I’ve likened the political machinations around the surge to theater. And today, as we await General Petraeus’s testimony, the usual players are taking on their customary roles. The MoveOn Left continues to consider it important to disqualify Petraeus as a … Continue reading →
Well, neither gets big points for popularity, that’s for sure. But Congress is definitely more of a wallflower than the President. In fact, one might say that right now, according to polls, Bush is half again as popular as Congress: … Continue reading →
Here’s American History 101, the 60s according to Osama: In the Vietnam War, the leaders of the white House claimed at the time that it was a necessary and crucial war, and during it, Rumsfeld and his aides murdered two … Continue reading →
What do we learn from the latest Osama videotape? (1) He’s alive. (2) He looks like crap, between his dyed beard and his cadaverous mien. (3) The appeal he’s making is to the useful idiots in the US whom he … Continue reading →
Bill Clinton referred to himself as “The Comeback Kid” during the 1992 campaign, when his moribund candidacy was revived in the state of New Hampshire. Now Clinton might be poised to quite literally come back—to the White House, that is, … Continue reading →
It’s become common wisdom to say one of the many huge mistakes of the postwar era in Iraq was to disband the army. But it’s always puzzled me that so many people seem to think it’s a self-evident truth. I’ve … Continue reading →
Well, of course. Scientists have discovered that certain people can eat anything and everything and not gain an ounce. Well, duh. I could have told them that years ago. In the early 70s I was blessed with three roommates of … Continue reading →
In a recent Atlantic article by Robert Kaplan entitled “Rereading Vietnam,” the author discusses a number of books that have been given little press and short shrift by reviewers. These are histories and memoirs written by men who served in … Continue reading →
I’ve written at some length about the France2 trial and the fact that the al Durah tapes have never been released (if interested, see my posts on the subject from October 24 to Oct 30, 2006). Here’s a petition the … Continue reading →
Remember those tests of perception known as figure/ground drawings? As a child I was fascinated by their magical “now you see it, now you see something else” mutability. Here are two of the most popular—the vase/profiles one and the young … Continue reading →
…no. But it may have peaked and even be on the decline—for the moment. This Newsweek article on the subject reads as though it were written by a committee—and, as it turns out, perhaps it was. No less than seven … Continue reading →
This seems encouraging: Germany’s largest synagogue—one that somehow managed to survive both WWII and the Soviet-contolled aftermath in East Berlin—was restored and reopened in a moving ceremony on Friday that featured, among the thousand people who gathered to celebrate, elderly … Continue reading →