Here's a fascinating example of people who just don't get it:

The first time she felt numb. The second time she cried. Lillian Glass, a Beverly Hills psychologist, was stunned at the barbarity of terrorists beheading their hostages, right there on her computer screen. Equally surprising was how easily she found the video online.

"You can't imagine anything worse," she says. "Right now, they're coming into your home. It's like they're using technology as a vehicle for war."

Ritual beheading is as primitive as war gets. But 21st century technology is making the grisly details of such killings visible to millions around the world.

In what has become a war of images, the slayings of businessman Nicholas Berg, engineer Paul M. Johnson Jr. and South Korean interpreter Kim Sun Il have been publicized through both conventional media channels and the raw, unfiltered chambers of the Internet.

It is impossible to say how many people have watched the videos over the Internet. But "Nick Berg" was the second most popular search request on Google in May, following "American Idol (news - web sites)." Last week, the most popular search was for "Paul Johnson."

FBI Supervisory Special Agent Kenneth McGuire, who oversees the cyber-crime squad in Los Angeles, says that disseminating video of such violent acts over the Internet is a new form of cyber-terrorism — one proving difficult to contain.

Some Internet services have tried to shut down sites that host such videos, but the images continue to flow. Over the weekend there were new kidnappings and threats of beheading, and with them, the possibility of more videos to come.

First of all, considering the war over phraseology, shouldn't I be called a "cyber extremist" and not a "cyber terrorist"? More seriously, I think that if Special Agent McGuire can't distinguish between terrorists and an outraged citizen showing the terrorists' handiwork to others, then something is very wrong with him, and the FBI. He seems unable to understand that there are people in this country who are living in such a state of denial about terrorism that they believe Americans are the real terrorists. They've been inundated with images of abu Ghraib, and have lost perspective.

Obviously, there are squeamish people who should not watch beheading videos. Nor, obviously, should they watch the video of abu Ghraib atrocities under Saddam Hussein. So why on earth would they do so? And why would they blame the medium which made the videos available? For them to say that they have been "terrorized" when they've Googled a web site, downloaded a video and then watched it is preposterous. And I submit that if they feel terrorized, they ought to blame the terrorists who did the things depicted in the film. If they come here, they ought to bear in mind that I only did what they did; I found the video and downloaded it. I made it (and others) available for the reasons I have set forth here, here, here, here, and here.

And here's some dean of journalism, trotted out to echo the control freaks who want to censor the Internet:

Not everyone buys the explanation, posted by one website, that it aims to "discourage" terrorists by showing how evil they are. Tom Kunkel, president of American Journalism Review, called the justification a "fig leaf."

"Any news outlet — or any private individual, for that matter — who makes available footage of the actual beheadings is, to my mind, an accessory to the crime itself," says Kunkel, dean of journalism at the University of Maryland. "Those are the individuals who are essentially finishing the work of the terrorists, by delivering their grisly 'message.' "

Does the History Channel know about this?

As to the "explanation, posted by one website, that it aims to 'discourage' terrorists by showing how evil they are," I can't speak for others, but Kunkel completely misses the point (although curiously, and unlike most journalists, he uses the word "terrorist" instead of the de rigueur "extremist"). While it is true that the beheading videos show how evil the terrorists are, only a fool would claim that this would "discourage" them.

The only way to discourage terrorists is to kill them, Mr. Kunkel! And if seeing that video helps fuel the warrior spirit which is required, then that's reason enough to help make it available.

I can't speak for other blogs or web sites, but reading through the comments people have left shows that people are overwhelmingly outraged, horrified, and angry at the terrorists. Which they should be -- and this sense of outrage I don't think they'd get from watching the evening news or reading the daily paper.

If that's what's being done to Americans, why shouldn't they be allowed to see it?

And maybe -- just maybe -- if enough people are outraged and sickened, the cash won't flow as easily into terrorist coffers. There's evidence that even some of their supporters are sickened: according to Jim Dunnigan,

The terrorists have learned that the beheading routine is counterproductive and even offends many of their own supporters. (Link.)

Stuff like that you can read in history books, or certain religious books.

But seeing is believing.

And context is everything. The beheading videos are unedited, and show the cruelty and the demonic nature of our enemy, lest we forget.

No shots of an American president playing golf are spliced in.

UPDATE: Here's an example of the warrior spirit these beheadings engender:

From: AABufalo@aol.com
Date: Mon, 28 Jun 2004 08:37:43 EDT
Subject: Letter to the Terrorists in Iraq
To: AABufalo@aol.com

This letter is for Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, ''Islamic Response,'' and the rest of the so-called "insurgents" in Iraq. I obviously do not have an e-mail address for these vermin, so I am forwarding this letter to my entire address book in the hope you good people will forward it to as many people as possible, and that eventually through the miracle of the internet it somehow ends up in the hands of the intended recipients. Thank you all for your assistance.

To the terrorists currently operating in Iraq,

I see that you have captured a U. S. Marine, and that you plan to cut off his head if your demands are not met. Big mistake. Before you carry out your threat I suggest you read up on Marine Corps history. The Japanese tried the same thing on Makin Island and in a few other places during World War Two, and came to regret it. Go ahead and read about what then happened to the mighty Imperial Army on Tarawa, Iwo Jima and Okinawa. They paid full price for what they did, and you will too.

You look at America and you see a soft target, and to a large extent you are right. Our country is filled with a lot of spoiled people who drive BMWs, sip decaf lattes and watch ridiculous reality TV shows. They are for the most part decent, hard working citizens, but they are soft. When you cut off Nick Berg's head those people gasped, and you got the media coverage you sought, and then those people went back to their lives. This time it is different. We also have a warrior culture in this country, and they are called Marines. It is a brotherhood forged in the fire of many wars, and the bond between us is stronger than blood. While it is true that this country has produced nitwits like Michael Moore, Howard Dean and Jane Fonda who can be easily manipulated by your gruesome tactics, we have also produced men like Jason Dunham, Brian Chontosh and Joseph Perez. If you don't recognize those names you should. They are all Marines who distinguished themselves fightin! g to liberate Iraq, and there will be many more just like them coming for you.

Before the current politically correct climate enveloped our culture one of the recruiting slogans of our band of brothers was "The Marine Corps Builds Men." You will soon find out just how true that is. You, on the other hand, are nothing but a bunch of women. If you were men you would show your faces, and take us on in a fair fight. Instead, you are cowards who hide behind masks and decapitate helpless victims. If you truly represented the interest of the Iraqi people you would not be ambushing those who come to your country to repair your power plants, or sabotage the oil pipelines which fuel the Iraqi economy. Your agenda is hate, plain and simple.

When you raise that sword over your head I want you to remember one thing. Corporal Wassef Ali Hassoun is not alone as he kneels before you. Every Marine who has ever worn the uniform is there with him, and when you strike him you are striking all of us. If you think the Marines were tough on you when they were cleaning out Fallujah a few weeks ago you haven't seen anything yet. If you want to know what it feels like to have the Wrath of God called down upon you then go ahead and do it. We are not Turkish truck drivers, or Pakistani laborers, or independent contractors hoping to find work in your country. We are the United States Marines, and we will be coming for you.

Andy Bufalo
MSgt USMC (Ret)
USMCstories

Nat Hentoff, with his usual perspicacity, once again slays the UN for it's (non-)reaction to Sudan, and closes with this bit on one American's response:

On May 4, American ambassador Sichan Siv, walking out of the U.N. Human Rights Commission in disgust after it had re-elected Sudan to membership, said to The New York Sun, "The least we should be able to do is not elect a country to the only global body charged specifically with protecting human rights, at the precise time when tens of thousands of its citizens are being murdered or being left to die of starvation." It's "Never Again" again.

He notes speculation that Bush has grown silent on the Darfur issue so as not to detract from the peace being brokered between the Muslim establishment and the Christian minority in the south.

Are we wtinessing tolerance of genocide because this time it's Muslim on Muslim crime? And what of the fact that the victims are black? Neighboring countries refuse involvement on the grounds that "it would constitute interference in a member state's internal affairs."

I recall my old sociology professor's caution that cultural relativism is often nothing more than a subtle kind of racism, citing the practice of female genital mutilation. He asked us how we'd react if this were reported in some remote Canadian town or in Ireland. He was right, and many in the class came to realize in an instant that their tolerance was little more than a dismissal of (to borrow an academic term) "the other."

But I guess the U.N. is a bit preoccupied these days.

Jim Dunnigan:

It's easy to admire terrorists from a distance, rather more difficult when they are terrorizing you. (Via GlennReynolds.com.)

Even admiration. Or whatever one wants to call this statement from Michael Moore:

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

It's easy to admire them from a distance.

And easier for some than for others.

Via Andrew Sullivan, I found quite a book review by Gary Indiana. The following is just an excerpt:

[I]t's impossible to actually read this book without missing Clinton, for unlike his predecessor and his successor, the Spook and the Born-Again Cokehead/Booze Hound, he isn't mean-spirited, homophobic, racist, or idiotic, never confuses himself with Jesus Christ, and even when putting annoying people in their place, does it with a light touch. "Unfortunately, my relationship with Bill Bennett didn't fare well after I became President and he began promoting virtue for a living." "Vice-President Dan Quayle said he intended to be the 'pit bull terrier' of the election campaign. When asked about it, I said Quayle's claim would strike terror into the heart of every fire hydrant in America." Clinton is even gracious to Barbara Bush, a vicious old bag in pearl sets who could've given Angela Lansbury notes for her role in The Manchurian Candidate.

I will leave it to others to parse whether it is preferable, given the systemic and implacable evils of maintaining an empire that is inherently vampiric and suicidal, to have its declining years managed by Rapture-hungry mental dwarves, cretinous judges flapping about in Iolanthe-inspired Inquisition costumes of their own design, and megalomaniacs of indeterminable species such as Richard Perle; or by a plain-talking arriviste who can't resist a Big Mac and a strawberry milk shake, and once in a while needs a blowjob from somebody he isn't married to. I happen to think it does make a difference what kind of arse sits in the Oval Office and whether he governs with a sense of his own transience and imperfection or uses fear and intimidation to whip the population into line with whatever brand of pious bullshit makes him feel like Superman. For people who truly believe the Bush coup d'état has "restored honor to the Presidency," or however that tired tune goes, I recommend Bill Clinton's book as a good strong dose of the reality principle. Honorable people don't waste any time proclaiming how honorable they are, and sometimes honor consists in admitting you fucked up.

Normally, I hesitate to "parse" the thoughts of other people, but I just can't seem to take "the systemic and implacable evils of maintaining an empire that is inherently vampiric and suicidal" as a "given." Might as well parse out a sentence begining with "given that you are a child-molesting crack addict...."

I have never seen so many unsupported ad hominem attacks in a book review.

But perhaps he pulled a few punches, for the reviewer didn't accuse Bush of torturing children at parties. ("Gary Indiana", it should be noted, authored the famous fascist-erotic child torture film, Salò.)

Plus, he was fair enough to chide Bill Clinton -- if only for being gracious to Barbara Bush, the new queen of evil.

Are things getting nasty or what?

UPDATE: Mea culpa! As I previously acknowledged in a comment below, I mistakenly identified Gary Indiana as the author of Salo. (Hurried writing is the explanation, but not an excuse. If it matters, I did see Salo years ago and knew it was a Pasolini film.)

As the author was kind enough to write to me, I thought this deserved an additional notation, and an apology to Gary Indiana, who is NOT the author of Salo the film, but of this book about the film. The book is titled Salo or the 120 Days of Sodom.

Here's his email:

> Sweetie,
>
> I think you should go back to school for a while:
> Pier Paolo Pasolini
> made the film "Salo," a landmark of film history, in
> 1975, not me.
> Before you start faulting other people's logic,
> perhaps you should have
> a more direct encounter with the world of facts than
> you seem to have
> had thusfar.
>
> Best,
>
> Gary Indiana

Again, my apologies! I would certainly love to go back to school for a while. But I'm not sure that even that would prevent me from making such factual errors. All I can do is note them as I become aware of them.

MORE (10-4-04): Because this post is so old, I have updated the blog with a new post in response to the author's email.

I don't know why I had William Carlos Williams in my head, but I did and I stumbled across this bit of nonsensical criticism:

"It is interesting that Williams himself never quite understood the workings of his own prosody. Thus when, in an interview of 1950, John W. Gerber asked the poet what it is that makes "This Is Just To Say" a poem, Williams replied, "In the first place, it metrically absolutely regular. . . .So, dogmatically speaking, it has to be a poem because it goes that way, don't you see!" But the. . .stanzas exhibit no regularity of stress or of syllable count; indeed, except for lines 2 and 5 (each an iamb) and lines 8 and 9 (each an amphibrach), no two lines have the same metrical form. What then can Williams mean when he says, "It's metrically absolutely regular"? Again, he mistakes sight for sound: on the page, the three little quatrains look alike; they have roughly the same physical shape. It is typography rather than any kind of phonemic recurrence that provides directions for the speaking voice (or for the eye that reads the lines silently) and that teases out the poem's meanings."

I hope you've anticipated me. The scholar is of course in the wrong, mistaking meter as solely the province of iambs and amphibrachs which themselves are completely arbitrary. WCW never said anything about "phonemic recurrence," but rather called the poem metrically regular.

Put simply meter is anything by which poetry is measured.

All poetry was originally oral. That's what happens when people haven't invented alphabets yet. And so naturally meter was determined by the sounds and rhythms native to a given language. Greek meter was based on syllable length, while Latin meter was originally based on stress and later succeeded through an unlikely synthesis of stress and syllable length (a success incidentally that English never duplicated, as evidenced by anything consciously composed of iambs and amphibrachs).

Here the scholar, Marjorie Perloff, is oblivious to the fact that William Carlos Williams was not only literate (i.e. not an oral poet), but wrote with a machine that produced characters of fixed-width (i.e. a typewriter). Had she recognized this she quite easily could have concluded that the meter was dictated by the instrument used in creation, and that the printed poem, not it's sound, was being measured.

Eureka!

However, that too would be wrong. There is no illusion of metrical regularity in the tyopgraphy, as she claims. This is her coup against WCW, that he has tricked himself with his little visual play. In fact the "three quatrains" do not look much alike at all.

When you read the poem it certainly seems metrical though. So what then? If Williams is not using word stress or syllable length, and is not mistaking typography for meter, what is it?

It's sentence stress (present in Classical Greek, but little explored), which is elusive, but an infintely more sensible measure than word accent -- unless you're a robot.

If you've any doubts about the metricality of sentence stress in the poem, read it straight through as though you'd found it on your refrigerator, then read any old piece of prose. There's a flow (in Greek: rhythmus) that sounds natural, not contrived, yet not prosaic. Incidentally Greek and Roman metricians often observed that people speak in the meters of tragic and comic dialogue without knowing it. The more native a rhythm is to a language the less identifiable it is as a "poetic" rhythm.

There's been a spate of statue smashings in Venice and despite published reports, I hardly think a vandal is on the loose.

Officials credit "an isolated lunatic," and the case of course brought to the reporter's mind Laszlo "I am Jesus Christ!" Toth.

What it brought to my mind was something others apparently see as wholly different, though it's equally insane.

What's a little stone?, some might say.

It's at once an achievement and a document, a tangible record. But I suppose that's the materialistic Western imperialist in me talking.

I'm running in an election I can't really claim I want to win, because if I win I lose. Besides, the only reason I'm in the election is that my keyboard was broken, which wasn't my fault, so I'm a true victim of circumstance.

I refuse to campaign, and I refuse to debate.

I decided to look at my watch instead.

It's now a quarter past three.....

By the time the results are ticked off, so will I be!

But here's my pledge: Win or lose, I promise to be a sore loser!

Here's a report (by Olivier Guitta of The American Thinker) which isn't getting much attention, so I thought I'd link to it here.

As far as I know, the following story has not been picked up by the US media, and that is definitely a mistake. You will see why shortly. Out of all places, I found this amazing piece in one of the most virulently Anti-American newspapers in Paris, Le Monde, in the June 25, 2004 issue.

The French reporter tells the story of an Iraqi from Tikrit, Saddam's hometown, who recently saved the lives of four US soldiers.

This hero wants to be called “Ahmed” because he does not want his true identity revealed. Ahmed fears that if anyone found out, his house would be hit right away by a rocket. He adds that he can only speak to the reporter because he is in a café in Baghdad, and not in Tikrit. Ahmed is very upset by the terror instilled by the insurgents. He remarks that even in mosques, imams cannot speak about non-violence -- otherwise their lives are threatened.

Ahmed then explains what happened on a Friday in June around Tikrit. He was picnicking with his sister and nephews when they saw an overturned US Humvee. They approached the vehicle and saw that four American soldiers injured, including two unconscious ones. At first, the soldiers were scared because they were quite certain that Ahmed was going to kill them. But then when they saw the whole family around, the soldiers grew less worried.

Ahmed doesn't speak a word of English, but nevertheless remembered the word “relax ,” and tried to explain with his hands that he would take them to the hospital. But the soldiers began yelling “NO, NO,” and asked Ahmed to take them to the US base. So, Ahmed took the two unconscious soldiers in his car and drove them to the nearest American base, while his sister stayed with the other two.

Upon arrival at the base, Ahmed was arrested, because the American soldiers obviously did not understand his Arabic explanation. But a translator soon sorted out the situation and told the soldiers from the base to go with Ahmed to fetch the two injured remaining soldiers. And they did. The GIs wanted to thank Ahmed with money, but he refused categorically and told them that he did not need any reward. Ahmed wanted more than anything else that his identity be kept secret because otherwise he would be killed on the spot by the insurgents.

Ahmed's wisdom about the situation in Iraq is incredible. He is very grateful to the US. That is what he had to say: “The Americans did not come alone and without support in Iraq. Four million Iraqis residing abroad and millions of Iraqis inside the country were totally behind them. The proof is that nobody fought to save Saddam's regime. Today, an honest Iraqi citizen can only call for the American departure. But I believe we have to help them leave in a peaceful manner. The guerillas only sabotage. They are the biggest obstacle to the reconstruction of Iraq.”

I suspect it isn't getting much play because in what passes for a morality play, the Americans are supposed to be the villains. (Or, at least, worse villains than Saddam Hussein or al Qaida.)

UPDATE: I knew of Le Monde's anti-American reputation, but still, until I read this, I hadn't appreciated the true perfidy of that vast coverup machine called The Washington Post. (To be sure, if ever cornered, they'd say it's all the fault of a 31 year old reporter who's in over his head, but considering the history of the Post I'm not buying):

Part of the explanation is Rajiv Chandrasekaran, the Baghdad bureau chief for the Washington Post. He spent most of his career on the metro and technology beats, and has only four years of foreign reporting, two of which are in Iraq. The 31-year-old now runs a news operation that can literally change the world, heading a bureau that is the source for much of the news out of Iraq.

Very few newspapers have full-time international reporters at all these days, relying on stringers of varying quality, as well as wire services such as Reuters and Agence France-Presse, also of varying quality. The Post's reporting is delivered intravenously into the bloodstream of Official Washington, and thus a front-page article out of Iraq can have major repercussions in policy-making.

This effect is magnified because of the Post's influence on what other news organizations report. While its national clout lags behind the New York Times, many reporters look to the Post for cues on how to approach a story. The Post interprets events, and the herd of independent minds bleat their approval and start tapping on their keyboards with their hooves.

....Don't take my word for it that the Post’s reporting is substandard and superficial. Take the word of Philip Bennett, the Post's assistant managing editor for foreign news. In a surprisingly candid June 6 piece, he admits that "the threat of violence has distanced us from Iraqis." Further, "we have relied on Iraqi stringers filing by telephone to our correspondents in Baghdad, and on embedding with the military. The stringers are not professional journalists, and their reports are heavy on the simplest direct observation." Translation: we are reprinting things from people we barely know, from a safe location dozens of miles away from the fighting.

....Since I saw Rajiv Chandrasekaran's integrity up close, I haven't believed a word he writes, or any story coming out of the bureau he runs. You shouldn't, either. (Via Glenn Reynolds.)

Imagine! The anti-American French are fairer to the American military than the Washington Post.

After a long litany of being spammed with many hundreds of SPAM-comments, being publicly taunted and challenged by a spammer (or spam defender), and after months of abusive comments, I am now almost ready to turn off comments, because it is taking too much time and distracting me both from blogging and from life.

It isn't fun to wake up in the morning to 225 spam comments, or to abusive comments meant only to irritate, insult, or attract attention. I shouldn't have to be bothered to even delete them, and I'd rather not.

As Glenn Reynolds reminded me, some people think less of a blog because of comments on it! The logic puzzles me, because anyone who'd think less of person A because person B comes along and says something crazy or insulting is not being logical, because unless person B has intelligently and logically rebutted person A, his comments are irrelevant to A's argument, and A is under no duty even to address them. As Mindles Dreck observed,

I don't think a guns-blazing preaching-to-the choir rhetoric changes any minds.

But we do not live in an ideal (or fair) world....

For now, I'm going to try installing a script to turn off all old comments, but life is too short for all this comment nonsense.

Right now neither script will execute, so I may be forced to turn them off entirely.

There's no rule I can see saying that blogs are supposed to be a public forum for anyone except the author. As Perry DeHavilland says, a blog is analogous to a home:

When you open your house to visitors, you do not give up the right to kick people out if they start insulting other guests and spray painting their opinions on the wall. Of course some people would say, "Oh but that is censorship if you stop them". Er, no, it is just maintaining control over what is and is not acceptable on your private property... but of course some people, the sort that I am now far quicker to ban, do not actually believe in private property (not when you pin them down), and often cannot see that censorship by the state of private media channels and editorial control over a private media channel (such as a blog, for example) are materially different things. But then to someone who thinks all interaction should be political (the usual term used is 'democratic' these days), such distinctions make little difference to them. I am not referring here to specific people but rather the general class from which our 'problem commenters' tend to spring.

UPDATE: I finally found another plugin and it seems to be working! It's set to block all comments on posts over 21 days old, which ought to get rid of at least some of the spam comments.

As Varius Crispinus reminds, the idea that anyone's mind can be changed by an illogical slogan on a bumpersticker is astonishing. Yet people obviously believe in the power of nonsense slogans, proudly displayed. One of my favorites: "POVERTY IS VIOLENCE." A demonstration that the driver of such a car does not think logically (something I don't need to be reminded of while driving).

Then there's the girl who hectored James Lileks about how the money that he earned should not be his:

Well, why is it your money? I think it should be their money.

Along this line of thought (?), the best bumpersticker I saw simply read, "WORDS ARE NOT TRUTH!" The problem was, it wasn't the only bumpersticker on the driver's car, which made me wonder whether the driver was lost in a sea of useless, lying words. One thing is certain: there is no winning or losing an argument with someone who believes (er, claims to believe) that words (er, some words) are not truth. (An old Lewis Carroll idea....)

Some words? Never mind which words! You wouldn't understand! We'll just call you names if you try!

I try to avoid accidents, so I try to stay several car lengths behind.

UPDATE: AN ECHO NOT A CHOICE? Hillary Clinton today sounded like Lileks' 18 year old girl all growed up!

We're going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good. (Via Glenn Reynolds.)

Returning from lunch today I saw a bumper sticker that read, "WAR Doesn't Decide Who's Right - Only Who's Left."

I couldn't help but think that the world is better left without the likes of Hitler.

Beyond that though there's something very naive in the logic. It presupposes that support for a given war effort is predicated upon the belief that war determines who's right. But who really believes that the good is determined by the stronger? This was the gist of Thrasymachus's argument in book one of Plato's Republic, but he also argued that injustice is the proper course of action.

Book one reads like one of Plato's shorter dialogues, which end without resolution (Socratic aporia) as Socrates concludes that he has not arrived at a definition of justice. Yet in this work the technique, and the foil of the sophist Thrasymachus, lead us into an extended exploration of justice and the ideal state, which variously touches upon warfare as an unavoidable reality, not as an exercise in determining right and wrong.

My hunch is (and now I'm suddenly interested in studying the Republic ...) that Plato would agree that war does not determine who is right, but must often be undertaken by those seeking justice as the ultimate answer to injustice.

The saturday-morning-cartoon-morality of the bumper sticker set assumes that there's more Thrasymachus than Plato in us (in point of fact the relativists opposed to war have more in common with the sophists), and we should do better than to counter that war does determine who's right.

It can, so long as the right keep up the fight and resist naive appeals to peace in the face of danger.

The Supreme Court's ruling on the seizure and detention of suspected terrorists is in.

The ruling reportedly is that "both U.S. citizens and foreign nationals seized as potential terrorists can challenge their treatment in U.S. courts."

There are a number of tricky angles on this thing. I certainly wouldn't want to be locked away on suspicion without redress. Then again, I'm a U.S. citizen. The thing I fear about this ruling is the possibility that it opens the courts to non-citizens, enemy combatants, acknowledged terrorists -- legitimizing (for example) Michael Moore's senseless call to treat Osama bin Laden as "innocent until proven guilty."

What powers does the CIC have?

Thoughts on the ruling?

People expecting to find public declarations or documents linking al Qaida to its supporting countries are a bit naive, for they forget that al Qaida is inherently a clandestine organization.

The following letter from the Iranian leadership is illustrative of the elusive nature of the clandestine relationships enjoyed between al Qaida and its patron states.

...Future sessions have been assigned to further discuss the elimination of major obstacles, further implementation and improvements with regards to a higher level of cooperations with Al Qaida Network & Hezbollah towards a specific goal. At the end, with satisfaction and complete support of your work and understanding the importance of your duties, the supreme leader insists, “Be sure, there are no trace of any support for Al Qaida which could have negative and irreversible consequences, and limit it to the present relations with “Moghnie & Al Zarghavi”.

God be with you,
Ali Akbar Nategh Nouri

Head of Supreme Leader Intelligence Office

NOTE: Nouri was President Khatami's nominal opponent in Iran's last election.

This doesn't come as news to me; I have previously posted about the Committee of Three and al Qaida's links to Iran and Hezbollah. None of this was especially controversial in the days of a Democratic admininistration. It's just that with Bush as president, terrorists must be denied out of existence. Or called "extremists," or "insurgents".....

Denial is always a good cover.

Mistakes are human. At least, so goes the conventional wisdom. But here's a story I found via my blogfather which just makes my blood boil:

Two officers of the Beaumont Police Department found one such danger when they entered a yard while responding to a call, and were surprised by a large rottwieler. Feeling threatened, they fired five rounds at the dog, killing it. There is only one problem. They were at the wrong house…

....The shooting took place Friday about 2 p.m., when a child in the house next door to Vanderford's mistakenly set off a silent panic alarm in the purse of the child's mother, Acosta said.

A responding officer went to Vanderford's house, thinking he heard that address over the radio instead of Vanderford's neighbor, Acosta said.

The two officers saw a garage door open in the back yard and an alarm placard on the house and assumed they had the right house, Acosta said. When they went around the back of the house, the dog came out of the garage and was 5 feet away when the first officer fired his weapon.

"Having no time to react, he didn't have time to retrieve the pepper spray, he felt the dog was rather large and too close, the officers reacted with their firearms," he said.

Well, what about the dog? Wasn't he just doing his job too?

Mistakes like this can be intolerable, and can create lifelong rage. It's been more than 30 years since it happened, but I've never forgiven the cops who held guns (two pistols and a shotgun) to my head, made me lie on the ground and called me names, simply because they thought I was with the Symbionese Liberation Army, which had robbed a nearby bank. (I wasn't with the SLA; I was in my own backyard and had no idea a bank had been robbed.)

At least I was alive! People have been killed because of such mistakes.

Armed self defense is not always a good idea when dealing with police, because if you lose, you're dead, and you'll look guilty as hell. The problem is complicated further in the case of undercover raids; if your house is raided erroneously and you're not a drug dealer, you'll think you're being attacked by a gang of criminals, and..... well, it's not exactly a comedy of errors.

There needs to be accountability, yet often there isn't. Sometimes, the only remedy is to hire a guy like Johnnie Cochran. And I say this as someone who isn't anti-police (I've had many good friends who are cops), although I am anti-Big Brother. The laws and the legal system are out of control, and when that happens, those charged with enforcement can get caught up in it. When there's no remedy for such sloppiness as raiding the wrong house, or storming a yard without a warrant because a baby alarm went off, we all suffer.

Arthur Chrenkoff reported an interesting quote:

"[t]he U.S. is not going to invade Sudan. That's not a plausible option. But we can pass a tough U.N. Security Council resolution authorizing troops, as well as more support for African peacekeepers. If Germany, France and Spain don't want to send troops to Iraq, then let them deploy in Darfur." (Via Glenn Reynolds.)

It's rather tough to blame Americans for Muslim genocide, but I suppose that sooner or later somebody will. Lots of antiwar people blame the U.S. for Saddam Hussein, yet they oppose lifting a finger to do anything about him.

There's also a distinct but growing tendency (on the left for the most part) to blame Americans for being killed.

I offer an idea; a modest proposal, I guess....

Why not apply the same standard to the rest of the world? That way, whenever people anywhere are killed, we can just sit back and say that they deserved it, that they shouldn't have been there, that they provoked their attackers, or that they were obviously acting like cowboys!

If it's their fault, then they got what they deserved, just like the slaughtered hostages, or even the victims of September 11. And if people got what they deserved, it makes it far easier to deal with, for justice has prevailed.

End of story!

UPDATE: I didn't realize how thoroughly this kind of blame-the-victim thinking has become a national trend -- even to the point of infecting the upper levels of American leadership. But now I see John Kerry blaming repressed Cuban dissidents for their own repression! According to Pejman Yousefzadeh

In discussing whether he would support the Varela Project, which is designed to bring about peaceful democratic reform in Cuba, Kerry remarked that he found the Project "counterproductive." Why? Because the Project "has gotten a lot of people in trouble . . . and it brought down the hammer" of the Castro regime on dissidents who are now being persecuted as a result of their participation in the Project. ....

.....[Kerry] is essentially saying that those who decided -- of their own free will -- to participate in the Varela Project and further its goals of peaceful democratic change in Cuba (a goal endorsed by former President Jimmy Carter, among others) -- brought persecution on to themselves. (Via Glenn Reynolds.)

Perhaps this is the kind of thing that voters should keep in mind come this November.

Here's a news item that ought to be great for the cell phone industry:

Mobile phones cut sperm up to 30pc
By Helen Tobler
June 28, 2004

MEN who regularly carry a mobile phone could have their sperm count reduced by as much as 30 per cent.

Those who place their phone near their groin, on a belt or in a pocket, are at greatest risk, new research has revealed.

The findings, to be presented at an international conference this week, are the first to suggest male fertility could be affected by the radiation emitted by mobile phones, also long suspected of causing cancer.

The study by Hungarian researchers found the sperm that did survive exposure to mobile phone radiation showed abnormal movements, further reducing fertility.

But Australian experts advised men not to panic yet.

Just one of the risks of life, however minute it might be. I don't know why anyone would be surprised.

It goes without saying, of course, that cell phones transmit from wherever they are located.

In this blog, I have long complained about sexual shame.

Michael Moore has reminded me that there now exists a growing, very different kind of shame, of the sort which normally is against all common sense, against national interest, and possibly even less logical than sexual shame.

Moore and those who think like him want me to be ashamed to be an American. Now, if I am not going to be shamed by people who judge others not by the content of their character but by where they place their penises, why on earth would I allow someone to tell me I should be ashamed of my country?

Where do these people get off?

UPDATE: Here's where some of them get off; by assaulting people who dare to disagree with them, even slightly. (Via Glenn Reynolds.) I wouldn't be surprised if it gets worse.

A MORE VIOLENT FORM OF SHAME: Another American hostage captured and threatened with beheading:

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Arab television broadcast videotape Sunday of two men of Pakistani origin taken hostage by militants: a driver for an American company and a blindfolded man in military fatigues described as U.S. Marine lured from his base. Insurgents threatened to behead them both.

Also, militants hit a coalition transport plane with small arms fire after takeoff from Baghdad's airport, killing an American passenger and forcing the aircraft to return. Turkey rejected demands by militants threatening to behead three Turkish hostages unless Turkish companies cease business with U.S. forces in Iraq.

The U.S. military could not immediately confirm that a Marine had been abducted, but the video shown on the Al-Jazeera network showed a card identifying the man by a Pakistani name and as an "active duty" Marine. The man had a trimmed mustache and his eyes were covered with a white blindfold.

Al-Jazeera said the militants demanded the release of all Iraqis "in occupation jails" or the man would be killed. The group claimed it infiltrated a Marine outpost, lured the man outside and abducted him.

UPDATE: Silly me! That question has already been answered, by (any wonder?) Michael Moore!

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

Lots of bloggers are mad as hell over Michael Moore's piece of anti-American, Hezbollah-supported propaganda, Fahrenheit 911.

Christopher Hitchens' and Jeff Jarvis both do an excellent job of fisking Moore and the film, and countless other bloggers (too numerous to list) have spoken up.

I am getting a lot of non-blogger traffic right now, and it occurred to me that people who don't have a blog might be wondering what if anything they can do.

Here's are a couple of things you can do:

UPDATE: I see that Varius Crispinus just wrote a post about the Hitchens piece, too! Now if he could go down to the theater with a few of those flyers, and a camera.....

UPDATE: Fritz Schranck has written an utterly damning review of Moore and his "mockumentary":

the idea that we are in this war for our own defense and in part for the defense of one of our closest allies is completely foreign to Mike Moore. Either that, or he simply chose to ignore anything that might conflict with his all-about-the-oilll argument.

Moore’s attitude about his former fellow Flint residents is one of the most annoying aspects of this film. As Moore describes them, those who decide to enlist are essentially lower-class sheep, incapable of making up their own minds without falling prey to the blandishments of a pair of Marine recruiters. How insulting is that?

One of the minor stunts he pulls off in this film also helps illustrate how fast and loose Moore is with the underlying facts.

He goes to Washington, allegedly in an attempt to entice Members of Congress to enlist their own children into the armed services. At one point, you can hear him call out to Delaware’s lone representative, Mike Castle, as Castle walks past.

Here’s a tip—if you want a Congressman to enlist his children in the Marines, you might first want to make sure he has some.

Castle has no children, a simple, easy-to-confirm fact which Moore conveniently ignores for the sake of this shtick.

This is now the third Michael Moore film we’ve watched, and whatever appeal he ever had as a filmmaker is now gone completely. That’s it. No more Mike Moore for me. He can spend his millions preaching to his own choir if he wants, but it’s obvious Moore has no interest in engaging those with whom he disagrees into anything like an honest debate of the issues.

Life’s too short to spend any more of it with a man like that.
(Via Glenn Reynolds.)

MORE: In similar vein, there's a fascinating, must-read post (via InstaNonPunk'd) on "legitimate abuse of power," which demonstrates a common ideological justification of dishonesty and abuse of logic like Moore's by claiming that the other side (in this case Limbaugh, Coulter, etc.) does it too.

Truth, as always, is irrelevant.

MORE: Jim Lynch offers a very fair review of the film, and urges Moore haters to see it. Excerpt:

If you’re a member of the Left or if you simply just hate Bush then this film is for you. This truly is the Passion of the Christ for the Left. Every negative caricature of Bush is here - the idiot, the liar, the fool, the frat boy, etc. It’s all there and you’ll enjoy every minute of it. As well you should and why not? This is raw, partisan red meat and it’s not meant to be “objective” at any point. So sit back with your favorite dainty and enjoy yourself.

Is the film worth seeing if you’re not a leftie? Yes, I believe it is. As I said above, it is not objective, fair or even accurate in how it presents George W. Bush, 9/11, Afghanistan or Iraq at various points. This is Michael Moore’s vision and this is how he sees things. As such it is an interesting and entertaining look into how the Left views the world and, more importantly, how it views George W. Bush and various events in recent history.

Andrew Sullivan refuses to see Fahrenheit 911 at all, for similar reasons:

I cannot bring myself to go to this piece of vile, hateful propaganda. I walked out of "Roger and Me" years ago, before Michael Moore was Michael Moore. I know who he is. I refuse to sit in a theater and subject myself to lies and hate.

UPDATE: Something else to do. I suppose you can always write to Mr. Moore. (I'm assuming the following is his current address, because it's also listed as his business address):

Michael Moore
225 West 83rd Street
Apartment 17L
New York, New York 10024

A friend has pointed out this piece by one of my favorite writers, Christopher Hitchens. It should be required reading for anyone who comes away convinced by Farenheit 9/11 (such as Howard Stern, who I'm pretty sure spent a sizeable portion of yesterday's show tongue-kissing Michael Moore).

Here's an excerpt, and not even the most entertaining (some of that comes when he pits Moore's own contradictions against one another):

I have already said that Moore's film has the staunch courage to mock Bush for his verbal infelicity. Yet it's much, much braver than that. From Fahrenheit 9/11 you can glean even more astounding and hidden disclosures, such as the capitalist nature of American society, the existence of Eisenhower's "military-industrial complex," and the use of "spin" in the presentation of our politicians. It's high time someone had the nerve to point this out.

I'd quote more, but the whole piece is a joy to read and well worth it. Just wait until he hits upon Moore's recent (and racist) claim about what would have happened had there been more black passengers aboard the planes.

Is Michael Moore guilty of making Islamic-style snuff films?

Read this and decide. Or this. Or how about his latest film?

Scenes include a public beheading in Saudi Arabia, Iraqis being burned by napalm, and the grisly sight of an Iraqi man dumping a dead baby into a truckbed filled with corpses.

Here's an example of fashionism: Gore calling his critics "brownshirts."

Quite aside from the general inadvisability of calling your political opponents fascists, you'd think that if Al Gore wanted to call someone a fascist, the last synonym he'd pick from the thesaurus would be "brownshirt," considering that he was famous for literally wearing a brown shirt. I'm just distracted into thinking about that whole Naomi Wolf/alpha male business again. He's lost control of his imagery in more ways than one. (Via Glenn Reynolds.)

Maybe bloggers can start a civility movement at the bottom, a sort of grassroots effort of the kind James Lileks discussed earlier:

Look. We don't have to agree on the big hard issues, but we can certainly agree that we share common values that set us apart, and that it profits no one to identify the opposition as something outside the American experience. Liberals are not Communists. Republicans are not fascists. We have a nice window of opportunity here where we can come together by choice, instead of being thrown together by events. I say we get a head start on national unity, and turn on anyone who floats the Nazi analogy. Shun 'em. No links, no reviews, no radio interviews, no newspaper pieces, nothing. From now on, the Nazi parallel buys you bupkis. This means that the right doesn't get to parade around the mutterings of high-profile wackjobs as illustrative of the heart of everyone who votes D, and the left doesn't get to do the whole "he's wrong in his overheated critique, BUT" dodge. Enough. ENOUGH! For Christ's sake, enough!

I can't say I haven't done it, because I have. (I can be real nasty, and I don't like myself when I catch myself doing it.)

I just wish people would try. Is that asking too much? And when you try and fail (as we will), there's always a thing called an apology.

In any case, I think it's going to get worse before it gets better. But as long as there are some who at least try to remain civil, logical, rational, there will be hope for the growing, uncivil minority. (I hope.)

EXTRA THOUGHT: Of course, that leaves satire....

Some people don't like satire or sarcasm at all. Yet I think it's a less malicious, less heavyhanded, less sanctimonious way of making a point than screaming that someone is evil or a Nazi. And while it's true, as Lileks says, that liberals are not Communists, what do you call Communists who are not liberals? It strikes me that calling them liberals is about as fair to liberals as calling Nazis conservatives would be to conservatives. Humor helps!

It's Friday, and Online Test Day at Classical Values, where I test my patience, and as the case may be, my patients.

From the constantly enigmatic Cultural Cuisinart, Ghost of a flea, I found a quick way to make a Classical Values drink:

The Flea's "ingredientes" are different; 1 part intelligence, 1 part self-sufficiency, and 1 very mysterious, unlisted substance, which makes the drink impossible to replicate.... (But I can cheat, can't I?)

I'll drink to either!

Ahhh...... I feel better already....

_______________________________________________

The Flea also links to "What Pulp Fiction Character Are You?" -- a test I found impossible not to take, because I liked the film, and I wanted to know whether I'd get the same result:

. You are the king of smooth -- enough said. Take the What Pulp Fiction Character Are You? quiz.

Nick turned out to be Koons, who's described as "paranoid, and perhaps a bit whacked."

Funny, because most of my friends think that would apply to me. Perhaps I am too paranoid to answer the questions honestly.....

_________________________________________

Meanwhile, Marie at Ordinary Galoot has been blogging up a storm, and I am delighted to see that her wit has been noticed by the great humorist Frank J.. Her IMAO-inspired post involves a cage full of hundreds of people doing time for perjury under Clinton, snake, Clinton head, cigar, and chained "No Time for Slime" clock ticking away. Making Frank feel dirty is quite an accomplishment, Marie! I never managed to do that!

Marie also featured a quick, easy-to-take, warning label test, and mine did not disappoint:

Oh what a tangled web we weave!

___________________________________

That's it for the tests!

But Marie had more, and it was something important.

In a post near and dear to my heart, she discusses the shameful treatment meted out to the Pink Pistols by the forces of political correctness:

[T]he parade people prefer that the Pink Pistols portray only the party line and port no pistols on parade.

Actually, the Gay Pride People letter wasn't nearly as snotty as one has come to expect from the leftwing. It was worded in a downright civil manner! Frankly, I can kinda sorta see why they wouldn't want concealed carry in a parade, but on the other hand I can't see having a parade at all. It just blocks traffic and annoys people. On the third hand, I don't exactly see how they think they're going to confiscate anybody's weapon, and on the fourth hand, it'd be nice if they'd respect others' right just as much as they want others to respect their rights. and if I continue in this vein, I'll need an extra pair of mittens.

(Something I have posted about before, here, and here.....)

My blogfather Jeff weighs in on the Pink Pistols' bout with official gay intolerance, and links to a very well-deserved spanking of the PC crowd by James R. Rummel.

I find myself disgusted by the shabby treatment of the Pink Pistols, and if they're that sickeningly politically correct in Ohio, I shudder to think what would happen in San Francisco....

My patience has been tested to the max!

From the 'old news is good news so long as it's ridiculous' department ...

Those who know better than you are gaining ground the world over.

Following Canada's customarily laughable lead, Australia will now require cigarette manufacturers to display images of cancerous and diseased limbs and organs, a step the EU had agreed to take lat last year. (Similar legislation failed to make it through the House last year, despite the efforts of the AMA.)

It's considered a success by fanatics in Canada who've recorded a 3% decrease in smoking, though Australian tobacconists are surely correct in calling the measure "a desperate tactic" that "will not alter smoking patterns."

It's not that I favor smoking or have ever even considered smoking (it never appealed to me, and I never tried).

It's the notion that the central government of any nation should be wasting its time with this kind of legislation, and that there are evidently legions of crusaders fighting the good fight against this most evil of threats against humanity.

Does it strike anyone as odd that support for the war on cigarettes seems easier to obtain than support for the war on terrorism?

I'm reminded of those obnoxious "Compliance Alliance" ads we're bombarded with on a daily basis in Pennsylvania.

Apparently it is a real organization that recruits kids to entrap retailers who sell cigarettes by using any means necessary to convince them to sell without seeing ID (if their ads are at all accurate).

Yet while they claim to be fighting Big Tobacco's manipulation of kids (their tag line is "Elimination of Manipulation"), they target $7 an hour cashiers, manipulating them into breaking the law. Their most insidious and distasteful ad is heard daily on the radio:

A girl asks a male cashier for cigarettes, and he tells her that he needs to see ID. She of course gives him some old line about forgetting it, but she always buys her cigarettes here or something. He sounds a bit awkward and uncomfortable at being pressured, but still unwilling to sell. Her friend pipes up claiming to recognize him from a party, and they giggle and say that they thought he was cute.

After flirtation and flattery he relents, but says that next time they need to remember their IDs.

They turn on him instantly, laughing at him and telling him that what he did was "not cool" and that he'd just broken the law. And then there's the ominous warning that "the law is real and there will be consequences." If this had been a "real" compliance check, they inform him, he would have been "busted" (incidentally, "Busted" is the group's official name). He of course sounds embarrased and upset.

This is obviosuly just a commercial, and all are surely just actors playing parts, but instilling the fear that big brother might come at any time in the guise of a teenage girl was intentional, as was the threat of legal action and subtle use of sexual humiliation.

The state of PA has done a masterful job of manipulation itself in hiding the fact that "Busted!" is their operation even in this press release. The only indication is the blurb that they work in conjunction with the PA Dept. of Health. Throughout the site they claim that the organization is run by kids, for kids. This farce is maintained in part by the intentionally amateurish look of the site, though the site was registered by (hence probably designed by)a professional tech company with a competent design department that has produced many professional looking sites.

There's no real information anywhere about how and when the group was formed, exactly how children organized and funded themselves, and why they cared enough to harrass minimum wage earners. But there's plenty of circumstantial evidence that the state has been behind the whole thing and has been trying to lend an air of "grass roots" legitimacy to it.

Things like this power point document
, or better yet this PDF of the Annual Report of the fiscal year july '02-june '03 which shows that the state spent well over $1 million on the program and "trained" the kids who "lead" the initiative.

I'm just wondering why they go to such lengths to hide state involvement and the fact that the state created the organization.

Here's a new report of WMDs found in (of all places) Iraq:

The head of the U.S. team conducting the search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq announced on Thursday that his group has uncovered at least ten more artillery shells filled with banned chemical weapons and is finding new WMD evidence "almost every day."

"We've found ten or twelve Sarin and Mustard rounds," said Charles Duelfer, who replaced David Kay as head of the Iraq survey group earlier this year after Kay concluded that WMDs were unlikely to be found.

"We're not sure how many more are out there that we haven't found," Duelfer added, in an exclusive interview with Fox News Channel's Brit Hume. "There are still surprises out there. We're finding things and we're getting reports of hidden caches almost every day which we have to investigate."

Last month, the Pentagon confirmed that the first of the Iraq WMD findings - two shells suspected of containing deadly chemical weapons - were indeed filled with Sarin and Mustard gas.

None of these WMDs will "count." The story won't be reported, because there has been an agreement that there are no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

And there never will be!

What would it take?

Will one of these shells have to explode and kill a few hundred soldiers? If that happens, then who will be said to have lied?

(How does the rest of it go? "While people died"?)

Readers may have noticed that the elusive Justin Case (whose interest lies in technology, science fiction, and other things of which I am woefully ignorant) has finally authored his first post -- a review of the thought processes in the mind of one of modern Luddism's pioneers, a guy named Jeremy Rifkin.

For some time, I have tried to shame and pressure Justin into blogging, and I suspect once he saw that classical scholar VARIUS CRISPINUS was added as an author here, he finally felt comfortable enough to begin.

Some of you might remember my various Leon Kass posts (best known of which was the ice cream post), which were inspired, aided and abetted by Justin. But that's not all. Justin, whom I have known for 30 years, is the guy I credit with making me start blogging. And I know how to return a favor. (At least, when I can.....)

I cannot tell you how delighted I am by this development, and I hope readers like it, because the goal is more and better postings all the time.

WELCOME JUSTIN!

Ice cream I scream for more!

Since it's recent launch, NRANews is not only doing well, they've expanded. The show can now be heard on Sirius Radio. Plus, if you don't have the Sirius equipment, there's a special offer for NRA members. I'd be an idiot not to take advantage of this, because it's a fraction of what you'd pay in the stores.

NRANews is not only blogger-friendly, but host Cam Edwards is a blogger himself. (And the left is listening. Hmmm, I mean watching!) I heard one show featuring Dean Esmay and James Joyner, and more blogger interviews are in the works. (Dean, by the way, linked to NRANews' interview with Chief Wiggles.)

Yesterday, there was this editorial in the Chicago Tribune:

The National Rifle Association last week launched a daily satellite radio program, “NRA News,” to provide news and pro-gun commentary to an estimated 400,000 listeners. With that, the nation’s oldest gun rights group transformed itself into the nation’s newest news organization.

At least, that’s how the NRA sees it. Critics say the NRA’s new radio show is actually a thinly disguised ploy to ricochet its way around campaign finance laws. Well, sure it is. And though we’re no fans of the NRA agenda, we’ll say this to NRA News: Welcome to the broadcast media world. You have every right to be there.

Among the many grotesque distortions created by the McCain-Feingold campaign finance “reform” law passed in 2002 is a rule about how organizations can spend money on political speech close to Election Day. The law essentially forbids independent groups from buying political advertising that criticizes or praises candidates by name within 60 days of a general election and 30 days of a primary election.

Yes, the law attempts to create a criticism-free zone for candidates.

Amazing.

At least the law exempts the news media from this restriction. Apparently someone noticed that language about a ‘free press’ in the 1st Amendment.

Since the law exempts news organizations, their editorial endorsements and the rest of their political commentary, the NRA intends to get its political message out through this radio program.

Will campaign reformers or anti-gun groups challenge the NRA ploy? Go ahead, the association says, make their day. “Tom Paine was free to pamphlet,” said Wayne LaPierre, NRA executive vice president. “So are we.” Absolutely true. A legal challenge to NRA News would be offensive to this nation’s 1st Amendment principles of free speech and a free press. That has always been one of the failings of efforts to curtail political campaign spending and advertising. The government is in the position of determining which political speech is free and which is not. News reporting and analysis, in print or on broadcast, are exempt from legal restrictions, and so should other forms of political speech. The voters are intelligent enough to decide for themselves which political views they wish to support and which they don’t.

First, though, voters must be free to hear those views.

This newspaper often disagrees with what the NRA has to say—and we have the freedom to voice that in any edition of the newspaper. The notion that the NRA would be restricted in what it can say and when it can say it is offensive. In that spirit, NRA News should be welcome to fire away—with words, preferably, not live ammo.

But the question of what is journalism is a good one. Glenn Reynolds doesn't think that the First Amendment creates any privileged or protected groups, as we all have the same rights. Because as Glenn p