The Harvard College Freshman Pledge

This is a fascinating report, from Virginia Postrel, "Harvard Now Values ‘Kindness’ Not Learning." For example:

Kindness isn’t a public or intellectual virtue, but a personal one. It is a form of love. Kindness seeks, above all, to avoid hurt. Criticism -- even objective, impersonal, well- intended, constructive criticism -- isn’t kind. Criticism hurts people’s feelings, and it hurts most when the recipient realizes it’s accurate. Treating “kindness” as the way to civil discourse doesn’t show students how to argue with accuracy and respect. It teaches them instead to neither give criticism nor tolerate it.

And at Bits and Pieces (the blog of Harvard Professor Harry Lewis, "The Freshman Pledge":

Its purpose is to make people think and to induce conversation on the important matter of civility and generosity. I am assured that the intention is not to make anyone feel compelled to sign the pledge.

In this case, alas, the line between an invitation and a compulsion is exceedingly narrow, and I doubt those who explain it to students can consistently do so with the required nuance. The pledge is delivered to students for signing by their proctors, the officers of the College who monitor their compliance with Harvard rules and report their malfeasances to the College's disciplinary board. Nonconformists would have good reason to fear that they will be singled out for extra scrutiny. And their unsigned signature lines are hung for all to see, in an act of public shaming. Few students, in their first week at Harvard, would have the courage to refuse this invitation. I am not sure I would advise any student to do so.

The substance of the pledge is critically important. This is not a pledge to refrain from cheating, or to take out the garbage. It is not a pledge to act in a certain way. It is a pledge to think about the world a certain way, to hold precious the exercise of kindness. It is a promise to control one's thoughts. Though it refers to sound institutional values affirmed at Commencement, the pledge pretends to affirm them not through the educational process to which the Dean testifies, but through a prior restraint on students' freedom of thought. A student would be breaking the pledge if she woke up one morning and decided it was more important to achieve intellectually than to be kind.

Chilling. Our very highest institution of learning, once again seen as among the most totalitarian.

Via Maggie's Farm.

How to Save the Euro

At The Economist, "It requires urgent action on a huge scale. Unless Germany rises to the challenge, disaster looms":

SO GRAVE, so menacing, so unstoppable has the euro crisis become that even rescue talk only fuels ever-rising panic. Investors have sniffed out that Europe’s leaders seem unwilling ever to do enough. Yet unless politicians act fast to persuade the world that their desire to preserve the euro is greater than the markets’ ability to bet against it, the single currency faces ruin. As credit lines gum up and outsiders plead for action, it is not just the euro that is at risk, but the future of the European Union and the health of the world economy.

Keep reading. The piece keeps mentioning the "restructuring of debt," which follows from the fact that some European states simply can't make good on their obligations, and sovereign default would hammer commercial banks and cause even deeper economic turmoil. But the larger issue is whether EU members deal with the crisis in multilateral fashion or retreat to narrower self-interest, casting off Greece to its own misfortunes, and so forth...

RELATED: At New York Times, "Suddenly, Over There Is Over Here" (via Memeorandum).

Tyndale University Buckles to Pressure From 'Social Justice' Activists, Cancels George W. Bush Speech

All someone has to do is scream "war criminal," and university administrators will cave. And this is a Christian institution.

At The Blaze, "CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITY CANCELS GEORGE W. BUSH SPEECH AMID STUDENT & FACULTY PROTESTS." And Blazing Cat Fur, "Michael Coren: Tyndale University Caves to Cultural Marxists Cancels George W Bush Speech":

Meetings on European Debt Crisis End in Debate, but Little Progress

This story's interesting beyond the financial crisis itself. Europeans snubbed Tim Geithner, but why? They think he's a clown? They think the Obama administration's a joke? Or America's weakened structurally, and it wouldn't have mattered who was Treasury Secretary?

See New York Times:

WROCLAW, Poland — European finance ministers ended a two-day meeting here Saturday without making substantial progress toward solving the region’s debt crisis, or any pledge to recapitalize Europe’s banks.

The meetings were highlighted by the appearance by Timothy F. Geithner, the United States treasury secretary, whose advice, and warnings, drew a tepid reaction from the euro zone’s finance ministers. And Mr. Geithner’s rejection Friday of a European idea for a global tax on financial transactions prompted a debate about whether Europe should go ahead on its own.

Meanwhile, with an October deadline looming for international lenders to agree to the release of around 8 billion euros, or $11 billion, of aid to Greece, without which it could default on its debt, George Papandreou, the Greek prime minister, canceled a trip to the United States.

“The coming week is particularly critical for the implementation of the July 21 decisions in the euro area and the initiatives which the country must undertake,” Mr. Papandreou said in a statement on Saturday.

The attendance of an American official at Friday’s meeting was unusual, and Jacek Rostowski, the finance minister of Poland who invited Mr. Geithner, said it showed “unity within the transatlantic family.”

That glossed over the grumbling about Mr. Geithner’s comments from several European ministers Friday, including Maria Fekter of Austria, who publicly said she was unimpressed with Mr. Geithner’s contribution.

Yet the American plea for urgent decisions to shore up the euro zone was echoed Saturday by two European ministers whose nations have stayed outside the single currency.

Freaks of Nature?

No, not Lucy Pinder's lovely endowments. It's the rare mutant baby seal and Robert Stacy McCain's 12-year-old son, seen further down at the post: "Freaks of Nature."

But you gotta give it to McCain. Even his advertising's doing some awesome Rule 5 work over there.

RELATED: "VIDEO: Lucy Pinder Sexy 2012 Calendar."

NewsBusted: 'Economists predict America's unemployment rate will remain high for several more years'

Via Theo Spark:

Sarah Jessica Parker's Secret for Successful Marriage: Hating Husband Matthew Broderick for 20 Minutes a Day

At London's Daily Mail, "Why I allow myself 20 minutes a day to hate my husband, by Sarah Jessica Parker":

So now we know how she does it.

Sarah Jessica Parker has discussed the unconventional secret behind the success of her 14 year relationship.

The 46-year-old star admitted that she coped with married life by allowing herself 20 minutes a [day] to 'hate' her husband Matthew Broderick.

The actress was chatting [to] Ryan Seacrest on his KISS FM breakfast show when he quizzed her about comments she made earlier this month about allowing herself moments of rage.

The I Don't Know How She Does It Star replied: 'I think that's healthy and I think it's realistic.'

'Some people have it down to 20 minutes a week. Other unfortunate people have it down to 20 minutes per hour.'

I don't ever "hate" my wife. And it's rare that I even allow myself to be angry with her. When we've had marital difficulties I felt both sad and somewhat resigned, but usually not angry. When I get angry I want to strike out, and that's not a healthy emotion for me, so I avoid it. And my wife and I are committed to our marriage through "better or worse," so separation has never really been an option for us. It would take something extreme, like a death of one of our children and a subsequent emotional and psychological implosion, to really sink our partnership. We live for family. (And of course there's never been questions of infidelity, which I imagine would be a deal-breaker, but cheating isn't part of our experience or even a considered possibility.) I think you have to take a deep breath every day and thank God for having someone who loves you (with all your faults), and who's there for you in "sickness and in health." Besides, I just don't think 20 minutes of hating your spouse is all that healthy, but it's Sarah Jessica Parker's marriage not mine.

Roman Gladiator School Found in Austria

This is cool.

At National Geographic, "Huge Gladiator School Found Buried in Austria" (via Maggie's Farm).

Also at Daily Mail, "Archaeologists discover remains of a Roman gladiator school in Austria."

Mila Kunis Rule 5

Enjoy: "Mila Kunis: A Late-Night Host We Can Agree Upon (VIDEO)."

What We Got Right in the War on Terror

I was hoping to do some big analysis of Abe Greenwald's masterful essay, at Commentary, but never got around to it. This is simply the best piece I've read on the war on terror:

Over the course of the 10 years, American authorities foiled more than two dozen al-Qaeda plots. Those averted tragedies were not foremost on the minds of revelers who gathered to celebrate Bin Laden’s demise on May 1 at Ground Zero, Times Square, and in front of the White House. But if a mere few of the plots had materialized, those spaces might not even have been open to public assembly.

Not only have U.S. authorities managed to keep America safe from al-Qaeda for a decade; by the time he was killed, Osama bin Laden was barely a leader. Among the items recovered at his compound in Abbottabad were some recent writings, in which the former icon lamented al-Qaeda’s dramatically sinking stock and pondered organizational rebranding as a possible antidote.

His growing insignificance as a global player was not the product of chance. The marginalization of the world’s principal jihadist was the result of audacious American policy—indeed, the most controversial and hotly debated policy undertaken in the wake of 9/11. In the words of Reuel Marc Gerecht writing in the Wall Street Journal, “the war in Iraq was Bin Laden’s great moral undoing.” In his desperate attempt to drive American fighting forces out of Mesopotamia, Bin Laden sanctioned a bloody civil war in Iraq in 2005 and 2006. The carnage failed to repel the United States, but in the end, the countrywide slaughter of Muslims proved too much to bear for al-Qaeda’s own one-time and would-be supporters. The “Sunni awakening” that helped transform Iraq was an awakening out of al-Qaeda jihadism, and the blow it delivered to Bin Laden’s ambitions was stunning.

After the turnaround in Iraq, the landscape of the Muslim world suffered even greater changes—with ordinary Muslims rising to revolt against Persian and Arab tyranny, not against American hegemony. As Fouad Ajami has written: “The Arab Spring has simply overwhelmed the world of the jihadists. In Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Bahrain, and Syria, younger people—hurled into politics by the economic and political failures all around them—are attempting to create a new political framework, to see if a way could be found out of the wreckage that the authoritarian states have bequeathed them.”

It was the Freedom Agenda of the George W. Bush administration—delineated and formulated as a conscious alternative to jihadism—that showed the way. Indeed, the costly American nation-building in Iraq has now led to the creation of the world’s first and only functioning democratic Arab state. One popular indictment of Bush maintains that he settled on the Freedom Agenda as justification for war after U.S. forces and inspectors found no Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. The record shows otherwise. “A free Iraq can be a source of hope for all the Middle East,” he said before the invasion, in February 2003. “Iraq can be an example of progress and prosperity in a region that needs both.”

And something of the kind has come to pass. “One despot fell in 2003,” Ajami has said. “We decapitated him. Two despots, in Tunisia and Egypt, fell, and there is absolutely a direct connection between what happened in Iraq in 2003 and what’s happening today throughout the rest of the Arab world.”

Thus, there are three intertwined achievements that have proved to be the dispositive features of American success in the war on terror: formulating the Freedom Agenda in the Middle East, reversing the course of the war in Iraq, and establishing a national-security apparatus to foil multiple terrorist attacks. It is no coincidence that they are also the most controversial foreign policies America has implemented since the Vietnam War.

September 11 was a hinge moment in American history. The attacks plunged the nation into a full-scale war against non-state entities. Any adequate American response had to break with previous approaches in previous conflicts. War could not be waged on parties inside states in the same way it had been waged on states themselves. Prisoners captured on a battlefield in a country not their own and with no interest in following the rules of conventional war could not be handled as they had been. Getting the edge on Islamist terror would mean fundamentally rethinking our approach to both the blunting of deadly threats and the shuttering of the political hothouses of the Middle East in which such threats thrive.

The adoption of these unprecedented and uncompromising means of war inspired animated debate in the United States. In fighting the war on terror, we have been told, America has become—depending on the accuser—either too dismissive or too enamored of democracy. Some on the left think our national-security apparatus undermines our defining ideals. On the right, outraged voices condemn our naive enthusiasm for helping to secure liberty for Muslims abroad, calling it a form of multicultural self-sabotage. After civil war seized post-invasion Iraq, critics from across the ideological spectrum denounced our misguided effort. The fits and starts and frustrations of the war decade have this one thing in common: we have done battle in an age when spectacular setbacks appear to provide irrefutable evidence of our own baseness and incompetence—a few years before drab good news arrives to refute both expert opinion and common knowledge.

The arguments that we have prosecuted the war on terror immorally and ineffectually are important, and deserve the respectful hearing they have received, even if many of those arguing these points have resorted to launching the most abject slanders and accusations toward those who believe the war on terror is just and has been fought honorably. To be sure, not everything the United States has done in the war on terror has been correct. Far from it. As Winston Churchill said, “War is mainly a catalogue of blunders.” In the fight against Islamist terrorism, American blunders have come in all shapes and sizes, and in truth there are few small wartime miscalculations. This is especially so in an age of instant global headlines.

We continue to suffer for our biggest mistakes. Concerning the failure to catch Bin Laden and make serious efforts to nation-build early in the Afghanistan war, inaccurate intelligence about Saddam Hussein’s weapons, and the Pentagon’s ill-preparedness for the Iraqi insurgency, there can be no absolution. These errors have cost the country tragic sums in money, credibility, and life. They also set our efforts back precious years.

But these blunders, great as they are, have not undone America’s outstanding accomplishments. Ten years ago, the most delusional optimist among us would not have predicted the irrelevancy of Osama bin Laden or a decade without another al-Qaeda attack, let alone a democratic Iraq and a transformative explosion of antiauthoritarianism in the Middle East.

Nor do American achievements in this war mean we are in a position to quit the fight. The notion that America achieved closure with Bin Laden’s killing suggests to some, perhaps even the occupant of the White House, that the war on terror has had its decade and the United States can now move on. “America, it is time to focus on nation-building here at home,” said Barack Obama this summer as he announced a sizable drawdown of troops in Afghanistan for the fall of 2012. The suggestion that our work is done has traction only because resolute American action at home and abroad have provided a sense of security so pervasive it now goes unquestioned.

The United States has fallen prey to false comfort in the past. So before we submit to the siren song of closure, we would do well to recall that that is exactly where this war began—and our retaining some genuine measure of security has been the result of thinking and acting more boldly than we have in generations.

Now go read the whole thing.

The Courtney Messerschmidt Scam

I've held off posting this. Last weekend brought the news that Courtney Messerschmidt is merely the front-woman with a fake name for a collective of writers at GSGF.

Thomas Ricks, who invested a lot in Courtney, wasn't too bothered by the outing: "pHoNy GrEaT sAtAn'S gIrLfRiEnD." Neither was Crispin Burke at Wings Over Iraq.

I can't say the news didn't bother me, although I'd known for a long time that all was not right with Courtney Messerschmidt.

I got the news via Facebook, as did a number of people who Courtney'd been working with. I didn't quite understand it at first, because it wasn't a personalized note. Yeah, she confessed that she wasn't the primary author of GSGF, and that she hadn't attended the University of Georgia. But Courtney's been communicating with me since mid-2007. She'd write emails to wish me a good day at work, or to ask questions about neoconservatism. I considered her a friend and neocon protégé.

So I felt a real sense of betrayal. Indeed, Courtney and I exchanged hundreds of e-mails. She sent me this background in late 2007:

On Wed, Nov 21, 2007 at 6:28 PM, Courtney Messerschmidt wrote:

Hi Donald,

Ok - whenever you start to zzzzz out, please remember that you asked.

My 'rents are very old. In fact I have nieces and nephews older than me. My mom taught college and my dad retired frm the AF and works at a world famous aeronautical firm near Atlanta. He says he'll know when he gets to retire from that depending on what school I go to. One of my brother in laws is a Capt in 'Old Ironsides' - America's Armor division. He was an LT in Najaf I think in Aug 2003 when Mookie Al Sadr's Mahdih Army v1.0 was granted access to the perfumed halls of Allah.

When all my friends plowed through Paris' heiress book - I was plowing through Dennis Ross' "Missing Peace", Bodansky's "High Cost of Peace" and "Beyond Paradise and Power" by Ischinger, Fukyama, Applebaum and others, Michael Oren's "6 days of war". Alexander Bevin's "How America got it right' and Larry Schwiekert's "America's Victories" are essntial reading.

I have widely traveled throughout Europe including Ireland, Great Britain, France, Benelux, Deutschland, Czech repub, Italy, Greece and Belgium. In The ME I've been to Israel, Egypt and Turkey. In March 2002 me and some friends almost singlehandedly crashed HAMAS's condolences site for suicide bombers and their family after the Seder massacre. Hasn't been up since..

Being blessed with an unusual last name helped drive me towards history. Having to drive through multiple civil war battlefields to get any where tended to fuel my curiousity.

911 was a big influenece as I remember sitting on the floor at home eating my Captain Crunch Berries when that couple held hands and jumped from the 70th floor of the WTC. Just then the avuncular Peter Jennings cut to their man in Gaza. THere they were. Having a great old time - passing out laffy taffy with that demonic cry Alluha Ackbah. "I only wish that Bush was in those towers with his precious baby Sharon" is what one woman alledgedly said.

I was trapped at home one summer with my dads immense library. New books like James Spahns 'Rise of the Vulcans' and old ones Gary Dorrein's "Imperial Designs" or Robert Kagan's "Paradise and Power' had an effect - The more I studied American History the more convinced I became that America "...ain't what's wrong with the world..." I saw Victor Davis Hanson on Britt Hume's show back around Xmas 2001. I've been hooked every since.

Ivo Daalder's book "America Unbound" is crucial - though not the reasons Daalder would hope for. He kinda wails that 'Merica can do whatever she dang well pleases - unbound by the UN, the EU, NATO, OPEC, OAS, G7's and G8's. I love that!

Curently, my life is so controlled - do this, don't do that so I started my own blog. Mainly because I was sick of people saying the American military was broken, Iraq is a quagmire etc. A random reading of American history shows that is so incorrect - it's either stupid or weirdly unAmerican. Places I went to began to block me from challenging their inappropiate, weak, boring and incorrect handwringing. Empowerment I reckon. Also like Gollum says to Smeagul in "2 Towers" - "Now we be the master!"

I want to work on grand strategy like Dr Posen's but since I have no PHD's or Pulitzer prizes behind my name it may take a while.

I'vr been meaninig to raise this subject with you and now I shall.

Redefinition. The term Neo Con is so misunderstood, so falsely painted that it may be time for a new term to describe that especial perspective. Since Posen himself espoused neo conish views as a fait accompli in FP circles that can be used to our advantage. As far as a new name - I'm leaning towards New Millenialism myself.
Redefinition will be critical in the near future.

Example - Islamo Fascism is out (regardless of what Hitchens says). Mohammedism should be the new term.Tough for critics to cry about that term - after all Mohammed was a fighting, conquering, ruthless, merciless intolerant dictator.

Wow - didn't mean to ramble but remember you did ask. Now how about a bit of reciprication?

I appreciate you sharing your time and ideas with me - spiritually we are very close.

As Fisher said to Churchill,

"yours til charcoal sprouts",

Courtney

Last weekend I asked Courtney to confirm four questions:

You are a genuine neocon, right? I believe you are and that our communications on that were genuine.

And the picture of you is genuine, right?

What about your 'rents? Is the stuff you told me about your parents and family true? The military background of your brothers? And so forth. That's all true, right?

And did you write the majority of posts at GSGF, and I mean at least more than half? Or about what percentage?

The only thing she would confirm on record was that she is indeed a hardcore neoconservative. The remaining questions she fudged or ignored. She wouldn't give me a straight answer on the percentage of her self-authored posts at GSGF and she ignored my questions about her personal background. I finally wrote back to say that we were no longer friends.

Courtney's maintained her Facebook page, although she's removed all the pictures of herself. She'd sent me some by e-mail, like the one above. And since she says that Courtney is her real first name, it's likely that the personal pictures are genuine and she's scrubbed them to protect her identity from the inevitable harm to her reputation, should she move on from anonymous blogging to the real world of college and employment.

John Hawkins, unlike some of the others, severed ties with her: "The Courtney Messerschmidt Controversy."

Courtney still publishes at Theo Spark's, where I am a co-blogger, so I may have some peripheral interactions with her in that role. But that's it. Folks get the real me online, through blogging and social networking, email, etc. I expect the same in return, as just the decent thing to do.

Eleanor Mondale and Kara Kennedy, Both Daughters of Democratic Senators, Presidential Candidates, Both Dead at 51

I saw this earlier, "Eleanor Mondale, Daughter of Former Vice President, Dies at 51." I recall Eleanor back in the day. She was a striking blonde bombshell. And now here comes the news that Edward Kennedy's daughter Kara is also dead at the age of 51. See: "Kara Kennedy, daughter of Teddy, dies" (via Memeorandum):

BOSTON - Kara Kennedy Allen, the only daughter of the late Senator Edward Kennedy, has died.

A family friend confirmed to CBS Station WBZ that the 51-year-old Kennedy passed away, after reportedly suffering a heart attack Friday evening.

Walter Mondale was of course Jimmy Carter's vice-president. He served in the U.S. Senate from 1964 to 1976. He lost his presidential campaign against Ronald Reagan in 1984. Edward "Teddy" Kennedy, President John F. Kennedy's brother, served in the U.S. Senate from 1962 to 2009. He challenged Jimmy Carter for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1980.

Victoria's Secret 2011 Fashion Show Will Air Tuesday, November 29, On CBS

At 10:00pm.

See: "2011 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show Announced."

PREVIOUSLY: "Erin Heatherton Victoria's Secret."

At Philippe's

I visited Pajamas Media Editor David Swindle yesterday in Los Angeles. Here we are out across the street from Philippe's, where we enjoyed a wonderful meal. David moved over to Pajamas Media after NewsReal Blog closed down at the David Horowitz Freedom Center. He's got some exciting plans for Pajamas. David's encouraging me to start publishing my work there again.

The last time I was at Philippe's was April, 2010, when I spent a day at the Los Angeles County Museum of art.

The Palestinian Obsession

From Caroline Glick, at Jerusalem Post:

If nothing else, the Palestinians’ UN statehood gambit goes a long way towards revealing the deep-seated European and US pathologies that enable and prolong the Palestinian conflict with Israel.

In a nutshell, the Palestinian Authority – or Fatah – or PLO initiative of asking the UN Security Council and the General Assembly to upgrade its status to that of a sovereign UN member state or a sovereign non-UN member state is an act of diplomatic aggression.

Eighteen years ago this week, on September 13, 1993, the PLO signed the Declaration of Principles with Israel on the White House lawn.

There, the terror group committed itself to a peace process in which all disputes between Israel and the PLO – including the issue of Palestinian statehood – would be settled in the framework of bilateral negotiations.

The PA was established on the basis of this accord. The territory, money, arms and international legitimacy it has been given was due entirely to the PLO pledge to resolve the Palestinian conflict with Israel through bilateral negotiations.

By abandoning negotiations with Israel two years ago, and opting instead to achieve its nationalist aims outside the framework of a peace treaty with Israel, the Palestinians are destroying the diplomatic edifice on which the entire concept of a peace process is based. They are announcing that they have no intention of living at peace with Israel. Rather they intend to move ahead at Israel’s expense...

Obama Approval Dips in Latest New York Times Poll

See: "Support for Obama Slips; Unease on 2012 Candidates":

President Obama’s support is eroding among elements of his base, and a yearlong effort to recapture the political center has failed to attract independent voters, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll, leaving him vulnerable at a moment when pessimism over the country’s direction is greater than at any other time since he took office.

The president’s effort to seize the initiative on the economy was well received by the public, and clear majorities support crucial pieces of his new job-creation program. But despite Mr. Obama’s campaign to sell the plan to Congress and voters, more than half of those questioned said they feared the economy was already in or was headed for a double-dip recession, and nearly three-quarters of Americans think the country is on the wrong track.

Republicans appear more energized than Democrats at the outset of the 2012 presidential campaign, but have not coalesced around a candidate. Even as the party’s nominating contest seems to be narrowing to a two-man race between Mitt Romney and Gov. Rick Perry of Texas, a majority of their respective supporters say they have reservations about their candidate. Half of Republicans who plan to vote in a primary say they would like more choices.

Yeah, a larger field of candidates would be good, but what can you do? I'm frankly surprised at the shape of the GOP field as it is. Seems like we'd have more heavyweights, and having Sarah Palin in the race would have been nice. But the main thing is that, clearly, whoever wins the nomination is going to pound Obama and the Democrats. Victory's going to be sweet!! I can't wait to remind Markos Moulitsas about how he failed to "crush" our spirits, the idiot.

“Any Republican who gets the nomination, whether it’s my first choice or not, is going to be better than what we’ve got now,” said Allen Hulshizer, 77, a Republican and retired structural engineer from Glenside, Pa. “By the time you get down to the final selections, any one of the top contenders will certainly be better than Obama.”

We're All Journalists Now

At GigaOM, "Freedom of the press applies to everyone — yes, even bloggers" (via Glenn Reynolds):

In the decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, released just a few weeks ago, the judges pointed out that the First Amendment’s protection for freedom of the press “encompasses a range of conduct related to the gathering and dissemination of information,” and that citizens have the right to investigate government affairs and share what they learn with others. Judge Kermit Lipez also specifically noted that these protections don’t just apply to professional journalists. He said in his decision:

[C]hanges in technology and society have made the lines between private citizen and journalist exceedingly difficult to draw. The proliferation of electronic devices with video-recording capability means that many of our images of current events come from bystanders [and] and news stories are now just as likely to be broken by a blogger at her computer as a reporter at a major newspaper. Such developments make clear why the news-gathering protections of the First Amendment cannot turn on professional credentials or status.

We couldn’t have put it any better ourselves (although we have tried a number of times). The advent of social news-distribution tools like Twitter and Facebook, not to mention blogs and YouTube and other web services and social networks, have powered what Om has called a “democratization of distribution” that makes virtually anyone into a publisher.

RTWT at the link.

RELATED: From Carol Rose, "Victory for liberty and the right to videotape public officials."

DaTechGuy Covers Andrew Breitbart in Lexington Massachusetts

Good stuff:

Check that link for the full report.

Libyan Rebels Enter Bani Walid in Final Push

At Telegraph UK.

Ralphs Stores to Close If Workers Go On Strike

Great news!

At LAT, "Ralphs says it will close stores if workers go on strike. Albertsons may follow."

The labor fight between union officials and grocery employers spilled outside of the negotiation room Friday as Ralphs announced that the company would “initially” close all 250 of its Southern California stores if workers go on strike.

How long these stores would remain closed is unclear.

About 18,000 employees are covered by the contract currently being negotiated between Ralphs, Vons and Albertsons and the United Food and Commercial Workers union. Ralphs has an estimated 22,000 employees in Southern California.

“During a strike, it is difficult to create a good shopping experience for our customers and a good working environment for our employees,” Ralphs spokeswoman Kendra Doyel said in a statement Friday. “We will evaluate the situation as it progresses.”

Another reason to hate unions.

See also: "Statement by the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union Regarding H.R. 2587: Republicans in Congress Put Corporate Interests Ahead of Job Creation." Well, jeez, where have I heard that before?

Ford Drive One 'Press Conference' Commercial Rips Auto Bailouts

At Hot Air, "Wow: Ford ad blasts bailouts — and perhaps more."

The statement that America is about taking risks and enduring failure rather than expecting government to bail everyone out sounds more like a big thumb in the eye of the Obama administration, whose latest jobs bill keeps extending unemployment benefits, and which continues to propose spending billions on subsidies for businesses that can’t succeed on their own — like Solyndra.

No doubt. It also backhands Obama on his dismissal of American exceptionalism.

Tareq Salahi Files for Divorce From Wife Michaele

Not only are the Salahis getting divorced, but Tareq's banned from Journey concerts. Man, talk about insult to injury. That's harsh: "TAREQ SALAHI - BANNED from Journey Concerts."

I blogged the party crashing story in 2009, and was picked up at WND, "White House 'gatecrashers' tied to terror sympathizer."

VIDEO: Plane Crashes Into Stands at Reno Air Race

At FOX 10 News Phoenix, "Report: Plane Crashes at Reno National Championship Air Races."

More at Hot Air, "Nightmare in Reno: At least 75 injured, 25 critically, in air-race disaster."

Alleged Sexual Assault Reported at Long Beach City College

LBCC President Eloy Oakley sent out a campus-wide notice last night, and the story's hit the local press. See Long Beach Press-Telegram, "Student allegedly assaulted in Long Beach City College restroom":

LONG BEACH - Detectives searched today for a man who followed a student into a restroom at Long Beach City College and assaulted her, police said.

Check both links for further details

Republican Voters Split on Rick Perry's Statements on Social Security

USA Today, "Poll: Perry's Social Security view concerns some Republicans":

Republican voters are evenly split over whether Texas Gov. Rick Perry's outspoken stance on Social Security makes them more or less likely to support him for the presidential nomination, a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll finds, but they are worried that his views could cost him in the general election.

The survey, taken after the CNN/Tea Party Express debate among Republican contenders Monday, illustrates the complicated politics on the issue that has prompted the sharpest divide between Perry and former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, the contenders at the top of national polls.

Perry, the Texas governor, calls Social Security a "Ponzi scheme" for younger workers that needs to be fundamentally revamped for future recipients. One in five Republicans say that position makes them more likely to support him; one in five say it makes them less likely to do so. However, by more than 2-1, 37%-17%, Republicans predict Perry's position will hurt rather than help his chances of being elected president.

Keep reading.

A majority of both Republicans and independents says protecting Social Security, despite its problems, is most important. Also at Gallup, "Perry 'Ponzi Scheme' Remark Doesn't Faze Most Republicans: Solid Majority Believe Social Security Should Be Preserved." (Via Memeorandum.)

But see Charles Krauthammer, "A Ponzi scheme that should be fixed." As usual, Krauthammer's is the best article I've read on this in a long time.

Speaker John Boehner Speech at the Economic Club of Washington

At New York Times, "Boehner, in Washington Speech, Reaffirms No-Tax-Increase Position."

Elisabeth Hasselbeck Rips Michael Moore on Osama Bin Laden's 'Execution'

Michael Moore's repeating the same talking points I heard him spewing almost a year ago. Only 100 al Qaeda fighters in Afghanistan? Sheesh. Medal of Honor recipient Dakota Meyer faced more than half that when he saved 36 lives in 2009. And this week's attack on the NATO compound was an astonishingly effective siege of the central command of the international protection force. Unreal. And here's Moore again saying we shouldn't have killed Bin Laden. He was just another crazy guy in the world, or something. Watch. Elisabeth Hasselbeck let's him have it:

Frustrated Democrats Support Primary Challenge Against Obama

At The Hill, "Some frustrated Democrats want to see Obama primary challenge."

Hey, let's see it. Recall the 1992 analogy again, where Pat Buchanan won 38 percent in New Hampshire, a harbinger to G.H.W. Bush's loss in the general election.

Los Angeles Times Readers Respond Viscerally to 'Evangelical Pastors Heed a Political Calling for 2012'

The original article ran last Sunday, on September 11.

And now from the letters to the editor, "Faith and politics in America..."

The evangelical pastors featured in The Times' story cannot be faulted for their political activism, which is protected under the 1st Amendment. The problem is their distortion of the Christian faith.

How can any sensitive Christian support the death penalty, the proliferation of firearms, unjust wars of choice, the dismantling of the social safety net, increased riches for the wealthy at the expense of everyone else, the rejection of medical coverage for the poor, the continual domination of American life by corporations and the rest of the Bachmann-Perry agenda?

When a significant slice of the church loses its hold on everything Jesus stood for, the problem is religious heresy, not political activism.

Charles H. Bayer

Claremont

More letters at the link, including one with the worn cliche, "what would Jesus do"?

Marine Who Saved 36 in Afghanistan Gets Medal of Honor

I was at lunch today and watched President Obama award the medal to Cpl. Dakota Meyer.

At Los Angeles Times, "Marine is awarded rare Medal of Honor at White House":

The desperate call crackled over the radio in predawn darkness: A small team of American and Afghan troops was pinned down in a remote village under withering fire from three sides. A young lieutenant was begging for artillery or air support. Without it, he yelled, "we are going to die out here."

Can't be done, came the reply. It might kill civilians.

Less than a mile away, Marine Cpl. Dakota L. Meyer heard the radio exchange in agony. His buddies were dying, yet Meyer was under orders to stay where he was. Four times he requested permission to go to their aid, and four times he was refused.

After two hours, Meyer decided to defy his superiors. The powerfully built 21-year-old with a soft Kentucky drawl climbed into the turret of a gun truck mounted with a .50-caliber machine gun and, with another Marine driving, raced toward the battle.

On Thursday, Meyer was at the White House to receive the Medal of Honor, the nation's highest award for valor, for saving the lives of 36 combatants — 13 Americans and 23 Afghans — and personally killing at least eight Taliban fighters that day, Sept. 8, 2009. He is the first living Marine to receive the award since the Vietnam War.

Meyer, now 23, stood at attention in dress uniform as President Obama recounted what happened in the village of Ganjigal in Afghanistan's Kunar province.

Added: Bing West's essay, "The Afghan Rescue Mission Behind Today's Medal of Honor."

The Beauty of Moral Excellence

Peter Wehner has an interesting piece, at Commentary, "Our Lack of Moral Vocabulary":

Earlier this week, David Brooks wrote a fascinating column on young people’s moral lives, basing it on hundreds of in-depth interviews with young adults across America conducted by the eminent Notre Dame sociologist Christian Smith and his team.

The results, according to Brooks, were “depressing” — not so much because of how they lived but because of “how bad they are at thinking and talking about moral issues.” Asked open-ended questions about right and wrong, moral dilemmas and the meaning of life, what we find is “young people groping to say anything sensible on these matters. But they just don’t have the categories or vocabulary to do so.” What Smith and his team found is an atmosphere of “extreme moral individualism — of relativism and nonjudgmentalism.” The reason, in part, is because they have not been given the resources — by schools, institutions and families — to “cultivate their moral intuitions, to think more broadly about moral obligations, to check behaviors that may be degrading.”

This is part of a generations-long phenomenon. In his 1987 book The Closing of the American Mind, Allan Bloom wrote, “There is one thing a professor can be absolutely certain of: almost every student entering the university believes, or says he believes, that truth is relative.” And the university, Bloom argued, is unwilling to offer a distinctive visage to young people. The guiding philosophy of the academy is there are no first principles, no coherent ways to interpret the world in which we live.

But this is merely a pose. No one, not even a liberal academic, is a true relativist. Scratch below the surface and you’ll find them to be (morally) judgmental toward those who want to discriminate based on race, gender, or sexual orientation. They will likely have strong (moral) views on criminalizing abortion, restricting marriage to one man and one woman, anthropogenic global warming, water-boarding terrorists, rendition, Israeli settlements, profits for oil companies, and cutting taxes for the rich. The left is adamant: women have a “right” to an abortion and gays have a “right” to marry. These rights are viewed as a priori and inviolate. And no one, not even a progressive liberal arts professor, is morally indifferent to someone who wants to rape his wife, molest his children, and steal his iPad. It is fashionable to insist we don’t want to “impose our values” on others or “legislate morality.” But the reality is we do so all the time, on an endless number of issues, and no civilization could survive without doing so. The question, really, is which moral standards do we aspire to? What is the ethical code we use to judge ourselves and others?

Keep reading, and note:

One final thought: what is often lost in this debate is that human fulfillment and happiness isn’t found in a world stripped of moral beliefs. Despair, not joy, is found among those who believe in nothing, who find purpose in nothing, who fight for nothing. Because of human anthropology – because we are moral creatures, made in the image of God – we are meant to delight in His ways, to live lives of high moral purpose. All of us fail more often than we should. But we cannot give up on the aspiration; nor can we allow our hearts to grow cold and indifferent, unmoved by the beauty of moral excellence.

But check Brooks' essay, which strikes a chord with my experience. I do think young people are deeply moral, but they lack an expressive vocabulary to articulate these beliefs in the public realm.

Silicon Valley Gives Conservative Christians a Boost

At Los Angeles Times:

Silicon Valley, the politically liberal technology hub, is an unlikely incubator of conservative Christian activism.

But a group of its venture capitalists is backing an ambitious project that seeks to affect the 2012 election by registering 5 million new conservative Christians to vote.

The nonprofit organization United in Purpose is using sophisticated data-mining techniques to compile a database of every unregistered born-again and evangelical Christian and conservative Catholic in the country.

Through partnerships with Christian organizers and antiabortion groups, United in Purpose hopes to recruit 100,000 "champions" to identify unregistered Christians and get them to the polls as part of its Champion the Vote project. Profiles drawn from its database, which numbers more than 120 million people, will enable organizers to target potential voters with emails and Web videos tailored to their interests.

Well, now's the time, if there ever was one. I'm still not holding my hopes out for any political breakthroughs in California, but this sounds nice.

'Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic'

Okay, here's my Thursday placeholder until later.

Enjoy Sting, "Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic":

From yesterday morning's drive time at The Sound LA:

8:03 - Bennie And The Jets by Elton John

8:08 - What I Like About You by Romantics

8:18 - Little By Little by Robert Plant

8:23 - Free Bird by Lynyrd Skynyrd

8:32 - Purple Haze by Jimi Hendrix

8:35 - Sweet Emotion by Aerosmith

8:47 - Question by Moody Blues

8:52 - Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic by Police

More blogging tonight.

New York-9 and the Democratic Coalition

I love this story, from Sean Trende, at RealClearPolitics (via Memeorandum).

It's a political science-y essay, with charts and graphs. And here's a clue: "Obama has had problems with working-class whites in particular."

Britney Spears Glamour UK October 2011

I like it: "Britney Spears is this month's cover girl and she's looking better than ever!"

And see: "Britney Spears: Then And Now." She's all grown up!

Via Britney on Twitter.

RELATED: At Randy's Roundtable, "Midweek Rule 5 Break: Nicci Pisari."

After New York Race, G.O.P. Sees Ripple in Jewish Vote

Now get this, at New York Times:

WASHINGTON — Not since Jimmy Carter in 1980 has a Democrat running for president failed to win a lopsided majority of the Jewish vote. This has been true during times of peace or war, and even when there has been deep acrimony between the White House and the Israeli government.

Republicans see a chance to change that in 2012, with President Obama locked in a tense relationship with Israel’s leaders and criticized by many American Jews as being too tough on a close and favored ally. Tuesday’s Republican upset in New York’s Congressional election, they say, is a sign of bad things to come for Mr. Obama.

Sensing trouble, the Obama campaign and Democratic Party leaders have mobilized to solidify the president’s standing with Jewish voters. The Democratic National Committee has established a Jewish outreach program. The campaign is singling out Jewish groups, donors and other supporters with calls and e-mails to counter the Republican narrative that Mr. Obama is hostile to Israel.

More at the link.

And from the editors, who aren't please by developments, natch: "Israel and New York’s Ninth District."

F*** You, Douglas! — W. James Casper = COBAG = Repsac3!!

I'm just now getting to this, but W. James "Costanza" Casper = RACIST = Repsac3 had an entry for "civility week" earlier, at my blog post on "Tolerance of Islam":

Fuck you, Douglas...

You post about me, I'll almost certainly comment, like it or don't...

Cope.

(If you really wanted to be left alone, you wouldn't engage, would you?)

This is someone who has completely abandoned the slightest adherence to social norms and decency. So, for the record: I've never said no interaction. Idiot RACIST Repsac3 is BANNED from commenting at American Power. That is, NO ENGAGEMENT AT MY COMMENT THREADS, DUH!! Bird-brained W. James Casper, whose immorality is boundless, again reminds us of George Costanza. Click the image to watch. Unable to control his impulses, George eats a chocolate eclair out of the garbage pail. Jerry says to him, "Well, you my friend have crossed the line that divides man and bum. You are now a bum." And in our most recent despicable attack by RACIST Repsac3, our sick obsessive stalking asshat (and non-friend) has crossed the line that divides a restrained and respectable citizen from a profane and clinically deranged progresssive cobag: "You are now a complete cobag."

Congratulations!

Israel and Marriage Key Issues in New York Special Election

Two of my most important public policy issues.

From John McCormack, at Weekly Standard:

How did Republican Bob Turner pull off an 8-point win (54%-46%) in a district that gave Turner just 39% of the vote in 2010 and went 55% for Obama in 2008? Sure, it helped that the Democratic incumbent Anthony Weiner resigned in disgrace after he accidentally posted a lewd photo of himself, intended for a young woman, to his public Twitter account. But scandal alone wasn't enough to flip New York's 9th congressional district to Republicans. In early August a Siena poll showed Democrat David Weprin leading Turner 48% to 42%, but by late last week Siena showed Turner had pulled into the lead 50% to 44%.

o win in a Democratic district, Turner needed Democratic votes. The two issues that seem to have helped drive some of the district's traditionally Democratic voters to cast their ballots for Turner were Obama's Israel policy and Weprin's vote for same-sex marriage. Former Democratic New York City mayor Ed Koch endorsed Turner primarily to send a message to Obama on Israel. Democratic state senator Ruben Diaz backed Turner because of Weprin's vote on marriage. Democratic state assemblyman Dov Hikind says both issues, as well as dissatisfaction with Obama's failed economic policies, were "overriding" factors that led him to support Turner.

"This is an underlying issue that is extremely powerful issue," Hikind says of Weprin's vote for same-sex marriage. Weprin didn't merely vote for the bill. He got on the floor of the assembly and compared voting against same-sex marriage to "outlawing marriages between Jews and non-Jews or interracial marriages.”

"The fundamental message was 'I'm an orthodox Jew and gay marriage is perfectly fine,'" Hikind says of his Democratic colleague's speech. "To me, when he did that, he crossed every single line." Forty orthodox rabbis declared that orthodox Jews could not support Weprin.

Keep reading.

And yeah, he crossed every single line, ASFL.

Mexican Drug Cartels Hang Bodies Off Bridge as Warning to Social Media Users

At CNN: "Bodies hanging from bridge in Mexico are warning to social media users."

Justin Timberlake Photos Leaked After Mila Kunis Phone Hacked

Interesting.

At TMZ, "MILA KUNIS HACKED!" And Daily Mail, "Mila Kunis and Justin Timberlake exposed as possible friends with benefits by hacker."

Plus, at IBT, "Mila Kunis Hacked, Compromising Photos of Justin Timberlake Leaked (PHOTOS)."

PREVIOUSLY: "Scarlett Johansson Nude Photos Leaked!"

Attack Watch

Or, at Michelle Malkin's, "Attaaaaack Waaaaaatch."

Plus: "Obama Campaign: AttackWatch Gains Over 100,000 Sign-Ups In Less Than 24 Hours."

Yeah, that oughta help. Not!

BONUS: "Attack Watch, new Obama campaign site to ‘fight smears,’ becomes laughing stock of the Internet."

U.S. Poverty Rates Hit 50-Year high

Obama promised change, and boy did he deliver. Change we haven't seen in nearly fifty years.

At LAT, "U.S. poverty totals hit a 50-year high":

Census Bureau's grim statistics show recession's lingering effects, as young adults move back home and 1 million more Americans go without health insurance.

Reporting from Washington — In a grim portrait of a nation in economic turmoil, the government reported that the number of people living in poverty last year surged to 46.2 million — the most in at least half a century — as 1 million more Americans went without health insurance and household incomes fell sharply.

The poverty rate for all Americans rose in 2010 for the third consecutive year, matching the 15.1% figure in 1993 and pushing many more young adults to double up or return to their parents' home to avoid joining the ranks of the poor.

Taken together, the annual income and poverty snapshot released Tuesday by the U.S. Census Bureau underscored how the recession is casting a long shadow well after its official end in June 2009.

Continue reading.

Scarlett Johansson Nude Photos Leaked!

Hey, better late than never.

At Wall Street Journal, "Scarlett Johansson Nude Photos Part of FBI Probe of Digital Theft."

And at What Would Tyler Durden Do, "Scarlett Johansson is Naked." (At WeSmirch.)

Democrat Hopes Collapse Following Turner Win in New York Special Election

I've used the 1992 comparison previously. George H.W. Bush was defeated for reelection just 22 months after having record approval ratings of near 90 percent. With last night's breathtaking GOP win in NY-9, the left's utter freak out over 2012 has now hit gale force.

There's lots of stuff on this. See Caitlin Huey-Burns, at RealClearPolitics, "GOP Scores Major Upset in NY-9." Also David Seifman at New York Post, "Disaster looms for O in 2012" (via Memeorandum), and Peter Wehner at Commentary, "Panic, Then Rage Ahead for Democrats."

And at Politico, "Dems schvitzing over NY-9 results," and "Twin defeats spark Democratic fears."

BONUS: From Andrew Breitbart, "After Turner Earthquake in Weiner District, Democrats’ Civil War Against Obama Begins."

VIDEO: Afghanistan Firefight — NATO Headquarters, International Security Assistance Force, Kabul

Via This Ain't Hell...:

And at New York Times, "Militants Attack U.S. Embassy in Kabul."

KABUL, Afghanistan — Heavily armed insurgents wearing suicide vests struck Tuesday at two of the most prominent symbols of the American diplomatic and military presence in Kabul, the United States Embassy and the nearby NATO headquarters, demonstrating the Taliban’s ability to infiltrate even the most heavily fortified districts of the capital.

As the insurgents fired rocket-propelled grenades, Westerners sought shelter — one rocket penetrated the embassy compound — and Afghan government workers fled their offices, emptying the city center. NATO and Afghan troops responded with barrages of bullets. At least 6 people were killed and 19 wounded.

Keep reading.

New York 9th Congressional District Special Election Results

The Other McCain's got a live blog going: "NY-9: Turner Time?"

Also, David Weigel's calling it:

11:20: There's simply not enough of a Weprin margin in Queens to let him overcome the coming Turner landslide in Brooklyn. This is over, even if the AP waits a while to call it.

Bob Turner (R) defeats David Weprin (D)

9:30pm PST: Now at Los Angeles Times, "Republican Bob Turner wins special election in New York."

I got a note this morning from my good from Norman Gersman in New York. Listening to local talk radio today, Norm reported that it "was wall to wall Democratic advertisements viciously attacking the Republican candidate." And that obviously had little effect. And Norm noted, importantly:

In Queens, there is a small but truly active group of patriots who fully engage themselves in every election for Republican and Conservative candidates. They have boundless energy setting up phone banks, handing out literature, putting out signs, and just doing whatever has to be done to win an election. In Democratic Queens, they usually lose...but that has never, ever deterred them from working on the next campaign. A win tonight is due to them...a great group of patriots. All Americans should stand up and applaud what they have accomplished in the past few months. Their hard work will effect every 2012 campaign because it sends the message that no Democrat, not one, is safe. They all can and will be beaten. So when you read about this election, or view a piece about it on TV, you know who deserves the credit. Great job guys.

That's great to hear. Congratulations to our GOP friends out in New York. The Dems have held the 9th district continuously since 1923. It's going to be a desperate attempt by the Obama-Dems to spin this loss as insignificant for 2012. Just remember: Whatever the White House says, the truth will be the exact opposite.

Michele Bachmann Slams HPV Vaccine Mandate at GOP Debate

She did fine in the debate: "Rick Perry's HPV mandate returns to haunt him."

It's the post-debate comments that weren't Bachmann's best moments. Ed Morrissey's got the main story, "Bachmann: Gardasil causes “mental retardation”." (Via Memeorandum.) And Los Angeles Times has a medical report, "GOP debates HPV vaccine, but medical community gives it OK."

I'll bet Bachmann recovers on this sooner than Perry. The mandate calls into question his bona fides as a small-government conservative. And the debate got heated today among right bloggers and on the Twittersphere.

AoSHQ has this: "Bachmann: I'm A-Goin' to Go Ahead and Push This Lunatic Vaccines=Autism Lie":

Michelle Bachmann is desperate. She's an ambitious, egotistical woman who started running for President just two short years after she first ran for Congress. In the past two months her support went from 13% and rising to 4% and falling.

So she needs something, doesn't she, and Rush Limbaugh warned her off her planned Social Security demagoguery.

So, instead, this bullshit.

And Dan Riehl's got this: "Perry Doesn't Look Ready to Lead America," and "So Much For NRO Being Conservative."

And Tabitha Hale on Twitter: "I think maybe I should abandon Twitter until primary season is over so I still have friends."

It's gonna get heavy like this on the right for a while. Folks are starting to really dig in behind their favorites.

'Time Waits For No One'

It was another long commute yesterday morning. Construction continues on the 405 Fwy modernization, and the 22 Fwy interchange narrows down to two lanes when the freeways merge in Seal Beach. That, and it's just after 8:00am as I'm hitting the road to work, so it's "rush hour" --- except folks can't rush amid the crush. Anyway, blogging's light during the midweek. I watched movies on cable when I got home, caught the GOP debate, and helped my youngest work on his homework. The drive time playlist is below, from The Sound LA:

8:23 - Don't Stand So Close by Police

8:27 - Time Waits For No One by Rolling Stones

8:34 - Who Are You by Who

8:40 - Lookin' Out My Backdoor by CCR

8:50 - Rock 'n Me by Steve Miller

8:53 - Ain't Talkin' 'bout Love by Van Halen

8:57 - Alabama Song (whisky Bar) by Doors

9:00 - American Woman by Guess Who

9:05 - Under Pressure by Queen & David Bowie

More blogging tonight.

Doug Ross Had an Awesome 'Larwyn's Lynx' Yesterday

I ran out of time and energy to blog on all the 9/11-related commentary available over the weekend, and Doug Ross had even more stuff I'd missed.

Some great reading: "Larwyn's Linx: Let's Roll Over."

Furor Over Paul Krugman's 9/11 Blog Post

From the letters to the editors, at New York Times:

To the Editor:

Re “The Years of Shame” (“The Conscience of a Liberal” blog, The New York Times on the Web, Sept. 11):

Paul Krugman writes, “The memory of 9/11 has been irrevocably poisoned; it has become an occasion for shame.” I disagree.

I feel no shame about my personal recollections and commemorations of 9/11. My memories of the day have not faded; I recall what I saw with my own eyes in Lower Manhattan. I do not believe that our political system was irrevocably poisoned, or that it is a day of shame.

I remain grateful for the words of comfort that President George W. Bush and Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani provided the nation in the aftermath.

I find no shame in the pursuit of justice since then by two presidential administrations. I may not agree with every policy decision taken since, but American society is sound and our recollections have not been hijacked.

I urge Mr. Krugman to appreciate moments of great leadership, regardless of the leader’s political affiliation.

MICHAEL METS
Glendale, Queens, Sept. 11, 2011

There are two more letters at that link.

James Taranto has commentary, "History's Smallest Monster." And Michelle felt obligated to respond: "A few more words about Koward Krugman."

And at Mediaite, "Megyn Kelly Hosts Fiery Debate Over Paul Krugman’s ‘Years Of Shame’ 9/11 Column." (Click through to watch. Megyn interviews Medea Benjamin, who is completely down with Krugman's desecration, naturally.)

Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld cancelled his subscription to the Times in protest: "Donald Rumsfeld cancels New York Times subscription." And "Rumsfeld Decides to “Go Timesless”."

Paul Krugman responded to the criticism (doubled-down), "More About the 9/11 Anniversary."

Turning Conservative After September 11, 2001

I've mentioned it a few times in the past. It was actually the left's reaction to the Bush administration and the Iraq war that made me realize I was conservative. In fact, I realized it on the morning of March 19th, 2003, when I spoke at a campus panel on the war. I didn't feel at home. I was surrounded by bloodthirsty leftists, students and professors, who looked like they had vengeance in their eyes. I went home that night and had dinner with my family, and I remember President Bush coming on the air to announce that combat operations had begun in Iraq. My political beliefs have never been the same. I voted for Al Gore in 2000. I still thought the Democratic Party was the party of Truman and Kennedy. How naive I must have been. But my vision has become clearer every year since then.

The annual debate over the September 11th attacks always reminds me of my political transformation. By now it's safe to say that 9/11 and the Iraq war have merged in my consciousness, although it wasn't always so. It took me a couple of years to understand the partisan divide in America, that one side stands for old-time values, love of country, individualism and sacrifice. The other side stands for ideological intolerance, anti-Americanism, and appeasement toward the forces of evil in the world. It's a stark difference that took stark historical events to congeal for me personally.

I'm reminded of this by some of the comments at my post from yesterday, "Progressives Shame the Country on the 10th Anniversary of 9/11." I wrote at the conclusion there: "For many people like myself, that's why they became conservative." And my good friend Kenneth Davenport dropped by to comment, responding in particular to my conclusion:

I haven't thought about it in this way before, but I've certainly become more conservative in response to the painful nihilism that regularly comes from the left. I live in a different world than they do, and there really are no areas of common ground. That's the truth. They see America as a flawed nation which should apologize for itself at every turn and which deserved the attacks of 9/11. And I see America as the last best hope of earth, a place of unbounded fairness and generosity, forged in the belief that the individual -- and not government -- is sovereign. There is no reconciling these two different belief systems. So I don't try. Instead, I surround myself with good people who share my values and who give thanks every day that there are those who are willing to sacrifice everything for our survival as a nation.

That's so well-said, and reaffirming. And Ken's posted a photo-essay from yesterday as well, where he demonstrates his love of country and appreciation of sacrifice: "9/11 on the USS Midway."

Now remember that it was Paul Krugman who got me going yesterday, and it turns out Glenn Reynolds received a load of comments about that. See, "EVERYBODY’S ANGRY, to judge from my email, about Paul Krugman’s typo-burdened 9/11 screed":

Don’t be angry. Understand it for what it is, an admission of impotence from a sad and irrelevant little man. Things haven’t gone the way he wanted lately, his messiah has feet of clay — hell, forget the “feet” part, the clay goes at least waist-high — and it seems likely he’ll have even less reason to like the coming decade than the last, and he’ll certainly have even less influence than he’s had. Thus, he tries to piss all over the people he’s always hated and envied. No surprise there. But no importance, either. You’ll see more and worse from Krugman and his ilk as the left nationally undergoes the kind of crackup it’s already experiencing in Wisconsin. They thought Barack Obama was going to bring back the glory days of liberal hegemony in politics, but it turned out he was their Ghost Dance, their Bear Shirt, a mystically believed-in totem that lacked the power to reverse their onrushing decline, no matter what the shamans claimed.

I'm not angry, as much as continually shocked at the brazen progressive hatred. It forces me to look inward, to my values and beliefs, and to history and national purpose. But sticking with the theme here, recall the essay from Cinnamon Stillwell in 2005, "The Making of a 9/11 Republican":

I was raised in liberal Marin County, and my first name (which garners more comments than anything else) is a direct product of the hippie generation. Growing up, I bought into the prevailing liberal wisdom of my surroundings because I didn't know anything else. I wrote off all Republicans as ignorant, intolerant yahoos. It didn't matter that I knew none personally; it was simply de rigueur to look down on such people. The fact that I was being a bigot never occurred to me, because I was certain that I inhabited the moral high ground.

Having been indoctrinated in the postcolonialist, self-loathing school of multiculturalism, I thought America was the root of all evil in the world. Its democratic form of government and capitalist economic system was nothing more than a machine in which citizens were forced to be cogs. I put aside the nagging question of why so many people all over the world risk their lives to come to the United States. Freedom of speech, religious freedom, women's rights, gay rights (yes, even without same-sex marriage), social and economic mobility, relative racial harmony and democracy itself were all taken for granted in my narrow, insulated world view.

So, what happened to change all that? In a nutshell, 9/11. The terrorist attacks on this country were not only an act of war but also a crime against humanity. It seemed glaringly obvious to me at the time, and it still does today. But the reaction of my former comrades on the left bespoke a different perspective. The day after the attacks, I dragged myself into work, still in a state of shock, and the first thing I heard was one of my co-workers bellowing triumphantly, "Bush got his war!" There was little sympathy for the victims of this horrific attack, only an irrational hatred for their own country.

As I spent months grieving the losses, others around me wrapped themselves in the comfortable shell of cynicism and acted as if nothing had changed. I soon began to recognize in them an inability to view America or its people as victims, born of years of indoctrination in which we were always presented as the bad guys.

Never mind that every country in the world acts in its own self-interest, forms alliances with unsavory countries -- some of which change later -- and are forced to act militarily at times. America was singled out as the sole guilty party on the globe. I, on the other hand, for the first time in my life, had come to truly appreciate my country and all that it encompassed, as well as the bravery and sacrifices of those who fight to protect it.

Thoroughly disgusted by the behavior of those on the left, I began to look elsewhere for support. To my astonishment, I found that the only voices that seemed to me to be intellectually and morally honest were on the right. Suddenly, I was listening to conservative talk-show hosts on the radio and reading conservative columnists, and they were making sense. When I actually met conservatives, I discovered that they did not at all embody the stereotypes with which I'd been inculcated as a liberal.

PROTO CREDIT: "Faith, Freedom, and Memory: Report From Ground Zero, September 11, 2010."

NASA Aerial Video of 9/11

Via Israel Matzav:

d

Paul Simon Sings 'Sounds of Silence' at New York 9/11 Ceremony

Via Blazing Cat Fur:

President Bush Reads Lincoln Letter at 9/11 Memorial Service in New York

Via Althouse, who publishes the text of Lincoln's letter:

September 11 Memorial Ceremony in New York

Bloomberg took heat for excluding clergy and firemen, but I'm sad I wasn't able to attend.

At New York Times, "Bush and Obama: Side by Side at Ground Zero":

For the first time on Sunday, President Obama and former President George W. Bush stood together at the site of the Sept. 11 attacks, listening as family members read the names of lost love ones and bowing their heads in silence to mark the moment the planes hit.

In May, Mr. Bush declined Mr. Obama’s invitation to join him at ground zero after the raid that killed Osama bin Laden. But on this morning, they stood shoulder to shoulder — commanders in chief whose terms in office are bookends for exploring how the United States has changed since Sept. 11, 2001, particularly in its response to terrorism.

The tableau was striking: the president who spent years hunting Bin Laden next to the one who finally got him. The president defined by his response to Sept. 11 standing alongside the one who has tried to take America beyond the lingering, complicated legacy of that day.

Mr. Obama read from Psalm 46: “God is our refuge and strength,” which an aide said he chose because it spoke of perseverance. Mr. Bush, the wartime leader, read a letter from Abraham Lincoln to a widow who was believed to have lost five sons in the Civil War.

More at that link above, and at Memeorandum.

And at Althouse, "President Bush, reading Lincoln's letter at the 9/11 ceremony in NYC."

9/11: Radical Islamists Burn U.S. Flag in London Protest (VIDEO)

From Telegraph UK:

And from London's Daily Mail, "100 protesters burn American flag outside U.S. embassy in London during minute's silence for 9/11."

RELATED: "Progressives Shame the Country on the 10th Anniversary of 9/11."

Israel's Memorial to September 11

At Berman Post, "Israeli 9/11 Memorial":

If the measure of a true friend is how sincerely they mourn for your loss, Israel once again showed how close of an ally they are to the United States.

RELATED: At Jerusalem Post, "PM on 9/11: We are still susceptible to terror attacks."

Progressives Shame the Country on the 10th Anniversary of 9/11

I long ago lost any respect I had for Paul Krugman. I read Krugman's scholarly work back in the mid-1990s. He was a reasonable voice for American economic competitiveness, and his work was at the leading edge of strategic trade theory. But upon becoming a New York Times columnist he found his calling as a celebrity mouthpiece for the most inane progressive ramblings in American politics. Beclowning himself in that role would be putting it mildly. He probably should have just taken the day off from blogging today, but he couldn't resist fouling himself, wrapping himself in progressive toxicity. Linkmaster Smith has the essay screencapped, and can't bring himself to even comment on the depravity: "I really can’t comment on this in any family-friendly way." Plus, more from Dana Pico: "And Paul Krugman truly does define The Conscience of a Liberal," and Lonely Conservative: "Paul Krugman is Deranged." And check Althouse, who slams Krugman for his cowardice at closing his post to comments.

There's a Memeorandum thread. And checking the progressive entries we see the left's shame piling up like a heap of dung.

Here's idiot progressive Blue Texan, at Firedoglake, "Krugman is Right: We Should Be Ashamed of What Happened after 9/11."

Is anyone proud, 10 years later, that we’re still losing lives in Afghanistan?

Of course, you dolt. People are proud of the sacrifice and valor that's helped to make this country safer. Shame on you.

And Susie Madrak at Suburban Guerrilla can't take a moment to even honor the dead:

I’m not watching any of this “commemorative” crap today (thank God for cable!) and I’m certainly not writing about it today.

Shame on you, Susie. The attacks of 9/11 killed indiscriminately, killing those of all creeds and colors. At least have the decency to honor the dead.

At read the comment thread at Washington Monthly, where for the rare wayward commenter, you've got steady serving of hate-filled progressive gruel:

Krugman sums up my feelings exactly.

They once again came to the surface for me while I watched GDumbya read a letter from President Lincoln during the ceremony in NYC this morning.

Although 9/11 was a tragic autrocity [sic], the real tragedy is that we allowed an incompetent, out-of-control administration lead us down a rat-hole in the Middle East and consequently lose our national soul, our treasure, countless lives, our reputation, our integrity and our influence in the world.

I often wonder how different our present circumstance would be if the Supreme Court had not appointed Bush as president in 2001.

(Recall Daniel Henninger nailed progressies on this, arguing that the left's desecration of goodness preceded 9/11, going back to the Florida recount and the GOP's victory in Bush v. Gore. See: "America's Broken Unity After 9/11.")

And then check Prairie Weather, "A growing consensus about post-9/11":

Maybe an important aspect of the great divide in America is the difference between those Americans who are able to feel shame and willing to make genuine apologies, and those who can't admit to shame and toss off self-justification as a cheap plastic substitute for remorse.

I'm confounded on the one hand and enraged on the other. What apologies are necessary here? I mean, seriously. Doesn't Prairie Weather sum up everything that conservatives have been combating here at home since the early days of the war on terror, such as the progressive war on Bush's domestic and foreign security policies? Since September 11th we've seen the left's long train of shame. Recall the radical left's rank political opportunism in opposing the Iraq war, demonically, of course, since the Democrat Party in Congress --- the party of defeat --- turned against our troops after authorizing their deployment, to excoriate the mission, and declare repeatedly that Iraq was lost and that we should turn tail in an ignominious cut-and-run. And we had years of Bush derangement syndrome, which then transmogrified into putrid Palin derangement syndrome, all combined into a program of partisan political destruction that's done nothing but weaken American security by successfully terminating programs such as wiretapping that were keeping Americans safe. A decade's shame of appeasement and partisan abomination is frothing to a head in the left's responses to the 10th anniversary of 9/11. For many people like myself, that's why they became conservative.

Myth and Reality After 9/11

From Victor Davis Hanson, at National Review:

Why did radical Islamic terrorists kill almost 3,000 Americans a decade ago?

Few still believe the old myth that U.S. foreign policy or support for Israel logically earned us Osama bin Laden’s wrath. After all, the U.S. throughout the 1990s had saved Islamic peoples from Bosnia and Kosovo to Somalia and Kuwait. Russia and China, in contrast, had oppressed or killed tens of thousands of their own Muslims without much fear of provoking al-Qaeda.

Moreover, thousands of Arabs have been killed recently, but by their own Libyan and Syrian governments, not Israeli Defense Forces. Al-Qaeda still issues death threats to Americans even though its original pretexts for going to war — such as U.S. troops stationed in Saudi Arabia — have long been irrelevant.

On this ten-year anniversary of 9/11, no one has yet refuted the general truth that bin Laden tried to hijack popular Arab discontent over endemic poverty and self-induced misery. In cynical Hitlerian fashion, al-Qaeda’s propagandists sought to blame the mess of the Arab Middle East on Jews and foreigners, rather than seeking to address homegrown corrupt kleptocracies, inefficient statism, indigenous tribalism, gender apartheid, and religious fundamentalism and intolerance ...

More at that link.