of this has occurred because private Americans, from television producers to M.D.s to the manufacturer of the bionic hands, have donated their time, money, and talent to help repair what was done to them by a regime that was as brutal as any in history. That they were the victims of Iraqi doctors who so grossly violated their oaths to please a tyrant reminds one of Dr. Josef Mengele's actions against imprisoned Jews during WWII. It's also a reminder that evil exists in our world, pace our therapeutic culture that prefers to bury that word along with the victims of those who are evil themselves.

According to the Times, "All the Iraqi amputees strongly support the U.S.-led coalition's war to oust Saddam's regime and hope peace and prosperity will return to their homeland." Says one of the Iraqis: "Only thing I wonder . . . is why the Americans didn't come in 1993. They could have walked in and taken Baghdad with 100 men. We've been waiting all these years."

That's the message in a front-page story in today's Wall Street Journal ($) on the mini-Chinatowns (and, I'd add, Koreatowns, Vietnamtowns, et al.) that have sprung up in unlikely places. The article traces the development of a series of malls and shopping centers along a formerly dreary stretch of road in Las Vegas. Possessed by an entrepreneurial drive in a land of opportunity, first and second-generation Chinese have constructed a commercial center at which their confreres can purchase just about any product from the old country.

Just as interesting is the fact that the businesses are miles from the suburban homes of most customers who flock there daily. That's a striking departure from ethnic enclaves in older cities such as New York and San Francisco, which still harbor ethnic neighborhoods where people live and shop.

James Chen, who pioneered the Chinatown concept in Las Vegas, is a model of what an enterprising individual can do in his community. His actions strengthen the institutions of civil society by helping immigrants succeed in their new land. According to the Journal:

"Chinatown Plaza feels snug and homey. In contrast to kitschy casino shows for Asian gamblers, it began a parking-lot Chinese New Year's festival. Politicians came. Signs went up on Interstate 15: 'Chinatown Next Exit.' Mr. Chen founded a Chinese-American Chamber of Commerce and printed up a directory. He puts on a Miss Chinatown beauty pageant, holds open-houses for school kids, arranges free flu shots for the elderly and offers help with their tax returns."

What's more: "Comfort, as Prof. Zhao at UCLA sees it, is what Chinatown Plaza and places like it are about. She calls the Asian shopping center a new form of social organization for America's migrating immigrants. 'When people have to drive for miles, they want to spend a day,' she says. 'Nobody lives in it, but it becomes the meeting place, the center of a community.'"

That a commercial area could become a comfort and cultural zone for suburbanites won't surprise the tens of millions of Americans whose own lives in the 'burbs prove the vacuousness of snobbish charges that suburban life is culturally sterile and isolated. Americans are too innovative and communal to live miserably. Thanks to the James Chens around us, the critically important act of forming communities is possible anywhere. Even in the desert.

It says a lot about the intellectual credibility of those that manage Hudson Institute, a neo-conservative thinktank, when one office can hold General William Odom, who in today's Wall Street Journal calls the Iraq war a failure and down the hall you find a hawk like myself who doggedly supports the Bush Administration's policies to bring peace and democracy to the Middle East.

Odom says:

"Anybody that's pro-American cannot gain legitimacy. It will be a highly illiberal democracy, inspired by Islamic culture, extremely hostile to the West and probably quite willing ... to fund terrorist organizations."

The longer U.S. troops hang tough, he reasons, the more isolated America will become. That in turn will place increasing strain on international economic and security institutions that have undergirded the emergence of "America's Inadvertent Empire," as Mr. Odom's latest book calls it. "I don't know that the UN, the IMF, the World Bank, [or] NATO can survive this," he says.

First off, do we want them to survive? And secondly, these multilateral institutions have weathered much worse -- Vietnam, the reunification of East/West Germany, and the collapse of the Soviet Union.

I'm sorry Mr. Odom takes a stand that even John Kerry won't -- cut and run. We did that once in Vietnam and 79 million people still live in tyranny.

Those of us who live within striking distance of great cities without being in their orbit are often amused, then maddened, by the provincialism that passes for sophistication among the chattering classes. Nowhere is that more obvious than in Washington, which lies about 125 miles to my south. I love going to Washington, perhaps because I'm a Georgian who's taken to heart Flannery O'Connor's observation that (to paraphrase) our era is so morally blind that characters must possess an exaggerated depravity just to get our attention.

David Brooks nails this attitude, or lifestyle, in his column in today's NYT. He describes the Beltway's childish infatuation with placing the blame for 9/11 on the Bush administration as doing what D.C. does best. Key paragraphs:

"What's going on is obvious. The first duty of proper Washingtonians is to demonstrate that they are smarter than whomever they happen to be talking about. It's quite easy to fulfill this mission when you are talking about the past. It's child's play for a salad-course solon who spent the entire 1990's ignoring foreign affairs to condemn the administration piously for not focusing like a laser beam on Al Qaeda on Aug. 6, 2001.

"It's harder to be a smart aleck about the future, especially in regards to Najaf and Falluja, where none of the choices are good ones. Do the Baathists win a victory every day they hold off our siege? Or if we take them out now, do we undermine Sistani? We Klieg Light Kierkegaards will give you the right answer — three years from now, after whatever option the president takes has been judged and found wanting.

"Some people in other places may like to look through keyholes to see women in their underwear. We here in the political class like to look through keyholes to see what happens when a bunch of alpha males (and females) with the jobs we wish we held sit around a table and curse about people not in the room. After two years of Iraq obsession, many of us couldn't tell you what the Dawa Islamic Party stood for if our kids' Sidwell admissions depended upon it, but the frisson we feel hearing the nasty words Colin Powell said behind the back of Douglas Feith! C'est délicieux!"

A court has its courtiers, whether on the hills of Rome, the waterways of Constantinople, or the swamps of the Potomac. Like Brooks, I'll take Washington (and the country it purports to rule) any day. But not without a good moral map and remembrance of my roots.

China's rulers continue to show their contempt for Hong Kong's democrats. Yesterday's decision to bar popular elections for the island's chief executive in 2007 and deny the expansion of the plebiscite in legislative elections the following year reveals Beijing's fears of its own people's opinions. By ordering that legislative seats filled by rigged elections (what the WSJ [$] compares to the "rotten boroughs" of 18th and 19th-century England) increase in number to keep pace with any expansion of freely elected seats, China is trying to blunt the effects of democracy in action. As the Journal notes, "China's new generation of Communist leaders seem as nervous as their predecessors about even modest moves toward democracy."

This is also obvious in Beijing's almost comic censoring of Vice President Dick Cheney's speech there last week. Maochun Yu of the U.S. Naval Academy writes on the Journal's op-ed page ($) that Cheney's speech was bowdlerized despite promises that it would be broadcast uncensored to the nation. One example, as reported by Prof. Yu:

"'[Cheney said] While democratic processes are sometimes untidy and unpredictable -- as any close observer of American politics can attest -- they permit the peaceful expression of diverse views, protect the rights of the individual, check the ability of the state to abuse its power, and encourage the kind of debate and compromise that leads to lasting stability.' The vice president also said, 'the desire for freedom is universal; it is not unique to one country, or culture, or region.' All deleted by the Chinese censors.'"

China's corrupt and tyrannical regime is right to fear liberty. Few people would freely choose to be governed by a party dedicated to maintaining its hegemony at all costs.

Today Freedom House released a report on the pace and degree of the democratization of the Balkans. The report, Nations in Transit, 2004, says that steady progress has been made, but that much more work is needed to help build the institutions that make up civil society.

When Pat Tillman, former NFL star and Army Ranger, was killed in action in Afghanistan on Thursday, we were all reminded that love of country still supercedes love of fame and fortune in the hearts of many Americans. Today's Wall Street Journal ($) pays homage to Tillman's sacrifice by quoting from Ronald Reagan's famous 1984 speech made on the beeches of Normandy.

"Forty summers have passed since the battle that you fought here. You were young the day you took these cliffs; some of you were hardly more than boys, with the deepest joys of life before you. Yet, you risked everything here. Why? Why did you do it? What impelled you to put aside the instinct for self-preservation and risk your lives to take these cliffs? What inspired all the men of the armies that met here? We look at you, and somehow we know the answer. It was faith and belief; it was loyalty and love.

"The men of Normandy had faith that what they were doing was right, faith that they fought for all humanity, faith that a just God would grant them mercy on this beachhead or on the next. It was the deep knowledge -- and pray God we have not lost it -- that there is a profound, moral difference between the use of force for liberation and the use of force for conquest. You were here to liberate, not to conquer, and so you and those others did not doubt your cause. And you were right not to doubt.

"You all knew that some things are worth dying for. One's country is worth dying for, and democracy is worth dying for, because it's the most deeply honorable form of government ever devised by man. All of you loved liberty."

The Centre for Civil Society in New Delhi, India, describes itself as "an independent, nonprofit, research and educational organisation devoted to improving the quality of life for all people of India by reviving and reinvigorating civil society. The motivation behind the Centre is the poignant paradox of intelligent and industrious people of India living in the state of destitution and despondency. But we don’t run primary schools, or health clinics, or garbage collection programs. We do it differently: we try to change people’s ideas, opinions, mode of thinking, the mindset by research, seminars, and publications." Check out their impressive web site to learn how pro-liberty forces are working in the world's largest democracy.

Links for this organization and many others are maintained on our "Links" page. Look for frequent updates as our links list grows.

Under Saddam's regime, every element of Iraqi society declined sharply. Few institutions were more neglected than its university system, which essentially ceased to function in any modern sense two decades ago. Writing in the Chronicle of Higher Education ($), John Agresto, the Coalition Provisional Authority's senior adviser to the Iraqi Ministry of Higher Education and president emeritus of St. John's College, Santa Fe, N.M., says that the spirit is willing, but it needs Western help:

"Nothing here is easy. The 1980s and '90s broke the physical and intellectual back of higher education in Iraq. I recently visited the laboratory of the Veterinary College at Baghdad University. There, in one room, were all their vials and bottles neatly lined up on shelves. And each container was empty. One bottle had perhaps a tablespoon of a brown, sludgy residue at the bottom. The blue label on the side read 'expires June 1980.'"

"The university libraries may have been the sections of academe that suffered most under Saddam Hussein. On their shelves are few books published after the early '80s. Most journal subscriptions ended around then, or even earlier. The library at Tikrit University's College of Law has spacious rooms and enough shelving for thousands of books. Unfortunately, it contains probably fewer than 80 volumes. Many of them are merely copies of copies of old texts, xeroxed pages stitched together."

Yet the desire to improve is widespread, Agresto reports, and Iraqis want most to reconnect to the outside world, from which they were shut off by Saddam's xenophobic henchmen. Western professors are needed to teach Iraqi scholars and graduate students some of what they've missed over the years. Equipment is hopelessly dated, libraries are bare, and resources scarce. Some American universities are already stepping forward, and many more are needed, as Agresto writes:

"In the north, under the protection of the no-fly zone, Sulaimani University has long been a partner of East Tennessee State University. Already this year nearly 20 universities or university departments from the United States have provided help: developing departments of public health, participating in the modernization of law colleges' curricula, building up departments of archaeology and environmental science, and training faculty members in computer science and administrators in academic management."

A key part of the reconstruction of Iraqi society will be played by its reemerging intellectual class. American academics who wish to see a stable and free Iraq need to step forward now, early in the process, to ensure that our universities export our best ideas. Imagine the chaos that would ensue if instead we sent them a shipload of postcolonial theory and deconstruction. America and the Coalition didn't spill blood to rid Iraq if its Baathist ideologues only to replace them with Western nihilists.

Democracy Project Board member Wilfred McClay has a characteristically thoughtful essay on American civil religion in the latest issue of The Public Interest.

The Daily Telegraph (via the Washington Times) reports that among the 270 individuals named in a Congressional investigation of corruption in the Iraqi Oil-for-Food Program are: Former French Interior Minister Charles Pasqua; President Megawati Sukarnoputri of Indonesia; Russian nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovksy; and of course Benon Sevan, the U.N. official in charge of the program.

Others on the list include the former French ambassador to the U.N., two other Frenchmen (a priest and a man involved with the Franco-Iraqi Friendship Association), and VIPs from all over Europe and the Middle East.

It begs credulity to be asked to trust U.N. officials to "oversee" the transfer of power to Iraqis and to ensure that things run smoothly thereafter. As Midge Decter pointed out earlier this morning on C-SPAN, the force for good on the world stage today is America, not the U.N. While American troops were dying to liberate Iraq, corrupt U.N. officials were selling millions of barrels of oil and pocketing the proceeds. Anyone who still believes that the U.N. confers true political legitimacy (as, disappointingly, does Tony Blair) needs lessons in political philosophy and the dangers of cynicism (or naiveté).

A must-read report on the Millenium Challenge Account has been released by the Global Prosperity Initiative at Mercatus Center. The Millenium Challenge Account is the new and brilliant method the Bush Administration is using to apportion out foreign aid. After decades of wasted billions of American taxpayer monies often given to the likes of Kim Jong Il in exchange for false bargains, Bush shut down the gravy train and plainly stated there will be no further aid unless there is progress in the following three areas: 1) ruling justly; 2) encouraging economic freedom; and 3) investing in people. The report's authors recommend Congress add to this criteria: 1) entrepreneurship; 2) property rights; and 3) political capacity to sustain reforms. I agree with the first two, but am puzzled by the third, which I believe opens the door to suggestions of "those people are just not ready for democracy." Of course, their argument is different -- citing the sad state of Romania as an example of a nation that was just not ready for help by USAID. Was it that they weren't ready for help, or was it that the political resolve just wasn't there on USAID's part to help push through necessary changes?

That's my spin on a Times story headlined "Establishment Candidates Defeat Challengers in Sierra Club Voting." An effort led by former Colorado governor Richard Lamm to win control of the Club's 15-member board and implement an anti-immigration policy was turned back by 95,000 votes.

The good news: those who see immigrants (and the human species, excluding of course themselves) as a scourge were defeated.

The bad news: those who see the modern world (excluding of course themselves) as a hopeless wreck, with the free market to blame, won.

Via Glenn Reynolds, a new blog sardonically called Friends of Saddam is following the unfolding scandal at the U.N.

The lead editorial in today's Wall Street Journal calls John Kerry to task for seemingly exchanging the quest for democracy in Iraq for that mantra of realpolitik, stability. It rightly calls this a historic reversal of the two major parties' positions on foreign governments. Today's Republicans, led by George Bush, seek to bring liberty to other shores, while Democrats have adopted a skeptical tone towards the possibility of Arabs' learning to govern themselves through elected representatives.

It's difficult to know why leading liberals have adopted a position they once scorned. Have they truly lost their faith in the common man, no matter his ethnicity, or are they merely adopting a cynical stance in an effort to undermine the administration's efforts to rid the Middle East of illegitimate, tyrannical regimes? As the Journal says, "9/11 exposed the Faustian bargain at the heart of Mideast 'realism.'" Supporting dictatorships while turning a blind eye to their support for terrorism abroad and brutality at home didn't bring much stability to the region in the past. Just why John Kerry and the liberal establishment think it will work in the future is a mystery.

Zulfi Urfali, who was born in Iraq and now lives in the Atlanta suburb of Stone Mountain, understands fear. Although his father was heavily involved in Iraqi politics as an advisor to the king's uncle before the bloody overthrow of the monarchy in 1958, Urfali and his family have remained silent on all matters political for nearly 50 years. That rule of silence continued even after he immigrated to the US in 1977 from Lebanon, where the family fled after the king's murder. He feared that speaking out about politics would bring harm to his family back in Iraq, which included a brother and cousin.

Then came September 11, 2001, and along with it an epiphany. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports:

"[The] terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, made Urfali rethink his life's purpose. A few months later, he called the Georgia Republican Party headquarters on Roswell Road. 'That was the turning point in my ideological views toward civil society and democracy as a whole,' Urfali said. 'I realized this was a war of ideology.'"

Urfali is now going door to door asking people to support President Bush's reelection effort. He wants to see civil society and democracy come to his homeland, and by exercising his free speech rights (he became an American citizen in 1980) and entering a political campaign here, he's demonstrating an understanding of what it takes to make any society free and prosperous.

The AJC talked to some Iraqis in Detroit, home to the nation's largest Iraqi population.

"'President Bush means liberation for my people,' said [Hussain] Talabani, an Iraqi of Kurdish descent. 'For me, Bush means the return of my people to their villages. No more chemicals. No more torture in basements.'"

These are deeply moving words. Is the anti-war crowd listening?

A large number of Latin Americans are displeased with their new democratically elected governments, and many would support the return of strong-man rule if it brought economic prosperity and equality under the law, according to a new United Nations report.

According to the International Herald Tribune:

"The report attributes the erosion of confidence in elected governments to slow economic growth, profound social inequality and ineffective legal systems and social services. Despite gains in human rights from the days of dictatorship, most Latin Americans, it says, still cannot expect equal treatment before the law because of abusive police practices, politicized judiciaries and widespread corruption."

While I can't comment on the report's accuracy, it isn't surprising that democracy, as defined by the right to vote, isn't delivering the goods its promoters promised. For representative government to flourish, the foundational elements of civil society -- rule of law, freedom of the press, property rights, cultural and religious pluralism -- must be implemented and allowed to develop. The franchise is a necessary but insufficient element of a developed, free society. Absent the administrative, economic, juridical, and constitutional guarantees that individuals may live without being harassed by the state or their fellow citizens, discontent with the shell of democracy is predictable.

Latin American voters would do well to remember that these crucial civil institutions are weak or missing from their countries largely because of the very the strong men whose rule some of them long to see again. Rather than stand aside as dictators are brought back, citizens of affected countries, NGOs, the U.S., and other democracies around the world should enact policies and educational programs to aid the development of civil society throughout the region.

The history profession probably contains more unreconstructed Marxists than mainland China, and they're upset at President Bush's appointment of Allen Weinstein to be archivist of the U.S. Their charge that he'll be too "secretive" is a screen for the real reason they want to deny him this honor, which has more to do with party orthodoxy than with the quality of his writings.

Allen Weinstein's real sin is that he employed rigorous scholarship to prove, beyond any reasonable doubt, that Alger Hiss was indeed a Soviet spy. This argument, made in Perjury: The Hiss-Chambers Case in 1978, has been upheld by such scholars as Sam Tanenhaus, who had access to declassified Soviet papers unavailable to Weinstein 26 years ago. In other words, the increase in the amount of primary sources available has only strengthened the foundation of his original conclusion.

But historical evidence matters little to the radical left, especially where Alger Hiss is concerned. They pummeled Whittaker Chambers when he came forward with his charges that Hiss was a spy nearly 60 years ago, and they would dearly love to block the rise of one whose work did so much to make their denial of historical truth patently obvious. Here's hoping the President stands behind his man and doesn't let latter-day apparatchiks decide an honest scholar's fate.

The New York Times Book Review correctly dismisses the conspiracy theories woven by Craig Unger's ''House of Bush, House of Saud: The Secret Relationship Between the World's Two Most Powerful Dynasties.''

There is no doubt that the Saud and Bush familes are close. That comes from working together in the oil patch for the past forty years and from lives lived with meaning -- George Herbert Walker Bush was not only President of the United States, but Ambassador to the United Nations, Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, and Founder and President of Zapata Oil, which later became Pennzoil.

Jonathan Tepperman -- the reviewer -- writes:

"To prove his claim, Unger would have to establish that the Bushes deliberately acted in ways that went against America's national interest. But this he cannot quite manage. Instead, he tries to detail all kinds of other unrelated, nefarious intrigues that the Saudis and Bushes have supposedly engaged in over the years."

Tepperman identifies the real problem:

"The fact is that United States-Saudi relations are ruled by a particularly rigid iron logic, which dictates a fairly constant American policy: support for the royal family and indulgence of its excesses in return for stable oil prices. It's no coincidence that Washington's attitude toward Riyadh has remained essentially static for 50 years now. Or that United States policy changed little during the eight years of the Clinton interregnum -- an inconvenient fact that's hard to square with Unger's thesis (unless he believes that Clinton was on the take, too)."

Yesterday, President Bush backed Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's plan to pull out of Gaza and parts of the West Bank. However, the New York Times is reporting that what Sharon has offered is "already angering many Arabs." The headline reads, "In Major Shift, Bush Endorses Sharon Plan and Backs Keeping Some Israeli Settlements."

What's this big shift, the Times speaks of? It reads:

"Mr. Bush said that Israel should not have to return to its pre-1967 borders, and that Palestinians and their descendants who lost their land in Israel in 1948 should eventually be settled in a Palestinian state, not back in Israel. The president's pronouncement effectively ruled out any "right of return" by Palestinians."

Under common law in the United States and Britain, it takes a lot less time for a previous landowner to lose their "right of return." The doctrine of adverse possession allows an open and notorious possessor of property who resides on it for 12 years to take title. Israel has had possession in many places since 1948 and in other places since 1967. Both a lot longer than 12 years.

There is damage from war. Oftentimes considerable loss of property. But this glass is half full mentality that the Palestinians are using to oppose Sharon's plan to pull out of the occupied territory will never bring peace. Look -- the United States after the Mexican-American War never gave up California, New Mexico, Arizona, et. al. But that is precisely what Israel is doing.

Bush is right to call it "historic" and "courageous," because it is.

The U.S. will vote in the United Nations to condemn Cuba's abysmal human rights record, reports say. Although American officials initially announced that Mexico would join the U.S. in voting to condemn Cuba, a question has arisen over whether or not that is true. According to a Mexican news outlet, President Vicente Fox's government has not committed itself to that vote:

"In Mexico, presidential spokesman Agustín Gutiérrez Canet said that 'Mexico takes its positions according to convictions and not because of pressure.' He said that this is a decision that the government assumes individually and not between countries."

Here's hoping that justice trumps expediency and that Mexico takes a public stand against Castro's illegitimate regime.

Could Islamic terrorism be an indicator that, as a religion, Islam is following the Church of England down the path to temporal obscurity? Theodore Dalrymple, the pen name of the Englishman Anthony Daniels, M.D., makes this argument in the current issue of City Journal. As a medical doctor he's worked with many poor Moslems in London, so he writes from considerable experience. Whether he's right or not I don't claim to know, but his concluding paragraph is characteristically blunt:

"Islam in the modern world is weak and brittle, not strong: that accounts for its so frequent shrillness. The Shah will, sooner or later, triumph over the Ayatollah in Iran, because human nature decrees it, though meanwhile millions of lives will have been ruined and impoverished. The Iranian refugees who have flooded into the West are fleeing Islam, not seeking to extend its dominion, as I know from speaking to many in my city. To be sure, fundamentalist Islam will be very dangerous for some time to come, and all of us, after all, live only in the short term; but ultimately the fate of the Church of England awaits it. Its melancholy, withdrawing roar may well (unlike that of the Church of England) be not just long but bloody, but withdraw it will. The fanatics and the bombers do not represent a resurgence of unreformed, fundamentalist Islam, but its death rattle."

This issue of City Journal also contains excellent essays by Steven Malanga, Victor Davis Hanson, and Kay Hymowitz, among others.

Too many American elites, whether in business or politics, prefer to take out the anxiety caused by difficult problems on those who offer solutions. In his column today, Arnold Kling cites Churchill as an historical example of a leader who faced just this problem when he argued that Hitler posed a threat to peace. This "strange paradox" stems from an intellectually incoherent stance summed up by Churchill in 1936 (quoted by Kling) as:

"So they go on in strange paradox, decided only to be undecided, resolved to be irresolute, adamant for drift, solid for fluidity, all-powerful to be impotent."

We see this in action in the work of the 9-11 commission, says Kling:

"The Bush critics would have us believe that the Administration could have prevented the attacks with immaculate pre-emption. Assuming that we had discovered and disrupted the hijacking plot, there might have been no war in Afghanistan, much less in Iraq. It is as if the critics see the alleged preventability of the attacks as justification for acting as if they never happened. Confronting the Islamic death cult would have been unnecessary. In that sense, the real agenda of the left on the 9-11 commission is to justify hating the solution. "

He also observes something worth remembering as we critique Bush's performance on terrorism: we have nothing with which to compare it. And he makes clear that, other than withdrawal from foreign affairs (which he rightly sees as both undesirable and politically impossible), we have little choice but to press forward with our efforts to steer the Muslim world away from what he calls the "death cult of terrorism." This is a long-term, difficult, and expensive proposal, and we need fresh ideas on how best to construct a coherent, workable strategy and then implement it effectively. And fresh ideas are in short supply among the administration's partisan critics.

The Washington Times' editorial board writes of Vice President Dick Cheney's trip to Asia:

"The vice president's tour is solidifying alliances with friends in Asia who now are more dependable than some of our historical partners in Europe."

And sadly these so-called friends include South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun who was elected after an anti-American campaign in 2002.

Carroll Andrew Morse has a succinct history of Hugo Chavez's five-plus years in power in Venezuela. Because of that nation's pre-existing civil society and democratic institutions, however imperfect they may have been, Morse sees it as a test of the international community's willingness to aid pro-democracy forces inside a country that's being overtaken by a corrupt regime.

That's the advice Victor Davis Hanson has for American war planners in Iraq. End the gentlemanly desire not to insult anyone's religion, go after militants in mosques, call radical Muslim "clerics" what they are -- thugs and killers. Best paragraph:

"We should simply ignore most supposed Islamic restrictions on war-making since they are entirely one-sided, asymmetrical, and self-serving. All during the Afghanistan campaign we worried about Ramadan, and were warned by the impotent Arab Street about the repercussions to follow if we shot back at Taliban thugs who hid in mosques and sniped at us during their holy days. Did we remember that when Egypt invaded Israel during its sacred Yom Kippur holidays it bragged of the sneak attack as the 'Ramadan War'—and in pride, not shame? Did we hold back from attacking Nazi Germany on Hitler's Birthday? And was it really wise to impose what turned out to be a one-sided truce at the Tet holiday in Vietnam?"

During the Cold War we were warned by the pro-detente crowd that we shouldn't provoke the Soviets by appearing too belligerent or overly powerful. That was bad advice then and it's deadly advice now. Every time coalition forces have engaged the rag-tag thugs that make up the Iraqi "resistance," they've sent the paramilitary Baathists running for their lives. After victory in WWII America didn't try to be sensitive to the emperor's claims to divinity -- we scuttled them. We didn't try to ensure freedom of speech to Germans who still saw themselves as a superior race -- we censored them or jailed them. Iraqis, like everyone else, will choose stability over chaos. By moving forcefully against armed militias and thugs left over from the old regime, coalition forces can keep Iraq on the road to internal peace.

While the article is three months old, it is worth taking another look at my friend Donna Hughes' article "Sex Slave Jihad" that appeared in Frontpage Magazine.

Professor Hughes sums up well what we are fighting against -- not some principled religious theocracy -- but a bunch of sleazy thugs who care nothing of the pillars of Islam, but use those pillars to their worst ends, in this case, to trample on the human rights of tens of thousands of young girls and women by forcing them into sexual slavery in order to make a profit.

As the debate over pre-9/11 intelligence continues, and the feckless continue to imply (but never quite say it) that the peoples of Afghanistan and Iraq were better off with their authoritarian leaders, we all will be reminded by reading Hughes' article about how fundamental a sea change the Bush Administration has caused in the Middle East.

For those among the American Far Right (i.e. Pat Buchanan and The American Conservative crowd) who criticize the Bush Administration's foreign policy, in my estimation what is at root is a fundamental meeting of the minds between their worldview and that of the Taliban/Wahhabites. Both sects purport to believe that Western modernity and the values of the Enlightenment -- life, liberty and the pursuit of property -- have caused our moral decline, yet never mentioning the moral failings of those times they romanticize, such as the Middle Ages. In reality though, as Professor Hughes markedly shows, such demagogues prey upon the goodwill and good hearts of the religious faithful to impose their will and their crooked ways.

Given the daily diet of hysteria we're receiving from American and European elites, it's good to read another level-headed essay (following on Saturday's by David Brooks & noted below), this time by Barbara Amiel in the Daily Telegraph.

"It is possible that the Taliban could return one day from the caves where its remnants now hide - if the central government fails. So? Communism may come back to the former Soviet Union, tyranny to South Africa. Does that mean it was not worth removing those regimes in the first place? Those commentators criticising American policy all evince horror of the Taliban, Saddam and terrorism. But follow their arguments to their logical conclusion and most are really saying that the world would be better off if the Taliban still ran Afghanistan and Saddam ran Iraq. They would deny this, but the consequences of what they argue for, or against, lead to nothing else."

She continues:

"Much hostility towards America seems fuelled by an unusually venomous response to this particular president. Possibly, that's because Bush is so quintessentially American that his personality acts like a magnifying glass, focusing the sun on the very spot that burns European skin. From his body language to his somewhat aphasic utterances, he personifies a sort of American-ess that for the British in particular (and some American elites as well) is a mixture of ridiculous and low class. If you are a person of certain standards, it is exceptionally irritating to play second fiddle to a world power led by a man who walks like a bit actor in a cowboy movie and talks about God more than one ought to in select circles."

It is if you're a student subjected to modern "social studies" textbooks, according to a new study by the Thomas B. Fordham Institute (www.edexecellence.net). As described in the WSJ's Taste page, as well as in such excellent works as Diane Ravitch's The Language Police, textbooks are written not to teach but to avoid giving offense. They substitute politically correct revisionism for balanced interpretation, and fill pages with illustrations and photographs (but none that might offend!) rather than well-written text.

I note below one result of such dumbed-down works -- journalists who can't place contemporary events in historical context. I own several of my grandfather's old textbooks from his days as an elementary school principal before and after WWII. They're well written, challenging, and surely beyond much anything now in use. Is there a publisher interested in bringing out updated versions of these venerable works?

Knowing that journalists' lack of a sense of history often prevents them from assessing current events accurately, it's a good idea to balance curiosity with skepticism whenever one reads or listens to them. David Brooks understands this (at least when he's at his best), as demonstrated in his Saturday Times column. Hyperventilation on the war in Iraq is tres chic, from dinosaurs (Ted Kennedy and Robert Byrd) to dingbats (Maureen Dowd), and it's particularly easy to be misled when we're dealing with a culture that seems even more foreign and exotic than it is. As Brooks says:

"The Shiite violence is being fomented by Moktada al-Sadr, a lowlife hoodlum from an august family. The ruthless and hyperpoliticized Sadr has spent the past year trying to marginalize established religious figures, like Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, who come from a more quietist tradition and who believe in the separation of government and clergy. Sadr and his fellow putschists have been spectacularly unsuccessful in winning popular support. The vast majority of Iraqis do not want an Iranian-style dictatorship. Most see Sadr as a young, hotheaded murderer who terrorizes people wherever he goes. He and his band have taken this opportunity to make a desperate bid for power, before democratic elections reveal the meagerness of their following."

While there's clearly room to criticize some elements of the administration's Iraqi policy, most notably its need to explain what's a stake there more fully to the American people, only a journalism school graduate would expect the place to be as serene as a Sunbelt suburb. Americans, especially those too young to recall WWII, have a poor understanding of what a dictatorship is, and how it works. It isn't one man with a gun; it's a couple hundred thousand conspirators with RPGs, money, and a desperate need to prevent a legitimate government from forming. Dictators rule through corruption, fear, and brutality. They destroy civil society -- Burke's "little platoons" -- in order to maintain power.

The Iraqis are traumatized and, no doubt, disoriented, but they're not crazy. Polls show that most of them are glad we're there and don't long for a return of Saddam, or even Saddam-lite. A dangerous minority has formed private militias (which civil society and stable states cannot allow) who are now attacking coalition troops and civilians. But they don't speak for most Iraqis, and they won't win if we don't lose our nerve.

Over the past couple of months we've learned more about the rampant corruption in the United Nation's Oil for Food Program in pre-war Iraq. From Kofi Annan's son to Bevin Sevan, the Oil for Food director, it appears that a pattern of kick-backs and payoffs ensured the diversion of billions of dollars that were supposed to help Iraqis survive the embargo that resulted from Saddam's noncompliance with UN resolutions. Former UN weapons inspector Hans Blix thinks Iraq was better off under Saddam. And yet we're told time and again that this same UN confers legitimacy on a nation's actions, as in the war in Iraq.

This morning Mary Anastasia O'Grady ($) reports that Venezuela's corrupt far-left president Hugo Chavez has retained the services of Patton Boggs, a K Street lobbying firm in Washington, to polish his image in that city. Chavez is coughing up a cool million per year in this effort, and Thomas Hale Boggs, Jr. of that firm donated $10,000 to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. Ms. O'Grady also recalls Jack Kemp's efforts to improve the image of Chavez last year.

It turns out that former Haitian leader Jean Bertrand Aristide also plied key opinion makers with funds in a (one has to admit) successful effort to blunt criticism of his bloody regime. His largesse went to former members of the Congressional Black Caucus and others who, you'll recall, raised a cry when Aristide was finally run out of town in late February. Since they received nearly $6 million from Aristide, ruler of the poorest country in the Western hemisphere, their pain is understandable.

Turns out that none of this is illegal. But a more important question is, is it transparent enough under current law? When respected, or at least semi-famous, politicians or former office holders speak out in favor of a foreign leader, how many of their listeners know that they're on the till?

Illegitimate rulers from ancient Greek tyrants through Saddam Hussein have known the power of money. It shuts up the right people and, when needed, makes others sing. And, as we've seen, it can sway the foreign policy of a great democracy. Or, in some cases, not.

9-11 Commission Vice Chairman Lee Hamilton asked the million dollar question today to National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice:

"There are a lot of very, very fine -- 2 billion Muslims. Most of them, we know, are very fine people. Some don't like us; they hate us. They don't like what modernization does to their culture. They don't like the fact that economic prosperity has passed them by. They don't like some of the policies of the United States government. They don't like the way their own governments treat them.

And I'd like you to elaborate a little bit, if you would, on how we get at the source of the problem. How do we get at this discontent, this dislocation, if you would, across a big swathe of the Islamic world?"

"RICE: I believe very strongly, and the president believes very strongly, that this is really the generational challenge. The kinds of issues that you are addressing have to be addressed, but we're not going to see success on our watch.

We will see some small victories on our watch. One of the most difficult problems in the Middle East is that the United States has been associated for a long time, decades, with a policy that looks the other way on the freedom deficit in the Middle East, that looks the other way at the absence of individual liberties in the Middle East.

And I think that that has tended to alienate us from the populations of the Middle East. And when the president, at White Hall in London, said that that was no longer going to be the stance of the United States, we were expecting more from our friends, we were going to try and engage those in those in those countries who wanted to have a different kind of Middle East, I believe that he was resonating with trends that are there in the Middle East. There are reformist trends in places like Bahrain and Jordan. And recently there was a marvelous conference in Alexandria in Egypt, where reform was actually was on the agenda.

So it's going to be a slow process. We know that the building of democracy is tough. It doesn't come easily. We have our own history. When our Founding Fathers said, We the people, they didn't mean me. It's taken us a while to get to a multiethnic democracy that works.

But if America is avowedly values-centered in its foreign policy, we do better than when we do not stand up for those values.

So I think that it's going to be very hard. It's going to take time.

One of the things that we've been very interested, for instance, in is issues of educational reform in some of these countries. As you know, the madrassas are a big difficulty. I've met, myself, personally two or three times with the Pakistani _ a wonderful woman who's the Pakistani education minister.

We can't do it for them. They have to have it for themselves, but we have to stand for those values.

And over the long run, we will change _ I believe we will change the nature of the Middle East, particularly if there are examples that this can work in the Middle East.

And this is why Iraq is so important. The Iraqi people are struggling to find a way to create a multiethnic democracy that works. And it's going to be hard.

And if we stay with them, and when they succeed, I think we will have made a big change -- they will have made a big change in the middle of the Arab world, and we will be on our way to addressing the source."

The so-called "source" are the hearts and minds of the Arab people. These are people who have been lied to and indoctrinated with hate about our nation's peoples and our values. The fight we encounter in the Middle East will not be won with either guns or butter, but rather in who does the better job -- the U.S. or Al Jazeera -- in persuadiing the "Arab Street" of what's best for them. Modernity or the Stone Age? Because American tolerance for attacks on our homeland will only extend so far -- remember Hiroshima and Nagasaki?

Lee Harris, whose essays on terrorism were recently collected in his book Civilization and Its Enemies: The Next Stage of History, argues that Orientalism, made famous by the late Edward Said's book of the same name, amounts to little more than racism. But the victims in this case -- namely Arabs -- achieve that status not so much because Westerners argue that they can't live up to our standards, but because their own intellectual class does so. Key paragraph:

"Does it need to be pointed out that such an ideology dehumanizes the very people whose interests it is supposed to be defending? If we exempt a group of people, like the Palestinians and the Arabs, from normal ethical demands we make on Europeans, Americans, and the Asians, are we respecting their culture, or pitying them for having such a rotten one? To say that we must apply a whole new set of ethical rules to the Arabs implies that they are not fit to be judged by ours. Furthermore, to fail even to bring our ethical standards to their attention, is to imply very strongly that they could not appreciate these standards if we did."

Harris's observations go to the heart of efforts to bring (first) the rule of law and (later) democracy to the Middle East. If Arabs are assumed to be incapable of living under any type of polity other than tyranny, then all efforts to modernize the region and reduce the threat of terrorism and war are futile. The work of Edward Said and his acolytes is a core element of the multicultural left here and abroad, which preaches a destructive cultural relativism that precludes condemning barbaric behavior as such, lest we forget that it's not worse, only different. Yet it also supports the contentions of the racialist far right, which argues that democracy is beyond the grasp of other ethnic or racial groups.

I'm reminded of the intellectual class's reaction to the Iranian Revolution. As an undergraduate history major I heard professors with national reputations state blithely that the mass executions that were still going on (c. 1981) were simply part of that nation's "indigenous culture" and that, although we wouldn't condone it, we couldn't condemn it, either. Nearly 25 years later let's hope we've learned that such a romantic, limp-wristed approach is not only ahistorical, but born of old fashioned nineteenth century racialism -- whether it's spread by those of European descent or Arabs themselves.

That's the title of Victor Davis Hanson's latest essay, which is also one of his best. It's quite long, so here are some excerpts:

"Out of all the recent chaos emerges one lesson: Appeasement of fundamentalists is not appreciated as magnanimity, but ridiculed as weakness — and, in fact, encourages further killing. A shaken Spain elected a new government that promised to exit Iraq. In return, the terrorists planted more bombs, issued more demands, and then staged a fiery exit for themselves. France, as is its historical wont, triangulated with the Muslim world and then found its fundamentalist plotters all over Paris. The Saudi royals thought that they of all people could continue to blackmail the fundamentalists — until the suicide-murderers turned their explosives on their benefactors and began to blow up Arab Muslims as well. General Musharraf once did all he could to appease Islamists — and got assassination plots as thanks."

On Ted Kennedy's recent claim that Iraq is George Bush's Vietnam:

"Apparently the senator thinks that the cause of these medieval fanatics who want to bring the world back to the ninth century will resonate with leftists the same way Uncle Ho's faux promises of equality and egalitarianism swayed stupid anti-war protesters of the past. Or is the real similarity that, once more, as promoters of anti-Communist realpolitik, we Americans are installing a right-wing government rather than promoting pluralism, elections, and the protection of minorities and women — the 'dream' of the 1960s? Or perhaps Kennedy's comparison revolves around 600 combat dead in Afghanistan and Iraq, the liberation of 50 million from the Taliban and Saddam Hussein, and the emergence of proto-consensual governments in less than two years of hostilities? Does all that suggest to Senator Kennedy that we are embarking on a 12-year war, will lose 50,000 men, and are stymied by a bellicose nuclear China and Russia on the borders of Iraq?"

He concludes:

"We did not ask for this war, but it came. In our time and according to our station, it is now our duty to end it. And that resolution will not come from recrimination in time of war, nor promises to let fundamentalists and their autocratic sponsors alone, but only through the military defeat and subsequent humiliation of their cause. So let us cease the hysterics, make the needed sacrifices, and allow our military the resources, money, and support with which it most surely will destroy the guilty and give hope at last to the innocent."

Cuba's news agencies aren't in the habit of reporting the real news, of course, and American and Western news agencies too often soft-peddle Castro's dictatorship. The website Cubanet collects information from Cuba and updates its reports regularly. There are also links to Western news sources, and the site is available in English, Spanish, and French.

Freedom House has issued a report called "Countries at the Crossroads." Such a survey is critically important as these nations are on the fence as to whether they'll continue progress towards democracy or fall back towards autocracy.

The study finds that "pervasive corruption and weak judicial systems are major impediments to the development of democracy in transitional societies." The results of the survey are a bit of a downer, with Freedom House reporting that democratic reforms in the former Soviet Republics of the Ukraine and Georgia are in a state of erosion since first implemented after the collapse of the USSR.

Interestingly, those nations tetering towards more democracy, rather than less, are in the Middle East. Freedom House reports that the monarchical governments of Bahrain, Qatar, and Jordan are gradually introducing democratic processes in their nations, actions no doubt influenced by the United States' toppling of Saddam and promotion of democracy in Iraq, and the Middle East at large.

Higher education plays a vital role in the health of civil society. Readers of this blog who are interested in the modern university will find much helpful information, including lively and civil chat rooms, at College Confidential.

Last week I posted an outstanding essay on Libya's tentative opening to the world by Ambassador Mark Palmer. He noted the vital role to be played by the Libyan dissident Fathi Eljami. On Opinionjournal.com today, Claudia Rosett writes the disturbing news that Mr. Eljami is missing, along with his wife and son. This followed the surrounding of his house by state security personnel and the cutting of his phone line.

Ms. Rosett nails the situation: "That is Gadhafi's test of the Western diplomats and politicians who have been flocking to Libya to praise him. He is now busy discovering what he can get away with. If Mr. Eljahmi--and his wife and son--are allowed to disappear into the murk, the dungeons or the graves upon which Gadhafi has built his long totalitarian rule, we fail not only Gadhafi's test, but our own principles, at our own peril."

She also provides Mr. Eljami's phone numbers and urges anyone who cares about his fate to call. When you receive something other than mere ringing or a recorded message followed by a busy signal, you'll know Gadhafi has felt the international pressure to free this brave dissident. The numbers:

(218 is the country code for Libya, and in the U.S. you must dial 011 first):

Home: +218-21-360-8921
Mobile: +218-91-371-9129

The Associated Press has published an article on the efforts of Democracy Project's chairman, Candace de Russy, to maintain high academic standards at the State University of New York, of which she is a trustee, and across the country. I've posted the article in our Digest section.

Call it what you will -- being blunt, direct, straightforward -- the use of frank speech in the foreign policy arena is always refreshing. This is true not only because of the manner of diplomatic discourse itself, with its nuances, indirection, and concern not to give offense, but because frank speech about sensitive subjects is sure to bring howls of protest from the sensitivity crowd.

So it's notable when two straight-speaking op-eds marking the tenth anniversary of the Rwandan genocide appear on the same day in the New York Times. The first, by Emmanuel Dongala, recounts his surreal experience of watching that genocide unfold on TV from his home in Brazzaville, Congo. Dongola attacks the "Africanly" correct way of thinking, which causes many African intellectuals and leaders to withhold criticism from leaders who, at some point in their past, acted honorably. Thus, thugs like Robert Mugabe are given a free ride lest one appear to side with white farmers. Significantly, Dongola is himself a refugee.

The second piece, on the disaster unfolding in Sudan, is by Samantha Power. She argues persuasively that Western and African leaders are once again standing aside while genocide is committed against blacks in western Sudan by the Arab-dominated government in Khartoum.

Neither writer suggests that the US should send the Marines to every hot spot on earth. But acting doesn't always consist of shooting, especially when inaction and support of the status quo, whatever it is, so often substitutes for policy decisions. A consistent belief among Democracy Project's officers is that intervention abroad -- whether diplomatic, economic, educational, or (at times) military -- can make America safer even as it saves lives and brings stability to world trouble-spots. After September 11, it's clear that Fortress America is an impossible dream. If we can't decide to stop genocide, we have little hope of laying the foundation of civil society in dysfuntional states.

Update: Brent Tantillo tells me that the rebels in the Darfur region are seen by some as being as brutal as the Khartoum regime. Their goal, unwittingly encouraged by some in the West, is a separate state. Sudan just made Freedom House's list of World's Worst Regimes for 2004, so tragedy begets tragedy in this ravaged country.

Freedom House's Paul Marshall in his article "The Southeast Asian Front" appearing in the April 5 edition of The Weekly Standard offers critical analysis about what (in my estimation) may be the second most important election for the future of the War on Terror: Indonesia. The first being the United States' election for President in November.

Indonesia is the world's largest Muslim nation. During the past several years, it has been subject to much of the greatest violence by radical Islamists happening to reside inside its borders. Remember the October 2002 Bali nightclub bombing? Right now, these radical Islamists are in a fight for control of Indonesia's future. Will it continue on the path of democratization or will either major political party, in an effort at building a majority in the Parliament, cave-in to the radical Crescent Moon and Star party and make concessions that will move this nation closer to Taliban-ruled Afghanistan.

Yesterday, Indonesia's 230 million citizens, who live on literally thousands of Islands across the South Pacific, voted. With only 1 percent of the vote tallied (as it is difficult to get all of the ballots tallied in a country with so many disparate regions), The Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle headed by current-President Megawati Sukarnoputri is losing just by a nod. Former strongman Suharto's party has them edged by .04 percent.

President Megawati's government has taken, in the words of Marshall, a "flaccid response" to the War on Terror in Indonesia with the current Vice President Hamzah Haz on record in support of Abu Bakar Bashir -- the mastermind of the Bali attacks. Marshall believes -- and I think he's right -- that no matter whether Megawati wins or Suharto's regime returns, with the election results being so close (Marshall predicted this), either party "must seek the support of the smaller parties that hold the balance of power." Marshall continues:

"As the price for their support, the small radical parties demand "Islamic" legislation or strategic positions in the government. Yusril Mahendra, whose Crescent Moon and Star Party received only 3 percent of the votes in the 1999 elections, has become the spectacularly misnamed 'minister of justice and human rights.' He is pushing reactionary legislation stipulating that only Muslims may teach Islam to Muslims, even when their parents send them to Christian schools, as is common. All schools with any Muslim students would also be required to have mosques or their equivalent, meaning that mosques would have to be built on the church grounds on which many Christian schools sit."

Radical Islamists take their faith seriously. They will not stop at knocking down the Twin Towers, they will not stop at blowing up the rails in Madrid, they will not stop at imposing their repressive and inhospitable and backward belief system on their fellow 230 million countrymen in Indonesia.

No, this is war. And that's why we must fight because if we do not come to them, they'll come to us. Remember September 11.

China has declared that it has sole power to determine the pace at which Hong Kong may move toward democracy, the WSJ ($) reports. A key excerpt from the ruling by the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress reveals the centralization of decision-making concerning Hong Kong's future:

"China is a unitary state instead of a federation, and localities have no power to decide on or change their constitutional system on their own."

The Journal notes the success Beijing has had in dampening hopes for democratic rule in Hong Kong: "Some 84% of the people polled recently by one Hong Kong newspaper said they thought there was little or no chance that universal suffrage would be introduced by the time Mr. Tung's [Hong Kong Chief Executive Tung Chee Hwa] term expires in 2007. While polls last year showed that more than 80% of people wanted direct elections by then, a recent survey by academics at Chinese University and City University showed the figure has dropped to about 60%."

Learn more about Hong Kong's various pro-democracy groups by visiting the Civil Human Rights Front (CHRF), which comprises more than 40 non-governmental groups there.

I've posted a new entry on our Digest pages. Jay Nordlinger's article on Wal-Mart, the cover story for the latest National Review, sparked a few thoughts on optimism, middle America, and innovation. Stop by the Digest for new entries in the days ahead.

The politicization of 9-11 continues apace, as the President is attacked daily by Democrats with decades-long records of defense budget cutting and pullbacks abroad. This morning the Washington Times reports that the final national security document prepared by the outgoing Clinton administration -- 45,000 words long -- does not mention al-Qaeda at all. Times reporter James G. Lakely writes: "The scarce references to bin Laden and his terror network undercut claims by former White House terrorism analyst Richard A. Clarke that the Clinton administration considered al Qaeda an 'urgent' threat, while President Bush's national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, 'ignored' it."

There can be no doubt that precious few Americans took terrorism as seriously as we should have prior to September, 2001. Desperate attempts to lay the blame at the feet of the Bush administration, including the savaging of Condoleezza Rice as ignorant or worse, should be seen as the cynical political ploys they are.

We've read about low levels of historical knowledge among Americans. A new survey commissioned by Blenheim Palace, built by Queen Anne for John Churchill, the first Duke of Marlborough and ancestor of Winston Churchill, reveals not merely ignorance of historical dates and events, but a propensity to merge fact and myth and confuse history with Hollywood.

As reported by the Daily Telegraph in London: "One in 10 of the 2,000 adults questioned in the survey commissioned by Blenheim Palace thought that Adolf Hitler was not a real person, and half were convinced that King Arthur existed."

What's more, "Confusion about Britain's historical figures was laid at the door of Hollywood films, such as Braveheart, and Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves. Almost half the adults surveyed believed that Sir William Wallace was not a real person, and a quarter were convinced that Robin Hood was. One in 20 thought that Conan the Barbarian, a character played by Arnold Schwarzenegger, was a genuine person. Some also believed that Lord Edmund Blackadder and Xena Warrior Princess, characters from television series, were real."

Conan and Xena are real, but Hitler is fiction? Next thing you know American TV will blame LBJ for JFK's death.

The History Channel has apologized ($) for airing an appallingly bad show, "The Guilty Men," last November. That ostensible historical documentary purported to show that JFK was the victim of an assassination plot in which Lyndon Johnson took part. The channel will air a new special, "The Guilty Men: An Historical Review" this Wednesday at 8:00 pm EDT that takes on the claims of the original show.

In an election year that has seen Democratic candidates give credence to conspiracy theories that President Bush knew in advance of the attacks of 9-11, the level of irresponsibility -- and just plain ignorance -- displayed by the History Channel's "Guilty Men" is inexcusable. LBJ's defenders, including Motion Picture of America President Jack Valenti and former CNN chairman Tom Johnson, forced the station to back-peddle on its own programming and did everyone a public service.

Today's New York Times Magazine carries an excerpt from David Brooks's forthcoming book, On Paradise Drive: How We Live Now (And Always Have) in the Future Tense, due out in May.

Brooks contends correctly that today's suburbs, including the exurbs that lie well beyond aging housing developments and malls from the 1950s and '60s, harbor tremendous ethnic and social diversity. Of those who sniff at suburban life as intellectually vacuous and void of significance, he writes:

"[T]here are no people so conformist as those who fault the supposed conformity of the suburbs. They regurgitate the same critiques decade after decade, regardless of the suburban reality flowering around them."

He notes the presence of immigrants from around the world in what were once mostly-white 'burbs, something my experience as a suburban Atlantan in the '90s supports. I recall spotting Dixie Used Cars, complete with Confederate flag, along Buford Highway in Gwinnett country next door to a Korean restaurant whose sign was in Korean. Stone Mountain, once middle class and white, is now middle class and mostly black. And on and on, all across the country and especially in the Sun Belt.

Brooks attributes the American drive to succeed to a "Paradise Spell" that propels us to relocate frequently, despise the past, and see the future as more real than the present. He's onto something, no doubt, in that we are sometimes crass, materialistic, and shallow. And we are, as he notes in his concluding paragraph, "consumed by hope, driven ineluctably to improve, fervently optimistic, relentlessly aspiring, spiritually alert and, in this period of human history, the irresistible and discombobulating locomotive of the world."

Well said, but incomplete. Perhaps the book will flesh out his argument, but Brooks's admirable defense of suburban life, made up in part from his knowledge of actual suburbanites, itself lacks a historical understanding of why we're so driven to improve ourselves. Part of the answer is, quite simply, that we can. We have as a people more opportunity every day than most of mankind has experienced since the invention of cities. We're willing to move because opportunity isn't always at our doorstep, and we live in a huge nation that requires only one language. Air travel is cheap and easy, so getting home to see the folks doesn't involve the adventure (a euphemism for danger) it once did. And we can expect to succeed in real terms, which isn't the same as chasing rainbows.

The suburbanites I know are fiercely patriotic, mostly religious, and generous folks -- virtues they manage to pursue because, however strong their desire to succeed, they understand the need for self-sacrifice and civic duty. Indeed, they make up most of the populations of red states about which Brooks has written. And while ignorance of America's history and civic traditions is alarming, historians who know how to write, such as David McCullough and Michael Beschloss, sell hundreds of thousands of copies. As does, of course, David Brooks.

Another piece from the Los Angeles Times. This is a typical puff piece coming from a liberal newspaper meant to suggest to readers that things in Lebanon are not really that bad. Look and see all of the new construction happening in Beirut. After reading this, the naive masses are supposed to think: "The Bush Administration is just lying to us about the Syrians and their brutal grip on power."

The Los Angeles Times reports that suspected terrorists in last month's railway bombing in Madrid blew themselves up yesterday as police closed in on them. What wimps. If they are true believers in their cause they would stand up and face the repercussions of their actions. Instead, they took the easy road and did not have to look into the faces of the families they killed. It's at these moments when you hope hell does exist.

The Washington Times reports that Muslim clerics condemned the mutilation but not the slayings of four American civilian contractors in Fallujah. Who are these clerics? Bill Clinton seeking to question the meaning of "is?" Muslims in Iraq and elsewhere have a responsibility to live up to President Bush's description of Islam as a "peaceful" faith. Such hairsplitting statements made regarding the brutal killings in Fallujah will only outrage our people to ensure that Muslims are "peaceful" by force.

After flirting with the idea of releasing Opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) leader Aung San Suu Kyi, Burma's Foreign Minister Win Aung has stated that she will not be released from house arrest, where she has been held since last May. Burma's military government did say that the NLD would be invited to participate in talks on a new constitution, set to begin May 17. The US and Japan should press Rangoon to release Suu Kyi, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, well before that date. Doing so would indicate a degree of good will on the government's part missing since she was removed from public life. Clearly, Burma's nascent democracy movement cannot advance unless opposition political parties can campaign, win elections (as they did in 1990), and form a legitimate government.

Japan has announced that it will cooperate with the US in building a missile defense system, the New York Times reports today. The Times naturally worries that this could, as the headline reads, "Tilt Asia Power Balance," as if democratic countries' acquisition of the means of defending themselves against ballistic missiles is somehow sinister. Don't we want the balance of power to be on the side of liberty? The Times also makes much of what such a move on Japan's part means given that country's pacifist post-war tradition. But does anyone really believe that Japan, as opposed to China and North Korea, poses a threat to its neighbors?

Other nations that have agreed to cooperate with the US include Australia, Taiwan, and the UK. This is an entirely positive development in that it offers protection from the murderous regime in North Korea, which fired a ballistic missile over Japan in 1998. Similarly, China has over 500 ballistic missiles aimed at Taiwan, whose population of 23 million occupies an area smaller than that of Maryland and Delaware combined. Westerners who oppose missile defenses believe that strength begets war, when in fact it is the only proven deterrent.

Christopher Hitchens has a set of questions for the anti-Iraq war crowd:

"I debate with the opponents of the Iraq intervention almost every day. I always have the same questions for them, which never seem to get answered. Do you believe that a confrontation with Saddam Hussein's regime was inevitable or not? Do you believe that a confrontation with an Uday/Qusay regime would have been better? Do you know that Saddam's envoys were trying to buy a weapons production line off the shelf from North Korea (vide the Kay report) as late as last March? Why do you think Saddam offered 'succor' (Mr. Clarke's word) to the man most wanted in the 1993 bombings in New York? Would you have been in favor of lifting the 'no fly zones' over northern and southern Iraq; a 10-year prolongation of the original 'Gulf War'? Were you content to have Kurdish and Shiite resistance fighters do all the fighting for us? Do you think that the timing of a confrontation should have been left, as it was in the past, for Baghdad to choose?"

One of Hitchens's advantages over his opponents, beyond an admirably direct style, is his knowledge of history. He knows that the Iraq war wasn't dreamed up ex nihilo by a cabal of DC think tank types because he's taken the time to acquire a historical understanding of the Middle East and, more importantly, of human nature. This gives him a vision with which he may construct likely future scenarios. That, in turn, means that he shares a great deal with those who, before and during the first Gulf War, called for the elimination of Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq.

The bomb found by Spanish authorities along the high-speed line between Madrid and Seville (near Toledo, reports say) was placed by as-yet unknown terrorist. Should the culprits prove not to be members of an Al-Qaeda linked group, some will claim that Spain's recent cave-in at the polls has not made it more vulnerable to terrorism. Yet it surely matters little who placed the bomb or why. Rewarding terrorism by moving from an offensive posture to appeasement has its own rewards -- for the killers who desire the implosion of civil society.

Additionally, authorities report that three letter bombs were sent to news organizations in the northern Spanish city of Zaragoza. No one was hurt, as two of the letters were dismantled and a third destroyed by authorities. Spanish voters who chose the incoming Socialist government in the hope that they could live in peace if only they distanced themselves from the US-led war on terror are discovering what everyone should have learned long ago: appeasement never works.

Mark Palmer was US ambassador to Hungary when the Berlin Wall fell. As he details in his new book, Breaking the Real Axis of Evil: How to Oust the World's Last Dictators by 2025, he believes the world can be cleansed of dictatorships through peaceful means. Yesterday in Washington he delivered an address on bringing democracy to Lybia and he thought it appropriate for Democray Project's web site. It's posted in our Digest section and deserves a wide audience.

Education is so lacking across the Arab world that 80 percent of its inhabitants are illiterate. This is the chief cause of that area's reflexive reactionary stance toward the West and all that it represents: the liberation of women, economic progress, individualism, and pluralism. These claims are made in a remarkable interview with the Israeli Arab poet and intellectual Salman Masalha conducted recently by the Jerusalem weekly Kol Ha'Ir (hat tip FrontPage). The text was translated by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), the venerable source of translated material from the Middle East.

Masalha has harsh words for Islamists: "There's something in the Islamic perception that drives you crazy, and that is the looking only backwards, not to the future. If the golden age was in the past, your entire vision is rearwards. This causes deterioration. In our mentality as Arabs, there is a poisonous formula that can lead to nothing good at all. There is a need for change in this programming. There is a disk in the Arab mind that must be replaced with another disk, and only this way can change come."

He calls for the education of women (something now permitted in Afghanistan): "First of all, separation of religion and state. [Then] war on ignorance, opening up to the world and to [other] cultures. The Islamic motto of 'Islam is the solution' must be replaced by 'the woman is the solution.' Women must be educated, encouraged, and enlightened. In a home with an educated and productive wife, the children will grow up to be educated and productive. A large part of the backwardness and tragedy of the Arab world lies in its abhorrent treatment of women."

And he notes the absence of satire in the Arab world. This is key, because for satire to be accepted, a culture must have the self-confidence to allow self-criticism, something that is woefully lacking in contemporary Arab society. Masalha concludes by condemning the corruption of Arab intellectuals: "This is the greatest betrayal of the intellectual Arabs. Those who dare flee to America or Europe, because they cannot create and write in their own societies. Others, according to reports that are beginning to be published, received over the years envelopes full of dinars from Saddam Hussein. Intellectuals of this kind are the root of the problem."

That's the question asked by the Wall Street Journal's editorial board today, and rightly so. MacArthur might not have sent a couple of Apache helicopters to mow down (which is what I recommend) those who took part in the gruesome mutilation of four INNOCENT American contractors, but his retribution would have been fierce and already felt.

Bremer's weak leadership in Iraq has opened the door to claims that Bush is weak on terror. What happened yesterday was terrorism. And our response to it should be as equally forceful as it was in Afghanistan after September 11. On the flip side, rather than wringing your hands and saying everything in Iraq is ok, admit that it's not. It's full of thugs that need to be cleaned out -- dead or alive because they are terrorists. Yesterday's events in Fallujah are all the proof Bush needs that Iraq is full of terrorists or those very willing to be so. Are we wimps or warriors?

The Chronicle of Higher Education ($) reports today that a scientific delegation that included three Israelis has cancelled its trip. The conference's organizer, Belkacem Kabbachi, of Ibn Zohr University in Agadir, emailed a German scientist to say that he could not guarantee the safety of the participants should the Israelis attend the Third International Workshop on the Formation and Migration of Dunes. Although Israel and Morocco do not have diplomatic relations, the North African nation is a popular tourist destination for Israelis, according to the Chronicle. The other scientists are to be congratulated for taking a stand against such naked bigotry (again, substitute any other ethnic group and imagine the international outcry that would ensue). Apparently tourists and their cash are welcome, but mere scientists had better stay home.