The efforts by some members of the FEC to restrict political speech is by now well known among bloggers, though doubtless the general public (of the non-blog-reading variety) has heard little about it. Mike Krempasky has attended this week's hearings at the FEC, and he notes, among other things, that Trevor Potter denied alleging that Brad Smith provided misinformation to the public about the FEC's intentions. Of course, that claim is itself misleading. Skeptic's Eye takes on, and defeats, the asinine Star Tribune's editorial that ponders, with furrowed brow, just what would happen in Halliburton opened a blog. Read it all.

But the most incisive, original post I've come across on the matter lately is by Mark Tapscott. To illustrate the kind of debate that an FEC crackdown on blogging would prevent, Mark describes a successful conspiracy, in our very own country, to overthrow the government through anonymous pamphleteering, scheming, and subterfuge:

Just consider: These connivers sought nothing less than to subvert the federal government but they hid behind a non de plume that gave no absolutely hints about who they were or anything else about their characters, positions in society or professions. They disclosed nothing about their professional or personal relationships, nothing about who signed their paychecks, nothing about where they lived and nothing about any special interests they served.

Not only did they obscure the truth about themselves behind an impenetrable shield of anonymity, they contrived to be heard in every state of the nation by somehow persuading those who controlled America's main communication lines to spread their subversion, thus making them partners in the plot.

It's a rich post and should be read in full. Who were these masked men? Well, you can still purchase their writings, in many different editions, in fact, and some of you no doubt own them even as you read this.

What would have been the result if Jay, Hamilton, and Madison hadn't been able to publish their views? Leaving aside the argument over the quality of the Articles of Confederation, at base, we would have had no change. That is, had The Federalist Papers never materialized, or if their distribution had been prevented, the status quo ante would have been preserved.

And today, what if campaign finance "reformers" succeed in silencing critics of sitting politicians? Clearly, the results would be -- no change. Incumbents would remain such until natural death (retirement not being the first choice of many federal politicians); challengers, especially for seats in the House of Representatives, would face ensconced candidates running in Gerrymandered districts specially tailored to keep them in office. And the power of the federal government to regulate the lives of every American's political speech, or to influence the character of government via the franchise, would be reduced.

There's a word for those who oppose all change in government, beyond its growth, and it describes both those few who cling to the belief that the Constitution advocated by the authors of The Federalist Papers is inferior to what it replaced, and to the "reformers" who seek to eviscerate the First Amendment: reactionaries. The former are, like neo-Confederates, irrelevant at this stage of the game. The latter, however, are, like the poor, always with us, but possessed of significantly less dignity.

On the heels of the President's speech defending America's determination to transform the political culture of the Middle East, beginning with a democratic and, one day, peaceful Iraq, it's useful to take a broader look at nascent democratic moves within the region. The Summer, 2005, issue of the Middle East Quarterly, an excellent source of information and analysis on that volatile, yet key, region, offers an insightful look into two countries lately much in the news: Lebanon and Syria.

In Lebanon, citizens weary of Syrian overlordship, with its attendant corruption and stifling of liberties, came to a head this past spring in the aftermath of what was certainly the Syrian-backed assassination of Rafik Hariri. But, as William Harris demonstrates in "Bashar al-Assad's Lebanon Gamble," Lebanese agitation against Syrian rule began with the death of long-time dictator Hafez al-Assad in 2000. The West, including America, had long since acquiesced to Syrian dominance of Lebanon, and no small number of observers expected Bashar to liberalize his father's Baathist regime. His subsequent actions, however, dashed those hopes, even if they did little to bring about Western demands for change toward Lebanon.

As Harris demonstrates, Syrian rule in Lebanon, though initially reliant on 30,000 troops, gradually came to make use of diplomatic tricks employed by the Romans, Byzantines, and, more recently, the British and French. These centered around the formation of alliances with various members of Lebanon's warring tribes and parties: Druze, Maronite, Orthodox, Shiite, and Sunni. Eventually, military might became less important to maintaining control, as organized criminal outfits centered around the above parties, along with powerful families, served to lock Lebanon into a seemingly permanent state of weakness -- much of it self-induced through its long civil war.

[As one who spent years reading Renaissance history, I'd add that the chaotic situation in Lebanon resembles that faced in many of the Italian city-states of the fourteenth through sixteenth centuries. Families vied for control of trade, raised private armies, and alligned themselves with stronger foreign powers (France, the papacy, the Holy Roman Empire). Not to draw too direct a parallel, but viewed historically, Lebanon's troubles are neither unique nor unsolvable. I examined some solutions to these perennial problems in this review.]

Harris thinks that Syria's bungle in Lebanon may cost Assad his rule. Internally, Syria is weak, with a per capita income of only $1,130 US; compare that to the $16,000 enjoyed by Israelis, by far the highest in the region, and to the $3,900 in Lebanon. Assad fils and pere were long able to use the situation in Lebanon as an outlet for internal pressure at home; repression was excused by the need to prevent a return to chaos within Lebanon, and pan-Arabism has long since been a mainstay of repressive Arabic regimes (witness Saddam's Iraq or Arafat's Palestinian territories).

Harris calls the Syria built by the Assad's a "wasteland," and he's certainly correct. Poor, humiliated by their withdrawal from Lebanon, they haven't given up on ruling Lebanon again, and yet their loss of face has been dramatic. It's useful to recall that, only a few years ago, pre-9/11, Assad's regime was given a green light by the administration for its continued intrigues in Lebanon:

As the opposition coalesced in Lebanon, Washington turned a blind eye. The Syrian regime interpreted Washington's lack of interest as a green light to crack down. The critical moment came in March 2001 when Secretary of State Colin Powell and other senior officials refused to meet Maronite patriarch Sfeir during his visit to Washington. In August 2001, when Sfeir visited Jumblatt amid large crowds to launch again Lebanon's old Maronite-Druze partnership, Lahoud's Syrian-backed regime struck, arresting hundreds of activists. Syrian defense minister Mustafa Tlas, delivering Bashar's address at an officers' graduation ceremony, announced that Damascus "stands beside President Lahoud and brotherly Lebanese army commander General Michel Suleiman" in facing "suspicious movements whose linkage with foreign elements hostile to Lebanon and the Arab nation has been confirmed."

The failure of this style of diplomacy should be clear for all to see, although we know all too well that the reactionary left still pines for a return to the days when America ignored, and even supported, tyranny abroad. The administration changed its foreign policy in order to deal with the new reality that 9/11 so brutally ushered in. Its actions are based on the belief that liberty can be gained universally, over time and with regional variations, and America is unquestionably the foundation for democratic theory and practice in the modern world. Perhaps this fact explains the left's hatred for Bush and his policies: if America is fundamentally evil, as they claim, then the exporting of liberty itself must be evil, too.

Harris ends his essay on a hopeful note: Lebanon's fractious political culture has largely united in opposition to continued Syrian meddling, and Syria's brutal regime is floundering at home and abroad. Given that the terrorists now killing Americans and Iraqis have been welcomed by Damascus, the administration is unlikely to grant Damascus even more wriggle room, either in Lebanon or along the border with Iraq.

Further reading: Also see the work of two other scholars in the Summer issue of the MEQ. Michael Rubin's review of Natan Sharansky's The Case for Democracy, and Suzanne Gershowitz's short essay on Egyptian dissident Ayman Nour, are posted on the American Enterprise Institute's main web site.

In the aftermath of the Ten Commandments decisions, a couple of sources of information caught my attention. Skeptic's Eye did a bit of research and found that, in the 1948 presidential election, the Democratic Party (yes) was happy to team up with the Catholic Church (again, yes) to turn out the Democratic vote. It seems that there was a referendum on the Mass. ballot to determine whether or not state officials would be able to hand out birth control information. The Church was staunchly against it, and the high turnout of heavily Democratic Catholics helped carry the state for the Democrats.

The second, if you haven't already read it, is George Will's column, "Thou Shalt Split Hairs." Will recalls the long history of religion on the Hill -- including services held in the House of Representatives until 1857.

His conclusion, sure to upset the tender psyches of ever-vulnerable lefties:

Nowadays many people delight in being distressed. They cultivate exquisitely tender sensibilities and practice moral exhibitionism, waxing indignant about minor encounters with thoughts and symbols they dislike. So, just to lower the decibel level of American life, perhaps communities should refrain from religious displays other than in religious contexts.

But this is a merely prudential, not a constitutional consideration. On Monday the justices churned out 140 pages of opinions and dissents about the Texas and Kentucky displays. Here is a one-sentence opinion that should suffice in such cases: "Because the display on public grounds does not do what the establishment clause was written to prevent -- does not impose a state-sponsored creed or significantly advantage or disadvantage one sect or sects -- the display is constitutional."

Having lost in a presidential contest, and failed to regain control of either house of Congress, one might think the Democrats would try a new approach to undermining a wartime president. Yet they're stuck with the most asinine argument one can imagine: mention of 9/11 in connection with the war on Islamo-fascism is off-limits!

Aside from the obvious question -- what do they think sparked the war? -- this strategy failed miserably last fall. Whenever Kerry or others tried to ban mention of 9/11 during the campaign, they made themselves look insincere, opportunistic, and desperate -- not a winning combo. Their appearance today is, if anything, worse, as "sticking with a loosing proposition" can be added to the list.

The best, most concise, rebuttal to the carping over the President's speech that I've come across thus far is by John Hinderaker, who says, "Pessimism is not a policy, and defeatism is not a strategy." He offers a point-by-point refutation of the left's arguments. That is, he intellectually eviscerates them, and handily, by engaging in an act they seem incapable of pulling off: informed, reasoned, logical thought.

The death of Shelby Foote, the Mississippi-born novelist and historian who passed away Monday in Memphis at the age of 88, closes a chapter in Southern letters that began with such literary and cultural lights as William Faulkner and William Alexander Percy, and was carried over the decades by, among others, Flannery O'Connor and Foote's best friend, Walker Percy.

Foote's life at times took a tragic turn: married three times, he drank too much and wrote too little during the early years of his friendship with Percy, as told in their collection of letters, The Correspondence of Shelby Foote and Walker Percy. But he was smart, possessed a vivid historical imagination, and remained a close observer of the culture in which he lived. In his remarkable biography of Percy, Pilgrim in the Ruins, Jay Tolson (also editor of the Foote/Percy letters) described the circumstances under which Foote and Percy met:

"Foote doesn't remember the moment he met Walker, but he recalls the day Uncle Will approached him at the country club swimming pool in the late spring of 1930. "He'd been playing golf -- he was a dreadful golfer, but he like to play occasionally in those days -- [and] he came over and said, 'Some kinsmen of mine are coming here to spend the summer with me. There are three boys in the group and the two older boys are about your age. I hope you'll come over to the house often and help them enjoy themselves while they're here.'" Shelby eagerly obliged. Like most people in Greenville, he knew that Uncle Will's house was a special place, and the prospect of spending time there -- whoever these kinsmen turned out to be -- was exciting.

Uncle Will's intuition about human chemistry was, as usual, canny. Shelby would not have been the first choice of many Greenvillians. He put off many people with his manner -- brash, cocky, sometimes rude. The consensus in town was that his mother and aunt had spoiled him, and there was doubtless some truth to the charge. An only child, he was strikingly handsome, with a shock of dark hair and deeply set eyes, and his easy self-assurance must have struck many adults as insufferable vanity. But Will had good reasons to think that Shelby would make a good companion for his cousins. He was an intelligent boy, for one thing, quick and clever. Though not prematurely bookish, he was certainly alive to the possibilities of good literature. Will was drawn to a boy with such a fine and promising mind, and apparently he thought that his cousins would be too.

There was something else about Shelby that made him seem a likely mate for the Percy boys, and especially for the oldest one. Shelby was a loner, quite content spending time by himself. Never athletic, he enjoyed some of the same solitary activities that Walker favored, particularly model airplane building and reading. A similarity of natures may have owed something to a similarity of backgrounds, for Shelby, too, had experienced the loss of a parent. In 1922, when Shelby was just tow months shy of six, his father died of septicemia. The family was then living in Mobile, Alabama, and the boy could hardly have known his father that well. Yet, in some ways, the fiction that Shelby would one day write would be as much a pondering of his father's fate as Percy's would be of his. The story of Foote's father was somewhat different, though: a turn-about success story cut short by death.

Shelby Foote, Sr., had been a no-count rich man's son, a gambler and a boozer right up to the day he married Shelby's mother, Lillian Rosenstock . . . . Lillian must have had a miraculous effect on Shelby's father. Shortly after they married in 1915, he suddenly turned serious and in seven years worked his way up from shipping clerk to general manager of the Armour and Company meat packing firm. But as fate would have it, he had little time to savor his worldly success. The responsibilities of his new position took him to the coastal town of Mobile, Alabama, and shortly thereafter he succumbed to a bacterial infection that twenty-five years later would have been cured by a few doses of penicillin.

Foote was a great lover of Mozart (as is Benedict XVI). Here's a portion of a letter to Percy from August 10, 1983, typed as it was written, with some misspellings and shorthand:

Mozart's C Minor Mass goes into this same mail and should reach you at the same time. I envy you your early hearings of it, though the fact is I enjoy it more every time I hear it -- hear all kinds of things I never heard before. I inclose the text: not because you arent thoroughly familiar with the Mass, but because this one is incomplete: the text is truncated to include only what is set to music, the Kyrie, the Gloria, and the Sanctus, all comlete; the Credo only goes through the Et incarnatus est, and the Agnus Dei and Dona nobis pacem are missing altogether. . . . Youre likely to have some trouble with the late-18th Century notion of church music, but no more than you have with Bach and Handel, both of whom were influences, Handel in the Gloria and Bach in the Quoniam, where the counterpoint for three voices is damned near incredible. Some say that in the Qui tollis they can hear the whips and smell the vinegar; I dont go that far, but I sure do like it and feel its power. What may give you the most trouble (and what I like about the best) is the Incarnatus est, a soprano aria; she soars like a bird for nearly nine minutes, outdoing herself as she goes along.

Over at Mere Comments, Russell Moore takes note of a central difference between Percy and Foote: religion. Percy was one of the past century's most famous American converts to Catholicism; Foote remained an agnostic throughout his life. Yet, as the Moore says, Foote was a "brave and thoughtful man."

Here is how Tolson describes Walker Percy's death on May 10, 1990, at which Shelby Foote was present.

"Walker's spirit was ready," Shelby Foote later said, "but his body wouldn't let go." On the evening of the twenty-eighth, Foote called the house and got Roy, who was sitting next to his brother. Percy realized who Roy was talking to and asked for the phone.

"I've got an hour, maybe an hour and twenty minutes," he said in a voice that sounded removed, almost disembodied. "Goodbye."

Although he had been expecting the worst, Foote could not restrain himself: "My God, Walker, I'm an only child, and you're the closest thing to a brother I ever had."

But Percy would have none of that. Before handing the phone back to Roy, he said, simply, "Goodbye."

. . . The end had finally come. Knowing that his brother was dead, Phin went out on the porch to tell the others. It was 3:40 P.M., and almost eerily George Riser arrived just as Phin came out. Everybody went into the room to bid the first of the farewells. After paying his respects, Foote returned to the porch so the family could be alone -- so he too could be alone. It was a beautiful spring afternoon, with a clear cerulean sky, and Foote remembered that May 10 was the day that Stonewall Jackson had died. He also remembered that of the many descriptions of Jackson's death that Percy had read, Percy had liked his description best of all. Somehow thinking this made Foote feel close to his closest friend.

Update: The obituary of Foote in today's New York Times is quite complimentary, so I hope it's not churlish to point out three factual errors. 1. William Alexander Percy was Walker Percy's cousin (his father's first cousin), not his uncle. W.A. Percy was affectionately called "Uncle Will" by Walker Percy and his brothers, who were raised by the elder Percy after they were orphaned. 2. Walker Percy died at his home in Covington, Louisiana, not in New Orleans. 3. Louis D. Rubin is an English professor (now emeritus), not an academic historian, as is implied.

Fired Dacula, Georgia, high school physics teacher Larry Neace, whose case will be heard by the Georgia Board of Education on July 26, continues to enjoy widespread support and sympathy in metro Atlanta, at least according to the education blog of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

The comments tend to center on two aspects of the story: the role of the teacher in leading students to understand not only the academic subject at hand, but larger lessons for life in the world, including self-discipline and high expectations; and the lamentable atmosphere cultivated by Dacula High principal Donnie Nutt, who, many claim, has allowed the school's football program to run roughshod over its academic program.

Karen Armsby, whose daughter, a Georgia Tech graduate now studying architecture in graduate school at Rice, wrote me last month to express her outrage at the firing of Larry Neace. She opens her long commentary from yesterday by praising Neace:

Larry ‘Doc’ Neace is a special person that makes a positive impression on everyone who meets him, and an outstanding educator who has positively influenced and motivated so many students, regardless of whether or not they ended up with a good grade in his classes. He is a quiet and intelligent man. He listens when you speak and responds thoughtfully. He has the ability to transmit a great deal of complicated information in a simple, direct, and easy to understand way. He invites questions and discussion without showcasing his own superior knowledge. He seems comfortable in his skin as a scientist and a teacher, and has been a backbone of integrity and teaching discipline at Dacula High School for 23 years. Doc Neace has a policy that has been approved for ten years that requires that students develop a discipline of learning in his classes that includes paying attention and participating in classes.

Gwinnett county's school board forbids allowing disciplinary issues to influence a student's grade, but Ms. Armsby believes that this case clearly involved academics, since the student whose grade was lowered slept through much of the class in question. She then gets to what she sees as the heart of the problem. Her comment here is long, but I think it's worth quoting in full.

The Dacula High School principal has systematically moved the best and the brightest teachers out of our school. A principal should be a good people manager, and good managers don’t have to know how to do all of the jobs or have all of the knowledge of those they manage. But they should be responsible at the minimum for communicating with teachers under their direction, for sitting down as a fellow professional when a problem arises, and investigating what happened, identifying the conflicts, and working with the teacher to resolve the problem.

The principal here failed on all counts; he talked to and met with a complaining parent without talking to the teacher before a parent-teacher meeting. He allowed the parent to rant and curse at the teacher, then put his teacher on the spot and demanded he make a change right there in front of the parent. He gave an ultimatum that same day, repeating it three time in succession to satisfy the rule that the teacher be told ‘repeatedly’ to change his actions. And then the paperwork was kicked upstairs to the county office level to so-called ‘human’ resouces [sic], where the administrators also failed professionally to do their own inquiry to verify the facts, where they refused to address the concerns Mr. Neace had about his teaching certificate, and where they summarily branded him a rogue teacher who enjoyed flaunting the rules. They fired him after 23 unblemished years of dedicated service, and then the School Board rubber stamped the firing. The lone voice of reason on the School Board, Carol Boyce, whose kids have all attended Dacula schools was unable to sway the Board in their decision to ratify the superintendent’s decision to terminate Mr. Neace.

What happened here is the Peter Principle in action, a bunch of administrative rule focused educators who have risen to the level of their incompetence.

Doc Neace doesn’t fit in their agenda as he is focused on learning.

Here are a few snippets from other comments:

Amy: I spoke with my school board representative, Louise Radloff, after the board’s decision to register my disgust with their ruling. She said that it made her ‘sick to her stomach’ to have to vote to fire him. My thought is that if a vote makes you sick to your stomach that’s your body’s way of telling you it’s the WRONG decision. If the school board is only going to rubber stamp the superintendent’s decisions then why do we need a school board?

Ron: Isn’t this whole mess just ridiculous? A child sleeps in class but now we’re splitting hairs over academic versus behavioral consequences. God forbid we teach children what it’s like in the real world! I THOUGHT that was part of what we were supposed to do as teachers. I am so, so, very sick of parents complaining and blaming the teacher when Jr. can’t keep his head up in class. Perhaps if he slept at home instead of playing his X-box, talking on the cell phone, or watching TV half the night, then he wouldn’t sleep at school. I hope Doc Neace gets a fair hearing from the state, but I wouldn’t count on it. We used to work with parents to teach kids, but more and more often we’re working against them. When did we become the enemy?

Jake: Ron, you became the enemy when the national ethic changed from the golden rule to gold rules. . . . So any teacher that even looks like they’re a threat to Janie getting into Harvard or Johnny qualifying for the Hope is the enemy. Ironically, public schools deserve some of the blame. The PC environment that teaches everyone is okay, they’re just different, and Johnny isn’t a poorly- raised, ill-mannered brat that isn’t fit for decent society, he just has ADHD, encourages this behavior.

Steve: I have several friends and former colleagues who work or have worked under Donnie Nutt at Dacula and they all assert that there is virtually no emphasis placed on teaching and learing by the administration. In fact, most people who have only a cursory knowledge of Dacula High will tell you that the REAL principal is not Nutt, but the athletic director and head football coach Maloof. Does anyone think it odd that Maloof, not department heads, performs interviews of prospective teachers? Is it a mere coincedence [sic] that Nease’s student was a star football player? Why was Maloof even involved at all and present at the initial meetings regarding the sleeping student? I think the citizens of Dacula and Gwinnett deserve some straight answers to those questions as well as the one posed by Amy above.

Lynne: The administrators are supposed to read and approve each and every syllabus that their teachers submit for approval. Are these administrators losing their jobs as well - for approving a syllabus that they deemed “wrong” for 10 years?

This is one of the many reasons why Gwinnett County is losing some great teachers, and why the kids and their parents think that they run the schools - especially athletes.

Here is the White House's interpretation of the data in today's Washington Post/ABC News poll. It's the text of a White House release called By the Numbers:

Iraq Update: Americans support the President and see progress towards a safer world.

* The vast majority of Americans believe our troops should stay in Iraq. 58% say we should keep our forces in Iraq until civil order is restored – anything less is not accomplishing our mission. 60% say we
should keep the same number or increase the number of troops in Iraq – a 9-point increase in those who believe we should maintain or increase our presence there since March.

* Americans see progress toward our goals. 61% say elections in January brought us closer to bringing our troops home. They are positive about the future there: 53% feel optimistic about the upcoming year in Iraq – an increase from 46% who felt optimistic about the upcoming year in December.

* Americans believe security in the Mid-East - especially in Iraq - is essential to security in the United States. 56% say the war in Iraq is a part of the War on Terror and success there is essential to security in the United States.

* They believe we have made progress towards stability and security. 51% say the war in Iraq has helped long term peace and stability in the Mid-East – a 9-point improvement over the last year. 52% say the war has contributed to the long term security of the United States – an 11-point improvement in the last month.

* Americans see the positive impact our efforts have had on the entire region. 49% say the war in Iraq has encouraged democracy in other Arab nations. Americans support keeping troops in Iraq. Americans know we have made progress towards security – both in the Mid-East and the United States.

Sources include: Washington Post/ABC, June 23-26, 2005, Adults; Washington Post/ABC, June 2-5, 2005, Adults

Here is the text of a White House press release with excerpts from this evening's speech on the war in Iraq by President Bush.

Tonight, President Bush will address the Airborne and Special Operations Forces at Ft. Bragg to mark the one year anniversary of the transfer of sovereignty to the Iraqi people. The President will address the violence in Iraq and will answer the fundamental question on the minds of the American people:

"The work in Iraq is difficult and dangerous. Like most Americans, I see the images of violence and bloodshed. Every picture is horrifying – and the suffering is real. Amid all this violence, I know Americans ask the question: Is the sacrifice worth it? It is worth it, and it is vital to the future security of our country. And tonight I will explain the reasons why."

While acknowledging that the new Iraqi government and coalition forces have experienced tough fighting and suicide bombings, the President will explain why the terrorists are failing:

"The terrorists can kill the innocent – but they cannot stop the advance of freedom. The only way our enemies can succeed is if we forget the lessons of September 11 … if we abandon the Iraqi people to men like Zarqawi … and if we yield the future of the Middle East to men like Bin Laden."

After detailing both our military and political strategy in Iraq, the President will provide the American people with a broader, strategic understanding of the stakes in Iraq, the enemy we face, and why he’s optimistic the Iraqi people and coalition forces will prevail:

"We have more work to do, and there will be tough moments that test America’s resolve. We are fighting against men with blind hatred – and armed with lethal weapons – who are capable of any atrocity. They wear no uniform; they respect no laws of warfare or morality. They take innocent lives to create chaos for the cameras. They are trying to shake our will in Iraq – just as they tried to shake our will on September 11, 2001. They will fail. The terrorists do not understand America. The American people do not falter under threat – and we will not allow our future to be determined by car bombers and assassins."

The acknowledgement of tough going is appropriate, but it's the final paragraph that needs to be heard far and wide. We're fighting barbarians who willing murder innocent civilians. And, as the President will say, these people don't understand us. Like their ideological predecessors, the Nazis, they assume that democracies are populated by materialistic, secular cowards who will cut and run. And, of course, that's what the Kennedy/Durbin/MoveOn crowd would demonstrate beyond the shadow of a doubt if they could. But far too much is at stake here for that to happen, and I'm confident we will see this fight through to the end; that is, to a stable, democratic Iraq as the lynchpin in a reforming Middle East, itself a part of a safer world.

[Note: This is the second installment of Col. Cucullu's observations made during his recent trip to Gitmo. The first installment appeared yesterday.]

We've all heard wild tales about the interrogation techniques employed at Guantanamo Bay. Allegedly, these include sleep deprivation, drugs, overheated cells, seductive women, and even Christina Aguilera music (true torture). In addition to enjoying the kind of first-class meal these would-be terrorists enjoy everyday during my trip to Guantanamo Bay last week, I also learned part of their 2,600-calorie daily diet comes in the form of donuts -- donuts the terrorists enjoy while being interrogated by sensitive, nurturing, modestly-clad female interrogators.

On my trip last week to Gitmo, I was personally able to observe Joint Task Force specialists conducting interrogations. The detainee wore an orange jump suit -- the mark of detainees who refuse to do what guards direct them to do -- and was described by JTF officers as "extremely noncompliant." I was surprised to see one detainee, described as "a high level al-Qaeda organizational and financial expert," relaxed during his interrogation session, happily munching from a box of donuts which had been provided by his interrogator. The 30-something woman had an interpreter present during the interrogation, because, although the interrogator speaks Arabic, she says she is more comfortable having "another set of ears" present at each session.

As I mentioned in yesterday's column, many of the most dangerous inmates regularly attack the guards, pelting them with feces, urine, semen, and spittle, not to mention the constant threats they make against the guards' families. Even this terrorist, casually munching on donut after donut, says he would happily kill every American he could get his hands on: military or civilian; man, woman or child. The woman in charge of behavioral analysis at Gitmo -- a dedicated Ph.D. who has two years of experience with these people and has just extended her stay -- added, "This man is proud of what the did, the people he killed, the targets he attacked, the plans he made, and the money he raised for al-Qaeda. He met with Osama bin Laden frequently. He tells us these things as a proud jihadist fighter."

I asked why he had not tried to lay a hand on his interrogator, who is much physically weaker than he is. "He knows the drill," replied JTF Commander BG Jay Hood. "He is restrained by leg cuffs and can't reach the interrogators. If he tried -- and some have -- then he would be denied privileges." Like Krispy Kremes. He eagerly eats the donuts that the interrogator provides at each session, General Hood added, "so that he can throw his food tray at the guards who deliver it to his cell." He attacks guards and his punishment is to be supplied with breakfast pastries: sounds like torture to me.

After learning of the treats given to detainee terrorists, we were surprised to find the modus operandi of the female interrogators was much different than the media and the Left had led us to believe: The women act as caring nurturers, gently lulling the captives into disclosing vital information. "Why did Gitmo employ a female interrogator in the first place?" we asked. We were told that these thugs were especially sensitive about having Western women around them. "We are very effective with some of the detainees," another female interrogator told me. She looks to be in her forties, slight build, light hair. "I dress modestly when I work with the detainees," she said. "Long sleeves and an ankle-length skirt. I act as a mother or perhaps a sister to these men. In their culture those role models are acceptable. Indeed, it provides a comfort level for them to discuss their activities with a motherly/sisterly figure. We don't coerce; we don't pressure. We just talk. And listen very carefully."

"Most importantly," she continued, "we are breaking stereotypes. These men expected to find something quite different. Many are very well educated, in America and Europe, and have much exposure to Western culture. But their ideology has implanted a harsh, critical stereotype of what Western women are like. When we act differently - more in keeping with women's behavior in their family circles - then we connect with their culture and they open up to us."

Gitmo interrogators focus on "building rapport" with the detainees, getting to know them, gaining their trust. They "break down stereotypes" and engage in dialogue. General Hood affirms that "the techniques work." Not all conversation with the detainees is about military or terrorist actions. They chat, talk about family, background, world affairs. One woman bakes cookies for her sessions.

What, after all these years of confinement, do the Gitmo interrogators elicit from these people? One would expect that any important information they possess has long been overtaken by events or grown stale, that these people had been milked of all actionable intelligence months ago and were simply hanging around waiting for ultimate disposition by military tribunal.

Moreover, interrogating these terrorists is a challenge. They are from several countries, speak 17 languages, and are from a variety of professional, educational, and social backgrounds. They are not riff-raff scraped off the battlefield; some have advanced degrees in law, medicine, and engineering from schools like the University of London or Louisiana State University. Quite a few are demolitions experts. Many detainees have been extensively trained in counter-interrogation techniques. Some have learned their trade, in some cases first- or second-hand from former KGB and Eastern European intelligence operatives. They know how to build a cover story, construct a cover within a cover, and hold silence under duress.

They are, instead, critical informants in the War on Terror.

JTF interrogators disclosed that they are continuing to develop a large amount of important intelligence from these detainees, even years after capture, and the information gained is growing daily. Integrating this intelligence with Homeland Security agencies and with military reports from battlefields in Afghanistan and Iraq is helping penetrate the detainee cover stories and break down defenses. One detainee provided personal information on a current Afghan tribal leader that helped Afghanistan forces control a turbulent region. Other detainees gave up operational attack plans that they formulated that had not yet been implemented. Police authorities in Europe and America follow up these leads and continue to break up hidden terrorist sleeper cells.

Another man was silent for almost three years. He successfully maintained a false identity until a captured terrorist half a world away picked him from a photo and gave his name. Once he was confronted with the truth he began to talk. From him we are learning about al-Qaeda's web of financial sources, how funds are moved, and how money laundering takes place. His information enables specialists to dry up money sources that had been, up-to-that-moment, aiding their terrorist jihad.

There are many reasons to hold these very dangerous terrorists, including the wealth of vital information that we continue to elicit. To make this happen, they need to be confined in a special facility secluded from everyone else where they can be controlled effectively and interrogated properly. Guantanamo Bay fits the requirements in ways no other facility would. This base is keeping highly dangerous terrorists from killing more innocent Americans. It is not a gulag or torture camp.

The allegations, however, trickle down to the individual soldiers and sailors (the Navy is carrying a lot of the Gitmo guard responsibility). I asked one young woman about her feelings toward negative, erroneous accusations from the media and from Senators like Durbin and Kennedy. "We hear all that, of course," she answered, "but we try not to let it get us down." Then she grinned. "In fact, every time we see one of those stories, it just makes us want to work harder to accomplish our mission." Her name tag is blacked out, as are those of the other soldiers, because of personal threats from the detainees, so I won't give it here. But know that we owe these gallant service men and women a deep debt of gratitude for carrying out this vital but viciously slandered mission, all the while bearing up with great professionalism.

These are the professionals who bear the brunt of the overheated and irresponsible charges of the Left -- but if the Left manages to get the government to shut Gitmo down, they won't be its only victims.

Update: Scott at Power Line has posted a letter from Susan Albright, editorial page editor of the Minneapolis Star Tribune, that attempts to defend her paper's editorial defending Dick Durban's indefensible remarks on Gitmo. The letter, as Scott says, makes no attempt to establish the veracity of Durban's charges, but instead proceeds as if they were true. Then again, anyone who would come to the defense of Dick Durban is unlikely to be accused of clear thinking.

You'll recall Larry Neace, the Dacula, Ga., high school physics teacher who was fired May 6 for refusing an order from his principal to raise the grade of a football player who'd slept in class. Neace employed a ten-year-old policy that every student signed at the beginning of the term to lower the grade of an assignment handed in by the student, whose parent later complained.

His attorney appealed, and although the board of education in Gwinnett County refused to overturn his dismissal, the state Board of Education will hear his case on July 26. A decision is expected within 25 days of the hearing.

It's been awhile since I've posted, but life has been inordinately busy, having started a new job with Congressman Todd Akin of Missouri and returning from a beautiful and belated Honeymoon to Switzerland. Nevertheless, I had a spare moment this evening to blog and wanted to expand upon Win's entry of June 24 regarding the already-notorious Supreme Court decision of Kelo v. City of New London. In this case, the city of New London through the power of eminent domain condemned houses along the shore for the purpose of creating a new development with a hotel and office complex.

While the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution enables governments, both local and federal, to use the power of eminent domain if the property holders are justly compensated and the seizure is for a "public purpose," one has to wonder whether the authors of the Bill of Rights, George Mason and James Madison, ever envisioned that the power of eminent domain would be used to evict persons from their homes so that governments could build property for what in my view is a "private purpose." I think not.

Mark Tapscott asks a question of the Washington Post that, given their defense of the "free speech" of flag burning, requires a serious answer.

Mark quotes from the Post's editorial against banning flag burning, which says there are "no exceptions" to the First Amendment, and asks:

All of that is absolutely true, of course, but what about the free speech that is exercised when somebody buys a TV or radio spot to advocate the election or defeat of a candidate for Congress 60 or fewer days before Election Day?

That is, can the FEC outlaw types of political speech that some elites find inconvenient? According to the Supreme Court, the answer is yes. As to whether or not they'll do it, we should know later this summer.

UPDATE: This is Brent Tantillo -- I hope Win doesn't mind me making the following comment, but flag burning can be considered more than just speech, it also involves conduct; conduct which sometimes is very dangerous as it necessarily involves fire and sometimes gasoline or some other flammable substance.

[Note: Gordon Cucullu is a retired Army Green Beret Lt. Colonel and author of Separated at Birth: How North Korea Became the Evil Twin.]

Last week, I was privileged to be part of a Department of Defense trip to the Joint Task Force - Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. I got to see the operations of this “controversial” facility up-close – something particularly important after Sen. Richard Durbin’s comparison of its guard to Nazi stormtroopers and calls of leftists to shut the center down. Our group went to GITMO to check out tales that the military was being too tough on these terrorist detainees. We left convinced that America is being extraordinarily lenient – far too lenient.

After speaking with soldiers, sailors, and civilians who collectively staff GITMO, I left convinced that abuse definitely exists at the detention facilities, and it typically fails to receive the press attention it deserves: it’s the relentless, merciless attacks on American servicemen and women by these terrorist thugs. Many of the orange jumpsuit-clad detainees fight their captors at every opportunity, openly bragging of their desire to kill Americans. One has promised that, if released, he would find MPs in their homes through the internet, break into their houses at night, and “cut the throats of them and their families like sheep.” Others claim authority and vindication to kill women, children, and other innocents who oppose their jihadist mission authorized by the Koran (the same one that hangs in every cell from a specially-designed holder intended to protect it from a touching the cell floor – all provided at U.S. taxpayer expense). One detainee was heard to tell another: “One day I will enjoy sucking American blood, although their blood is bitter, undrinkable….” These recalcitrant detainees are known euphemistically as being “non-compliant.” They attack guards whenever the soldiers enter their cells, trying to reach up under protective facemasks to gouge eyes and tear mouths. They make weapons and try to stab the guards or grab and break limbs as the guards pass them food.

We dined with the soldiers, toured several of the individual holding camps, observed interrogations, and inspected cells. We were impressed by the universally high quality of the cadre and the facilities. While it may not be exactly “Club GITMO,” as Rush Limbaugh uses to tweak the hard-Left critics who haven’t a clue about reality here, GITMO is a far cry from the harshness experienced even by maximum security prisoners in the U.S.

Meals for detainees are ample: we lunched on what several thought was an accumulated single day’s ration for detainees. “No,” the contract food service manager said with a laugh, “what you’re looking at there is today’s lunch. A single meal. They get three a day like that.” The vegetables, pita bread, and other well-prepared food filled two of the large Styrofoam take-home containers we see in restaurants. Several prisoners have special meal orders like “no tomatoes” or “no peanut products” depending on taste or allergies. “One prisoner,” General Hood said, “throws back his food tray if it contains things he has specifically said he doesn’t want.” How is he punished for this outrageous behavior? His tray is numbered, the food he requested is put on it, and the corrected “order” is delivered to his cell.

The detainees are similarly catered to medically. Almost every one arrived at GITMO with some sort of battlefield trauma. After all, the majority were captured in combat. Today they are healthy, immunized, and well cared for. At a visit to the modern hospital facility – dedicated solely to the detainees and comparable to a well-equipped and staffed small-town hospital with operating, dental, routine facilities – the doctor in charge confirmed that the caloric count for the detainees was so high that while “most detainees arrived undernourished,” medics now watch for issues stemming from high cholesterol and being overweight. Each of approximately 520 terrorists currently held in confinement averages about four medical visits monthly, something one would expect from only a dedicated American hypochondriac. Welcome to the rigors of detention under American supervision.

Of the estimated 70,000 battlefield captures that were made in Afghanistan, only a tiny percentage, something on the order of 800-plus, were eventually evacuated to GITMO. These were the worst of the worst. More than 200 have been released back to their home country – if the U.S. is assured that the detainees would not be tortured by local authorities upon return. These men were freed because they were deemed by ongoing official military review processes to no longer pose a threat, or to possess no useful intelligence. And this process has proven too generous at times: more than 10 released GITMO detainees have been killed or recaptured fighting Americans or have been identified as resuming terrorist activities. Still, the process is up and running for review of cases, and if a Washington DC circuit court approves a government appeal, the system for military tribunals will get started. All mechanisms are in place and ready to go as soon as DoD gets a green light.

There is a good reason these unlawful combatants are being confined. They are evil and dangerous individuals. Yet these thugs are treated with an amazing degree of compassion: They are given ice cream treats and recreational time. They live in clean facilities, and receive a full Muslim religious package of Koran, prayer rug, beads, and prayer oils. An arrow in every cell points to Mecca. The call to prayer is played five times daily. They are not abused, hanged, tortured, beheaded, raped, mutilated, or in any way treated the way that they once treated their own captives – or now treat their guards.

Some questioned whether it were wise to give these radical Islamic fundamentalists the religious supplies that ended up landing them in GITMO in the first place. “Giving them the Koran is simply something that we think we ought to do as a humane gesture,” said second-in-command Brigadier General Gong. “We’re Americans. That’s how we operate.”

When we challenged military authorities about the seemingly plush environs these would-be murderers receive, the commanding officers stated this was the most productive course. JTF-GITMO commanding officer Brigadier General Jay Hood radiated confidence and determination when fielding challenges from our group about his overly lenient treatment. “It works,” he says simply. “We do not allow torture or mistreatment, period.” How do they guarantee this? By rigorous, on-going training and constant oversight up and down the supervisory chain. As proof that “establishing rapport” with the detainees is far more effective than coercive techniques, General Hood refers skeptics to the massive amount of usable intelligence information JTF-GITMO continues to produce even three years into the program.

You are right to worry about inhumane treatment taking place at GITMO. But your concern should be for the dedicated, well-trained, highly professional American men and women who are subjected to a daily barrage of feces, urine, semen, and spit hurled at them along with vile invective as they implement a humane, enlightened system of confinement on men who want nothing more than to kill Americans. These quiet professional Americans, who live under the motto “Honor Bound for Defense of Freedom,” deserve our utmost respect and concern. Shame on anyone who slanders or disrespects them for short-term and short-sighted political advantage.

Update: Power Line links to this op-ed in today's Minneapolis Star-Tribune by Congressman John Kline. Written in response to a pro-Durban editorial in the paper, it further refutes the Senator's infamous claims of torture at GITMO.

Update II: Col. Cucullu's second installment in this series is now up.

From the news, you'd assume that everyone in Iraq who isn't already dead will be, and soon. And not just from reporters standing safely in front of the White House, but from opportunistic politicians (a redundant phrase, I know) like the lamentable Chuck Hagel and the despicable Ted Kennedy. Their hysterics reminds me of a quip by, of all people, Ted Turner. At the University of Georgia in the early 1980s, he recounted a recent trip to Europe, made amid constant reports of terrorist acts on the Continent: "Hell, I thought I was going to see terrorists everywhere. I expected to be met at the airport by terrorists."

That's not to downplay to horrible violence occurring in Iraq, much less the global problem of terrorism. But it is to remember that all events, even murder, must be kept in historical perspective. The goals of the terrorists (Michael Moore's "Minutemen") is clear: drive out American troops by turning the American public against the war. As a WSJ editorial linked to above explains, the Hagels and Kennedys of America have willingly, and perversely, taken the bait. So, of course, has Dick Durban. All of them can count on the full support of MSM, but not because the latter do their job of reporting bad news. No, it's because the media has polished their image as an ambulance chasing hoard happy to see this President, whom they loathe, tarnished, even at the expense of many lives.

This morning, Arthur Chrenkoff has posted another of his invaluable reports on the other side of life in Iraq, and what a report it is. Good News from Iraq, Part 30, is indeed thick with reports you're likely to miss if you rely on MSM. Beyond that, however, it's a morality tale of bravery in the face of death, and persistence in the face of the cynicism and opportunism of Western elites such as Chuck Hagel.

Who'd you rather rely on in a crunch: Hagel or Kennedy, or Karim Wasfi, a cellist with the Bagdhad Symphony (and kudos to NBC for reporting this story). Wasfi studied music at Indiana University's famed School of Music, but rather than remain in the States, he returned home after Saddam's overthrow: "'The message is that we are stronger than the situation,' he says."

Or perhaps you hadn't heard that American troops are not, in fact, the thugs and torturers of Durbanville, but are helping to rebuild civil aviation, construct roads long neglected, get the electricity and clean water going again, and rebuild schools.

Arthur's good news reports aren't saccharine; they're not filled with pro-Western propaganda designed to paper over the bloodshed wrought by terrorists in that long-ravaged country. But they do serve to fill in the gapping holes left by big media's relentless pursuit of only one side of the story. And they prove, beyond a doubt, that civil society is indeed taking hold in Iraq, and that the ravages of Saddam's rule are being repaired in the face of continuing violence.

Update: Betsy Newmark links to, and comments on, a profile of Chuck Hagel in The Australian. As the Aussies say: "A liberal in Republican's clothing."

Update II: Karl Zinsmeister, just back from Iraq, also takes issue with the "all the news is bad" crowd.

Update III: The Anchoress says a beautiful prayer for our military people abroad. It's an extraordinary meditation on sacrifice, truth, evil, and much more.

Here's the lineup for TRUE NORTH for the week of June 27, 2005:

Monday: David Klein is a professor of mathematics at California State University, Northridge, and the lead author of the 2005 Fordham Foundation analysis of the state of state math standards, which rated Vermont’s standards as very poor: as D-level. David holds a B.S. in physics from the University of California at Santa Barbara, as well as a Ph.D. in applied mathematics from Cornell University. He has held teaching and research positions at Louisiana State University, UCLA, and the University of Southern California, and was a guest scholar at National Tsing Hua University in Taiwan. Dr. Klein has testified about mathematics education in forums ranging from local school boards to a subcommittee of the House of Representatives. He has served on official panels to review K–8 mathematics curriculum submissions for statewide adoption in California, and was appointed by the California State Board of Education to review and evaluate professional development proposals for California mathematics teachers. He has also been a mathematics content director for the Los Angeles County Office of Education. We’ll be discussing the main problems with the way math is being taught in our public schools.

Tuesday: Ed Klein, author of the controversial new best-seller The Truth About Hillary: What She Knew, When She Knew It, and How Far She’ll Go To Become President. Klein, who is no right-winger, is being attacked by the Left and the Right alike for this book. Some have suggested this book’s purpose is to “inoculate” the public against some of the concerns voters may have Mrs. Clinton’s character and personal history. (Since the book has been excerpted in Vanity Fair, that’s not as wild an assertion as it may seem.) Surprisingly, a number of Republicans are leaping to defend Mrs. Clinton—without being able to disprove anything Klein says. The generous-spirited Peggy Noonan, for example, argues, strangely, that Hillary can’t be as awful as Klein makes her out to be. (I, on the other hand, recognize Klein’s Hillary as a “type” very familiar on college faculties, starting in the late 1970s.) This is a riveting, and a chilling, portrait of a woman now bent on her third term as President.

Wednesday: Ken Masugi, the Director of the Center for Local Government at the Claremont Institute; the Center’s purpose is to apply the principles of the American Founding to the theory and practice of local government, the cradle of American self-government. Ken served as a special assistant to then-Chairman Clarence Thomas of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, then held a number of prestigious university appointments, including as the Olin Distinguished Visiting Professor at the U.S. Air Force Academy. He’s the co-author and co-editor of numerous scholarly books about American government, and is also widely published in places like the Los Angeles Times, Orange County Register, Washington Post, Washington Times, National Review, and the Weekly Standard. We’ll be discussing the Supreme Court’s ‘eminent domain’ decision in Kelo v. New London, which makes it legal for city governments to seize private property that will NOT be in “public use,” in order to increase a city’s tax base.

Thursday: Bill Sayre, formerly with the U.S. Federal Reserve, now a Member of the Board of Directors of Associated Industries of Vermont; of the Vermont Chamber of Commerce; and of the Vermont Forest Products Association. A student of Milton Friedman's (among other Nobel Laureates), Bill received his MBA in economics/finance from the University of Chicago.

Friday: Col. Gordon Cucullu, military analyst for the Fox News Channel and for New York's WABC-TV and WABC-radio, and for TRUE NORTH! Gordon is the author of Separated at Birth: How North Korea Became the Evil Twin. Check out Gordon's beautiful and content-rich website. Gordon will be telling us about his trip last week to GITMO, the Guantanamo Bay prison camp.

You are encouraged to forward this announcement to people who may be interested in the guests and topics featured this week, and to put our call-in numbers on speed dial.

Waterbury/Montpelier area: 244-1777

Long distance from anywhere: 1-877-291-TALK or 1-877-291-8255

How to Hear the Show

Tune in to WDEV 550 AM/96.1 FM or to WSYB 1380 AM to hear TRUE NORTH live, from 11:05 a.m. till noon, Monday through Friday.

Should you miss a show, don't forget--each week we post the previous week's shows on our website, so you can listen to those you missed online. Just go to truenorthradio.com, and click on ARCHIVES.

[Note: Gordon Cucullu is a Retired Army Green Beret Lt. Colonel. His latest book is Separated at Birth: How North Korea Became the Evil Twin.]

I was in GITMO last Friday. We interviewed the troops, observed ongoing interrogations, inspected detention facilities, and ate detainee chow. Bottom line: imprisonment at GITMO is probably a lot more pleasant than in any US Federal maximum security prison. There is absolutely NO TORTURE going on at GITMO. In fact some of us thought treatment was too lenient. But it gets results.

I'll have more for readers later in the week. Meanwhile, be advised that some of the best trained, most dedicated professional American soldiers and sailors are defending freedom by the often onerous, always dangerous task of guarding these terrorist thugs.

Update: See this post above for the full report.

That's the title of an essay by Wilfred McClay in the latest issue of Commentary. It's well worth your time, I think, and I urge anyone who's interested in the role of religion in America, particularly among conservatives and evangelicals, to delve into it. Here's the introduction:

Among all the things that liberals loathe about George W. Bush, his religious fervor would seem to be at or near the top of the list. Some consider him a mere pretender, or a hypocrite, lashing out at his post-9/11 persona as a world-transforming warrior with bumper-sticker barbs like “Who would Jesus bomb?” For the most part, though, liberal animus toward Bush’s faith comes from the opposite direction. It is his religious sincerity that infuriates and frightens, especially when contrasted with the easy and empty Bible-toting of, say, a Bill Clinton.

One does not have to dig very deep to explain this hostility. There are the familiar issues of the culture war—the “values” divide between red states and blue. There is also Bush’s personal manner, seemingly perfectly calculated to grate on the sensibilities of worldly, secularist elites. But something more profound may be at work as well. What liberals find objectionable about Bush as a born-again Christian is the kind of politician he has become by means of and on account of his faith. But what may be most discomfiting of all is the degree to which, in this regard, he has successfully laid claim to so many elements of the liberals’ own discarded past, and thereby begun to reverse the polarities of American politics.

For those who don't normally read Commentary, let me suggest that you spend some time on its web site, or leafing through copies at a book store or library. And if you like what you find, and I'll bet you will, indulge your intellectual curiosity and subscribe. It's one of a handful of magazines that consistently meets the highest standards of its field.

Today and yesterday were filled, to the brim, but here's at least one thought for a pretty summer Friday: the left is intellectually bankrupt. It's a theme we return to here frequently, and for a couple of reasons. First, after spending years in academe listening to conservatives described as ignorant, unread, and unsophisticated, several of us have pretty well had it with anyone who attempts to substitute attitude for knowledge.

Second, the intellectual implosion of the left not only shows no signs of abating: it is, if anything, accelerating. This is remarkable, as it has been in a depressed state for some time, and that it would sink lower isn't something one might expect. That sentiment is strengthened by the fact that so much ink has been spilled decrying the left's decline. One would think that the much-anticipated turn-around would have started by now, and yet no revival is on the horizon.

Today, Charles Krauthammer adds his voice to the chorus of those decrying the intellectual collapse of liberalism. He seizes on The Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) as the latest example of liberal decline, and he's right to do so, but he had many examples to choose from: yesterday's Supreme Court ruling in Kelo vs. City of New London, for example, which was supported by liberal justices, opposed by the conservative wing, and lauded by the New York Times. Pro-state, anti-freedom; pro-cartel, anti-free trade: little thought is needed to support such positions; better, they believe, to embrace an intellectually vacuous, elitist pseudo-philosophy until the bitter end.

By Candace de Russy and Mitchell Langbert

From today's New York Sun.

We are concerned that the American Association of University Professors' general secretary, Roger W. Bowen, recently has made public statements that selectively evaluate academic research. Such public statements breach the AAUP's established standards. Differentially criticizing the research of conservative scholars and withholding equivalent criticism from liberals suggest institutional bias. Such bias undermines the AAUP's claim of evenhandedly defending the professoriate’s pursuit of truth.

We refer to statements that Mr. Bowen made in the April 8, 2005, issue of the Chronicle of Higher Education concerning the study "Politics and Professional Advancement among College Faculty" by an emeritus professor of government at Smith College, Stanley Rothman; a professor of communications at George Mason University, S. Robert Lichter, and a professor of political science at the University of Toronto, Neil Nevitte. Published in the online journal Forum, the study finds campus liberals to outnumber conservatives 5-to-1. It also concludes that conservatives tend to get worse jobs than liberals when research productivity and other personal characteristics are taken into account.

Mr. Bowen's response to the study was to declare its methodology "suspect" because the sample size was "too small" and to assert, without empirical support, that in academia "the cream rises to the top." But the sample size in the Rothman et al study, 1,643, is larger than samples in the majority of published social-science studies. It is larger, in fact, than the sample size that the Nielsen ratings use. Moreover, the Rothman et al methodology is as appropriate to its subject as are the methodologies of many studies that are published in scholarly social-science journals each month, and whose methodologies Mr. Bowen would no doubt not presume to evaluate.

Concerned about the inaccuracy of this response by an important academic leader, one of us e-mailed Mr. Bowen an inquiry to which he responded as follows: "Several studies have recently been done, but none of them approach the breadth or depth of those done over time by the Higher Education Research Institute, or HERI, since 1989-90. Its conclusions, based on a much larger sample, reveal a very different picture."

Reviewing the most recent HERI survey, we discovered that it paints a picture not all that different from that in the Rothman et al report. To be exact, the 2002 HERI study finds that among four-year institutions, far left or liberal faculty outnumber conservatives by a ratio of roughly 3-to-1. Additionally, a low (below 15%) institutional response rate that is self-selected opens the HERI study to questions about methodology that are as serious as those that might be raised about the Rothman et al study. A balanced observer would raise questions about both studies, or be satisfied in the knowledge that social-science research is often imperfect.

When one of us then asked Mr. Bowen for further clarification of the basis for his remarks, he indicated that, rather than the HERI study, a professor at George Mason University, Jeremy Mayer, had provided him with information that was the basis for his remarks. When one of us questioned Mr. Mayer, he wrote that he had sent "Roger a preliminary e-mail slicing and dicing the methodology" in the Rothman et al study and that "I'd write a more sophisticated analysis if I'd known Roger was going to bandy my name about." Mr. Mayer's e-mail did not mention the HERI study.

Mr. Mayer's e-mail did, however, raise a number of criticisms of the Rothman et al study that deserve scholarly debate. In particular, the e-mail mentions that the Rothman et al data defined too small a portion of their sample as moderate rather than liberal or conservative, omitted foreign policy and trade issues in its definition of liberal and conservative, used a less-than-objective self-appraisal for measuring academic achievement, and omitted controls for teaching at Christian and historically black colleges. While such points are deserving of debate, they are in fact debatable. Mr. Rothman has confirmed that Mr. Bowen never contacted him for his response to these points.

While mentioning that Mr. Rothman and his colleagues "simply won't release their data," Mr. Mayer also provided us with a slide presentation. The slide presentation notes that Mr. Rothman states that he intends to release his data when his planned publications are finished. In addition, the presentation points out that "discrimination in hiring is a bad thing" and that it is "possible to have an interesting conversation on the issue." It goes on to ask "how [could] discrimination happen?" and in several slides speculates about potential reasons why there might be discrimination against conservatives. It then discusses econometric criticisms and alternative explanations for the preponderance of liberals over conservatives. Mr. Rothman has indicated to us that he intends to make his data available at the Roper Institute, as he has done with respect to six previous studies. He also indicates that he plans to respond to the various comments in future academic publications.

In short, like the HERI study, Mr. Mayer's e-mail and the slide presentation do not support Mr. Bowen's statements to the Chronicle, nor do they address the HERI study to which Mr. Bowen at first alluded as the basis for his published remarks. Based on correspondence with Messrs. Mayer and Rothman, Mr. Bowen's statements about sample size and "cream rising to the top" were at best exaggerations.

Ms. de Russy is a trustee of the State University of New York and an adjunct fellow at the Hudson Institute. Mr. Langbert is an associate professor of business, management, and finance at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York.

I've written about Trevor Potter before; several times, in fact. He runs a "reform" outfit called the Campaign Legal Center. They're the folks who sent out a press release that, in effect, called Brad a liar after his interview with CNET on March 3. Although Potter's biography on CLC's web site fails to mention it, he was John McCain's general counsel during the 2000 GOP primaries.

Now, Brad Smith has replied in Roll Call, the Capitol Hill newspaper, to a letter from Potter that appeared in that publication. Because the letter isn't available online, Allison Hayward, who used to work for Brad and who knows more about the inner workings of the FEC than most folks, has posted it at her superb new blog, Skeptic's Eye.

I urge you to go to Allison's site and read the letter in its entirety. Potter actually claimed, in his letter of June 9, that any inconveniences caused by campaign finance reforms are worth it. Brad takes him apart by showing the true purpose of "reform": the creation of rules so complex, and fines so expensive, that ordinary citizens are run out of the political process. Of course, this is exactly the purpose of all campaign finance "reform," and will be the result if McCain and his allies have their way.

I wrote "Why are they Smearing Bradley Smith?" on March 5, and it may provide useful background information if you haven't followed the story.

I intended to post this yesterday, but in case you didn't read it, this editorial from the New York Sun pays homage to retiring FEC commissioner Bradley Smith. You'll recall that it was Brad who, back in March, called attention to the threat posed by the FEC to bloggers in this interview. That led to vitriolic denunciations of Brad by the reform lobby, many of whom are McCain's minions, and all of whom wish to reign in the power of voters to make crucial decisions at the ballot box. If you're interested in our coverage of this still-unfolding saga, type Brad's name into the search box to the left.

Here's a taste of the Sun's editorial:

All Americans who value the First Amendment will regret the retirement of Bradley Smith from the Federal Election Commission. Mr. Smith, a member of the commission since 2000 who served as its chairman in 2004, publicly announced his resignation last week. He steps down August 21.

Mr. Smith was a rare character to head a regulatory agency: a man of principle who openly questioned the wisdom of the very regulations he was charged with enforcing. "I think there are a lot of things that should be deregulated," Mr. Smith has told The New York Sun. "I think most of the restrictions do more harm than good. We really need to start thinking harder about the costs of some of the campaign finance regulation."

Amen to all of that. The editorial ends with an exhortation to President Bush to appoint someone to Brad's post on the FEC who shares his determination to preserve our First Amendment rights in the face of a hostile "reform" lobby that seeks to limit the ability of Americans to speak out in ways that will influence elections, as if that isn't that the purpose of political speech.

It also reminds us that McCain and his forces have launched an effort to stifle the ability of so-called 527 groups, such as Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, or any on the left, to speak their minds on elections. If McCain is successful this round, he will have succeeded in further restricting the ability of Americans to speak their minds about politics, an affront to the First Amendment and the American way of life that cannot be tolerated. An important step in ensuring that the public has a voice in the FEC is for Republicans and Democrats who value free speech to pressure the White House to appoint a like-minded person to Brad's seat. We deserve, and expect, no less.

Sometimes people let loose with a mouthful other than the mouthful they intended to unleash. So it was recently with the superintendent of the Minneapolis public schools. Her name is Thandiwe Peeples. On the job for less than a year and under fire for a number of reasons, she let loose with a number of mouthfuls, one of which was more curious than any other. Trying to account for the difficulty of her job, she summed up her plight by declaring that her district’s “twenty-first century children” were being taught by “twentieth century educators.”

My first reaction was, “huh?” Just what the heck was she getting at? Was it just a throwaway line? Or was it simply some sort of educatorese? Or perhaps it was an attempt to curry favor with the parents of those oh, so modern children by calling into question the credentials of their oh, so hidebound teachers? Or maybe, just maybe, she was accidentally calling into question the entire enterprise that she represents, leads, and otherwise attempts to preside over.

Maybe the question at hand isn’t whether Superintendent Peebles is the one to lead the children of Minneapolis. Maybe the question is can—or should—anyone among her (my) generation lead these children. Or maybe the question is how to pick the best among them to lead all the rest of us.

As I was pondering all of this, my teen-aged son tossed in his own two cents worth on Ms. Peebles’ plight. “Isn’t that the way it’s supposed to be?” he offered. Well, yes, as a matter of fact, it is — or was.

Of course her students are charging their way into this century. And of course Minneapolis teachers were born in the last century. And of course that’s the way it’s always been. After all, isn’t education supposed to do have something to do with the young learning from their elders? And wasn’t that what education was once very much about?

Once upon a time there was something called western civilization. Once upon a time it was thought that this civilization was worth passing on to the next generation. Once upon a time public education was entrusted with the critically important task of doing just that.

No doubt there continue to be public educators in the city of Minneapolis who continue to do what has long been done—and who do it very well indeed. But apparently they are doing it in spite of a leadership that seems bent on telling them that we’d all be better off if these troglodytes followed the lead of their 21st century charges. What else is there to conclude from her statement? Either it’s pure drivel or it’s driving her agenda.

And what is that agenda? Would it be too much to suggest that it might be the logical consequence of multiculturalism run amok? There was a time when I used the word “well-meaning” before “multiculturalism.” But no more. If multicultural education means respect for various cultural traditions and languages, who could possibly be opposed to that? If it means that large American cities are salad bowls of various races, ethnicities, and nationalities, who could deny that? If it means that all of us can benefit from this great variety in a great variety of ways, who could think otherwise?

But perhaps it means something more than that. Perhaps it means that the western tradition in general and American history in particular just aren’t worth passing along any more. Perhaps it means that what was once called western civilization is just one more of the many “multis” in multicultural. If that’s the case, then we’ve got problems, yes, problems right here in our own River City. That’s problems with a capital “P” that could stand for pool which rhymes with school.

Oh, for the bad old days when pool was the problem. Or for when a marching band was the solution. Actually, it still is—or could be—a partial means to a solution. Think of a band as a metaphor for western civilization. Think of the great variety within that band. And then think of the wonderful result when that band functions together.

Now I’ve never met Superintendent Peebles. From the sound of things she’s hell on wheels when it comes to raising test scores. Good for her. Raising test scores is also of critical importance. But what good are higher test scores, if those who earn them share nothing more than, well, having earned higher test scores?

Our public schools ought to be places where we produce more than fresh candidates for the meritocracy. It ought to produce good citizens as well. And good citizenship ought to have something to do with something more than test scores. Good citizenship begins with children who know that they are part of a long tradition, yes, a long western tradition. It also ought to have something to do with character formation. And both of those enterprises are best left in the hands of their elders, especially those who are confident enough to assert that 20th century teachers have something to say to their 21st century students.

To turn that around, to contend that saddling 21st century students with 20th century educators is actually part of the problem, is to take us off into Alice in Wonderland land. It’s also either an act of cowardice or meaningless drivel—or part of a larger effort to undermine the very foundation of a once-proud public educational system that was once part of a once-confident western tradition. Take your pick.

John C. “Chuck” Chalberg teaches American history at Normandale Community College.

Today at about 12:45 pm in Center City Philadelphia, a mob of violent, professional anti-biotech protesters threw water on Philly police officers. Officer Paris Williams, a 52-year-old, 19-year veteran of the force, attempted to make arrests. Film shown on Philly TV shows protesters mobbing Officer Williams, knocking him to the ground, and kicking him. That led directly to a heart attack and his subsequent death.

You can watch the film and see photos, as covered by one Philly television station, here. The Philadelphia Inquirer also covered the story.

The attack occurred at 12th and Arch Streets, right in the middle of Philadelphia.

What were the anarchists "protesting" this time? Biotechnology. Bio 2005 began on the 19th and ends tomorrow. It's the world's largest biotechnology gathering, and over 1,500 companies are exhibiting. As of yesterday, over 18,000 people had attended, and some 6,000 of them, representing 61 countries, came from abroad.

And why were the "protesters," who have shown themselves to be nothing more than thugs, goons, and now killers, there? To what do they object? In a word, I suppose, they hate the modern world that makes their lives possible, and the democracy that protects their rights to protest.

But of course, they have no right to attack police officers, much less to kill one. In today's actions, they've shown their true colors as violent people who should not be allowed to take over the streets of American cities. Peaceful protest is the right of all Americans, but we've long since become far too indulgent of well-funded, well-organized anarchists who make a habit of violently seizing control of large American cities. The "protesters" tried to invade the Convention Center after they killed Officer Williams, but were rebuffed by his fellow officers.

Officer Paris Williams lost his wife several years ago; he leaves behind two grown children, who've now lost both parents, and far too early. They lost their father because "protesters" took advantage of the efforts by officers to protect those attending the conference while respecting the rights of thugs.

Lately, we've watched peaceful protests in Ukraine, Lebanon, and elsewhere help bring down corrupt and oppressive governments. How unjust that, simultaneously, we allow thugs to roam our streets and attack our officers in the name of democracy.

With Condoleezza Rice in the Middle East to promote democracy, let's hope she uses her enhanced megaphone to demand that Syria get out of Lebanon entirely and stop assassinating patriotic Lebanese, whatever their religion. Today's assassination George Hawi, by car bomb, is only the latest in a string of killings targeting prominent Lebanese who are vocal in their opposition to Syrian control of their native land. Among others murdered by Syrians, or their paid henchmen, are Samir Kassir, an anti-Syrian journalist killed earlier this month, and of course former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, whose murder in February set off the popular revolt against Syrian rule.

Coupled with Syria's well-known role in sheltering terrorists who attack Iraqis and Americans, their continued efforts to block the development of an independent Lebanon is an outrage. Syria's Assad should be put on notice, and quickly, that further efforts to kill Americans and destabilize the region will not be tolerated. His corrupt regime, founded by his father (for whom Jimmy Carter had great affection), has bankrupted his country, oppressed his people, and is now a proven international menace. The President, I hope, will speak out against this kind of behavior and serve notice that political reform, well under way in Syria's neighbors, is long overdue in Syria itself.

If the title of Ideas Have Consequences, Richard Weaver's seminal work on tradition (and, at times, traditionalism), has been overused to the point of becoming clichéd, the truth underlying the title's words remains firm. Ideas make their mark in the world because any action that is considered, rational, reasoned, and purposeful draws on the life of the mind. Picking up on this fact, one think tank used to employ the motto, "Turning Ideas into Action." Even the contemplative life can, and should, result in some action, including writing, teaching, praying, and setting an example by the way one lives. Yet, for all his contribution to conservative thought, Weaver's pessimistic assessment of the world lacks the appreciation for human potential and accomplishment, and perhaps even for our creation in the divine image, upon which to build a successful political movement, and conservatives would do well to avoid the comfortable den that knee-jerk pessimism offers.

To see what can happen to a movement, be it political, social, or cultural, that eschews an intellectual foundation of vital ideas derived at through rigorous research and debate for one constructed on the eternal sands of despair, one need only examine the contemporary left. From hollowed-out university curricula to the ascendancy of low-brow culture to a privileged place among elites, and to the replacement of considered, fact-based argument with emotional and irrational vitriol, the left's intellectual supports have never been weaker. Consider the components of the worldview upon which the left would build a political party: a distrust of democracy at home and abroad, loathing for bourgeois virtues, visceral hatred of political opponents, the embrace of conspiracy theories to explain complex events, an unwillingness or inability to engage in intellectual debate.

The list could be lengthened, but the picture is clear: the past 30 years have witnessed monumental setbacks for the left. Whether in the America of Reagan, a reigned-in Clinton, and George W. Bush; the U.K. of Thatcher and a reformed Labor party under Blair; the newly freed nations of Eastern Europe, whose former slavery large swathes of the American left chose to ignore; or the free market reforms in the Far East, the left's once confident, even smug, vision of the future has been dashed. And, as I've noted often, there is little on the horizon that would indicate a resurgence of the intellectual left. As others have asked, where are the books, journals, and writers upon which such a resurgence would need to rely? Who are the rising stars of liberal and radical thought?

The eviscerated state of the left, which finds itself without natural leaders or the kernel of a new movement, makes the gloominess of some conservatives, and the ineptness and evident cowardice of some Republicans, all the more inexplicable, at least at first glance. It's the subject of a thoughtful op-ed in today's Wall Street Journal (free) by John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldrige. Titled "Cheer Up, Conservatives! You're Still Winning," the piece points out what should be obvious to conservatives who, after all, pride themselves on taking the long view of the world around them: despite bumps in the road and temporary setbacks, the ideas upon which the right should base its actions are still far superior to anything the left can draw on to mount an effective opposition. And the long view they take reveals not disarray and confusion, but strength upon strength:

The essential conservatism of Mr. Bush's approach is all the clearer if you compare it with the big-government liberalism of the 1960s--or with the big-government reality of European countries that American liberals are so keen to emulate. Mr. Bush is not using government to redistribute wealth (unless you own an oil company), to reward sloth or to coddle the poor. And government in America remains a shriveled thing by European standards. Some 40 years after the Great Society, America still has no national health service; it asks students to pay as much as $40,000 a year for a university education; it gives mothers only a few weeks of maternity leave.

What about values? Back in the 1960s, it was axiomatic amongst the elite that religion was doomed. In "The Secular City" (1965), Harvey Cox argued that Christianity had to come to terms with a secular culture. Now religion of the most basic sort is back with a vengeance. The president, his secretary of state, the House speaker and Senate majority leader are all evangelical Christians. Ted Haggard, the head of the 30-million strong National Association of Evangelicals, jokes that the only disagreement between himself and the leader of the Western world is automotive: Mr. Bush drives a Ford pickup, whereas he prefers a Chevy.

Rather than dying a slow death, evangelical Protestantism and hard-core Catholicism are bursting out all over the place. Who would have predicted, back in the 1960s, the success of "The Passion of the Christ," the "Left Behind" series or "The Purpose Driven Life"? To be sure, liberals still control universities, but, thanks to its rive droite of think tanks in Washington and many state capitals, the right has a firm control of the political-ideas business.

The proof of their argument is in the competing outlooks of right and left regarding the future of the nation and the world. Talk to a liberal (go ahead, it'll be good for you), and you're more likely than not to find yourself confronted with one gloomy, yet unsupportable, prediction after another. The environment has entered a state of irreparible decline, global warming will destroy us all, the car is a source of great evil, we must cut back our expectations; in a word, the future is bleak.

Surely one major source of the comfort they seem to take from their pessimism is that, in spite of their dire warnings, little seems to change in their daily lives. Quotidian existence goes on pretty much as before, day after day, year after year. Food is cheap and plentiful (Dinesh D'Souza likes to recall the words of an Indian friend, commenting on Americans' obsession with obesity, "I want to live in a country where the poor people are fat"), energy prices, though rising, do not reflect true shortages, crime is falling, ownership of homes is rising, poverty continues to wane, and more. That's not to deny the persistence of stubborn problems, nor the growth of certain social ills or the coarsening of popular culture.

But it is to remember that the ideas that have given us the bounteous harvest we enjoy in so many areas of life are based on core beliefs -- the sanctity of the individual, freedoms enshrined in the Bill of Rights, the existence of moral norms, the liberty to pursue greatness -- that are antithetical to the left's worldview. Or, as Micklethwait and Wooldrige put it:

The biggest advantage of all for conservatives is that they have a lock on the American dream. America is famously an idea more than a geographical expression, and that idea seems to be the province of the right. A recent Pew Research Center Survey, "Beyond Red Versus Blue," shows that the Republicans are more optimistic, convinced that the future will be better than the past and that they can determine their own futures. Democrats, on the other hand, have a European belief that "fate," or, in modern parlance, social circumstances, determines people's lot in life. (And judging by some recent series in newspapers on the subject, the party appears to have staunch allies in American newsrooms at least.)

Euro-pessimism has no future in America. Indeed, Americans have always been repulsed by Europeans' intellectual embrace of fate as the key determiner of one's future. Whether expressed as a Hegelian historical spirit, Marxist material determinism, or the current willful blindness to demographic or international trends, Euro-bleakness has found fertile soil in American only in universities and among the media or cultural elite who receive, one step removed, the gloomy vision of the professors.

Which returns us, at last, to Richard Weaver, who knew a thing or two about gloom. For all his undeniable insight into the human condition, or his many invaluable lessons on language and human nature, Weaver never shook his love affair with pessimism. Any man who believes sincerely, as Weaver did, that Western culture reached its apex in the fourteenth century is less a conservative in the classical sense than a reactionary who has little hope for the future. It's why he and his followers have so little to contribute to answering a question every generation must ask: what should we do? For those in the public policy or political worlds, it's a question asked daily. When we're tempted to see nothing but clouds on the horizon, as some Republicans apparently are, it's useful to remember that political movements draw their inspiration from their founding ideas. As a subject for academic debate, Weaver's ideas can be rich fodder; as a foundation for a political movement, however, they lead less to action than inertia, less to optimism than retirement from the world.

Update: Via Michelle Malkin, the American Thinker has some thoughts on disdainful Democrats. Disdain masquerading as achievement makes Johnny a dour boy.

Today has been very busy with myriad tasks, and I apologize for the long silence. As my old advisor, Marvin Becker, employed as a preface to his observations on getting things done: "Taking into account the brevity of human life . . . ."

My correspondent, Bruce Kesler of California, served as a sergeant in Vietnam, and he's taken a great interest in the visit to America by Vietnamese Prime Minister Phan Van Khai. In an op-ed, Bruce notes correctly that PM Khai's visit presents the President with an opportunity to further prove his determination to extend democracy by, at the very least, speaking up for the oppressed, for dissidents, for political prisoners. (Check back at the August Free Press often for Bruce's op-eds, which run regularly.)

Ed Morrisey, more than most bloggers, writes extensively on this visit. Khai's visit to Bill Gates in Seattle was accompanied by protests, and the Washington Post covered the visit both yesterday (above) and today. On Gates, along with Yahoo! and Google, the Wall Street Journal editorial page observed:

It is admittedly difficult for China's government to block Internet content from its estimated 87 million users, a number that is growing. But it is a lot easier if it has the cooperation of the industry. These corporations might also remember that Beijing needs their business. The Internet is where demand and supply meet these days, and China's leaders need economic growth to continue if they are not to face large-scale upheaval. Certainly the Microsofts and Googles might try to drive a harder bargain.

There's reason to hope that even Vietnam might move toward a more open society, but only if prodded. After all, the latest news from Lebanon is simply outstanding, and Condi Rice went to Egypt to speak out for democracy in that keystone Arab state.

Finally, don't miss Bruce Kesler's insightful piece at FrontPage, titled "Same Lies, Different Wars."

The ongoing efforts by Dick Durban, Howard Dean, and other leaders of the left to attack not just the President, but America's history and role in the world, has a long pedigree. But one needn't recount the silly '60s this morning in order to find stories of hostility toward the civic virtues that make liberty possible. Just remember the run-up to last year's election, and its aftermath, when the left tried to convince us not only that America is a malign force on the world stage, but that terrorists in Iraq are the moral equivalent of our Founding Fathers.

Remember these words by Michael Moore?

The Iraqis who have risen up against the occupation are not "insurgents" or "terrorists" or "The Enemy." They are the REVOLUTION, the Minutemen, and their numbers will grow -- and they will win.

And this kind of drivel from the left?

The issues are the right to resist an invader and who should pay damages caused by illegal aggression!

I'm talking about resisting aggression. In all the world it is the right, often even the expressed duty, for every citizen to resist foreign aggression and occupation. In the old Swedish telephone directories it said under the headline "If the War comes" that "Any meassage [sic] that declares that resistance should end is false!" the idea being that if an aggressor knew in advance that the cost for occupation would be high, he would desist. Those who resist the aggressor, everywhere, are seen as legitimate freedom-fighters doing their patriotic duty. Not so in Iraq under American occupation!

Or Chris Matthews's apologia for murder?

Well, let me ask you about this. If this were the other side, and we were watching an enemy soldier, a rival—I mean, they‘re not bad guys, especially—just people that disagree with it. They‘re in fact the insurgents fighting us in their country.

I was reminded of that this morning because of this superb story on the front page of today's New York Times. Kudos to the Times for getting the story, and for placing it above the fold. It tells of an illiterate Iraqi named Ahmed Isa Fathil, 19 years old, who joined the new Iraqi Army, but quit nine months ago because its members are targeted for torture and murder.

Here's what the thugs hailed by Matthews, Moore, and their asinine supporters as "freedom fighters" and "minutemen" and "not bad guys" did:

This is Mr. Fathil's account of his ordeal.

He was having a lunch of lettuce and cucumbers in the kitchen of his home in the small desert village of Rabot with his mother and brother. An Opel sedan pulled up. Two men in masks carrying machine guns got out, seized him, and, leaving his mother sobbing, put him in the trunk of their car.

The drove to the house here. They taped his face, put cotton in his ears, and began to beat him.

The only possible explanation for the seizure he could think of was his time in the new Iraqi Army. Unemployed and illiterate, Mr. Fathil signed up after the American occupation began.

But nine months ago, when continuing working meant risking the wrath of the Jihadists, he quit. In all, 10 friends from his unit have been killed, he said. So have his uncle and his uncle's son, though neither ever worked as soldiers.

The men tended to talk in whispers, he said, telling him five times a day, in low voices in his ear, to pray, and offering him sand, instead of water, to wash himself. Just once, he asked if he could see his mother, and one of them said to him, "You won't leave until you are dead."

And:

When marines burst in, one of the captives was lying under a stairwell, badly beaten. At first, they thought he was dead.

The others were emaciated and battered. Mr. Fathil had fared the best. The other three were taken by medical helicopter to Balad, a base near Baghdad with a hospital.

But he still had been hurt badly. Marks from beatings criss-crossed his back, and deep pocks, apparently from electric shock burns, were gouged in his skin.

The shocks, he said, felt "like my soul is being ripped out of my body." But when he would start to scream, and his body would pull up from the shock, they would begin to beat him, he said.

Mr. Fathil has been at the Marine base south of Qaim since his release, on Saturday around noon. His mother still does not know he is alive.

When she was mentioned, he bowed and lowered his head, and began to cry softly, wiping his face with the jumpsuit given him by the marines.

He asked a reporter for help to move to another town, because it was too dangerous for his family to remain in their house. He begged not to have a photograph taken, even of the scars on his back. The captors took pictures of that, he said.

His town has always been a good place, he said, but the militants have made it hell.

"These few are destroying it," he said, his face streaked with tears. "Everybody they take, they kill. It's on a daily basis pretty much."

These are the animals the left lauds. And why not? After all, from the Weathermen to the Black Panthers, and from Leonard Bernstein to Michael Moore (not that their gene pools are identical), violence has been employed and praised by such Americans for a generation. It had it parallel on the old right, with the KKK, but there's a significant difference: the right today has repudiated its old thugs and the mad pseudo-intellectuals, such as the John Birchers, who supported them. The left, however, continues its embrace of violence, even when American servicemen and women are its victims. And that doesn't even take into account such men as Ahmed Isa Fathil or the thousands of Iraqis who did not survive the beatings, burnings, and bombs.

Dick Durban and his crew are not simply unpatriotic; they aren't merely engaged in a hideous effort to gain politically from bloodshed and violence. They're moral idiots, incapable of distinguishing good from evil, and willing to verbally assault our armed forces, even as they praise actions that, if implemented here, would destroy our freedoms. As we react to the left's ongoing efforts to undermine the credibility of America at home and abroad, don't forget that these remarks, both in the context of the war in Iraq and before it, have a long and undistinguished pedigree. And let's ensure that it's the moral relativism of the left that, in the end, undermines itself.

I spent the day in Washington on business, and so the blogging had to wait. I'll do my best to remedy that soon.

In an effort to bolster the chances that John Bolton, the President's nominee to be US Ambassador to the UN, the White House is asking a variety of Jewish organizations to add their voices of support. An article appearing today in JTA (the Jewish Telegraphic Agency) reports that, surprisingly, Bolton has received little support from major Jewish groups, including AIPAC. The surprise stems from Bolton's crucial role in 1991 in repealing the odious UN resolution of 1975 that equated Zionism with racism.

The administration also hopes Jewish community support will counterbalance lingering questions about Bolton’s past statements and work style, and help him win the necessary votes for Senate confirmation. N