Hilarious

From the woman who also believes that the New Deal was a bad idea and that Joe McCarthy was a great American hero:

"I generally don't write columns about the manifestly obvious, but, yes, the man responsible [For the record: Ms. Coulter is talking about President Bush] for keeping Americans safe from another terrorist attack on American soil for nearly seven years now will go down in history as one of America's greatest presidents."

Here is a survey of hundreds of professional historians (as opposed to professional bloviators, like Ms. Coulter) who disagree:

"Asked to rank the presidency of George W. Bush in comparison to those of the other 41 American presidents, more than 61 percent of the historians concluded that the current presidency is the worst in the nation’s history. Another 35 percent of the historians surveyed rated the Bush presidency in the 31st to 41st category, while only four of the 109 respondents ranked the current presidency as even among the top two-thirds of American administrations."

The other somewhat historic footnote

It has been exactly a century - 25 elections - since the last time neither major candidate was a state governor, sitting president or vice-president. In 1908 Secretary of War Taft defeated Democratic party luminary (not sure what else to call him, at that point in his career) William Jennings Bryan) by eight percent in the popular vote, or an electoral margin of 321-162. In those days, of course, the Democrats were still the party of the south and the Republicans (especially southerners) were still considered the party of Lincoln.

The Wikipedia article.

Tirofijo se murió.

The FARC are probably finished. It's about time.

Why they hate us, Iran edition

A young gentleman much more brilliant than I clued me in to this in one of my history classes. This is from 'The Iran Contra Connection,' by Jonathan Marshall, Peter Dale Scott and Jane Hunter -
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"... Israeli interests in non-Arab Iran became prominent as early as the 1 950s, when Mossad, Israel's foreign intelligence agency, cooperated with the CIA in establishing the Shah's secret police, SAVAK. A 1979 CIA report on Mossad notes that:

'The main purpose of the Israeli relationship with Iran was the development of a pro-Israel and anti-Arab policy on the part of Iranian officials. Mossad has engaged in joint operations with SAVAK over the years since the late 1950s. Mossad aided SAVAK activities and supported the Kurds in Iraq. The Israelis also regularly transmitted to the Iranians intelligence reports on Egypt's activities in the Arab countries, trends and developments in Iraq, and Communist activities affecting Iran.'"

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The rest of a short excerpt. Evidently when SAVAK was 'extraordinarily rendering' some young Iranian student who'd made nasty comments about the Shah, there was occasionally either a Mossad or CIA guy present. Personally I try not to armchair quarterback the Israeli and American intelligence services, undoubtedly this seemed like a better idea at the time than it does today. But it seems to me that it helps explain their attitudes with something more believable than 'they hate our freedoms.'

An idea whose time has probably come, but is almost certainly not original here

A history professor of mine recently shared with the class that he believes there ought to a national primary day, where this six-month process would take place in the space of a single day, roughly approximating the conditions of a general election. He thought this would reduce the relevance of Iowa and New Hampshire, which he described as 'America likes a winner.'

He also argued that delegate apportionment - whether proportional to percentage of the popular vote or winner-takes-all - ought to be consistent with the general election.

Another professor of mine made essentially the federalism argument in rebuttal when I brought the question up to him - that local state parties should and do have the wherewithal to decide when primaries are held, relative at least to the RNC and DNC.

I tend to agree with the former. I see more positives than negatives in a national day of primaries.

Florida, Michigan, Obama and November

I have read and listened to various sources arguing that supporters of Sen. Clinton dissatisfied with the DNC's Florida and Michigan decision could tip those states in favour of Sen. McCain come general election, assuming Clinton has not Boss Tweeded the nomination away from its rightful owner by then. If Clinton supporters might actually jump en masse to McCain out of spite or genuine preference (although it's hard to imagine why a supporter of Clinton would prefer McCain over Sen. Obama, given that Obama's policy ideas are much nearer to Clinton's than McCain's), Obama's supporters could have serious cause for concern.

Florida has voted blue only four times in the past sixty years (excluding 2000), once each for Clinton, Carter, Johnson and Truman. Of Democratic presidents over that period, only Kennedy and Clinton (in his first term) won without Florida. Michigan is a stranger case, having voted Democratic for the past twenty years, Republican for the twenty years before that, and Republican three times, Democratic twice in the twenty year block before that. That adds up to solidly blue demographics in the short term but solidly purple in the post-WWII long term, with Republicans edging the Democrats by an 8-7 margin in the fifteen elections since 1948. McCain's famous appeal to independents may be hard for Obama to counter in a well-balanced state.

Nuance

Saddam Hussein was not Adolf Hitler. Not even close.

Mahmoud Ahmedinejad is not Adolf Hitler. Not even close.

Dopey comments regarding the holocaust do not equal the holocaust.

Anti-Iraq war does not equal pro-Saddam. Pro-Iraq war does not equal war-monger.

Talking to dictators we don't like (that is to say, those who are not already allied to the United States) 'without preconditions' does not equal appeasement. Anyone who speaks out against a war is not Neville Chamberlain.

Moreover, we only use the word 'dictator' when it's a dictator we don't like. One never hears the words 'Saudi Arabian dictator King Abdullah,' nor 'Pakistani dictator Pervez Musharraf.'

Hugo Chavez and Mahmoud Ahmedinejad are not dictators. Both men were democratically elected, and both are subject to checks on their powers - Chavez by the legislature and Ahmedinejad by the Mullahs.

A plague of locusts will not terrorize the land if one's preferred presidential candidate is not elected, Republican or Democrat.

The 'War on Terror' is not World War II redux. Sept. 11 was not Pearl Harbor redux. The Iraq War is not Vietnam redux. Each of these events is more dissimilar than alike, although it's debatable how much more similar one set is than the other.

20th century American foreign policy in the middle east was shameful. In light of this, it's obvious that the terrorists do not hate us directly because they are evil or hate our freedoms, or, as President Bush put it, because we have a democratically elected government. However, in part, they do hate some of what a liberalised society allows that they find sinful. Essentially they are the extreme religious right-wing of the Muslim world - getting back to the basics of the faith because they believe that the mainstream of Islam has strayed from the faith of Muhammed.