born live love die

George Will is in a lather, as only George will.

But Jim Webb, Democratic senator-elect from Virginia, has become a pompous poseur and an abuser of the English language before actually becoming a senator.

He is calling Webb a pompous poseur?  That is certainly the pot calling the kettle charbroiled.  Will recounts the encounter between Webb and Bush from the last week and then says this:

Webb certainly has conveyed what he is: a boor. Never mind the patent disrespect for the presidency.

Actually, Webb has a lot of respect for the presidency, but not the current occupant fo that office.  Will is the one who conflates the two and is in err.

Will wraps it up with:

Based on Webb’s behavior before being sworn in, one shudders to think what he will be like after that. He already has become what Washington did not need another of, a subtraction from the city’s civility and clear speaking.

No, he is exactly what Washington needs: someone who won’t roll over, wave his legs in the air and wait to have his tummy tickled.

But George will.

Last week, Cheney was summoned to Saudi Arabia.  This week, Nawaf Obaid lets the other shoe drop.

In February 2003, a month before the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, the Saudi foreign minister, Prince Saud al-Faisal, warned President Bush that he would be “solving one problem and creating five more” if he removed Saddam Hussein by force. Had Bush heeded his advice, Iraq would not now be on the brink of full-blown civil war and disintegration.

One hopes he won’t make the same mistake again by ignoring the counsel of Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to the United States, Prince Turki al-Faisal, who said in a speech last month that “since America came into Iraq uninvited, it should not leave Iraq uninvited.” If it does, one of the first consequences will be massive Saudi intervention to stop Iranian-backed Shiite militias from butchering Iraqi Sunnis.

Who is Mr. Obaid?  The article says that he is an advisor to the Saudi  government, but we are in Pravda-watching territory.  He would not have written this op-ed piece without the approval of some high level member of the royal family.  Read the whole thing.

The nature with the Bush Administration was on full display when Alberto Gonzales visited with Wolf Blitzer on CNN.

BLITZER: Looking back on the decisions that you’ve made, at the White House, now at the Justice Department, anything jump to mind, anything that you deeply regret, a decision that you made?

GONZALES: Oh, I think that you and I — I’d have to spend some time thinking about that. Obviously, I’m not going to say that I am perfect and that I’ve been perfect in doing my job. Obviously, I’ve made some recommendations to my client. Some of those recommendations have not been supported in the courts. In hindsight, you sometimes wonder, whether perhaps the recommendation should have been something different.

But I do the very best I can as a lawyer. Evaluating the law, looking at the precedent, looking at the words of the statute, the words of the Constitution, in making my best recommendation in good- faith to the president of the United States. That’s all that I can do. And that’s what I will continue to do as attorney general of the United States.

Did you get that?  The President is the Attorney General’s client.  Not the people of the United States, the President.  This has never been the case in the history of the country, but by assertion, Gonzales, et. co., have made it so.

Also the nature of the press was on display, for they have rolled over like a bottom dog, waiting to have it’s tummy scratched.

Steve Gilliard has a good post up about how our options for leaving Iraq are few. He writes about a fighting retreat from Baghdad.

This is the Green Zone. If there is any sort of military action there, evacuation will be hard, if not impossible to accomplish, party because of the concentration of people and bodies. The main evacuation route to Baghdad Airport is a long, isolated highway the US calls Route Irish.

It is the most dangerous road in the world, and to travel it escorted is $3-5000 one way.

It is clear that loading up convoys with people and running them toward the airport will turn the route Irish into a turkey shoot.

We probably have contingency plans for setting up evacuation points around the city from which to collect evacuees. We can set up a defensive perimeter at some remove from built up areas and evacuate from there. We have air cover, but the roads may well be mined right now. This will be an overland retreat through the desert. Logistical support for such a retreat will also be difficult. The advance to Baghdad was delayed because of logistical problems, mainly fuel shortages. We will have the same problems during a fighting retreat.

His post has some good satellite imagery, check it out.

One of my favorite books is “The Genius of the People”, a book about writing the Constitution.  The genius of the people was not on display when the Supreme Court heard oral arguments about global warming.

“I mean,” asked Justice Antonin Scalia, “when is the predicted cataclysm?”

Scalia was one of several justices to remark on a lack of scientific expertise during an hour of questioning.

If he isn’t qualified, shouldn’t he recuse himself?

Massachusetts Assistant Attorney General James R. Milkey told the court that 200 miles of the state’s coastline are threatened by rising seas, a result of global warming.”The harm does not suddenly spring up in the year 2100; it plays out continuously over time,” Milkey said in answer to Scalia’s question. “Once these gases are emitted . . . they stay a long time — the laws of physics take over.”

Milkey faced skeptical questioning from Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., the court’s newest members, but the most sustained — and entertaining — interrogation came from Scalia.

At one point, he acknowledged the role of carbon dioxide as a pollutant in the air but wondered about it being a pollutant in the “stratosphere.”

“Respectfully, Your Honor, it is not the stratosphere. It’s the troposphere,” Milkey said.

“Troposphere, whatever. I told you before I’m not a scientist.”

Supreme Court, whatever.

For the first time since the American Revolution, the United States is fighting a protracted war with an all-volunteer force. The strain on both the military establishment and individual service members is apparent. But although there has been considerable concern that an all-volunteer approach could not possibly fill the ranks in wartime, both recruiting and retention of military personnel have remained strong during more than three years of American military operations in Iraq.

Finally, recruits come disproportionately from neighborhoods with above-average incomes. This was true before the war with Iraq, and it remains true today. In fact, those recruited during the war are more likely to come from affluent neighborhoods than are those who were recruited before the war.

A recent study by Tim Kane of the Heritage Foundation — which is consistent with our own analyses — showed that the percentage of recruits coming from the highest-income Zip codes in the United States had increased steadily since 1999, while the percentage coming from the lowest-income Zip codes had declined. By 2005 high-income areas were producing five recruits for every three from low-income areas. At the same time, recruit quality, as measured by high school diploma rates and aptitude test scores, remained high.

Those choosing to enlist in the military do so for a variety of reasons. Many are interested in economic factors, such as skills training and GI Bill educational benefits.

Lying bastards.

Charlie Rangel is right. If the people making the decision to seek war had kin at risk, we would have fewer wars.

Richard Clarke writes cogently about Iraq.

Too often in the Iraq debate, we have let intuition, slogans and appealing thoughts cloud logic. Perhaps the most troublesome example is the argument that we must honor the American dead by staying until we can build something worthy of their sacrifice.

Stripped of its emotional tones, this argument is, in economic analysis, an appeal to sunk cost. An MIT professor once promised to fail me if I ever justified actions based on sunk cost – so I learned that what is gone is gone, and what is left we should conserve, cherish and employ wisely.

Absolutely. The argument for sunk costs is an emotional one, but it is time to look past emotions.

Still, President Bush insists on staying in Iraq, and it is easy to understand why. In “The March of Folly” (Ballantine, 1985), Barbara Tuchman documented repeated instances when leaders persisted in disastrous policies well after they knew that success was no longer an available outcome. They did so because the personal consequences of admitting failure would be very high. So they postponed the disastrous end to their policy adventures, hoping for a deus ex machina or to eventually shift the blame.

There is no need to do that now. Everyone already knows who is to blame. It is time to stop the adventure, lower our sights and focus on America’s core interests. And that means withdrawal of major combat units.

Amen.

Michael Kinsley tries to shine a light on capitalism.

So free-market capitalism has decreed three different values for this company. One is set by the stock market: the value of all the company’s outstanding shares, or “market capitalization.” One is what the private investors are offering — usually a bit more than the market cap. And one is what the private investors sell the company for a blink of an eye later — which is usually a lot more than the other two. Which of these numbers is the true capitalist price? Which one represents the most sublime interaction of supply and demand? Anyone? Anyone?

Defenders of this procedure say it’s not that the stockholders have been swindled. It’s that the company is actually far more valuable in private hands because managers — even the same managers as before — can manage far better without the constraints of public ownership, with its meddlesome stockholders and nettlesome regulations. Maybe so. But if these deals aren’t a swindle, then the stock market itself is a swindle. It does not maximize value for its working- and middle-class investors. The stock market leaves money on the table waiting for “private equity” to swoop down and pick it up. Furthermore, Milton Friedman was wrong and the other famous economist who died this year, John Kenneth Galbraith, was right: The free market in corporate shares doesn’t produce well-run companies.

There are those who say that a free, capitalistic market is the best way to manage the allocation of resources. They say that capitalism drops ideas that don’t work. They are giving capitalism too much credit.

Capitalism is an inevitable outcome of trade between people.

But one need look no further than the cell phone market to see that capitalism is not about delivering better products to the marketplace, generating best return on investment, or providing the best cost benefit to the consumer. Cell phone companies have built out four incompatible nationwide networks of cell towers, do not allow customers to use features built into phones unless the customer pays extra and put all of their efforts into building market share.

I remember a Far Side cartoon where there are some dogs stranded on a desert island, and one says “First, let’s eat all the food.” Capitalists are like that.

Capitalism rewards short term goal seeking; capitalism requires moderation.

Trying to moderate capitalism is like trying to feed tofu to an alligator by hand. Good luck with that.

I agree.

He has proposed it in the past, but it was more of a gimmick then.  He is serious now.  But he is not getting any support from House Democratic leadership.

Rangel’s previous bids to reinstate the draft stirred little interest in Congress but considerable agitation among some bloggers and talk radio hosts, who suggested the public was about to be blindsided. Yesterday, congressional leaders tried to allay such fears, saying the 2007-08 legislative agenda will not include a resumption of the draft.

“Mr. Rangel will be very busy with his work on the Ways and Means Committee, whose jurisdiction is quite a different jurisdiction,” Speaker-elect Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told reporters. Ways and Means handles tax matters, not military legislation.

Cut the condescending crap.  The leaders who so easily balance a vote for war against the impact that it will have on their political future are not thinking about the young Americans who are being put at risk, because they are not connected vicerally to those young Americans.

When things go well, take credit, but duck responsibility when things go wrong.  This is the secret to success in business and the neo-cons are doing it in the public sector.

The weekend after the statue of Saddam Hussein fell, Kenneth Adelman and a couple of other promoters of the Iraq war gathered at Vice President Cheney’s residence to celebrate. The invasion had been the “cakewalk” Adelman predicted. Cheney and his guests raised their glasses, toasting President Bush and victory. “It was a euphoric moment,” Adelman recalled.

Forty-three months later, the cakewalk looks more like a death march, and Adelman has broken with the Bush team. He had an angry falling-out with Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld this fall. He and Cheney are no longer on speaking terms. And he believes that “the president is ultimately responsible” for what Adelman now calls “the debacle that was Iraq.”

Shorter Adelman: The plan was good, but the process was wrong.  Lying bastards.