Susan Estrich Comes Unglued

I've always tried to have respect for Susan Estrich. She's a fellow Harvard Law School graduate, and a helluva a lot more accomplished in politics than yours truly has ever been. But now, she's lost it.

If Ann Coulter penned something like this on the right, the Democrats would go nuts. But Susan Estrich, respectable liberal that she is (and the person in charge during the Dukakis meltdown in 1988), tells us the gloves are off from the Democrats...

My Democratic friends are mad as hell, and they aren't going to take it any more.

They are worried, having watched as another August smear campaign, full of lies and half-truths, takes its toll in the polls.

They are frustrated, mostly at the Kerry campaign, for naively believing that just because all the newspapers and news organizations that investigated the charges of the Swift Boat assassins found them to be full of lies and half-truths, they wouldn't take their toll.

The word on the street is that Kerry himself was ready to fire back the day the story broke, but that his campaign, believing the charges would blow over if they ignored them, counseled restraint. But most of all, activists Democrats are angry. As one who lived through an August like this, 16 years ago -- replete with rumors that were lies, which the Bush campaign claimed they had nothing to do with and later admitted they had planted -- I'm angry, too. I've been to this movie. I know how it works. Lies move numbers.

...Millions of dollars will be on the table. And there are plenty of choices for what to spend it on.

I'm not promising pretty.

What will it be?

Will it be the three, or is it four or five, drunken driving arrests that Bush and Cheney, the two most powerful men in the world, managed to rack up? (Bush's Texas record has been sealed. Now why would that be? Who seals a perfect driving record?)

After Vietnam, nothing is ancient history, and Cheney is still drinking. What their records suggest is not only a serious problem with alcoholism, which Bush but not Cheney has acknowledged, but also an even more serious problem of judgment. Could Dick Cheney get a license to drive a school bus with his record of drunken driving? (I can see the ad now.) A job at a nuclear power plant? Is any alcoholic ever really cured? So why put him in the most stressful job in the world, with a war going south, a thousand Americans already dead and control of weapons capable of destroying the world at his fingertips.

It has been said that in the worst of times, Kissinger gave orders to the military not to obey Nixon if he ordered a first strike. What if Bush were to fall off the wagon? Then what? Has America really faced the fact that we have an alcoholic as our president?

Or how about Dead Texans for Truth, highlighting those who served in Vietnam instead of the privileged draft-dodging president, and ended up as names on the wall instead of members of the Air National Guard. I'm sure there are some mothers out there who are still mourning their sons, and never made that connection. It wouldn't be so hard to find them.

Or maybe it will be Texas National Guardsmen for Truth, who can explain exactly what George W. Bush was doing while John Kerry was putting his life on the line. So far, all W. can do is come up with dental records to prove that he met his obligations. Perhaps with money on the table, or investigators on their trail, we will learn just what kind of wild and crazy things the president was doing while Kerry was saving a man's life, facing enemy fire and serving his country.

Or could it be George Bush's Former Female Friends for Truth. A forthcoming book by Kitty Kelly raises questions about whether the president has practiced what he preaches on the issue of abortion. As Larry Flynt discovered, a million dollars loosens lips. Are there others to be loosened?

Are you shocked? Not fair? Who said anything about fair? Remember President Dukakis? He was very fair. Now he teaches at Northeastern University. John Kerry has been very fair in dealing with the Swift Boat charges. That's why so many of my Democrat friends have decided to stop talking to the campaign, and start putting money together independently.

The arrogant little Republican boys who have been strutting around New York this week, claiming that they have this one won, would do well to take a step back. It could be a long and ugly road to November.

I could say a hundred things, but I'll stick to ten of them for now.

One, if Susan Estrich is unhinged like this, I fear for the Democrats. That party's going to get sucked in and fall apart in the vortex of its own hate.

Two, "arrogant little Republican boys?" Who writes like this? Does anyone sense some sexual frustration here? I'm probably way off there, but the line makes so little sense that it's the only thing I can think of here.

Three, I guess we can finally confirm that Gore-Lieberman 2000 was responsible for that drunken driving arrest record coming out the weekend before the election four years ago.

Four, Estrich still hasn't gotten over the 1988 loss that basically left her career as a political advisor in tatters. It's pretty clear that that she's still obsessed over the idea that Bush pere only won because he played dirty and Dukakis did not.

Five, I think the Democrats have bought into the victim mentality for far too long. When the GOP loses, most of us get pissed, but we figure it's because we didn't do a good enough job communicating our ideas, or maybe we concede that people didn't like our ideas (it's why moderate Republicans always apologize for the right wingers). In 2000, Bush never whined about the DUI coming to light in the last weekend -- he dealt with it. When Democrats lose, they think the GOP played dirty and stole the election... possibly because they'd be more than willing to do it themselves, but someone else can talk about projection and the Democrats.

Six, are they really this desperate? Based on the Kerry meltdown so far, maybe they are. They can't think of constructive steps to answer the charges by the Swift Boat Veterans, so they attack Bush.

Seven, can someone find Joe Lieberman and help him save this party from itself? Maybe Obama can help, along with the retired Sam Nunn. Maybe they can wake up the left-wing loopjobs to the fact that it's not dirt that's killing them. It's their message and their candidate.

Eight, ten bucks says the left-wing dishrag never reports on this column. Ever.

Nine, the Democrats are outraged by Zell Miller. Yet Zell spent his speech attacking Kerry's statements in public life, not his private life. Estrich has now decided that supposed GOP dirty tricks have given the Democrats carte blanche to attack Bush's personal life, no holds barred. Oh, I know it's those awful Swift Vets who started this. Does anyone on the left ever acknowledge that maybe these guys are angry for a legitimate reason? Say, Kerry's testimony when he returned from the war, which even the saint of bi-partisanship, Senator McCain, says is open to attack? Why can't Kerry take a constructive step on this? Go on with Russert, or even Democratic waterboy Stephanopolous, and answer questions and issue an apology for what he said then and the impact it had. Oh, wait, we can't do that, because these guys are all liars. Good approach -- it's accomplished a whole lot so far.

Finally, we have number ten. You don't want to do this, Susan. In your opinion, the GOP is dirtier than the Democrats. If so, is it remotely intelligent to battle them in a dirty campaign? No, you'd only do it because you're desperate, because you have nothing else left, and because you think you can throw dirt even better than the supposed masters. But remember, two can play at this game, Susan. Have you examined the personal life of John Forbes Kerry? Let me throw out one example: is he the same man who conducted back-room negotiations with the North Vietnamese in Paris, while he was still an officer in the Naval Reserve?

Someone get the bottle away from Estrich. If Kerry takes her advice, he may end up losing like Mondale.

No Liberal Media Bias To See Here

Maybe the AP reporter made a simple mistake. Spin Swimming points out the original AP press release regarding Bush's announcement at a campaign rally today about Bill Clinton's heart bypass surgery:

WEST ALLIS, Wis. - President Bush (news - web sites) on Friday wished Bill Clinton (news - web sites) "best wishes for a swift and speedy recovery.""He's is in our thoughts and prayers," Bush said at a campaign rally. Bush's audience of thousands in West Allis, Wis., booed. Bush did nothing to stop them.

Those awful, awful Republicans!

But wait! After people watching the rally on TV reported that they hadn't heard anything of the sort, the AP posted a corrected release. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has the transcript up; note the word APPLAUSE after Bush said Clinton is in our thoughts and prayers. And lastly, check out the sound clip posted by one of Spin Swimming's readers.

How anyone thought there was booing in that crowd is beyond me.

(Hat tip: Instapundit, yet again.)

And for the record, I'm shocked about Clinton's surgery -- he looked like a million bucks every time I'd seen him in public recently. As much as I loathe his Presidency, I hope he makes it through this safely and he's back on his feet quickly. He's in my thoughts and prayers as well.

The Kerry Campaign Can Now Officially Panic

Even I didn't expect a bounce this big...

New York: For the first time since the Presidential race became a two person contest last spring, there is a clear leader, the latest TIME poll shows. If the 2004 election for President were held today, 52% of likely voters surveyed would vote for President George W. Bush, 41% would vote for Democratic nominee John Kerry, and 3% would vote for Ralph Nader, according to a new TIME poll conducted from Aug. 31 to Sept. 2. Poll results are available on TIME.com and will appear in the upcoming issue of TIME magazine, on newsstands Monday, Sept. 6.

Maybe Bush should hire the protestors to protest the debates.

Good Riddance

Another key Taliban commander gets dusted by U.S. special ops forces. Nice work, boys. God bless you, and good hunting.

(Hat tip: Instapundit.)

The John Kerry Post of the Day

My latest discovery about my favorite cheese-eating surrendermonkey-looking Ketchup King cum Presidential candidate:

Look out, ladies and gentlemen. He's going postal.

Last night, in a move Mort Kondracke, the editor of Roll Call and a Fox News commentator, termed "incredibly petty", Botox Boy and his little boy running mate decided to jump the gun immediately after President Bush finished speaking at the GOP Convention. They opted to jump to the attack, with Kerry ripping into the service records of Bush and Cheney while complaining about having his service questioned.

I'm not going to get into the stupidity of this approach at this time, except to note that if Karl Rove is secretly in control of John Kerry's mind, he needs to be less obvious about it. We'll save the critique for a later post. But let me start with Kerry once again encroaching on my territory, and failing miserably.

You guessed it. The Condiment King decided to enter the sports realm. Again.

So far, we've head the idiot reference to Ned Yost from 2000. Let's not forget his ability to confuse Michigan football with Ohio State football. And don't get me started on his strange love affair with bicycling and French surnames. I could include Kerry's deer-hunting exploits, except I'm not a hunter. We didn't even mention the "Lambert Field" fiasco, at least that I recall.

But last night, he managed to screw up baseball, one more time.

Kerry opened his speech in Springfield, Ohio by noting that something very important had happened -- "The Red Sox pulled within 2.5 games of the Yankees."

Except for one problem. Both the Yankees and the Red Sox won, which meant the Red Sox are still 3.5 games out. Point in fact, the Yanks won by a score of 9-1. Over Ohio's own Cleveland Indians. So Kerry basically rubbed it in the face of any Indians fans in Springfield, who would have known their team got torched (granted Cleveland is 3 hours away from Springfield, which makes them more likely to follow the Reds... but I'm guessing a few folks there follow Ohio's AL team).

It's not bad enough for the Sox to be associated with another losing cause -- Kerry can't even get his facts straight.

The Bush Speech

Wow.

I'm not a political expert. I don't even play one on TV. But I'm a gifted amateur, and I've seen plenty of good political speeches... and a few great ones.

But Bush just gave one of the best I've ever seen. And it capped a week filled with great ones.

Bush was rightly criticized for giving a less-than-impressive State of the Union speech. In that speech, he tried to minimize domestic policy (the expected topic of any SOTU) in order to respond to the critical mass gathering against the war in Iraq. It wasn't the right place for that speech, and it cost him momentum.

Tonight, Bush delivered a speech that was part SOTU, part convention acceptance. And it meshed perfectly.

Part of this stemmed from the fact his leadoff hitters set this week up perfectly. McCain defended the war on Iraq as the right thing to do. Guiliani inspired us with tales of the President's leadership after 9/11. Schwarzeneggar appealled to the ideals of the GOP by recalling the positive message of Ronald Reagan. Mel Martinez and Michael Steele affirmed the theme of opportunity in the United States. Laura Bush discussed the humanity of her husband. Zell Miller attacked John Kerry's Senate record with a zest that seemed Jacksonian. George Pataki defended W's track record. And Dick Cheney set forth the case for George Bush in the mature, businesslike manner we all know.

By doing so, these people established two tones for this convention and this election. First, that this election was about national security and whom you would trust to keep your family safe. Second, that you can't trust a man who lacks stability and principles to lead us in that battle, so you can't trust John Forbes Kerry with this job.

This left Bush with two tasks tonight. First, he had to make sure that he dealt with domestic policy, lest he be accused of not addressing the economic concerns of voters who want to see new jobs and new proposals to make the economy better. Second, he had to hammer home the impression that he was a strong yet compassionate leader, someone who could be trusted to make difficult choices, and to have the courage to stand behind them, unlike his opponent.

The domestic part of his speech will leave some conservatives unsettled, since there's a goodly amount of spending proposed. It even sounded Clintonesque (ugh) when he started discussing how the work force and families have changed. But the fact that Bush asserted tax incentives for businesses regarding health care and pressed the issue of tort reform shows that he knows how to keep his base close to him, even with a big-spending past. They trust him because he stands strong on tax cuts, including the brilliant call to simplify the tax code and stands with them on social issues. Name a Republican who had the guts this week to raise the issue of abortion on that stage before W. He hit all the right notes in this parft of his speech. He even covered it later for those who disagree with him with the simple statement that while you may not agree with him, at least you know where he stands.

As for the rest of his speech -- he hasn't been this good since September 20, 2001. I'm serious -- even the speech to the U.N. didn't match this one for elegance, humor and structure. It was a little too long, but it never had me looking for the remote. He expressed the case for Iraq quite simply, yet never got defensive about it. At the same time, he expressed the pain of having to send men and women off to war, and the pain of having to speak to the families of the fallen. And he exhibited the emotion that people who meet him personally have felt after speaking with him. Just about everyone acknowledges that they'd rather have a beer (or club soda, I guess) with W. than break bread with John Kerry. But what people can lose track of, during the campaign rhetoric, is the basic decency of W. He's a good person at his core, and one who's very sincere and strong of will. You can question his decisions, but you cannot question that he believes in them.

He displayed the sort of self-deprecating humor politicians need, unlike Kerry, who's shown a thin skin when attacked. Bush didn't whine about unfair attacks upon himself. Instead, he made fun of his mistakes with grammar, his supposed arrogance, and his blunt manner. Again, this reinforced that humanity, one of his great advantages in this race. He used the same gentle humor to poke fun at some of Kerry's outlandish announcements, like his claim that he had conservative values. He also challenged Kerry again on his votes and his lack of consistency, again framing the decision on Bush's own terms -- terms that are favorable to him.

He closed with the idealism about America that many mock -- but one that again contrasts him favorably to John Kerry. He believes in the good things about this country, and believes that we are destined for great things. He framed the issue as one where John Kerry thinks this election is about minor issues -- and one where he's challenging Americans to make a choice that will be very important to future generations.

In the end, he delivered his best political speech at the time when he needed it, with the world watching. That's a damn good start to the fall campaign, and great ending to a spectacular GOP Convention. If this doesn't deliver a significant bounce, nothing could. The race isn't over by any means. But Bush has seized the initiative.

Cue the theme music. Good night, New York.

The John Kerry Post of the Day

My latest discovery about my favorite cheese-eating surrendermonkey-looking Ketchup King cum Presidential candidate:

Well, it's official. The Swift Boat Veterans aren't the only veterans who don't think too much of America's most famous triple Purple Heart winner.

Kerry gave a speech before the national convention of the American Legion yesterday, a day after President Bush addressed the group. Maybe it was the fact that the meeting was held in Nashville. Maybe it was the fact that military voters skew Republican anyway. Or maybe Kerry was having a bad hair day.

Whatever it was, Kerry did not have a great day. The New York Post reports...

There were no boos yesterday. A boo from a legionnaire is to sit on his hands, not applaud and say nothing.

But there was no shortage of warm hands and long silences at the Opryland Resort Hotel, where 5,000 American Legionnaires sat stoically listening to Sen. John Kerry.

"He was up there taking credit for everything the American Legion had achieved. He was talking about 'we' and 'I,' " said Ed Reiter of Long Island, who emphasized he was speaking for himself — not his delegation.

Sen. Kerry was, in fact, a serial user of the royal we:

"After returning from Vietnam, I saw vets who weren't getting the care they needed, so we fought hard and got additional funding for VA hospitals.

"We founded the first medical-assistance programs in the country . . . We stood with veterans by getting the GI Bill extended."

Added Reiter, "He talks like he was around 86 years ago when the Legion was founded. I can't remember him ever helping out veterans."

Michael Martin, a Viet vet from Nashville, said, "Today would have been a great time for him to apologize to his comrades after his comments in 1971 and then release his war records. Maybe all could've been forgiven. And I'm a Democrat."

Others within the group disagreed, of course. But most seemed to share this view. Note that the AP article on Kerry's speech mentions nothing about the reception by the veterans, which isn't a good sign. And the L.A. Times says he received a lukewarm response.

Ralph Peters, who's not exactly a friend of Bush, was even more harsh in his Post editorial. After ripping Kerry as "shameless" and calling his speech "disgraceful", Peters really gets angry:

Specific promises Kerry made were outright nonsense. He claimed he'd double the size of our special operations forces. Sounds great. But to do so would rob regular line units of critically needed, experienced NCOs and officers, fatally compromise the high standards of our special operators and take at least a decade — unless he means to ruin special ops entirely.

And Kerry's going to increase our ground forces by 40,000 troops. Good idea. But he's not going to send them to Iraq, you understand.

Having it both ways again.

Kerry said we should never go to war without a plan to win the peace. Agreed. But where was he 18 months ago, when such a criticism could have made a difference?

Back then, he was voting for the war. Before he opposed it. Before supporting it again. Now he's against it again. Although he supports our troops, of course.

Does Kerry have no shame at all? No spine, whatsoever? Is it possible to be nothing but a bundle of pure ambition, with no shred of ethics? Is Kerry so hungry for office that he'll change any position to buy a vote?

If President Bush shocks the Republican Convention tonight by coming out in favor of gay marriage, Kerry will immediately back a constitutional amendment to outlaw it.

Even on their worst day — and they've had some bad ones — the Bushies actually believe in a few things.

Kerry's the guy who, at the beginning of August, stated that we need to withdraw troops from Germany and South Korea. Then, as soon as President Bush announced a plan to do so, Kerry thundered against the idea. Confronted with his own remarks — made only two weeks earlier — he claimed that, well, yes, he thought we should withdraw troops, only not the way the president proposed to do it.

The guy is an eel in a vat of olive oil.

Yesterday, John Kerry tried to pander to America's heroes, conveniently forgetting that he'd trashed them for political gain, then shortchanged them throughout his Senate career. Suddenly, Kerry was the man who had fought for benefits for his fellow Vietnam vets, the man who felt their pain (Kerry makes Bill Clinton look like a paragon of integrity).

The only veterans' benefit young John Kerry fought for was the right of vets to be spit upon in public.

Yikes. I'm not sure what has Peters so aggravated. Maybe it's the statements Kerry made in his book The New Soldier back in 1971, the one with the upside-down flag on the cover, something we know he doesn't want publicized. Maybe he recalled this statement from that book:

We will not quickly join those who march on Veterans' Day waving small flags, calling to memory those thousands who died for the "greater glory of the United States." We will not accept the rhetoric. We will not readily join the American Legion and the Veterans of Foreign Wars - in fact, we will find it hard to join anything at all and when we do, we will demand relevancy such as other organizations have recently been unable to provide. We will not take solace from the creation of monuments or the naming of parks after a select few of the thousands of dead Americans and Vietnamese. We will not uphold traditions which decorously memorialize that which was base and grim.

The amazing thing about all this is that Kerry may anger veterans more than Bill Clinton did. But here's something curious we spotted in the text of The New Soldier...

I think that, more than anything, the New Soldier is trying to point out how there are two Americas -- the one the speeches are about and the one we really are. Rhetoric has blinded us so much that we are unable to see the realities which exist in this country.

Two Americas? Where have I heard that before?

(A tip o' the hat to Q and O, who covers much the same ground.)

See, Our Right to Privacy is Still Alive and Well

In case you were worried, you still have right to vomit in private, according to the Montana Supreme Court. Even the Patriot Act can't stop you.

(Hat tip to How Appealing, the best site around for appelate court enthusiasts).

De-bunking Snopes

Will Collier at VodkaPundit has a sensational post that backs up Zell Miller's rundown of John Kerry's record on defense from last night. The article also de-bunks Snopes' take on the Kerry voting record on defense. Citing Lt. Smash, who has scanned a Kerry campaign poster from 1984, we get to see the full list of weapons systems Kerry found offensive:

NUCLEAR FORCES

* MX Missile --- Cancel --- $5.0 billion
* B-1 Bomber --- Cancel --- $8.0 billion
* Anti-satellite system --- Cancel --- $ 99 million
* Star Wars [sic] --- Cancel --- $1.3 billion
* Tomahawk Missile --- Reduce by 50 per cent --- $294 million

LAND FORCES
* AH-64 Helicopters --- Cancel --- $1.4 billion
* Division Air Defense Gun (DIVAD) --- Cancel --- $638 million
* Patriot Air Defense Missile --- Cancel --- $1.3 billion

NAVAL FORCES

* Aegis Air-Defense Cruiser --- Cancel --- $800 million
* Battleship Reactivation --- Cancel --- $453 million

AIRCRAFT
* AV-8B Vertical Takeoff and Landing Aircraft --- Cancel --- $1.0 billion
* F-15 Fighter Aircraft --- Cancel --- $2.3 billion
* F-14A Fighter Aircraft --- Cancel --- $1.0 billion
* F-14D Fighter Aircraft --- Cancel --- $286 million
* Phoenix Air-to-Air Missile --- Cancel --- $432 million
* Sparrow Air-to-Air Missile

Maybe he would have been against spitballs as well. Not all of these weapons systems were good ideas, mind you -- the anti-satellite missile, for example, was an utter waste. But the Aegis, the Apache, the Patriot... as Smash points out, these have formed part of the backbone of our military.

I'll be blogging later (much later) on the other speeches this week, especially Rudy. One thought on Miller's speech, though -- the Dems keep talking about him as if he were a frightful bogeyman. Here's Terry McAulliffe, as per Jim Geraghty:

I don't think I've ever seen such a hateful speech in my life. He scared people. It was like one of those Jason movies. I think a lot of parents needed to move their children out of the room so that they wouldn't hear it.

As Geraghty pointed out, this is silly for several reasons. It's again the spiel of the Dems that they respond to substance about John Kerry's record by claiming the other side is being mean and dirty. But what's scarier is that the Democrats find a seventy-two year old member of their own party scary. If he's scary, how terrified will they be of Osama?

The Angry Chinese Chimp

A tip o' the hat to the Lord of Truth, providing me with so much material that I often fail to get to it, so as to bore people with long-winded political diatribes (all five people who read this, as it were). But the headline "Sexually frustrated chimp takes up smoking" should have been too good to pass up...

Sexual frustration has turned a Chinese chimpanzee from a mild-mannered simian into a problem primate who smokes cigarettes and spits at visitors, the Xinhua news agency says.

The Lord even provided us with several follow-up headlines...

1. Following this story, the Chinese government moved tanks in to surround the dissident chimp and crush the revolt.
2. The next day, knock-off versions of the smoking chimp were available all over Hong Kong.
3. The chimp's name: Ling Ling Kong
4. After a visit by the Energizer Bunny, the chimp seemed more relaxed, but was still smoking, albeit in bed.
5. US Officials offered to bring Koko the Gorilla over to help teach the Chinese chimp some "sign language" to help the chimp become more "self-sufficient."

For my own part, I found myself thinking about bad jokes about Liza Minelli. I know, I'm an awful person.

Gilligan Goes to Iraq

To quote the Lord of Truth, "OK, this person really has too much time on his hands. I have no idea who Ludwig von Mises is, or why he has an Institute, but the fact that this author can tie Gilligan's Island to the war in Iraq is pretty impressive." I'd have to agree, although I'm not sure I understand the whole thing...

Gilligan's Island is now out on DVD, reawakening the unanswered questions of childhood: why does the Skipper let Gilligan help with anything when he knows he'll just screw it up? Why did the movie star take a day cruise in an evening gown? Why did two of the richest people in the world board a dinky boat with the hoi polloi instead of leasing a private yacht? And why do any of the other stranded castaways treat the millionaire's government money as valuable while stuck on an island where no such government can enforce its value?

Because it's just a dumb TV show.

But that last question stuck with me. Would fiat dollars be treated as valuable without the government around to enforce its fiat? My impression in childhood was that money belonged to the government, was inextricably bound to the government, and we, the citizens of the government, were just using the money "on loan" so to speak. This impression came not only from the look of the money itself, but from American history, as children's cartoons had communicated it to me. (One Scooby Doo episode ends with the hidden "treasure" turning out to be a case full of hoarded and now worthless Confederate dollars.)

That's about where I checked out, but maybe someone else will enjoy it. What was really scary is that I recalled the Scooby-Doo episode he references.

The John Kerry Post of the Day

My latest discovery about my favorite cheese-eating surrendermonkey-looking Ketchup King cum Presidential candidate:

Trouble for our favorite Botox Brahmin today, as his campaign staff is now in hot water, according to the NY Daily News...

Sen. John Kerry is angry at the way his campaign has botched the attacks from the Swift boat veterans and has ordered a staff shakeup that will put former Clinton aides in top positions.

"The candidate is furious," a longtime senior Kerry adviser told the Daily News. "He knows the campaign was wrong. He wanted to go after the Swift boat attacks, but his top aides said no."

Campaign sources stressed that no one is losing a job at this point, but instead "proven winners" like former Clinton aides Joe Lockhart and Joel Johnson are being brought in to try to regain momentum for Team Kerry.

Many Democrats have suggested that an overhaul of the Kerry "message machine" is seriously overdue.

Johnson is now running Kerry's war room, and Lockhart will be both a spokesman and strategist.

"Nobody is going over the side, but some people's stock has gone through the floor," a source said.

You know, I've often argued that Al Gore ran a for-crap campaign in 2000 because he was always undecided about how to handle his connection to Bill Clinton. But it's easy to focus on the staff and forget that it's the candidate himself who sets the tone for the campaign. Has the Bush campaign, despite difficulties and ups-and-downs, ever fired anyone? About the closest thing we've seen is the return of Karen Hughes as an advisor, but she's basically been in that role part-time anyway. Otherwise, Bush's campaign rolls along, projecting stability -- which comes from the top down. In 2000, Gore was switching strategies once a week, as he showed during the debates, when he went from Smart-Aleck Creep to Milquetoast Nerd to Uber-Alpha Male in the span of three weeks.

Kerry seems too cautious for the Gore strategy of changing personas every time he changes suits, but he also seems unwilling to admit the problem might be more basic than his staff. Further evidence of the real culprit appears in this CNN article...

Several campaign officials and advisers say they recognize the need to have an "adult" traveling with the candidate -- as one put it, "someone who can tell him to shut up, or change something if and when that is necessary" and quickly deal with other strategic issues from the road.

"The 'sky is falling' people are out of line, but we do need to fix some things," said one senior campaign official.

That might not be quite accurate. They may need to fix the candidate. Jokes aside, isn't this directly counter to the idea that Kerry and the Dems are the smarter party? You don't hear Bush staffers saying they need to send an "adult" on the road with the President. I guess Clinton's advisors might have spoken that way, but for different reasons.

In the end, Kerry really fits the character we've come to know. He has no message, shifts blame for his own mistakes, and lacks the ability to make decisions without consulting opinion polls and 1,000 advisors. Perhaps these might be good qualifications for a Senator from Massachusetts, but not for a prospective President.

The Yankees Lose... and How!

I could not in good conscience let this day pass without noting the TREMENDOUS butt-kicking the Cleveland Indians administered to the Yankees yesterday. 22-0 isn't just bad, it's historic, as ESPN.com noted...

With an epic defeat, the New York Yankees' hold on first place in the AL East became increasingly tenuous.

Omar Vizquel got six hits to tie the American League record for a nine-inning game and the Cleveland Indians routed New York 22-0 Tuesday night in the largest loss in the 101-year history of the Yankees.

Cleveland matched the largest shutout win in the major leagues since 1900, set by Pittsburgh against the Chicago Cubs on Sept. 16, 1975.

...Yankees owner George Steinbrenner watched his team fall in record fashion, then refused to answer questions as he left the ballpark. New York captain Derek Jeter left the clubhouse before reporters were allowed in.

Nothing better than watching a member of the Mount Rushmore of Sports Evil get pummelled. Of course, now the Yankees will probably bounce back -- no matter what, they're almost guaranteed to torment us with another appearance in the baseball playoffs.

But feel better, fellow Yankee-haters. Stat of the day: Since 1936, every time a city has hosted a Republican Convention, that city's teams failed to make the World Series. Even in 1936, when the GOP met in Chicago, the Cubs appeared and lost. The last time a GOP Convention host celebrated a World Series title was in 1908... and it was Chicago again, with the Cubs once again. Last I checked, New York ain't Chicago, which means another year to celebrate the joy of watching the Yankees fall short.

The Terminator Speaks to All of Us

Thank you, Gray Davis.

It's odd for me to write those words, but the incompetent former Governor of the state of California will forever be a person to whom I owe a great debt. If he hadn't become the most despised man in California, there never would have been a recall effort in the Golden State. And without the recall, we wouldn't have had Arnold Schwarzeneggar's speech last night at the RNC.

Aronld's speech was dead-on perfect in its humor and its delivery, but it was more than that. Arnold is a moderate Republican who disagrees with some of the stances the party has on social issues -- but he didn't act as if this meant he was right and they were wrong, or that he needed to attack or defend the party's stance on these issues. In a way no one else has done, he made it clear that it's okay to disagree on some issues, because the folks in that room agree on far more issues, and on far more important values.

On top of that, he made it clear that we don't have to apologize for sharing those values. When's the last time someone referenced Richard Milhaus Nixon at a GOP Convention? Arnold did it perfectly, by noting that Nixon talked about free enterprise and smaller government -- in contrast to the big government, tax-and-spend values embodied by liberal icon Hubert Humphrey. Democrats love to lampoon Republicans as uncaring fatcats. We know it's not true, but we get defensive nonetheless. Arnold didn't get defensive -- he spoke forcefully and clearly about our values, and said he was proud to be a Republican, and others should feel proud to be Republicans as well. He told people that there are Republican values, and if you believe in them , you're a Republican. Yeah, that's a challenge, Democratic girliemen.

And the jokes were great. Humor goes a long way toward making a convention speech acceptable, but it's got to be self-deprecating humor or a gentle needle to the other side. Harsh cynicism never works, and neither does false modesty. Arnold poked fun at himself, and did so without lessening the impact of his story.

And his story was where he got to me. Here's the parts of the text that really stood out then and still resonate in my mind:

My fellow Americans, this is an amazing moment for me. To think that a once scrawny boy from Austria could grow up to become governor of California and stand in Madison Square Garden to speak on behalf of the president of the United States. That is an immigrant's dream. It is the American dream.

I was born in Europe ...and I've traveled all over the world. I can tell you that there is no place, no country, more compassionate, more generous, more accepting and more welcoming than the United States of America.

As long as I live, I will never forget that day 21 years ago when I raised my hand and took the oath of citizenship.

Do you know how proud I was? I was so proud that I walked around with an American flag around my shoulders all day long.

Tonight, I want to talk about why I'm even more proud to be an American -- why I'm proud to be a Republican and why I believe this country is in good hands.

...As a kid I saw the socialist country that Austria became after the Soviets left. I love Austria and I love the Austrian people -- but I always knew America was the place for me.

In school, when the teacher would talk about America, I would daydream about coming here. I would sit for hours watching American movies transfixed by my heroes like John Wayne. Everything about America seemed so big to me so open, so possible.

...To my fellow immigrants listening tonight, I want you to know how welcome you are in this party. We Republicans admire your ambition. We encourage your dreams. We believe in your future. One thing I learned about America is that if you work hard and play by the rules, this country is truly open to you. You can achieve anything.

Everything I have -- my career, my success, my family -- I owe to America. In this country, it doesn't make any difference where you were born. It doesn't make any difference who your parents were. It doesn't make any difference if, like me, you couldn't even speak English until you were in your twenties.

America gave me opportunities and my immigrant dreams came true. I want other people to get the same chances I did, the same opportunities. And I believe they can. That's why I believe in this country, that's why I believe in this party and that's why I believe in this President.

Excuse me if this gets a little emotional.

It's funny, because I'm not an immigrant myself. But I'm the son of immigrants, and those words spoke to me. They stirred a deep pride in myself, my family and in my country.

Those words -- they remind of being a kid, being the son of immigrants, being unable to speak English fluently until I was about six years old. I remember being told about the wondrous land in which I was privileged to grow up, because my parents wanted to come here, because they saw a better life for their family here.

Those words -- they sound a little like the things my dad could say and has said to me in the past. My dad had nothing when he arrived here, save an opportunity to further his education and a work ethic and drive that I can only strive to reach. He built a wonderful life for himself and his family -- things that would not be possible, or nearly as easy to do, in other places. He was proud of being from India, but he passed on chances to return, because he wanted his kids to grow up here.

Those words -- they refute the idea that people in other countries look at us and universally hate us. Most of them want to be one of us, to have that same feeling of freedom we have, to have the ability to fulfill their dreams. When I was a little kid, I'd visit India, and some of my cousins would tease me for being unabashedly pro-American (yes, even then, I was a right-wing zealot). Guess what? Those cousins live here now, and are raising their kids here as well.

Those words -- they say something amazing to me. Here we have an Austrian-born actor, who didn't speak English until his twenties, who became a multi-millionaire, lives in California and married a member of the most famous liberal Democratic family in America... and yet his words and life experience strike a chord with the son of an Indian couple who was raised outside of Philly, went to law school in Boston and lives in Washington, D.C. Stop and think about how wonderfully strange that is -- in other nations, the differences between us would serve as a dividing line. In America, we find common ground and see how we're alike, because both of us can achieve the same goal if we want.

In the end, those words remind us of the wondrous things that take place in our country. Look, I'm as much a cynic as anyone (I'm a lawyer who grew up in the 1980's and 1990's; how could I not be?). But Arnold's speech reminded me of the way the Gipper always left you feeling good. It reminds us of the fact that amazing, miraculous things happen to people regularly in this country, more so than in any other nation. We sometimes lose sight of the fact that people from all over the world yearn to come to this country, to study, to work and to find their dreams. And invariably, these people, or their children, or their grandchildren, or their great-grandchildren accomplish amazing things.

And that's because of the culture of this country, more so than anything else. We cultivate freedom and inspire the world with our example. We are a great country, and a great people. And Arnold reminded us of that last night. Let's not forget it.

Don't Mess With Al

The guys at Powerline have a great picture of an angry Al Franken, apparently in the midst of a fit against the producer of the Laura Ingraham Show. If Air America can't beat right-wing talk radio, maybe they can beat them up.

One tip, Al -- it's not polite to point.

Required Reading on the Kerry Tax Plan

The Lord of Truth checks in, but with a substantive policy analysis from Martin Feldstein in the Wall Street Journal that breaks down the Kerry tax plan... and what it says isn't flattering...

When it comes to taxes, John Kerry says he will raise taxes on taxpayers with incomes over $200,000 but will not increase taxes on the "middle class." Since most Americans regard themselves as middle class, they may feel that they won't be hit by a Kerry tax increase if their income is under $200,000. But while promising not to raise taxes on the middle class, Mr. Kerry is actually considering a big tax increase on families with taxable incomes of $80,000 and even less.

Of course, he doesn't put it quite that way. He speaks instead about raising the maximum amount of income on which the 12.4% Social Security payroll tax would be levied from the current $87,900 to $120,000. For someone with a salary of $110,000, that would mean a combined employee-employer payroll tax increase of $2,740.

That's a big tax increase for such an individual. A $110,000 salary earner with a spouse who looks after two children and with the typical income tax deductions for that income level has taxable income of $79,000 and pays an income tax of $13,400. The $2,740 payroll tax increase would therefore be the same as a 20% increase in that income tax bill.

Mr. Kerry's suggested increase in the payroll tax would do more than just raise the tax burden on millions of families who regard themselves as middle class. For those with wages between $87,900 and $120,000, it would take the marginal payroll tax rate on each extra dollar of earnings from zero to 12.4%. The resulting large increase in the individual's overall marginal tax rate would distort substantially the amount that people work, the effort with which they work, their interest in more training and more responsibility, their willingness to take entrepreneurial risks, etc. The higher marginal tax rate would also encourage substituting lower value fringe benefits for cash compensation.

Here are the specifics. For taxpayers now earning between $87,900 and $120,000, the overall marginal tax rate (including the federal marginal income tax rate of 25%, the Medicare payroll tax and a state income tax) would rise from 33% to about 43%. Experience with past tax changes suggests that raising the marginal tax rate from 33% to 43% would cause individuals to reduce their taxable earnings by about 7% by changing the way that they work and the way that they are compensated. Someone who now earns $110,000 would reduce his taxable income to $102,000. In practice this change wouldn't happen immediately but would mean a smaller increase in taxable income over time than would otherwise have occurred.

This reduction in taxable earnings not only reduces the revenue gain from raising the payroll tax ceiling but also causes an outright loss to the government of personal income tax revenue. For many individuals, the extra payroll tax revenue would be more than offset by the lower personal income tax revenue, causing a net loss of revenue to the government.

Here's why. Since an individual who initially earns $110,000 would react to the higher marginal tax rate by reducing his taxable income to $102,000, the payroll tax revenue that he and his employer pay would only rise by $1,748 rather than the $2,740 that would be collected if there were no change in behavior. Furthermore, income tax revenue would go down by 25% of the $8,000 fall in his taxable earnings or $2,000. In addition, because the increased employer portion of the payroll tax reduces personal taxable income, the income tax collections fall by an additional $218. Finally, the reduction in pretax wages also lowers revenue from the 2.9% Medicare payroll tax by $266. Putting the pieces together shows a payroll tax increase of $1,748 and losses on the income and Medicare taxes of $2,484. For this $110,000 earner, every extra dollar of Social Security tax revenue produced by the Kerry plan would cut other tax revenue by more than a dollar. Raising the taxable income ceiling would actually cause a net fall in total tax revenue for this individual of $736.

The distorting effect of the higher marginal tax rate on the way people work and the form in which they take their compensation creates a waste of real income that economists call the "deadweight loss" of the tax change. This pure waste is over and above the decline in earnings and the loss of tax revenue. For the individual who originally earned $110,000, calculations show that the deadweight loss caused by the higher marginal tax rate is about $3,100 even before taking account of the distorting effects on economic growth.

For individuals with incomes over $120,000, the increase in the payroll tax ceiling would not change the reward for additional work or the relative tax on cash income and fringe benefits. ...The net revenue gain is therefore about $3,420 for each of these individuals.

So the rise in the payroll tax ceiling would mean higher total taxes for some individuals and lower total taxes for others.

...The Kerry idea to raise the income ceiling for the Social Security payroll tax to $120,000 would increase the payroll tax revenue by $19 billion if there were no effect on taxpayer behavior. But changes in behavior shrink the additional payroll tax revenue to $16 billion and cause federal and state personal income tax revenue and Medicare payroll revenue to fall by about $11 billion. This means that more than two-thirds of the $16 billion increase in Social Security revenue is just a back door transfer from general revenue and the Medicare trust fund.

The net revenue gain would therefore be only about $5 billion or less than 30% of the $19 billion traditional "static" estimate of the payroll tax gain that ignores the impact of higher tax rates on taxpayer behavior and on the personal income tax liability. Finally, the total deadweight loss -- i.e., the total pure waste caused by the distorting effect of the tax -- would be about $9 billion. The total cost to the private sector of the government's raising the net revenue of $5 billion in this way is therefore $14 billion -- or nearly a $3 cost to taxpayers for every extra dollar of revenue that the government collects.

It's hard to think of a worse tax policy than one that raises very little revenue but causes a very large distortionary deadweight loss. But that's the tax policy that Mr. Kerry says he is considering.

Ouch. To be honest, there are elements of what Mr. Feldstein discusses here that can and will be disputed by the other side. But he puts forth a very cogent analysis, and does a solid job of explaining why increases in tax rates don't always translate in a straight line to increased tax revenue, and how such increases in tax revenue can have a significant drag on the economy.

The Lord of Truth actually compared this Ross Perot's charts in 1992, but this was much better... although it would be more entertaining if Admiral Stockdale appeared to explain it.

The Swift Boat Saga, Part XIV: The Mainstream Media Continues to Fade

The Swift Boat Veterans Saga has been Exhibit 1 in the decline of the so-called mainstream media, which we'll define here as most newspapers and the network news channels (in other words, all TV news save Fox News, CNN, and MSNBC, assuming anyone is watching MSNBC). These are the traditional sources of information people have turned to in the past when looking for news.

Since the public was limited in the number of sources it had for news, this meant the news organizations themselves exercised tremendous power. Most newspapers in the business followed the lead of big city papers such as the left-wing dishrag when reporting national news. And wire services, while they reported on everything everywhere, had the power to influence the initial slant of a story as much as anyone.

Now, of course, the traditional media has to cope with competition. For years, it was the network news, trying to swim against the tide of cable news shows that report anything and everything in a search for programming, ending the dominance of network news anchors like Brokaw, Jennings and Rather. And they had to deal with the growth of talk radio, which fueled a conservative counter-point to the typically liberal slant on the evening news as well. By the time Fox News enterted the fray in the mid-90's, network news was well into a slow decline in viewership.

But now, it's newspapers who face this issue head-on, in the form of the Internet and websites that update news constantly and force stories to the forefront. Drudge effectively broke the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal in 1998, but the Internet had only started to step to the fore. What it's doing now is dragging the mainstream media, kicking and screaming, to cover stories they'd rather not discuss.

Glenn Reynolds, otherwise known as Instapundit, summed it up beautifully in a column at TechCentralStation while discussing the decline of the media...

That decline is partly technological in origin. Monopolistic or oligopolistic newspapers and broadcast outlets were the result of technology: economies of scale and scope that rewarded consolidation and led to virtually no competition among newspapers and very little among broadcasters. Now that's changing, as alternative outlets like talk radio, cable television, and, especially, the Internet, have almost completely removed the traditional barriers to entry and allowed competition.

But the loss of those barriers isn't the biggest problem faced by the mainstream media. The biggest problem is that, like most monopolists, they've spent so many years enjoying their position and not worrying about quality that they're left floundering now that competition is exposing their faults. Like the folks at GM who couldn't understand why people were buying Toyotas all of a sudden back in the 1970s, today's Big Media folks are shocked to see ratings and circulation numbers falling while readership for Internet sites skyrockets. And, like the auto executives, they're even starting to mumble about the need for protection.

But it won't work, of course. And -- much like the release of the Chevrolet Vega, the Ford Fairmont, or the AMC Pacer -- the press's coverage of the 2004 presidential election has revealed an industry in deep trouble. One problem is that even the pretense of evenhandedness has vanished, as members of the press -- who increasingly share the same left-leaning political views and who increasingly live in what Mickey Kaus calls the press "cocoon" -- have let their bias show. In an admirable display of forthrightness, Newsweek's Evan Thomas remarked:

"There's one other base here, the media. Let's talk a little media bias here. The media, I think, wants Kerry to win and I think they're going to portray Kerry and Edwards I'm talking about the establishment media, not Fox. They're going to portray Kerry and Edwards as being young and dynamic and optimistic and there's going to be this glow about them, collective glow, the two of them, that's going to be worth maybe 15 points."

Hmm. A 15-point margin kind of makes a mockery of "democracy" doesn't it? And we were worried about a few hanging chads?

...But the real problem here, to paraphrase a Massachusetts politician who ran for President a few elections back, is not ideology, but competence.

The press's neutrality has been revealed as a fiction. That might not matter if they were still better at what they did than anyone else. After all, what about all the fact-checking, the professionalism, the editors meticulously ensuring fairness and accuracy?

Yeah. What about 'em? It's tempting to point to Jayson Blair, or any of the other media scandals of the past couple of years. (Or, for that matter, to Walter Duranty). But the problem goes even deeper than that. Beyond these major scandals, a combination of laziness, bias, and complacency haunts reporting on all sorts of subjects.

Reynolds takes the time to outline the issue in stark terms as it relates to Kerry and the Swift Boat Vets, specifically the now-infamous Christmas in Cambodia claim. His article cites Jonathan Last's superb piece in the Weekly Standard, which took note of the reaction by several newspapers to the Swift Boat story and how they wanted to cover it... or not cover it, as it were...

DURING THE AUGUST 19 edition of PBS's NewsHour, Tom Oliphant unspooled. "The standard of clear and convincing evidence--and it's easy when you leave out the exculpatory stuff--is what keeps this story in the tabloids," the Boston Globe columnist sputtered, "because it does not meet basic standards." "This story" (shades of "that woman") is the story of the Swift boat veterans who have raised a number of troubling allegations against John Kerry. Sitting across from John O'Neill, coauthor of Unfit for Command and John Kerry's successor as commander of PCF-94 in Vietnam, Oliphant did a fair imitation of Al Gore--sighing, harumphing, and exhaling loudly--whenever O'Neill spoke.

"'Almost conclusive' doesn't cut it in the parts of journalism where I live," Oliphant lectured O'Neill, who graduated first in a class of 554 from the University of Texas Law School and clerked for U.S. Supreme Court justice William Rehnquist. "You haven't come within a country mile of meeting first-grade journalistic standards for accuracy." Watching the media's reaction to the Swift boat controversy, it's clear that many journalists agree with Oliphant.

Two days later, Adam Nagourney paused in the middle of a news story in the New York Times to worry about how campaigns should deal with attacks "in this era when so much unsubstantiated or even false information can reach the public through so many different forums, be it blogs or talk-show radio." In an article in Editor & Publisher, Alison Mitchell, the deputy national editor at the Times, admitted, "I'm not sure that in an era of no-cable television we would even have looked into [the Swift boat story]." James O'Shea, managing editor of the Chicago Tribune, went further: "There are too many places for people to get information. I don't think newspapers can be the gatekeepers anymore--to say this is wrong and we will ignore it. Now we have to say this is wrong and here is why."

...Talk-radio and the blog world covered the Cambodia story obsessively. They reported on border crossings during Vietnam and the differences between Swift boats and PBRs. They also found two other instances of Kerry's talking about his Christmas in Cambodia. Spurred on by the blogs, Fox led the August 9 Special Report with a Carl Cameron story on Kerry's Cambodia discrepancy.

All the while, traditional print and broadcast media tried hard to ignore the story--even as Kerry officially changed his position on his presence in Cambodia. Then on August 19, Kerry went public with his counter assault against Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, and suddenly the story was news. The numbers are fairly striking: Before August 19, the New York Times and Washington Post had each mentioned Swift Boat Veterans for Truth just 8 times; the Los Angeles Times 7 times; the Boston Globe 4 times. The broadcast networks did far less. According to the indefatigable Media Research Center, before Kerry went public, ABC, CBS, and NBC together had done a total of 9 stories on the Swifties. For comparison, as of August 19 these networks had done 75 stories on the accusation that Bush had been AWOL from the National Guard.

After Kerry, the deluge. On August 24, the Washington Post ran three op-eds and an editorial on the Swifties; other papers expanded their coverage as well. But, curiously, they didn't try to play catch-up with the new media in ascertaining the veracity of the Swifties' claims. Instead, they pursued (or rather, repeated) the charge Kerry made: that Bush was behind Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. It was a touch surreal--as it would have been if Democratic national chairman Terry McAuliffe's criticism of Bush's National Guard record had prompted the media to investigate Terry McAuliffe.

O'Shea's comment is perfect for framing the issue in the eyes of the mainstream media -- we have to kill this story, as opposed to letting it wither away and die on its own. There's no consideration for the fact that the Swift Boat Tale may be, you know, accurate.

As Reynolds pointed out, the old media actually reacted, not by correcting its errors, but by trying to prove the story false. They also reacted by getting angry at the new media. The Minneapolis Star-Tribune allowed Powerline bloggers John Hinderaker and Scott Johnson to publish a reasoned editorial entitled "Apocalypse Kerry" earlier this month. Tribune editor Jim Boyd fired back with an editorial entitled "Republican Smear Machine Can't Stand Up to the Facts" that ineffectively refuted many of the points made by the bloggers, cited the old hobbyhorse of Max Cleland getting unfairly slimed, and concluded with this paragraph:

As the old saying goes, "Politics ain't beanbag," but this Republican crew, including Hinderaker and Johnson, take the art of slime-throwing to levels of immorality seldom seen. Voters need to awaken to this tactic, and realize how much contempt it shows for the workings of democracy and for the intelligence they bring to the task of choosing this nation's leaders.

The Powerline boys responded, and basically ripped the heart out of Boyd's screed, point-by-point, as shown in this sample...

First, the basics. We wrote that the Kerry campaign has retracted Kerry's oft-told tale of being in Cambodia on Christmas 1968. Boyd did not dispute this. We wrote that there is no record of John Kerry being in Cambodia in December 1968, or at any other time. Boyd did not dispute this. We wrote that Kerry's commanding officers have denied that he was ever sent into Cambodia. Boyd did not dispute this. We wrote that not a single crewman who ever served with Kerry has supported Kerry's claim to have been in Cambodia, and several crewmen have denied that their boat was ever in Cambodia. Boyd did not dispute this. We wrote that there is no record of Swift boats being used for clandestine missions as claimed by Kerry. Boyd did not dispute this. We wrote that Swift boats were unsuited for such secret missions, given their large size and noise. Boyd did not dispute this.

Gosh, for fraudulent smear artists, we seem to be doing pretty well. Given that he didn't deny any of our main points, what did Boyd have to say? Most importantly, he alleged that Kerry was in Cambodia, but it was in January 1969, not December 1968. Thus, Boyd wrote, ours is an "accurate but niggling criticism." Of course, there is no more evidence for Kerry being in Cambodia in January 1969 than in December 1968.
But when Kerry told his famous story to the Senate in 1986 -- the story that he says was "seared -- seared" into his memory, he was very specific about the timing of his life-altering experience. It was Christmas 1968, and he heard President Richard Nixon denying that we had troops in Cambodia while he himself had been sent there. It was this experience, he said, that caused him to lose his faith in the American government.

We pointed out that Kerry's account was obviously false, since Nixon was not president in December 1968. Boyd responded that Nixon was then president-elect, so Kerry's "discrepancy" was "understandable." Obviously, however, a president-elect was in no position to assure the American people that there were no troops in Cambodia.

We made the relatively minor point that Kerry's claim to have been shot at by the Khmer Rouge is implausible, since they did not take the field until 1972. Boyd said, with no attribution, that "the Khmer Rouge ... began its armed combat against the government of Prince Norhodom Sihanouk in 1967."

We based our statement on the testimony of Andrew Antippas, "the Cambodia Man" at the U.S. Embassy in Saigon between 1968 and 1970, who wrote: "[C]oncerning the assertion that Mr. Kerry was shot at by the Khmer Rouge during his Christmas 1968 visit to Cambodia, it should be noted that the Khmer Rouge didn't take the field until the Easter Offensive of 1972."

Different sources assign different dates to the beginning of military action by the Khmer Rouge, but we've seen no support for the proposition that the Khmer Rouge were in the field (as opposed to existing as a political organization) in January 1969.

Boyd's response, entitled "This year, the political smear is exposed even as it's happening", barely merits reading, save for this gem...

Then along came the Hinderaker-Johnson piece on Kerry. It should have set off all kinds of alarms. As one of the editors responsible for these pages, I regret that it did not -- and that I was not here to weigh in on the decision.

Now comes their second piece. I could do extensive line-by-line analysis, but I will not. It would take space I do not have.

In other words, I can't refute them line-by-line, so I won't even dignify their argument. What's hysterical is that he did try to refute just one of their arguments... and the Powerline boys responded again on their blog, not just once but twice, each time shredding Boyd's credibility further. It must be difficult to get abused this badly in cyber-space, but Boyd refuses to accept challenges from Hinderaker and Johnson to debate them on this issue, preferring to hide behind his editorial column. This, of course, shows what happens when a journalist who's not used to having to defend his opinions squares off with a pair of lawyers, trained in writing persuasive pieces that must also have a relationship to things known as facts. The sublime Hugh Hewitt summarized the issue very nicely...

I have been both a lawyer/law professor for two decades and a television/radio/print journalist for 15 years of those 20. It takes a great deal more intelligence and discipline to be the former than to be the latter, which is why the former usually pays a lot more than the latter. It is no surprise to me, then, when lawyers/law professors... prove to be far more adept at exposing the "Christmas-in-Cambodia" lie and other Kerry absurdities than old-school journalists. The big advantage is in research skills, of course, and in an eye for inconsistencies which make or break cases and arguments. Lawyers turned amateur journalists are going to be much better at it than time-serving scribblers... The only difference between professional and amateur journalists is that the former get paid to practice their trade. As with athletes, the purer effort comes with the amateurs, though some of the pros keep their ideals front and center.

In the end, the new media's encroachment on the old media's territory will only bring good things to Americans. More sources of information and more information overall means the ability to make better decisions. If the information is false, the key is to refute it, not call it names, as Boyd seemed intent on doing. Eventually, the old media may learn this lesson, but not too quickly, as John Podhertz pointed out...

I've been listening to mainstream-media types talk about the terrible threat posed to the news business by one new phenomenon or other since I began my career 22 years ago. The complaint is invariably, and drearily, the same: Whatever is new is bad because it supposedly lowers the historically high standards of the mainstream media.

The last two years in particular have seen the explosion of a new medium — the personal Internet newspaper, or blog — that has already and will forever change the way people get their information.

This is a thrilling development — unless you are a mainstream-media Big Fish.

The success of the Swift-boat vets' ads is the tale of the triumph of the nation's alternative media. The mainstreamers didn't want to touch the story with a 10-foot pole, and they didn't.

But the alternative media did. Amateur reporters and fact-gatherers offered independent substantiation for some of the charges. It turned out the criticisms of the Swifties weren't quite so easily dismissed.

Because there was new information coming out every day, there was more and more to discuss on talk radio and cable news channels. And the story just wouldn't go away, because millions of people were interested in it.

This democratization of the news is clearly a good thing, if only because it increases available sources of information in a democracy.

But it isn't a good thing if you're a proud part of an Establishment whose authority is being eroded and whose control of the marketplace is being successfully challenged.

What these Establishment-media types will never do — what they can never do — is consider the possibility that the 24-hour news cycle and the rise of talk radio and the Internet are all positive developments.

And I would argue they can't consider that possibility — not only because their platforms are slowly sliding into the quicksand, but because these alternative phenomena have been of great benefit to conservative ideas, anti-liberal attitudes and Republican politicians.

They hate the Swift-boat story. Hate it with a passion. Some of it's based in genuine conviction. Some of it's patently ideological. And some of it's based in fear. They are worried the bell is beginning to toll for them, and they're right.

Don't worry, guys. People will still buy papers for the classifieds. For now.

And They Say We Don't Report on International News, Part II...

Back to Malaysia, for an update on everyone's favorite world record attempt, courtesy of the Lord of Truth...

Malaysian woman holed up in a glass container with 6,000 scorpions has been stung twice, but is still determined to reclaim a world record for living with creatures, an aide said.

Nur Malena Hassan, who is attempting to set a new record by spending 36 days with the scorpions, suffered a mild fever after being stung on her face, Ali Khan Shamsuddin said Sunday.

"She's okay now and she's very determined to do it. God willing, she will leave the cage on September 25," Ali Khan told Reuters.

Nur Malena, nicknamed "Scorpion Queen," moved into the glass room measuring 12 feet by 10 feet at a shopping mall in Kuantan, about 160 miles east of Kuala Lumpur, on August 21. She leaves the cage just once a day for a 15-minute bathroom break.

The 27-year-old Malaysian woman, who set a world record by spending 30 days with 2,700 scorpions in 2001, is trying to win back the title from Thailand's Kanchana Ketkaew, who lived in a glass room with more than 3,000 scorpions for 32 days in 2002. Ali Khan said Nur Malena, who watches DVDs to pass the time, lacks sleep because of the scorpions crawling over her body, and that she is aware that she will pass out if stung three times within a short span.

Several questions pop into my mind, but I'll mention just three for now...

1. She has aides for this task. Is it just me, or does every celeb in the world have hangers-on, no matter how ridiculous the cause of their celebrity?

2. She watches DVDs to pass the time. I wonder if some joker has placed the Scorpion King in the pile of DVDs that are available.

3. If she gets a Purple Heart, the Swift Boat Vets are going to go nuts.

The John Kerry Post of the Day

My latest discovery about my favorite cheese-eating surrendermonkey-looking Ketchup King cum Presidential candidate:

Oh, boy. The candidate heads to Nantucket to lie low, and in the words of Al Hunt at the Wall Street Journal, "Sen. Kerry privately is said to be "bouncing off the walls" in frustration" over his campaign's sudden impersonation of Mike Dukakis' finest work. Luckily for us, we have Kerry's GQ interview from July to entertain us, especially this passage...

GQ: You beat prostate cancer. Was that your first thought of mortality?

JK: Oh God! No. You kidding, man? I mean, Jesus, I saw my own death any number of times in Vietnam. There was this period where I was convinced I'd be killed. But I made it back with a sense that every day is extra. You know, we used to have a saying over there when we were screwing around and getting in trouble, breaking the rules. We'd look at each other and we'd say, "We're fuckin' idiots, and this is Vietnam." I mean, that attitude is liberating. It's sort of been there, done that. And they can't—I'm gonna get in trouble for saying the F-word there—but people who come back from that are very lucky and know that, and it is very liberating. You know, there's not much that scares me. So I'm not worried about things—certainly not dying, because too many of my friends did. And so I think it empowers you to go out and tell the truth and let the chips fall where they may. Bush and Cheney don't understand that. That's one of the things I think is most lacking in their stewardship of our country.

GQ: Did you come back from Nam with any psychic damage?

JK: I was very lucky, Mike. I think I was able to take that pain and put it out there in my efforts to end the war. And so I very publicly laid out my depth of opposition to what was happening and my feelings about what had happened over there in a way that, you know, a lot of guys didn't have that opportunity, or couldn't or didn't, and they kind of held it in. And I think that's the harder thing; that's the problem for a lot of guys. So I never did have any of those issues. It doesn't slow me down; it motivates me.

GQ: You've never seen a therapist?

JK: No. I had some nightmares when I came home, which is not unusual.

GQ: Like what?

JK: I can't say. To me Vietnam is an old place, an old memory. It is old history, it's gone, it's past. The less I have to talk about it, frankly, the happier I am.

You know, I'm starting to believe that last line, especially with the Swift Boat Vets suddenly turning Kerry's Vietnam heroism into mincemeat. But Kerry's decision to discuss how Vietnam defines and motivates him before saying he doesn't like talking about it seems to perfectly define his campaign -- he can't make up his mind on what he wants to talk about.

One other thing, since Kerry takes the time to answer the Max Cleland question...

GQ: What do you think about what the Republicans did to Max Cleland?

JK: It's one of the reasons I'm running. I was so angry. It's one of the reasons Teresa switched her party. I think politics reached a new low, an unbelievable, irresponsible, I mean just horrendous level when it goes after a guy like Max Cleland. It's the lack of decency, a lack of common decency when you can attack someone like Max Cleland for not being patriotic. You may not like his vote. But then go ahead and argue about his vote. But don't say he's weak on defense and he's not a patriot and won't stand up for America. Which is what they said. I think it's one of the most disgraceful moments in American politics. And it motivated me within two weeks of that election to go on Meet the Press and say, "I'm going to run for President." Because we got tot change what's happening in this country. Absolutely. You better believe it.

Enough about the idiotic argument that the GOP questioned Cleland's patriotism, which Rich Lowry and others have debunked in the past. But to assert that this was the reason Kerry decided to announce a run for the Presidency makes his campaign seem even more shallow than before.

Hey, maybe we were wrong. Dukakis ran a much better campaign than this.

But Does This Mean Cats Prefer Kerry?

The Lord of Truth sends along this interesting piece on Kerry's chances with dog-lovers. The following passage seemed especially apt...

The American Kennel Club and BankOne surveyed American dog lovers and found that the owners of man's best friend are not evenly divided on the presidential candidates. Like regular church attendees, dog lovers prefer to run in George W. Bush's yard.

Asked which candidate they'd trust to walk Fido, dog owners favored Mr. Bush 51% to 37%. Asked which candidate would be better for their pooch's happiness, 44% favored Mr. Bush over 37% for Mr. Kerry. But perhaps more troublesome for the Democrat is what happened when participants were asked which dog breed they most closely associated with each candidate. For Mr. Bush, two breeds tied at 20% each: the Labrador retriever, the most popular family dog in America, and the Rottweiler, often used as a guard dog. As for Mr. Kerry, 15% associated him with Labs--but 14% picked a poodle (the poll didn't specify a French poodle).

I actually saw a bumper sticker on a pickup truck yesterday morning that read "My dog votes, too." Of course, there was a Kerry-Edwards bumper sticker next to it, so I assume this person owned a poodle.

As a person who aspires to own nothing more than fish, I'm sitting this one out. But I think Kerry's more cat-like than Bush. Cats are constantly grooming themselves and they disappear for long stretches of time (like 20 years in the U.S. Senate). Plus, Kerry's campaign is starting to resemble Halle Barry's movie.

One More Stupid Idea

We have this tale from the MTV Video Music Awards, where the Kerry and Bush daughters were booed Sunday night, as noted on CNN's American Morning...

[HEIDI] COLLINS: ... Some drama last night on the stage of the MTV Video Music Awards involving the daughters of presidential candidate John Kerry. Our pop culture correspondent, Toure, is joining me now live from Miami with more on all of this. Toure, good morning. Beautiful shot behind you there.

TOURE, CNN POP CULTURE CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Heidi. How are you?

COLLINS: I'm great. Listen, I want to get straight to the sound of this. A little bit unexpected event last night, when Vanessa and Alexandra about halfway through the show or so took to the microphones. Let's go ahead and listen for a minute.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

VANESSA KERRY, JOHN KERRY'S DAUGHTER: It's good to be here with you all tonight in Florida and to get this chance... (BOOING)KERRY: And get this chance...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: So, Toure, I understand you had a chance to talk with Vanessa. We want to go ahead and listen to what she said about that incident.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KERRY: I was scared out of my mind. I mean, I grabbed my sister, and I thought, what is happening? And -- but it doesn't matter, because we're fighting for something that I believe in so strongly. I will go up there and hear the whole arena boo if it means connecting with one person.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COLLINS: So Toure, did she connect?

TOURE: She did connect. I mean, most people cheered. But there were a lot of boos. And you could hear that. And it was kind of a difficult moment for her. And, as she said, she was really scared by that. But, you know, they're really focused on helping their dad. And MTV made it a nonpartisan moment by bringing in the Bush twins by videotape. So it was kind of a together moment. I mean, the whole night, there was a political subtext just saying, like, vote, everybody get out and be part of the system.

Can MTV get something simple through their addled skulls? People at the VMAs are not there to hear appeals to vote. They're there to hear music and watch an awards show. I don't think the booing is right, because I think people should try to exercise civility and either clap politely, or better yet, sit on their hands and stay silent for silly crap like this.

Hat tip to the Mudville Gazette and Instapundit, since I don't actually know anyone who actually watches American Morning.

The John Kerry Post of the Day

My latest discovery about my favorite cheese-eating surrendermonkey-looking Ketchup King cum Presidential candidate:

Turns out that JFK II is taking a vacation for most of the week, engaging in the sport of the common man -- windsurfing. But his Veep is now throwing out all kinds of ideas for review regarding the Kerry approach to Iran...

A John F. Kerry administration would propose to Iran that the Islamic state be allowed to keep its nuclear power plants in exchange for giving up the right to retain the nuclear fuel that could be used for bomb-making, Democratic vice presidential nominee John Edwards said in an interview yesterday.

Edwards said that if Iran failed to take what he called a "great bargain," it would essentially confirm that it is building nuclear weapons under the cover of a supposedly peaceful nuclear power initiative. He said that, if elected, Kerry would ensure that European allies were prepared to join the United States in levying heavy sanctions if Iran rejected the proposal. "If we are engaging with Iranians in an effort to reach this great bargain and if in fact this is a bluff that they are trying to develop nuclear weapons capability, then we know that our European friends will stand with us," Edwards said.

Edwards's notion of proposing such a bargain with Iran, combined with Kerry's statement in December that he was prepared to explore "areas of mutual interest" with Iran, suggests that Kerry would take a sharply different approach with Iran than has President Bush. The United States has not had diplomatic relations with Iran since its 1979 revolution, and Iran was part of Bush's "axis of evil" that included North Korea and the former government of Iraq. Earlier this month, Bush declared that Iran "must abandon her nuclear ambitions."

Edwards will deliver a speech today in Wilmington, N.C., that aides said will seek to sharpen the differences with the Bush administration on a range of foreign policy issues. Seizing on Bush's statement last week that he miscalculated the postwar conditions in Iraq, Edwards will lay out a broad indictment of how he believes the administration has miscalculated on Iraq, overseas alliances, Afghanistan and other issues.

One, Edwards barely qualifies to give a speech on foreign policy. The next person who tells me the press isn't kissing his butt because he's smooth-talking Democrat needs to do research on the hatchet job the press did on Dan Quayle, who was (a) more experienced than Edwards when he became Veep, and (b) better versed in foreign policy matters.

Second, what idiot came up with this idea? Maybe it's Madeline Albright all over again. Remember the 1994 Agreed Framework with North Korea? That essentially provided a similar bribe to a madman only slightly less deranged than the mullahs of Iran. That worked out so well, didn't it?

Third, how exactly does this impact Iran? We'll negotiate with them, which means we lack the spirit to confront them, which means pro-democracy forces in Iran lose faith in our commitment to seeing the mullahs leave power. We also are willing to bribe them out of weakness, since our only other option will be sanctions... which would probably only take effect with U.N. approval. And we all know how the U.N. enforces sanctions against oil-producing states -- it runs a corrupt Oil-for-Food program.

I've blasted the Kerry campaign for failing to produce meaningful initiatives about what it would do in office. If this is an indication, they're better off keeping their mouth shut and having Kerry do that goofy salute.

Your Honor, I'd Like to Move for a Bad Court Thingy

You know, this story was so weird, I didn't notice it initially...

An Oklahoma judge facing removal over charges that he masturbated and used a device for enhancing erections under his robes during trials said on Wednesday he would retire from the bench.

Creek County District Judge Donald Thompson, 57, wrote to Oklahoma Gov. Brad Henry resigning effective Sept. 1, a move that will allow him to retire with a full pension.

A former state representative and a judge for 22 years, Thompson was accused by state Attorney General Drew Edmondson of using a "penis pump" to enhance erections during trials and exposing himself to a court reporter several times while masturbating on the bench.

The state Court on the Judiciary was scheduled to hear a motion on Friday to suspend Thompson.

The judge has denied the charges and did not refer to them in his letter of resignation.

"I have greatly enjoyed my public service and offer my gratitude for the public trust reposed in me during the terms I served," he said.

Somehow, I'm thinking the PR staff should have told him to avoid saying "I have greatly enjoyed my public service."

The Sports Rant

Please let it be noted, one more time, that I watched the Olympics largely in protest, as most men do. But that's not to say there weren't things that should be noted. Here's ten of them, as a bonus...

1. I'm sick of people saying our Olympic basketball team is a disgrace because all they won was a bronze medal. They lost, mostly because we sent a team that was missing some our best players and the rest fot he team was ill-conceived to win in the international game. That's not their fault. Winning a bronze is not a disgrace. I had to hear Pepi Sanchez, a former Temple guard, explaining that international players no longer respect the NBA. Hell, no one does here either. That's not the point. This U.S. team, featuring no legitimate point guards and lacking anything resembling a consistent outside shooter still won the bronze. Name another country who could afford to leave five of its best players at home, as we did (Shaq, Garnett, McGrady, Kidd and Bryant, and that's off the top of my head) and still win a bronze. The rest of the world is capable of playing with our best. We're still the measuring stick.

2. One question -- is it just me, or did the Olympic torch resemble a giant cigarette?

3. 103 medals for the U.S.A. That's more than John Kerry received in Vietnam.

4. Nothing is more useless than that stupid extra gymnastics session where the gymnasts "thank" the crowd with performances. Somehow this only happens for sports that draw ratings, like gymnastics and figure skating. No one ever asks the archers to do a performance.

5. The men's marathon thing is ridiculous. As noted in the Washington Post, they spent $1.5 billion on security, and a defrocked priest in a kilt interferes with the ending of the final event.

6. Maybe Paul Hamm should give his medal to the Brazilian marathoner.

7. U.S. women's softball is so dominant, the Olympics may eliminate the sport. This is similar to why the French quit fighting wars.

8. Watching the closing ceremonies would have interfered with my desire to watch Terminator 2: Judgement Day for the 25th time.

9. The Jaguars just cut Hugh Douglas, which means he might be picked up by the Eagles, to pick up for N. D. Kalu. No, this has nothing to do with the Olympics, but I was falling asleep and needed to talk about something interesting. Ummmm... football.

10. The 2008 Olympics will be in Beijing. I won't be there.