Orson Scott Card vs. the "Bush Haters"

Scathing editorial in today's Wall Street Journal by one of my favorite science fiction writers, Orson Scott Card, a Democrat taking issue with the predominantly anti-war/anti-Bush platform of his party's presidential campaign(ers):

". . . their platforms range from Howard Dean's "Bush is the devil" to everybody else's "I'll make you rich, and Bush is quite similar to the devil." Since President Bush is quite plainly not the devil, one wonders why anyone in the Democratic Party thinks this ploy will play with the general public. . . ."

It's a long article but well worth reading, and his conclusion is one which is probably shared by many other Democrats:

I can think of many, many reasons why the Republicans should not control both houses of Congress and the White House. But right now, if the alternative is the Democratic Party as led in Congress and as exemplified by the current candidates for the Democratic nomination, then I can't be the only Democrat who will, with great reluctance, vote not just for George W. Bush, but also for every other candidate of the only party that seems committed to fighting abroad to destroy the enemies that seek to kill us and our friends at home.

And if we elect a government that subverts or weakens or ends our war against terrorism, we can count on this: We will soon face enemies that will make 9/11 look like stubbing our toe, and they will attack us with the confidence and determination that come from knowing that we don't have the will to sustain a war all the way to the end.

"The Campaign of Hate and Fear"
Wall Street Journal Dec. 16, 2003

The Capture of Saddam Hussein!

• The original announcement by Iraqi ambassador L. Paul Bremer this morning.
• Comments by President Bush.
• The Command Post: Iraq is providing an ongoing roundup of news and reports on various responses (and, via Tim Blair, mixed reactions of Dean supporters and Democrats).
• From Jeb Babbin and the NRO's commentary:

  To deny the Iraqis ability to try and punish Saddam is to deny the legitimacy of their process of forming the new government. The proper way to handle Saddam is for the Iraqi Governing Council to appoint its own tribunal and apply to Saddam the basic laws against murder. . . . The Allies set up war-crimes tribunals to try Nazi and Japanese criminals, and we didn’t need the U.N. or some international court to do it for us. Dust off the Nuremberg rules, convene a panel, and get on with it. We cannot allow the Iraqis to do less. (NRO Dec. 14, 2003)

• News and an amusing security notice from John Gault, from Baghdad's Coalition Provisional Authority:

  "There will be an unusually heavy amount of [celebratory] gunfire during the next 24 hours. This is due to the report of the possible capture of Saddam Hussein in Tikrit. All CPA members need to take the following measures to protect themselves. Stay in a hardened facility with overhead cover . . .

• Iraqi blogger Ays (Iraq at a Glance) is "happy"^x10 ("I don't know what to say.. I am confused.. no … I am very happy.. I am very happy.. .. I am very happy.. .. I am very happy.. .. I am very happy.. .. I am very happy.. .. I am very happy..")

Liquid Courage

Years ago I developed a standardized measurement for the agony involved in reading and reviewing tendentious books. I call it the "Donaldson Scale," after Sam Donaldson of ABC News, whose book I once had to suffer. "One Donaldson" means that a full bottle of scotch or its equivalent is necessary to grind out a review.

Hitherto few books have rated more than a Half-Donaldson, though the occasional effort of a French literary critic, or any John Irving novel, comes close to rating a Full-Donaldson. The memoirs of Hillary Rodham Clinton and Sidney Blumenthal have shattered the Donaldson Scale. To paraphrase one of Hillary's previous offerings, these books take a whole distillery.

Steven F. Hayward, "Hillary's Makeover"
Claremont Review of Books, Fall 2003

"neocon"

Dean Esmay on the slur "neocon", which has become quite popular among liberals as of late.

More on the history of the term here.

Academics say the most ridiculous things.

"In the West, fortunately, [anti-semitism] scarcely exists now, though it did in the past."

Noam Chomsky

"Bush, Saddam Hussein, Bin Laden, they are all terrorists."

Howard Zinn

Geez . . .