[Ed. note: The following statement was sent to me by Democracy Project chairman Candace de Russy.]

I am publishing this statement on behalf of the Va'ad ha-Emet, an ad hoc committee formed to carefully consider allegations that have been made about El-Haj's book, Facts on the Ground. The committee's criticism of the book is made timely by the fact that El-Haj is soon coming up for tenure at Barnard. The committee strenuously opposes granting her tenure.

The Va'ad ha-Emet concludes that Facts on the Ground fails to meet the most minimal academic standards and actually slanders a distinguished scholar:

A Brief Evaluation of Methodology and Use of Evidence in Facts on the Ground: Archaeological Practice and Territorial Self-Fashioning in Israeli Society by Nadia Abu El-Haj

Command of the Hebrew Language

El-Haj has undertaken to write an anthropology of Israeli attitudes towards archaeology and their role in "self-fashioning in Israeli society," yet there is no indication in the text that she either explored these topics in conversation with Israelis in a systematic way (she cites only conversations with tour guides) or by reading materials published in the national language. Indeed, there are indications in the text that she was not capable of doing so due to her apparent unfamiliarity with Hebrew. Even when following a source (p. 95), El-Haj repeatedly mistakes neve (settlement) for nahal (stream), misnaming, for example, Nahal Patish as Neve Patish (writing, roughly, the town of Patish in place of Patish Creek, a stream valley named for its hammer [patish]-shaped rock formation.)

On the next page (p. 96), she accuses Zionist pioneers of naming Tell Hai, Tell Yosef, and Tell ha-Shomer in a manner intended to mislead, that is, by implying that these new villages were built on tells, that is, on sites "of the remains of ancient settlements." El-Haj not only condemns such misappropriation of the word tell but asserts that the government Committee on Place Names (Va'adt ha-Shemot) "insisted" that "such improper terminological uses could not be continued."

Throughout this remarkable passage, Abu El-Haj appears to be entirely unaware that tell (tel) is a common Hebrew word meaning both "hill" and "artificial hill created by the remains of an ancient settlement." A direct translation of Tel Aviv, for example, is Hill of Spring, a hopeful name for a city that makes no pretense to antiquity. El-Haj's assertion that the names of these towns were condemned by the Va'ad ha-Shemot is sheer untruth.

A lack of familiarity with the language of a nation disqualifies a scholar from attempting certain projects. Lack of Hebrew disqualifies a scholar from undertaking a technical discussion of Hebrew and Arabic place-naming.

A study of "archaeological practice" in Israel could be carried out without a working knowledge of Hebrew. It would require the investigator to master the fundamentals of archaeological field research. There is no indication in the text that El-Haj has conducted such a study.

Familiarity with Previous Scholarship

In her discussion of place names, El-Haj demonstrates no knowledge of the indispensible work of Ruth Kark, Haim Goren, Yossi Katz and Dov Gavish. In her discussion of Israeli historical memory, she demonstrates no awareness of the important work of Nahman-ben-Yehuda, Anita Schapira, or Yaakov Shavit. Lack of familiarity with the work of the leading scholars who have written on her chosen subjects is part of what marks El-Haj's book as falling outside the realm of scholarship.

Use of Anonymous Sources and Unsourced Assertions

El-Haj repeatedly makes assertions of fact based on citing unnamed informants or no sources at all. These assertions would be shocking, if they were true. Examples:

"One archaeologist told me of a right-wing colleague who was constantly labeling Christian sites Jewish." (p. 233)

"In general, however, in Israeli archaeology… the practical work of excavating favors larger (mostly, well-preserved architectural) remains over smaller remains…smaller finds…do not survive the onslaught of bulldozers." (pp. 148-9)

Slander

On page 148, El-Haj makes a direct, personal attack on David Ussishkin of Tel Aviv University, whom El-Haj accuses of "bad science," using "large shovels," failing to sift dirt "in search of very small remains," and of using bulldozers "in order to get down to earlier strata which are saturated with national significance, as quickly as possible." According to El-Haj, he did so in such a way that "the remains above it were summarily destroyed."

El-Haj supports these assertions with nothing more than stories "recounted to me after the fact by both archaeologists and student volunteers," none of whom she names.

Ussishkin has responded that "All her accusations are based on talks with anonymous participants after the excavations…This is not a proper and serious way of research." He details his field methods and demonstrates the falsity of her assertions.

We consider El-Haj's accusations to be slanderous.

Summary

Facts on the Ground exhibits an inability to understand the language (Hebrew) of the nation that the author pretends to study, a broad failure on the part of the author to encounter the scholarly work in her field, a failure on the author's part to understand the use of evidence, and, finally, descends to the baseless slander of a highly respected scholar.

Signed by the Va'ad ha-Emet (Truth Committee)

28 March, 2007 ………………………..

*The statement of the Va'ad ha Emet (Truth Committee) was composed by scholars familiar with the fields relevant to an evaluation of Facts on the Ground (Israel Studies, archaeology of the ancient Near East, and toponymy.) They feel a need to remain anonymous because of the vituperative political climate on the campuses where some of them are employed.

The Va'ad ha-Emet feels that this statement is a useful contribution despite the anonymity of its authors, because the assertions are specific and verifiable, and, therefore, do not depend upon the reputations of the individual authors.

[Below is the full text of my column from the March 27 issue of the Washington Examiner.]

Caitlin Dean is a 15-year-old student at Bacon Academy (a public Connecticut high school) who donned a burqa one school day and reported racist remarks and taunts from her schoolmates.

Her case and the reaction to it tells us less about alleged Islamophobia than about two disturbing trends: The continuing seepage of the anti-Western cant common in universities into secondary schools; and the growing habit of baiting Americans in an age that glorifies victimhood — a habit that, when Middle East culture is involved, likely as not involves the Council on American-Islamic Relations.

Caitlin's Feb. 1 sartorial selection wasn't the spontaneous action of a young person engaged in a social experiment. Rather, it was suggested to her by her Middle East studies teacher, Angie Parkinson, who, the Hartford Courant reports, wanted to "promote her class" by finding students to dress in traditional Arab clothing. On that level, at least, the stunt worked: Enrollment in the class will jump to 48 next year from only 12 this semester.

Parkinson's willingness to use young people for self-promotion is shameful enough; how many adults recall as wise those teachers who sought to ingratiate themselves among students through adopting attitudes and stances more common to (and forgivable among) adolescents than grown-ups?

Among the obligations adults have toward children is to avoid creating situations in which clear temptations to wrongdoing exist, and in knowing the kinds of situations to avoid. That's why it's illegal to give underage persons alcoholic beverages or sell them cigarettes.

By putting immature young people in a position to make hurtful statements, Parkinson allowed her professional well-being, and her political cause, to trump common decency just as much as did the kids who made the remarks.

But infantilization via politicization knows no bounds. Bacon Academy, like the universities it mimics, boasts chic student organizations that long ago displaced such quaint relics as the Key, Beta, or chess clubs. There's a Gay-Straight Alliance and a Diversity Club. Should your charges grow bored with mundane local issues, they can do their small part in saving the world in the Save Darfur group.

And just as American history is no longer required at most universities, so another student at Bacon who also wore "traditional Muslim clothing" wishes it would disappear even earlier in the curriculum. As quoted in the Courant, he "criticized school leaders for replacing world studies in middle school with more American history."

Such notions among kids aren't born ex nihilo; they originate either at home among affluent boomers, or at school, where the products of methodology-obsessed education colleges and the left-liberal National Education Association ensure that students are exposed to the very latest pseudo-intellectual fashions from campus.

Parkinson's ploy also reflects a disturbing trend toward staging events designed to incite negative reactions that, in turn, become fodder for America's victimization mills. No case better illustrates this phenomenon than that of the so-called "Flying Imams."

On Nov. 20, six imams were removed from a Phoenix-bound US Airways flight in Minneapolis after passengers became disturbed at the imam's on-board actions, which included moving about the cabin, praying loudly in Arabic (including shouting Allahu Akbar!), and asking for seat belt extensions, which can be used as weapons and which none of the men needed. This example of what Debra Burlingame called "grievance theater" also worked, since removing the imams from the plane set the stage for round two: the lawsuit.

On March 13, Nihad Awad, executive director of CAIR, which has seen five of its former employees and board members linked to terrorism-related charges and activities, announced a suit by the imams against US Airways. More menacingly, the suit also threatens alarmed passengers who reported the imams' activities. The suit was filed by Omar T. Mohammedi, president of the New York chapter of CAIR.

These tactics converge back in Connecticut, where CAIR intends to milk the Bacon Academy incident for all it's worth. Rabia Chaudry, an attorney who is spokeswoman for CAIR's Connecticut chapter, told the Courant, "I think what the teacher has done is exactly what schools should be doing."

CAIR also hopes, in Chaudry's words, "to send representatives to meet with students in Colchester and other communities, to hold town meetings to talk about their feelings about Muslims, the war and terrorism."

The confluence of an irresponsible education establishment that breeds politicized classrooms and a professional victimization organization that threatens to silence critics of radical Islamists weakens our ability as a society to confront and defeat those who would weaken our liberties. It's time to bring down the curtain on grievance theater.

Winfield Myers, a co-founder of Democracy Project, is director of Campus Watch.

The Democrats have created a new bar to civic minded private citizens holding public appointive positions. In this, they have set their supporters up for quid pro quos, lowered the ability of government to attract talented private individuals, and reduced the willingness of private individuals to engage in the open political debate upon which voters depend to make choices.

Kerry and fellow Democrats held – in the blockage of Sam Fox’ nomination as ambassador to Belgium -- that whom one legally supports, of itself, is sufficient ground to block a nomination, regardless of other qualifications. They have, thus, introduced a new restriction to private citizens, usually at sacrifice, holding public office, and introduced a new restriction onto free political speech as private citizens with civic ambitions restrain their free speech.

Bob Bauer calls it a “Fox Hunt.” Since Bauer (bio) is currently counsel to the Democratic Senatorial and Congressional Campaign Committees, among other leading roles in the field of political law, his comments on the consequences of their treatment of Sam Fox’ nomination for ambassador to Belgium may be of interest to his clients:

Without a vote or debate, the failure of the Fox nomination might be deprived of significance, being just a political moment in time with no status as “precedent.” It could be read entirely the other way, too. The Administration could be said to have accepted the proposition that a nominee must answer to the opposition party for objectionable, rather than illegal, political speech. The Democrats, including Senator Kerry, did not emphasize legal questions about Swift Boat—about unregistered “political committee” activity or illegal coordination. Fox was challenged on the type of advertising he supported with his money….

This is a development of consequence. Political comment is seen as rancorous and uncompromising, indifferent to fact in a ruthless quest for impact. There is wide agreement that this is so, but only minimal meeting of the minds about which speech is reprehensibly beyond the pale. It is also understood that none of this controversial speech will travel far without money, and so, whether the complaint lies on the left or the right—whether the culprit is a well-known figure such as George Soros or the more obscure Fox—the fight is now carried to the donor.

When the Supreme Court in Buckley v. Valeo held that Congress could limit contributions to candidates, it resolved the First Amendment question by finding that the contributor was not the primary speaker, suffering a direct infringement of her own speech. Hers was “speech by proxy,” a lower form of speech. Contributors who remain within the regulated system approved by Buckley may still safely speak by delegation, through the candidate or the party or other registered organization.

But those who provide funding outside those limits, outside that system, to groups engaged in “attack” advertising are not just “speaking by proxy.” It appears that they will be held accountable, directly and personally, and others like Fox, with money and a cause but also with ambition, will surely pay attention.

In other words, only those whose free speech is exercised as politicians decree -- especially for their own self-protection, regardless of constitutional rights, are to be permitted free speech!

Victory on campus! David Caputo, the embattled president of Pace University has just issued a public apology to Pace Hillel President Michael Abdurakhmanov and Pace’s Jewish community. He apologized for the intimidating tactics utilized by the administration to censor the film Obsession, the story originally uncovered here on Democracy Project. He also acknowledged that Obsession will be shown at Pace in April. This is a genuine triumph over adversity in a hostile atmosphere. I applaud Michael for his courage to stand up for freedom of expression and conscience on campus. Here is President Caputo’s letter of apology:

March 26, 2007
To: Members of the University Community
From: David A. Caputo, President
Re: Tolerance and Understanding at Pace

We all are aware of the series of hate/bias-related incidents directed against members of our community that have beset us in recent months. You have joined me in condemning these cowardly and unacceptable acts and in expressing the belief that perpetrators of such acts are not welcome in the Pace community. As I have said before, despite those who would challenge us, we remain a University community that values its diversity of thought and culture. I remain fully committed to preserving an atmosphere at Pace in which a free exchange of ideas may flourish.

You also should be aware that the New York City Police made an arrest arising from one hate crime that was directed against African-Americans, as we reported earlier. We continue to work with area police departments to actively investigate the other incidents and to prevent any recurrence of these acts.
At the same time, we continue to look for ways to heighten the awareness and understanding of our various cultures by all members of the University community. A number of initiatives are underway or being considered:

·The “Not on My Watch” campaign has engaged many members of the University community in a variety of programs aimed at fostering conversations about diversity, tolerance, and understanding. Programs have included community meetings, a teach-in, training for members of the staffs in security and student affairs, and discussions with groups including President’s Council, Executive Council and the Student Affairs Committee of the Board of Trustees.
·We soon will announce a training program for all administrators, faculty, and staff.
·With growing numbers of students from diverse religious backgrounds on our campuses, I am reviewing a series of recommendations from a University task force looking at possible new structures in the area of interfaith campus ministry. I should have an announcement on this shortly.
·Faculty members from the ACE international initiatives group are considering repurposing extracurricular campus events that are linked to the first-year student seminar UNV101.

You also may be aware that Pace Hillel President and student Michael Abdurakhmanov and several other members of Pace’s Jewish community have expressed concerns about their belief that Hillel was coerced and intimidated into not showing the film Obsession last semester. I want both to assure them that no such coercion or intimidation was intended and to apologize for any action that may have unfortunately led to that belief. I also want to apologize for any hurt we may have caused Michael and other members of Hillel in issuing the University Statement on Hillel Charges in January. I am always concerned when a student or group of students feels unfairly treated. It is my understanding that Obsession has now been scheduled for a showing on campus in April.

These initiatives are designed to help ensure that Pace’s diversity continues to be appreciated as one of our greatest strengths and our community continues to be a welcoming and understanding place for all, regardless of cultural background, race, religion, ethnicity and gender orientation. I believe that our policies and procedures on conduct (including those relating to hate/bias-related incidents) foster an atmosphere where we all can grow and benefit from the free exchange of ideas, even if it is uncomfortable for some, and conversely provide a mechanism to address conduct that violates those principles.

Please commit with me to doing all we can to strengthen this important value that has been a bedrock of the Pace experience for more than 100 years.

Thank you.

One might think that someone who refuses to answer the questions he himself raises would be more circumspect about impugning another's integrity. But, no. That's not the way John Kerry operates, nor those who condone or support him.

John Kerry, and fellow self-inventers and plagiarists, Barack Obama, Joe Biden and Chris Dodd, may see it in the nation's interests to try and block the nomination of Republican philanthropist Sam Fox as ambassador to Belgium because he donated to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

As the Associated Press reported,

“U.S. ambassadors need to be both responsible and credible, and Mr. Fox's support for an organization known to have spread falsehoods illustrates neither,” said Dodd, who is seeking the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination.

So do United States Senators.

So, in the interest of upholding their own standard (otherwise known as hoisted by their own petards), we eagerly await John Kerry answering a few questions he has refused to address:
· How did Kerry finagle a Purple Heart for which those there and in his command denied he was qualified?

· How does Kerry claim to go into Cambodia when there is no evidence and even his supporters admit he fabricated the tale?

· Didn’t his acceleration away from the scene of battle topple the man into the water, who praises him for pulling him out, while all other Swift Boats engaged the enemy immediately?

· Didn’t Kerry lie that historian Douglas Brinkley wouldn’t allow release of Kerry’s Vietnam diary, as Brinkley revealed, and Kerry still refuses to open his notes?

· Didn’t Kerry promise to publicly open his military records, but instead only authorize release to three friendly news sources, who in turn refuse to open them?

· What did Kerry discuss with the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong representatives in Paris, and why did he return to the U.S. supporting their position?

· What exactly was the nature of his separation from naval service, and was his separation later changed, by whom and why?

· How much and what kind of financial or other inducements did Kerry make to the handful of Swiftees who agreed to support him against the hundreds of others who opposed him, including over 60 witnesses to his exaggerations and lies?

There are many, many more questions, but why rehash the truth when Kerry has fellow fabricators to cover his butt, and denigrate someone whose decency is above reproach – that is except by the like of Kerry.

Does this remind you of anyone, like John Kerry for instance? Barack Obama’s autobiography contains self-puffery and invented events. Kerry made of himself a great war hero, beyond whatever credit is deserved. Obama makes of himself a civil rights crusader, beyond whatever actual racial solidarity he experienced.

The Chicago Tribune reported last Sunday, after 40 interviews from Hawaii to Indonesia:

Several of his oft-recited stories may not have happened in the way he has recounted them. Some seem to make Obama look better in the retelling, others appear to exaggerate his outward struggles over issues of race, or simply skim over some of the most painful, private moments of his life.

Last Sunday’s Chicago Tribune did for Barack Obama’s autobiography what the major media failed to do with John Kerry’s, examine its veracity. The over 60 credible Swiftboater witnesses to Kerry’s exaggerations and lies were castigated by the major media. The MSM isn’t attacking the Chicago Tribune for revealing untruths by a favorite, but like with Kerry’s, the finding of false self-creation by Obama is being largely ignored by major media.

Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen recognizes, “He may be manipulating the facts in order to wrap raw ambition in the gauze of a larger cause. Sheer ambition is no longer tolerated in American public life.”

On the contrary, it is, at least if the candidate is a liberal Kerry or Obama. (Interestingly, self-hagiographers arm-in-arm attacking Sam Fox for helping fund the Swiftboat Veterans for Truth debunking of Kerry.)

John Kerry refused to come clean, or apologize for attacking Vietnam veterans conduct and morality, which incensed Vietnam veterans. Whether Blacks will be upset with Obama is unlikely. Obama has not attacked Blacks, and his hagiographic indiscretions were committed over a decade ago. Obama can Obamasize himself by admitting to relatively harmless youthful self-puffery, or he can diminish himself and his supporters by Kerryizing.

My latest Washington Examiner column, "Connecticut Teacher Encourages Muslim Mau-mauing," asks what a Connecticut high school teacher's request for student volunteers to advertise her class by wearing a burqua or other traditional Muslim garb around school has to do with ongoing efforts by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) to take advantage of situations in which Muslims are harassed, even when the offenses are manufactured.

Observations not included in the column:

1. Note the obsequious tone of the Hartford Courant's reporter who first wrote about the episode on March 12, especially in her description of CAIR:

CAIR is dedicated to promoting better understanding of Islam and Muslims through public education and interfaith cooperation and to defend American Muslims' civil and human rights, according to its website.

2. The teaching of Middle East studies in high schools too often mirrors university pedagogy, which consistently takes on an advocacy role, thereby substituting indoctrination for education and politicizing the curriculum.

3. When non-Muslims dress in traditional Muslim garb in an effort to show solidarity with Muslims, the premise of their actions draws on this same pedagogy and the more general culture of vicitmization that pervades American universities. It claims, "I know you are oppressed, and I stand with you." This element of the politicization of higher education helps to explain why non-Muslim women at the University of Missouri at Columbia recently sported scarves as part of the national "Scarves for Solidarity Campaign."

(Cross-posted at Campus Watch)

Hillel Neuer, the executive director of UN Watch, spoke truth to the U.N. Human Rights Council last Friday, for which he was admonished for speaking the truth. How dare he was the reply. How dare we ignore the reply, and what it says so clearly about the U.N.?

A bit of Scottish sense, via Walter Scott, first:

One hour of life, crowded to the full with glorious action, and filled with noble risks, is worth whole years of those mean observances of paltry decorum, in which men steal through existence, like sluggish waters through a marsh, without either honor or observation.

Now for Mr. Neuer:

Mr. President,

Six decades ago, in the aftermath of the Nazi horrors, Eleanor Roosevelt, Réné Cassin and other eminent figures gathered here, on the banks of Lake Geneva, to reaffirm the principle of human dignity. They created the Commission on Human Rights. Today, we ask: What has become of their noble dream?

In this session we see the answer. Faced with compelling reports from around the world of torture, persecution, and violence against women, what has the Council pronounced, and what has it decided?

Nothing. Its response has been silence. Its response has been indifference. Its response has been criminal.

One might say, in Harry Truman’s words, that this has become a Do-Nothing, Good-for-Nothing Council.

But that would be inaccurate. This Council has, after all, done something.

It has enacted one resolution after another condemning one single state: Israel. In eight pronouncements—and there will be three more this session—Hamas and Hezbollah have been granted impunity. The entire rest of the world—millions upon millions of victims, in 191 countries—continue to go ignored.

So yes, this Council is doing something. And the Middle East dictators who orchestrate this campaign will tell you it is a very good thing. That they seek to protect human rights, Palestinian rights.

So too, the racist murderers and rapists of Darfur women tell us they care about the rights of Palestinian women; the occupiers of Tibet care about the occupied; and the butchers of Muslims in Chechnya care about Muslims.

But do these self-proclaimed defenders truly care about Palestinian rights?

Let us consider the past few months. More than 130 Palestinians were killed by Palestinian forces. This is three times the combined total that were the pretext for calling special sessions in July and November. Yet the champions of Palestinian rights—Ahmadinejad, Assad, Khaddafi, John Dugard—they say nothing. Little 3-year-old boy Salam Balousha and his two brothers were murdered in their car by Prime Minister Haniyeh’s troops. Why has this Council chosen silence?

Because Israel could not be blamed. Because, in truth, the dictators who run this Council couldn’t care less about Palestinians, or about any human rights.

They seek to demonize Israeli democracy, to delegitimize the Jewish state, to scapegoat the Jewish people. They also seek something else: to distort and pervert the very language and idea of human rights.

You ask: What has become of the founders’ dream? With terrible lies, it is being turned into a nightmare.

Thank you, Mr. President.

Reply by U.N. Human Rights Council President Luis Alfonso De Alba:

For the first time in this session I will not express thanks for that statement. I shall point out to the distinguished representative of the organization that just spoke, the distinguished representative of United Nations Watch, if you'd kindly listen to me. I am sorry that I'm not in a position to thank you for your statement. I should mention that I will not tolerate any similar statements in the Council. The way in which members of this Council were referred to, and indeed the way in which the council itself was referred to, all of this is inadmissible. In the memory of the persons that you referred to, founders of the Human Rights Commission, and for the good of human rights, I would urge you in any future statements to observe some minimum proper conduct and language. Otherwise, any statement you make in similar tones to those used today will be taken out of the records.

Plights of those uninsured, and fears among others that they may be, are the focus of Democrats, in order to create political pressure to drastically overhaul America’s health care systems and taxes. But, the statistics that Democrats and the major media are using are grossly inflated. They, also and consequently, are used to undermine both the health care and finances of everyone else, the overwhelming majority, as well as our national security.

“Health care is emerging as a top issue in the 2008 presidential race,” declares the New York Times in reporting the presentations of seven prospective Democrat candidates for president, speaking at a forum sponsored by the Service Employees International Union and the Center for American Progress Action Fund in early primary state Nevada.

The core statistic cited by proponents of radical change is that there are about 46.6-million uninsured Americans. Much of the uninsured statistic evaporates, however, when analyzed.

These are the uninsured in America at any one point in time during a year in America, according to the U.S. Census.

First, according to the Census, that number had been erroneously compiled. Last week, the Census announced it had overstated the number by close to 2-million, about 4%.

Second of larger impact, according to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) about a quarter to half of the uninsured are without coverage for the entire year. The rest are between coverages.

Third, again according to the Census, about 20% of the 46.6-million it had previously reported without insurance at any point during the year are not citizens. The percentage is probably higher due to the difficulties of counting illegals.

Fourth, according to the same Census data, 17-million of the 46.6-million, 37%, are in households with above $50,000 a year of income, middle-class and above, who can afford health insurance, even if in some cases necessary to reprioritize spending toward this necessity.

There are other caveats of the uninsured count, but the core point is that the truer number of uninsured Americans who are so for long and economic or underwriting reasons beyond their reasonable control is closer to half the number commonly cited, let’s say 25-million.

By contrast, there are about 250-million in America who have health coverage, about 63% through employment and another 8% through individual policies, again according to the CBO, the rest through various government programs.

In other words, for 10% the Democrats would upend the other 90%, who by various surveys express 80% satisfaction with their health care, if anxiety about its personal costs.

However, neither the insurance industry, incremental reforms, nor employers have ill-served the insured. Again, according to statistics gathered by the Kaiser Family Foundation, “The share of private health care spending that health insurance covers has more than doubled since the 1960s.

In 1960, health insurance paid covered 36 percent of private health spending, while individuals covered the remaining 64 percent out of their own pocket. By 2004, health insurance accounted for 77 percent of private health spending, while out-of-pocket spending accounted for 23 percent of spending.

In 2005, workers paid on average 16 percent of the cost of employee-only coverage and 26 percent of the cost of family coverage. These shares are about what they were in 2000, which were 14 percent for employee-only coverage and 26 percent for family coverage.
Workers paid a smaller share of the premium in 2005 for employee-only coverage than they paid in 1996, when the employee share of the premium was 21 percent.

So, in the face of real statistics, what do the leading Democrats say? In short, demagoguery, chickens-in-every-pot, and the impact on the insured, the economy and the national security be darned.
Edwards admits tax increases will be necessary to pay for “universal coverage” :

Edwards said any politician who says they can provide universal health care and other promises while ending the federal deficit are not being honest.
"They've probably got a bridge in Brooklyn they want to sell you, too," Edwards said to laughter and applause. "I just don't think it can be done."

Clinton says soak others:

"We're going to change the way we finance the system by taking away money from people who are doing well now," she said. Asked who that way, she mentioned insurance companies.

Richardson says spend the funds spent on Iraq and needed defense improvements:

He said he would pay for his plan in large part by ending the war in Iraq and shifting the military spending to human needs - an idea that won loud applause.

Obama hasn’t figured it out, but offers his common empty rhetoric:

“I haven't yet made a decision about how much additional money is going to be needed,” said Obama, who has not yet proposed a detailed plan.

The legitimate needs of the 25-million, about half of whom qualify for existing government programs but don’t enroll, can be handled by energetic outreach, funding the targeted programs, high-risk pools for those with severe conditions (not shifting their costs on to other insureds through guaranteed enrollment in the insureds’ risk pools), and vouchers for the other working poor who are here legally. Illegal immigrants should not be further incentivised to come or remain.

Insurers are not profiteering, as Democrats rant. Their profit margins are about average for American industries, 7.1%, well-below the 11.8% of Publishing & Printing, even below the 7.5% of Computers & Office Equipment or 8% for Entertainment.

If Republicans need further encouragement to speak out besides the facts, they should consider that Democrats are selling 90% down the river for 10%. The 10% can be taken care of, but not by throwing the rest of Americans out with the wash water.

Angelina Jolie adopts a Vietnamese boy and it’s headlined around the world. (A comedienne channels her adopted Cambodian and Ethiopian children when grown, paraphrased to cleanup language: “You promised I was going to the U.S.A, and instead you trotted me around to the craphole countries of the earth.”)

Search for a headline, however, about the lot of other Vietnamese. You’ll find paeans to foreign investment, enriching communist overlords and Western businessmen, but little if anything about the exploitation and repression of the Vietnamese people.

Guest poster Mike Benge writes below about how Vietnam exports its surplus population, and how they’re maltreated. Benge worked for USAID for many years before and after being imprisoned as a POW of Hanoi.

The U.S. State Department has difficulty finding “credible” sources about the repression of Vietnamese, as it says repeatedly in its latest country report.

Perhaps, Reporters Without Borders has an answer, as it “voiced dismay today at the news that the Vietnamese government has decided not to renew BBC World Service correspondent Bill Hayton’s press visa.” Why? “Hayton seems to have irritated the authorities by his coverage of the repression of dissidents.”

I’ve repeatedly posted the many reports by global human rights organizations about the torture, imprisonment and oppression of political and religious “dissidents” in Vietnam. Except for here, have you seen these reports in the major media?

As Human Rights Watch reported this month:

The Vietnamese government, emboldened by international recognition after joining the World Trade Organization and hosting the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, is flouting its international commitments on human rights by launching one of the worst crackdowns on peaceful dissidents in 20 years, Human Rights Watch said today.

Currently, tens of thousands of Vietnamese just went on strike against their exploitation by foreign investors, being paid a monthly minimum wage -- even lower than China’s -- of about $50 a month for 6 and 7-day week, 12-hour workdays in sweatshops, including making toys for McDonalds to give away with Kids Meals. See here and here and here.

I wonder if Angelina Jolie takes her adoptees to McDonalds? I wonder, where is the AFL-CIO, which used to concern itself actively with building foreign unions’ freedom? I wonder, where are the major media of the West when they’re not riled about the U.S.? Oh yeah, they’re following Angelina Jolie around, either blinded by her beauty and fame or self-blinded to real oppression.

Vietnam 'broom of Titoism'

The Washington Times (et cetera section of Feb. 26) featured excerpts from Steve H. Hanke's article "The Broom of Titoism" regarding Marshall Josip Broz Tito's attempt at resolving communist Yugoslavia's surplus labor problem. "Tito came up with a simple, but ingenious, economic strategy; he ... exported surplus labor."

Communist Vietnam has taken a page out of Tito's playbook, and is now exporting a great share of its labor force in an attempt to quell the unrest that fermenting in that country. Seventy percent of the population is under 30 years of age. According to its labor department, Vietnam has a labor force of 43 million workers, and some 8 million Vietnamese of working age are jobless.

The government set a goal to send 500,000 Vietnamese workers overseas by 2005 to countries such as Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, and South Korea. The Labor Ministry has identified the United States, Australia and Canada as new major markets for Vietnamese guest workers this year (www.vietnam.gov.vn).

Exporting workers is not new for Vietnam, for after the communist takeover in 1975, hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese laborers were sent to the Soviet Union and European East-Block countries as a form of war debt payments, and many ended up jobless and stranded.

In 1999, the Vietnamese government also provided workers, mostly female -- albeit illegally-- to a Korean garment company making clothing for J.C. Penney and Sears in American-Samoa. The so-called "guest workers" were paid a pittance, exploited under deplorable sweatshop conditions, beaten, sexually abused and imprisoned.

The high court of American Samoa levied a fine of $3.5 million against the Korean company that abused the 251 mainly women workers and the Vietnamese government for exporting the workers. Vietnam has never paid the fine.

People in remote and mountainous areas in Vietnam remain unaware of these opportunities and rely on middlemen when they want to apply for overseas jobs. Swindlers flock to these rural areas, pretending to be representatives of job-supply companies recruiting workers for overseas jobs and promising large sums of money for their services. According to the Vietnamese government, "Legitimate contractors" are supposed to charge a finders fee of only $2,000 (U.S.) each and another $150 for health certificate and visas. However, recruits have to top off this amount with additional payments under the table.

More than 30,000 Vietnamese workers have been sent to Malaysia -- a number are Montagnards from the impoverished Central Highlands. To pay the recruitment fee, the workers' families have to raise the money either by borrowing at usury rates, or selling their land, livestock or other assets. Those who aren't swindled outright and actually get a job overseas, upon arrival, often find their wages aren't what was promised. The Vietnamese contractors and/or the host-country contractors siphon off a considerable amount as costs for housing, food and work-related equipment.

In some cases, food and housing are not provided, or if so, it is substandard, and workers have no health-care. Workers are "tied" to one company, and if they quit their jobs, even because of abuse, they can be sent back to Vietnam without receiving any wages or just abandoned in the host country with no money and no way home.

Vietnamese "guest workers" are employed as farm workers, household servants, in sweatshops, and in other jobs requiring heavy labor that the local labor force no longer wants to do. Women who don't end up in sweatshops or as housemaids are often employed in the sex trade or are sold off as wives to locals who can't find wives in their own country.

Mr. Hanke says, "Rather than modernize the economy, Mexico's politicos have also used Titoism's safety valve; when incapable of fostering productive jobs, export the labor force. ... Last year, almost 30 percent of Mexico's labor force was working in the United States." A great share of the U.S. agricultural labor force comes from Mexico. While Congress heatedly debates immigration, communist Vietnam has seized the opportunity and embarked upon a stealth strategy to penetrate the U.S.

As if the U.S. didn't already have a critical immigration problem, communist Vietnam wants to get in on the action and its Labor Ministry has negotiated with the U.S. government to send "guest workers" here to work as welders, gardeners and citrus-harvesters. However, the Vietnamese government is charging the workers a king's ransom -- $20,000 each -- for the privilege of coming to the U.S. to work -- far beyond the means of the average impoverished Vietnamese.

Thi Thanh Nhan, director general of Advanced International Joint Stock Co. (AIC), a labor export company, says workers' contracts can be for as long as three years, after which laborers can be granted permanent residency by the U.S. government. This sounds like a high-priced Vietnamese government undercover "coyote" operation for the more privileged.

There are still plenty of our former allies who are persecuted and have suffered for years in Vietnamese communist concentration (termed re-education) camps, who would just love to be able to come to the U.S. as "guest workers" and fill these jobs. However, the State Department feels these allies should stay in Vietnam.

The Montagnards lost half their male population fighting for the United States. Since the communist takeover, Montagnards have and continue to suffer from gross human rights abuses, religious persecution and thinly disguised genocide.

Recently at a Hanoi press conference, Ellen Sauerbrey, assistant secretary of state for population, refugees and migration, gave her answer to the debt the U.S. owes these loyal allies by proclaiming that the Mountagnards must stay in communist Vietnam (AFP, Feb. 5). Meanwhile, the U.S. imports Vietnamese "guest workers," and after three years they "can be granted permanent residency." Go figure.


MIKE BENGE spent 11 years in Vietnam as a Foreign Service officer, five as a prisoner of war, 1968-1973. He is very active in advocating for human rights and religious freedom for the peoples of this region.

Stephen Schwartz has penned a concise take-down of Barnard College archaeologist Nadia Abu El-Haj for Campus Watch. Abu El-Haj, who's coming up for tenure soon, is part of an effort to delegitimize the modern state of Israel by "discovering" that, contrary to archaeological and historical evidence, the ancient Hebrews never existed as a nation called Israel. Moreover, she claims that Israeli and Western archaeologists purposefully destroy evidence that would back up her absurd thesis.

For a somewhat analogous position on these shores, think of the claims that the drafting of the U.S. Constitution depended upon Iroquois Indians' Great Law of Peace (it didn't).

Better yet, Google the words "Roswell, New Mexico."

I just got off the phone with Larry Bailey, one of the prime organizers behind the successful turnout of the Gathering Of Eagles in Washington, D.C. last Saturday. Below are some of the questions I asked, to share with you. As you’ll see, Larry Bailey is both modest and determined, as are most veterans. There’s wide diversity among veterans on many issues, but there’s an irreducible core belief among the overwhelming majority against Cut-and-Run. It’s just not in our makeup.

During the 2004 campaign, none of the polling organizations surveyed veterans or Vietnam veterans. Wonder why? They didn’t want to hear the answer. Nonetheless, we made ourselves heard. We, without doubt, won the election. We will again. The MSM largely ignored or treated the GOE as an aside last Saturday. Nonetheless, we will be heard. We’re in every congressional district, we’re motivated, we’re speaking out, and will be involved with 2008, opposed to Cut-and-Run.

We’re slow to mobilize, but potent when we do, as the Vietnam Veterans Revolt of 2004 demonstrated. There’s much brewing among veterans to build on our efforts and connections forged during 2004 and with the Gathering Of Eagles, which will be forthcoming. For now, go to the Gathering Of Eagles website, and register to receive email updates.

Your military background?
27-year SEAL officer; tours in Vietnam, Dominican Republic. Stationed in Panama 2 years, Bolivia 2 years, Scotland 2 years. Commanded Navy SEAL school in Coronado, CA, for 3 years.


During Vietnam, were you aware of the protests?
ABSOLUTELY. Even "Stars and Stripes" highlighted anti-war activities.


How did they personally affect you, others with you, your mission?
Didn't affect any of my SEAL compadres, but it was easy to see that the protests would have an effect.


Why do this, when you can be enjoying retirement?
I AM enjoying retirement by doing this!!!


What started you on public politics?
Reading National Review when an ensign aboard a destroyer, but didn’t get active until the 2004 campaign to tell the truth about Kerry.


How did the Gathering of Eagles start?
In a telephone conversation between COL Harry Riley and me. We were commiserating about the fact that Janie Fonda was going to get another free pass to protest another (more-important) war, and we just agreed to try to do something about it. I called a friend, Kristinn Taylor, in DC, and asked if he would front for us (permitting, PR, etc.), and, when he agreed, Gathering of Eagles was underway. Then a gal in Tulsa, Kit Jarrell, volunteered to become our webmistress, and the GOE website was born. Her buddy, Heidi Thiess, of Houston, who blogs and runs an on-line radio show, came aboard, and we were off to the races.


Were you surprised by the turnout?
Yes and no. After our experience with the Kerry Lied Rally in '04 on Capitol Hill (only 5000 people showed), my expectations were modest. However, when certain indicators came into play (hotel reservations, chartered buses, background chatter, forums, blogs, etc.), I realized that something big was happening. None of us had any real idea how big it was going to be. I heard a credible estimate this morning of 40,000 people. They were all over the Mall--not just in the immediate rally area.


What was the best part of the GOE?
The coming together of so many heretofore voiceless veterans after 40 years and the camaraderie engendered by that coming together.


What efforts were made to alert the major media to the expected turnout for GOE?
A press conference at the National Press Club, Newswire notifications, e-mails, etc. Almost no pre-GOE reports showed up, and precious little afterward.


Why, then, do you think the major media and the anti-Iraq protestors were so surprised at the size of the veterans’ turnout?
Actually, I didn't pick up on any "surprise" on the media's part. They downplayed GOE's numbers and passion. The NYT said our people numbered in the hundreds, and I haven't read any MSM report that indicated that we had more people there than did ANSWER--not even the Washington Times.


Did any of the major media pay any more attention to the veterans than to passingly note their large presence?
No. I saw no evidence of personal interviews and the like.


What would you do different?
Self-immolate on the Capitol steps and have someone spray-paint me in the process.


What % of the 25-million vets do you think are for No Cut & Run?
75%, at least. Just a gut feeling, but...


The major media’s latest angle, to undermine support for the war against the terrorists who make war on us is to highlight the grave personal injuries of veterans and, in some cases, less than stellar care for them. What do these veterans really feel? Do they want pity? Do they continue to support US war efforts?
The whole Walter Reed "thing" is a media creation centered around Building 18, which IS a travesty, but, by and large, Walter Reed has been highly effective in treating Iraq War injured (and the rest of us, including me at one time).

America has many important interests in accomplishing a more benign Middle East, yet many of our national politicians and writers urge us to embrace defeat. Are they more invested in defeating Bush than in supporting Americans and America’s security interests?
Yes. Yes. Yes. No doubt about it.


Conservative bloggers formed the Victory Caucus last month, to oppose Republican senators who voted for the Democrats’ cut-and-run resolution. Do you foresee many veterans combining in some future political effort?
Yes.


What’s next?
GOE II at the Florida Vietnam Veterans Reunion in Melbourne the last weekend of April. All politicians who are opposed to Cut-and-Run are invited to join us for a beer.


What do you want readers to know, think about?
The consequences of pulling out of Iraq and of considering Muslims capable of participating in a secular, pluralistic society can occur.


Last words?
Veterans of America, unite! Become a potent political force.

Hope this helps, Bruce. I really enjoyed chatting with you.

Larry

Did you read in your local newspaper about this study of what a terrorist’s sized nuclear device could do to a major U.S. city? (See below)

Instead, the Washington Post featured another “simulation”: 13 members of the Iraq Veterans Against The War, which claims a membership of 400 (out of the over 500,000 servicepeople who have served there) ran around Washington, D.C. making believe they were searching for enemy combatants. According to the WP’s report, “they wanted to bring the war home to Washington.”

Perhaps, the Democrats in Washington see the guerrilla theatre as more entertaining, or their efforts to hamstring our efforts to stabilize Iraq as worth their efforts, but should take the other simulation -- and their responsibilities to Americans -- more seriously.

A new study by researchers at the Center for Mass Destruction Defense (CMADD) at the University of Georgia details the catastrophic impact a nuclear attack would have on American cities….The study, which the authors said was the most advanced and detailed simulation published in open scientific literature…“The likelihood of a nuclear weapon attack in an American city is steadily increasing, and the consequences will be overwhelming” said Cham Dallas, CMADD director and professor in the UGA College of Pharmacy. “So we need to substantially increase our preparation.”… Dallas and co-author William Bell, CMADD senior research scientist and faculty member of the UGA College of Public Health, examined four high-profile American cities – New York, Chicago, Washington, D.C. and Atlanta – and modeled the effects of a 20 kiloton nuclear detonation and a 550 kiloton detonation. (For comparison, the nuclear bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were in the 12 to 20 kiloton range). Bell explained that a 20 kiloton weapon could be manufactured by terrorists and fledgling nuclear countries such as North Korea and Iran… Among the study’s findings:
A 20-kiloton detonation would leave debris tens of feet thick in downtown areas with buildings 10-stories or higher. Roughly half of the population in downtown areas would be killed, mainly from collapsing buildings. Most of those surviving the initial blast in downtown areas would be exposed to a fatal dose of radiation.

Sorry brothers, that I wasn’t with you defending the Wall today. Bit far from sunny, warm Encinitas (beach town between San Diego and Camp Pendleton). Took my almost 7-year old son Jason for a walk on the beach to collect sea shells, then went for pizza. The usual crowd of young, beach-going tatooed’s and a few comparative geezers like me scattered in. Watched TV in the pizza parlor, and someone turned to CSPAN. Cindy Sheehan came on ranting, as pizza eaters cracked up when one beach youth just up from surfing said Cindy looked worse than Spongebob Squarepants after a bad day. A grayed pony-tail geezer nearby commented that without sex, drugs and rock-‘n-roll during the ‘60’s to blur the senses these protestors looked truly bored at the rants, and that if he wanted to be yelled at that’s what he had a wife for. Probably why the shivering small crowd in D.C. looked like the fuzz-faced who didn’t yet know better about getting ranted at and angry grandma’s who miss having husbands to rant at. Vietnam vet, who runs the Army surplus store, came in for a slice, asked why the Gathering of Eagles wasn’t being shown, instead of the Cackling, and returned to work. Jason and I went back to the beach. Made a game of looking for our friend, the funny Spongebob. Had enough of the scary one.

In my opinion of the best Gathering Of Eagles poster: United We Stand. Together We Kick Ass.
As we'd say in Nam: There it is.
Reports from fellow vets there, and even recognized by MSM (UPDATE: The Washington Post noticed), is that the Left were surprised by the large number of Eagles there, and chastened to behave.

For the best and funniest live-blog of the dead-bog of radical cliches, see here.

Congressman David Obey, who voted in 2002 against authorizing U.S. armed action against Saddam, today commented on the House resolution to withdraw from Iraq:

“Please don’t characterize what we are doing as shutting down funding for the troops,” said Representative David Obey, a Wisconsin Democrat. “Some of you have the misimpression that’s what the Congress did in Vietnam, and you don’t want to see the repeat of that. Congress never did that in Vietnam.”

Obey is technically correct. Congress did not send South Vietnam down the tubes by not supplying U.S. forces there. Congress, instead, forbid U.S. forces to engage in armed intervention after 1973 to uphold its pledges that would have prevented the massive Soviet and Chinese supplied North Vietnamese invasion of 1975 and did starve the South Vietnamese of the arms and supplies to adequately defend themselves.

Obey is also technically correct that the House is not intending to cut off funding for the U.S. troops, at least yet. Obey may, however, want to talk to 14 (15 if Independent Socialist Sanders of Vermont is included) of his Democrat cohorts in the Senate who today voted against the Gregg amendment "expressing the sense of Congress that no funds should be cut off or reduced for American Troops in the field which would result in undermining their safety or their ability to complete their assigned mission.” They are:
Daniel Akaka, Joseph Biden, Jeff Bingaman, Robert Byrd, Christopher Dodd, Russell Feingold, Edward Kennedy, Patrick Leahy, Robert Menéndez, Patty Murray, Jack Reed, Harry Reid, Jay Rockefeller, Sheldon Whitehouse, Bernard Sanders

As Obey told an advocate of more quickly cutting off funding for the U.S. in Iraq:

In a video posted on the Internet site YouTube, the Democratic lawmaker is seen pounding his fist repeatedly into the air, complaining loudly that Democrats don't have enough votes to cut off war funding and the protesters don't understand the debate in Congress.
"That makes no sense. It doesn't work that way," Obey says at one point.

Indeed, the Democrats’ march to cut the legs out from under South Vietnam went through a series of attempts from 1970 onward. Obey’s march to undermine the U.S. and Iraq continues onward. That’s how the Democrats work, relentlessly, to destroy U.S. resolve, policy, and allies.

Frank Hoffman, national security consultant, points out the strategic rationale for increasing our military.

Hoffman worries that these reasons for increasing a larger military force have not been adequately explained to either Congress or the American people, and that pressures for other domestic programs may squeeze out sustaining larger forces.

The rationale for increasing military forces goes beyond meeting immediate needs in Iraq, as the pipeline for presently planned increased forces will extend to 2012.

Indeed:

The war on terror is another potential rationale. Here again, however, exactly what kinds of capabilities are we adding to our protracted struggle against Islamic extremism? If we were adding 9,200 “foot soldiers” to the State Department and U.S. Agency for International Development, it might help. If we were bulking up our badly implemented strategic communications and public diplomacy programs with a new U.S. Information Agency, it might help. If we were using the military manpower to establish standing interagency task forces, an Army Training and Advisory Brigade, or new legions of active duty civil affairs and psychological operations professionals and intelligence specialists it might help.

But, one strategic rationale is that the civilian agencies exhibit no enthusiasm for fulfilling their role. So, one strategic reason for increasing military forces is these missions:

If the U.S. State Department and other agencies have no stomach for “armed civil affairs” or what might be called “contested state building” then the land forces need to have the resources to fulfill these new governance, advisory and training tasks.

Hoffman adds these reasons for increasing military forces:

* Reverse the Slow Manpower Erosion. Offset a decade of incremental reductions caused by rising personnel costs. The Services have been under significant pressure over the last few years to reduce manpower levels to pay for sharply higher recruiting, retention, and health care costs.

* Bury Our Technological Hubris. Offset a decade of illusions about future warfare. Over the past decade a number of speculative concepts about the changing nature of warfare have worked against maintaining a sufficient ground force. These include Defense planning guidance predicated upon very short wars, a prejudice for technology over “boots on the ground” and an irrational exuberance about the productivity enhancements posed by the supposed wonders of information technology.

* Prepare for the 21st Century, to better posture the Pentagon for the changing character of anticipated wars and contingencies, including the prospects of what the CIA calls the coming “Perfect Storm” of ethnic and religiously motivated conflicts. The historical patterns of such conflicts suggest that these will be protracted and manpower intensive, as we’ve seen in the last few years.

* Take Pressure off National Guard. We must reduce the need to tap into the National Guard so heavily. The National Guard has been incredibly responsive to a range of contingencies since 9/11, including support to that domestic crisis, Katrina, enhanced border security tasks, supporting operations in Afghanistan, and major deployments to Iraq. This is a well we have tapped into far too often, as a buffer against bad strategic decisions in Washington. The families of our Guard and Reserve component have been asked to pay too high a bill. Likewise, state governors have been left short of units and assets to meet their emergency and homeland security needs.

Under present circumstances and force levels, Korea and Iran believe the U.S. neither has the capacity nor the stomach for armed intervention. Our threats ring fairly hollow to their ears, and to other despots or terrorists, which increases the chances of either their calculation or miscalculation drawing the U.S. into otherwise avoidable armed conflict or defeats by default.

If Congress were serious about avoiding another Iraq, it wouldn’t be sending signals of weakness and withdrawal but, instead, getting to serious work examining the needs for a larger military, even larger than currently proposed, and providing the needed support and after-action capacity to the civilian agencies.

The gravely-voiced Senate Republican leader of my youth (when Republicans actually stood for spending restraint), Everett Dirksen, famously retorted to Democrats’ budget busters: “A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you're talking about real money.”

His words came to mind when I saw this article from the Associated Press.

A lawmaker's inquiry could slightly increase the cost of the Medicare drug benefit if its results are publicized, congressional auditors said Tuesday.

Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., has asked several insurers sponsoring Medicare drug plans to submit information about price concessions they wring from drug manufacturers. That pricing information is given to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, but cannot be disclosed.

Waxman's request has pharmaceutical companies worried, though he has not said what he would do with the information once he gets it.
The Congressional Budget Office estimates that disclosing the discounts means the cost of the drug benefit would likely increase by less than $10 billion over a 10-year period, and possibly much less.

In “Democrats Opt For Socialism Over Success,” AEI’s Scott Gottleib explains.

Medicare’s new program relies on networks of private drug plans, all competing to offer attractive benefits and discounted drugs in order to sign up new members. Most of the health plans have enrolled millions of members, and they have used this purchasing clout to extract deep discounts from the drug makers, translating into cheaper health coverage for Medicare members….

Rest assured, the Waxman dispatches wont push the plans off the cliff, so do not expect near-term impacts. But disclosing this commercial and confidential data could slowly erode the competitive activities that enable the Part D plans to save consumers' money and the new benefit program to lower drug costs.

Competition between the plans to lower costs turns on the negotiations that take place between the health plans and drug makers, and the ability of a drug maker to offer a preferred health plan more favorable pricing, often bundling together different drugs in one negotiation, without having to offer the same price to everyone else. This kind of price discrimination enables health plans use leverage and dealmaking to extract the lowest price for the panels of drugs that are most suitable to their members.

Disclosing the price breaks would probably quash the ability to work these bundling deals, which are at the heart of many discounts. With all the prices made public, every plan will get the same deal regardless of what they are willing to offer. You can bet the public price they are offered will be higher than the private deal they might have been able to cut.

The irony is, by all measures, that this competition is working for consumers. Why would Washington want to abate it?

The Medicare program agrees that disclosing the price breaks would undermine the ability of health insurers and pharmacy benefit managers like Caremark Rx and Medco Health Solutions, who also administer drug plans, from obtaining discounts.

The program cites an FTC analysis concluding that whenever competitors know the actual prices charged by other firms, tacit collusion and thus higher prices may be more likely. Separately, the Congressional Budget Office said a proposal to disclose the price data would add $40 billion over 10 years to the cost of the Medicare drug benefit….

In Washington, the only health care businesses that continue to get honest funding by Congress are the ones that do not work. As soon as something turns a profit, Congress looks to take it away. The fear about Part D was always that the drug program would devolve into price controls, thus destroying incentives for research and development as European governments have done.

Ironically, the politicians working the hardest to hobble the successful Part D plans are those like Waxman who are also advocating a universal health care system. Given the political track record they are laying, what health care venture is going to ever trust them? If Waxman succeeds, Part D will be added to a long list of cautionary tales for health companies contemplating work with Washington.

Bruce heralded the wisdom of the Swiss in rejecting the Bern central planners fantasy of national healthcare yesterday. It's no surprise to me that the Swiss rejected it. I traveled Switzerland extensively in 2005, and found that no nation in Europe more closely resembled the United States in outlook, including economic, political, and social than this small Alpine nation of only seven million.

Few probably know that Switzerland's Constitution is based on America's. According to Wikipedia:

the national assembly was divided among Ständerat (similar to the Senate in the United States), and the Nationalrat (the U.S. House of Representatives). Thus, the interests of the Federationalists was given account for. Switzerland adopted the use of referenda and a federal constitution in 1848. This constitution provided for a central authority while leaving the cantons the right to self-government on local issues.

“We don’t need moral judgment from the chairman of the Joint Chiefs,” says Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi, third in line for succession to the presidency.
(The transcript of her remark is here, commenting on Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Marine General Peter Pace, saying homosexuality is “immoral” in an interview with the Chicago Tribune.)

Pace’s position:

Responding to a question about a Clinton-era policy that is coming under renewed scrutiny amid fears of future U.S. troop shortages, Pace said the Pentagon should not "condone" immoral behavior by allowing gay soldiers to serve openly. He said his views were based on his personal "upbringing," in which he was taught that certain types of conduct are immoral.

"I believe homosexual acts between two individuals are immoral and that we should not condone immoral acts," Pace said in a wide-ranging discussion with Tribune editors and reporters in Chicago. "I do not believe the United States is well served by a policy that says it is OK to be immoral in any way.

"As an individual, I would not want [acceptance of gay behavior] to be our policy, just like I would not want it to be our policy that if we were to find out that so-and-so was sleeping with somebody else's wife, that we would just look the other way, which we do not. We prosecute that kind of immoral behavior," Pace said.

The "don't ask, don't tell" policy caused an uproar in the military when signed into law by President Clinton in 1993. At the time, supporters of the policy inside and outside the military argued that it was essential for the cohesion of combat units, not a question of morality.

I’ll leave the facts about gays in the military to the experts in military cohesion and effectiveness, and those expert in successfully integrating various backgrounds and lifestyles into stressful occupations that depend upon close ties among members.

My personal leanings are more tolerant now, nearing 60, than they were at 20 as a young Marine. That’s an important point to consider: the military depends upon the young, and depends upon unit cohesion. That’s not to say allowing open practice of homosexuality wouldn’t work in our professional military, but it is saying it’s another strain on professionalism and resources in the midst of a long war.

BUT, Speaker Pelosi, it absolutely won’t work to have a military in which “we don’t need moral judgment.” What the heck does she think motivates a young person to enlist or serve bravely but a moral judgment that our country and civilization is worth fighting for against those who are its enemies? What the heck does she think holds young men and women together under the horrible stresses of war but a unique bonding and reliance upon each other? What the heck does she appeal to in prosecuting young Marines or soldiers for mistakes in the heat of combat? Does Speaker Pelosi believe anyone would enlist or risk their lives and limbs to defend her or her San Francisco constituency, who have succeeded in largely chasing the military out of the Bay Area?

Moral judgment, and the willingness to fight for it, is what the military is about, indeed why we have a military. Otherwise, why not just accept beheadings, terror, enslavement, and all the other wonderful accoutrements of fanatic Islamists, or despotic satraps, or for that matter their depraved predecessors who murdered 100-million Russians and Chinese, or even persevere to win the Cold War.

Speaker Pelosi, third in succession to the presidency, needs some morality and, even more, some common sense, quickly.

Or, how about another headline: How to enjoy blowing up Hezbollah

OK, on to the fun……….

Foreign Policy magazine’s blog has found the following statistic:

What do you do when you're huddled up inside a bunker, hoping you won't get hit with a rocket?

If you're a young Israeli couple, chances are you go for the cheapest form of entertainment around: sex. That's why Israel is experiencing a 35 percent jump in the number of women entering their fifth, sixth or seventh month of pregnancy, according to statistics from health maintenance organizations.

I wonder if anything similar happened up in Hezbollah country?

Back in the neighborhood in Brooklyn where I grew up one simply referred to “da guys” as the members of what’s politely called organized crime, otherwise known as the Mafia, who stole with a paternal smile or threatening sneer. Everyone knew what was happening, and kept quiet about it.

Our congressmen (and ladies) may now be referred to as “da guys,” as Mark Tapscott describes their identities being masked while they plunder our public purse (otherwise known as your and my hard-earned income that is taxed away).

The most important names in any earmark discussion are those of the requesting Members of Congress. If your Congressman Hornblower slips in an earmark directing $50 million to a consulting firm that just happens to be owned by his biggest campaign donor, it's important to know Hornblower's name. Otherwise, he or she gets by with it because there's no way to have accountability….

Yet, OMB made it crystal clear today that the names of earmark-requesting Members of Congress will not be included on the OMB earmarks database on the Internet….

Why not make those names public? If only on the principle that anything in government that somebody absolutely, positively insists on doing in the dark might not be on the up and up?

Next, let's talk about those second most important names, the recipients of earmarks requested by congressmen that will not be named by OMB….

When I go back now and re-read the president's State of the Union speech in which he first addressed the issue of earmarks, I see this paragraph:
"Next, there is the matter of earmarks. These special interest items are often slipped into bills at the last hour -- when not even C-SPAN is watching. (Laughter.) In 2005 alone, the number of earmarks grew to over 13,000 and totaled nearly $18 billion.
"Even worse, over 90 percent of earmarks never make it to the floor of the House and Senate -- they are dropped into committee reports that are not even part of the bill that arrives on my desk. You didn't vote them into law. I didn't sign them into law. Yet, they're treated as if they have the force of law.
"The time has come to end this practice. So let us work together to reform the budget process, expose every earmark to the light of day and to a vote in Congress, and cut the number and cost of earmarks at least in half by the end of this session."

Somebody is spending your tax dollars but they are doing it without it being part of a bill voted on by Congress and signed by the president. Sounds like it shouldn't be law but it is treated like real law. Wouldn't you want to know who is responsible?

Oh, those prudent Swiss!

The Swiss are rightly known for both their financial acumen and staying away from the schemes of its neighbors. They’ve just demonstrated that again.

In Switzerland it is required that residents have health insurance. They have 87 insurers to choose from.

Swiss voters, by 71%, on March 11 rejected a proposal to have a single, state-run insurer.

The initiative made it onto the ballot after the left-leaning Mouvement Populaire des Familles collected 110,000 signatures to force the vote. The group claimed the current system is too costly and wanted it replaced by a single insurer that would base premiums on wealth and income.

The Swiss have seen the medical backwardness and rationing, at huge and unaffordable budgetary and societal costs, among their national health neighbors in Europe.

Is Washington listening? Or, even better, learning?

Bruce's excellent post of yesterday, Waiting for Eisenhower, reminds me of a passage in Philip Bobbit's Shield of Achilles:

Many persons in the West believe that war occurs only because of mis-calculation; sometimes this opinion is combined with the view that only aggressors make war. Persons holding these two views would have a hard time justifying the wisdom of Alliance resistance to Communism the last fifty years because it was usually the U.S. and her allies and not the Soviets who resolutely and studiedly escalated matters to crises threatening war. Besides the obvious cases involving Berlin in 1952, or Cuba in 1962, we might add the decisions to make the move to war in South Korea and in South Viet Nam, the nature and motivations of which decisions are underscored by the persistent refusals of the Americans and their allies to bomb China or invade North Viet Nam. That is, in both cases the allied forces fought to stop aggression by going to war and declined to employ decisive counteraggression.

Those persons who concede these facts and conclude that these decisions were wrong, and yet who applaud the victory of the democracies in the Cold War, are perhaps obliged to reconsider their views. For it was this peculiar combination of a willingness to make the move to war coupled with a benign nonaggression, even protectiveness, toward the other great powers that ultimately gave the Alliance victory. . .Even the ill-fated American mission in Viet Nam contributed to the ultimate victory: a collapse of military resistance in Indochina in 1964 would have had political effects on the very states of the region whose economies have since become so dynamic (analogous to those effects that would have been felt in Japan following a collapse of resistance in Korea in 1950).

Like the Cold War, the war against Islamo-fascism is an epic struggle of two ideologies battling for supremacy. While each battle in this fight may not be executed to perfection, i.e. Iraq, it is an important battle nonetheless, deserving of a resolution that will provide stability to the region by exiling those elements such as Al Qaida, Hamas, etc., that seek to impose their system of governance and culture on an unwitting populace. For this we needn't wait for Eisenhower, we must press forward with the current mission.

I just encountered an unread copy of Jacques Barzun’s From Dawn to Decadence in my library. Several years ago, Hudson Institute President Herb London recommended I read Barzun, as Herb was a pupil of Barzun’s while an undergraduate at Columbia. However, family and career commitments intervened from taking up his suggestion.

In the opening pages of the book, Barzun calls the age we live “decadent” because it “sees no clear lines of advance...the loss it faces is that of Possibility.” He continues:

The forms of art as life seem exhausted, the stages of development have been run through. Institutions function painfully. Repetition and frustration are the intolerable result. Boredom and fatigue are great historical forces.

It will be asked, how does the historian know when Decadence sets in? By the open confessions of malaise, by the search in all directions for a new faith or faiths. . . To secular minds, the old ideals look outworn or hopeless and practical aims are made into creeds sustained by violent acts: fighting nuclear power, global warming, and abortion; saving from use the environment with its fauna and flora (“Bring back the wolf!”); promoting organic against processed foods, and proclaiming disaffection from science and technology. The impulse to PRIMITIVISM animates all these negatives.

Such causes serve to concentrate the desire for action in a stalled society; for in every town, county, or nation, it is seen that most of what government sets out to do for the public good is resisted as soon as proposed. Not two, but three or four groups, organized or improptu, are ready with contrary reasons as sensible as those behind the project. The upshot is a floating hostility to things as they are. It inspires the repeated use of the dismissive prefixes anti- and post- (anti-art, post-modernism) and the promise to reinvent this or that institution. The hope is that getting rid of what is will by itself generate the new life.

It occurs to me, sadly, that many in the leadership of the modern Democrat Party embody this new worship of Decadence. Most of the Senators aligned with this party are opposed to the war in Iraq, not necessarily for its merits, but because they are opposed to everything that embodies the Western ethos: development (as evidenced in their sacrosanct belief that the Earth is warming, despite an eminent French scientist saying otherwise, and that humans are the problem rather than the solution), Judeo-Christian ethics and mores (as evidenced by their failure to defend against religious radicals in the Middle East who aim to annihilate modern liberalism), free-markets (by their willingness to tax and regulate American business into recession and push the benefits of Big Labor to the detriment of the American auto industry) and their abandonment of free-will (as seen in the growth of the nanny-state through no-smoking regulations, and the banning of trans-fats).

The Western tradition recognized that wars are transformative events that can help shape the direction of the modern world, a fact evidenced by our own Revolution and Civil War, both World Wars in the early half of the 20th Century, and the resultant post-Bretton Woods world order that created the United Nations, World Bank, IMF, and NATO, among others. As Philip Bobbit writes in the Shield of Achilles:

Many people see war as an illness of states, a pathology that no healthy state need suffer. This way of looking at things more or less disables us from shaping future wars, as we search, fruitlessly, for the wonder serum that will banish war once and for all (or as we plan to fight wars we know – or believe – we can win). Yet we can shape future wars, even if we cannot avoid them. We can take decisions that will determine whether the next epochal war risks a general cataclysm.

Most Democrats see no possibility in President Bush’s Middle East strategy of bringing democracy to that region, because they are drunk on this “wonder serum” that we can banish war forever. A look at any history book, the Bible, or even an encyclopedia for that matter should quickly dispel these anti-Western thinkers of this utopian ideal. No, war will never be banished from this Earth, so long as evil exists, which is another truth that anti-Westerns want to forget. So why not have war on our terms?

This is the thinking of those blamed for the Iraq War: the much maligned neo-conservatives. Despite the protestations of those on the left and the far right, who claim that this war has been bungled, we Americans forget so easily that those 3,000 or more young men and women who have died in Iraq have died to ensure that September 11 never happens again – and so far they have done a damned good job of it.

The War in Iraq is indeed a war on our terms, because it has had the intended or unintended effect (this should be the real point of debate about Bush) of attracting every looney in the greater Middle East to come to Iraq, rather than our shores, to kill the “American infidel,” as they see us. If we weren’t fighting them there, then they would be fighting us. Here. Lest we forget the World Trade Center bombing in 1993, the East African U.S. embassy bombings in 1998, and the USS Cole in 2000. This should be a stark reminder that terrorism against America and its interests didn't start on 9/11, nor will it end if we pull out of Iraq.

While Bush may not deserve a gold star for his efforts in the War on Terror, at least he’s doing something. And that something is a lot better than anything that the Decadent Democrats have offered.

Samuel Beckett’s play “Waiting for Godot,” is seen by most as a tragicomedy about the meaningless of life but humanity’s will to live in spite of this, as the tramps on a bench and visitors quarrel and contemplate various subjects. At end, the tramps are still sitting on their bench, filling space with words but not their lives with substance.

That seems to characterize most of our current discussions about who is to be elected president in 2008.

David Broder, ever a chronicler of Washington’s words, describes a poll in which by 3-1 the security of the U.S. should be our primary goal rather than enlarging democracy abroad.:

What people really want is a way of looking at the world – and understanding America’s part in it – a narrative that would replace the rejected Bush scenario….[quoting William Galston of the centrist-liberal Brookings Institution] “People are looking for a candidate who suggests a way to defend our essential interests while regaining some of our lost esteem.”

Who is up to the task?

The description of Americans’ yearnings is on target. What isn’t is the reality of the yearning. It seems a throwback to our feelings about the – in fond memory, but less so in fact -- halcyon 1950’s days of President Eisenhower.

Although the U.S. and its interests and allies were far less secure than fond memories, the United States is no longer fairly safe behind the distance of oceans, nor overwhelming nuclear forces and seeming willingness to use them, nor economically secure behind the singular dominance of international commerce, nor even part of an international or domestic elite consensus on the superiority of Western civilization, nor is there anyone of Eisenhower’s proven global experience and stature.

Nor is there a candidate whose public and private dealings are either above reproach or allowed to appear so by a muckraking press or political opponents’ exposure. An Associated Press-IPSOs poll “says 55 percent of those surveyed consider honesty, integrity and other values of character the most important qualities they look for in a presidential candidate.” Eisenhower’s affair during WWII, remember, wasn’t revealed till well after his presidency.

Another stark difference between then and now is that our media and political elites weren’t determined to reveal U.S. secret programs, including the low cost upending of petty despots deemed a threat to our interests or international stability. Imagine Venezuela’s Chavez being deposed by the C.I.A. today?

In short, we are not able to return to the 1950’s – even if they were as wonderful as childish memories.

Indeed, what’s most striking about our yearnings is that they are almost childish. We yearn for security with little price, exertion or self-responsibility from ourselves.

Not only is our defense budget as a proportion of our economy a fraction of during the 1950’s, not to mention the 1980’s, but our direct participation in defense is buffered by a superb but burdened volunteer force, and most continue to ignore the ability and willingness of terrorist fanatics to strike right here.

Amidst this, there’s no one among our prospective candidates, or only passingly and without emphasis or conviction, willing to stress the need to pay the prices, exert ourselves, and take personal self-responsibility for the needs and self-restraint.

If we’re to enjoy even a slight resemblance to the 1950’s or come closer to our yearnings, it will take leadership not evident and our maturity as a people, nation and civilization, also not evident.

Otherwise, calculating pols reading polls will continue to just pander to unrealistic yearnings, while real threats are ignored till crashing down on our bench. Words and idle musings are not enough.

Words have meaning, or facts don’t.

The meaning and use of words are really matters of power. As the meeting of Alice with Humpty Dumpty in Wonderland went:

Humpty Dumpty: When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less.
Alice: The question is, whether you can make words mean so many different things.
Humpty Dumpty: The question is: which is to be master - that's all.

Words have denotations, a particular factual reference, and connotations, associated meanings. Most listeners do not distinguish denotations and connotations in common usage. The borders are unknown – the facts not being known – or the associated meanings created have taken over popular understanding. A society’s wordsmiths, its powerful writers and politicians, exert much influence over how this plays out.

We see this with such words as “swiftboating,” which the liberal media has negligently defined as “unsubstantiated” attacks on a politician, it only applying to exposures of Democrats, ignoring eye-witness depositions and the non-MSM investigative unearthing of John Kerry’s exaggerations and lies.

We see this with the international propaganda effort to label Israel an “apartheid” state. It’s a well-considered and coordinated campaign, to make Israel a pariah.

Former president Jimmy Carter is a willing co-conspirator, and he didn’t start recently.

None other than John Kerry’s hagiographer, Douglas Brinkley, revealed what Carter was advising Yasser Arafat on how to describe the 1987-1993 Palestinian intifada:

Carter advised him to tell the world of the Palestinians' situation in speeches designed ``to secure maximum sympathy." …Brinkley said Carter told him, referring to the civil rights injustices that occurred in the southern United States in the 1960s, that ``the intifada exposed the injustice Palestinians suffered, just like Bull Connor's mad dogs in Birmingham."

Carter ratcheted up his animosity to Israel in his latest description of Israel as an apartheid state, and seeks to mask his purpose by saying, as the Associated Press reports “I have spent a good part of my life seeking peace for Israel based on justice for the Arabs.”

One-sided “justice” is otherwise known as a kangaroo court and, in this instance, annihilation of Israel and Jews.

In an interview with Yossi Beilin, leftist Israeli politician and architect of the Oslo peace accords, he was asked what he thought of the Israel-apartheid comparison.

“It’s really crazy,” Beilin told me. “Only ignorant people, or people with malice, can say something like that. The ignorance is either about what apartheid was all about, or about Israel,” he said.

Benjamin Pogrund, former deputy editor of South Africa’s Rand Daily Mail, explains:

Apartheid … comes easily to hand: it is a lazy label for the complexities of the Middle East conflict. It is also used because, if it can be made to stick, then Israel can be made to appear to be as vile as was apartheid SA and seeking its destruction can be presented to the world as an equally moral cause.

The influence of such intellectual laziness, or animosity, in using falsely inflammatory words is international.

Cardinal Karl Lehmann, chairman of the Conference of German Catholic Bishops, deplored Wednesday remarks by bishops who said walls around Palestinian communities reminded them of the Warsaw Jewish ghetto….

Two Catholic bishops in a party that visited Yad Vashem this week had been quoted saying they were shocked to see on the same day images of the ghetto where the Nazis confined Warsaw Jews and the confinement of Palestinians in the West Bank by walls. …

Lehmann said, "The German bishops are aware of their historical responsibility. We know that we have to constantly show this anew by being sensitive in our choice of words."

When our major media display tolerance for, indeed participate in, the adulteration of language and facts, as with “swiftboating,” they are also creating the fertile ground for other adulterations of language, as for calling Israel an “apartheid” state.

The U.S. State Department released its latest country report on Vietnam on March 7. Secretary of State Rice introduces the annual exercise, saying,

With the release of this year's reports we are recommitting ourselves to help new democracies deliver on their people's aspirations for a better life. We are recommitting ourselves to stand with those courageous men and women who struggle for their freedom and their rights. And we are recommitting ourselves to call every government to account that still treats the basic rights of its citizens as options rather than, in President Bush's words, the non-negotiable demands of human dignity.

Yet, within the Vietnam report, although saying, “The Socialist Republic of Vietnam is an authoritarian state ruled by the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV)….The government's human rights record remained unsatisfactory,” repeatedly it’s said that State could not find “credible” reports for many of the cases of torture and imprisonment reported by various human right organizations.

Reporters Without Borders “voiced dismay today at the news that the Vietnamese government has decided not to renew BBC World Service correspondent Bill Hayton’s press visa.”

Why?

Hayton seems to have irritated the authorities by his coverage of the repression of dissidents.

It doesn’t irritate the communist-profiteers when it’s reported how cheap its labor pool is, to entice foreign investors and enrich Hanoi’s rulers and lackeys. It, also, doesn’t seem to irritate most MSM that they are only permitted to be stooges for Hanoi and Western businessmen’s enrichment, at the price of oppression.

The Democrat polling outfit Democracy Corps offers some public surveys that are quite useful to Republicans, as well. Its latest survey digs into basic attitudes toward government programs, our elected leaders, and the political parties. The commentary by Democracy Corps, although tilted, still rings quite true:

Republicans are clearly responsible for much of this disillusionment with government, but it would be delusional and dangerous to assume the public will hold only them accountable and give Democrats a pass….The core of the problem is a fundamental belief that government, and the politicians who lead it, refuse to be held accountable for the way they conduct business – how they spend money, whom they listen to when setting their priorities, and how they conduct themselves….Americans now view government as more of a barrier than a helping hand, and its failure to be accountable in a way that produces results is central to these doubts….Perhaps the most stunning finding in the survey is that just 13 percent believe the federal government would spend additional money well while 83 percent say it would be wasted….[P]eople are sick and tired of politicians who not only operate by a different set of rules, but also who refuse to talk straight, take responsibility and admit a mistake when something goes wrong. Third, people believe that Washington listens to the wealthy and powerful, and not to them in determining the priorities and focus of government.

Democracy Corps’ analysis says: “The central question is this: Do Democrats want people to listen to them?…Democrats have a big opportunity to advance an agenda here, but only if they are bold advocates for change and accountability.”

That’s also the central question and challenge to Republican leaders.

Democracy Corps notes: “The Democrats’ initial uptick in January has stalled, and voters are not particularly bullish about a Congress that is now under Democrats’ control.”

The recommendations to Democrats by Democracy Corps apply equally well to Republicans. Indeed, they apply moreso to Republicans, who have heretofore led on these scores but who have abused the trust of not only many Independents but many Republicans.

1. Resist the temptation to remain the protector and defender of the federal government and instead seize the mantle of change and accountability;

2. Maintain authenticity, talk straight and assume responsibility for what you say you will do;

3. Establish accountability as a core element in everything you propose, along with advancing a set of specific measures;

4. Advance a strong fiscal accountability agenda that cuts waste and makes government more efficient and results-oriented;

5. Go further on anti-corruption, ethics and lobbying reform.

The prospective leaders for the Republican presidential nomination – Guiliani and Romney particularly, due to a reputation for management -- are scoring much higher in polls than the more inside-beltway types leading the Democrat chase. It’s time for Republicans in Congress to seize their opportunities by vigorously returning to Republican strengths they are viewed as frittering away for incumbent comforts and pelf over the past several years.

I have been invited to speak about the Academic Bill of Rights at an upcoming meeting of the Brooklyn Young Republican Club. Having just returned from a stimulating couple of days in Washington DC attending the tail end of CPAC and the Academic Freedom Conference sponsored by Students for Academic Freedom, I look forward to the opportunity to keeping the spirit and momentum going for freedom and liberty on New York campuses.

The highlight of the event was the powerful speech by Former Senator Rick Santorum who explicitly named the enemy we are facing, not terrorism, which is a mere tactic, but the ideological foe of radical Islam. We must take the battle to our campuses with the zeal of missionaries to educate the next generation. The next day many students shared their episodes of coercion and political harassment in the classroom and even death threats for voicing contrary political viewpoints. This conference demonstrated the urgent need for students to stand up for their freedom of speech and conscience on campus and underscored our patriotic duty as citizens of our great country to join together with students and professors of good conscience in the battle for academic freedom.

Bob Capano, president of the club has opened the invitation to local students and professors to come join the forum and share their experiences if they desire. Please email me for more information. Here is the press announcement of the event:

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Brooklyn Young Republican Club to Host Forum on “Academic Bill of Rights”

Legislation to Protect Student and Faculty Free Speech Rights on College Campuses to Be Discussed

[Brooklyn, NY] – Bob Capano, President of the Brooklyn Young Republican Club (BYRC), today announced that the BYRC will be hosting a forum on an “Academic Bill of Rights” at their monthly meeting on Wednesday, March 14th at 7:30 p.m. at Peggy O’Neill’s, located at 8123 5th Avenue in Bay Ridge.

Phil Orenstein, an activist in the nationwide academic freedom and reform movement who also just returned from the annual Academic Freedom Conference in Washington, D.C., will speak about the “Academic Bill of Rights”. This legislation is currently pending in the NYS Senate (S2300) and in the NYS Assembly (A04406). The legislation is currently active in some 20 state legislatures. The bill provides that:

1. students should be graded on the basis of their work, not their political or religious beliefs
2. students fees should be distributed fairly
3. professors should not use the classroom for political indoctrination or interject irrelevant political, religious or anti-religious diatribes
4. faculty should be hired or fired or promoted on merit, and not on the basis of their political views or religious beliefs
5. students have the right to a wide diversity of scholarly opinions
6. requires that educational institutions create grievance procedures for violations of student's freedom of speech and conscience and inform students of such procedures

Capano stated, “We are thrilled to sponsor a substantive forum on a topic that many students and instructors at college campuses cite as an issue that should be studied and addressed. As an adjunct Professor of Political Science over the past several years, I know that it is important to provide a balanced, impartial learning environment so that students can make their own informed decisions and know that they will be graded fairly. We look forward to hearing more about this proposed legislation.”

For more information on the Brooklyn Young Republican Club, go to www.brooklynyr.com
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If there’s more about ERISA than you care to know, you may care about the reduction in basic state and local government services to you as a taxpayer in order to pay for humongous liabilities run up by politicians to pay off government workers and unions.

There outta be a law!

Please see my Washington Examiner column today, “A new ERISA should include coverage of state and local pensions.”

The blogger’s bane is being ignored. Although fellow bloggers have been kind in frequently linking to me, on a subject of particular expertise* I’m usually ignored: health care, pensions and insurance. Here’s the topic #1 or #2 on Americans minds, according to polls, which consumes nearing 20% of our GNP for health care and which has multi-trillion dollar unfunded liabilities for pensions (squeezing out essential government services to taxpayers and citizens), and almost all conservative bloggers have nothing to say about it.

Sure, a few may occasionally gripe about a particular health care or insurance experience, but otherwise avoid the subject as they concentrate on the latest front page blood pressure raiser. Conservative bloggers should start paying more attention, before they find themselves lined up for a public proctologist in lines of rationed medical backwardness administered by one-size-fits-all bureaucrats, and busting their axles in rutted roads on the way to dilapidated parks in order to finance lush public pensions.

Chris Reed, an editorialist of the San Diego Union-Tribune, (here’s his bio) has been doing a fantastic and knowledgeable job of exposing the new clothes of the grandiose health care proposal by California Gubernator Schwarzenegger as lacking fiber.

In his online blog at the newspaper, today, Reed cites the court decision striking down the Maryland so-called “Wal-Mart tax” requiring a certain level of health benefits by employers or else pay a tax to a state fund for the benefit of the uninsured:

Because the Fair Share Act effectively mandates that employers structure their employee healthcare plans to provide a certain level of benefits, the Act has an obvious "connection with" employee benefit plans and so is preempted by ERISA.

Reed then phones one of the nations leading ERISA expert