Reuters headline:
Yasser Arafat Says Gibson Film Not Anti-Semitic
I love it.
Saturday, March 20, 2004
BUSH CAMPAIGN EVENT APPARENTLY A FRAUD
Those rumors of the imminent capture of al-Qaeda's #2 were a lot of malarkey:
Terror Group Unlikely Harboring Al-Zawahri
The hunt for terrorists on Pakistan's frontier appears to be narrowing on an Uzbek terror group that once trained in Afghanistan, but experts said it was unlikely to be sheltering al-Qaida commander Ayman al-Zawahri.
The Pakistani army said Saturday that amid an offensive in South Waziristan, they have intercepted radio conversations mostly in Uzbek and Chechen.
The region is the last believed refuge of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, or IMU, which seeks to overthrow the secular government of the former Soviet republic....
[Ahmed] Rashid [author of Taliban] said Osama bin Laden and his deputy Ayman al-Zawahri don't use non-Arabs to protect them — making it unlikely that al-Zawahri is in the area, as Pakistani officials had earlier claimed.
Instead, Rashid said it was more likely that the "high-value" target Pakistanis said they are pursuing is Tahir Yuldash, the 30-something political leader of the IMU....
--AP
I expressed skepticism about this siege a couple of days ago. I don't think I expressed enough skepticism. I think this was a fraud from the word go -- either Pakistan was fooling the world about the possible "high-value target" or Pakistan and the Bushies were doing it in sync. Either way, Pakistan clearly agreed to coordinate this with a flightsuit-filled week in the Bush campaign, a week of macho talk about Iraq and 9/11 and so on, and I bet the Bushies think it was a net gain for them in either case. And it sure was for Musharraf, who lost a few troops and is going to get lots of neat U.S. weapons.
Those rumors of the imminent capture of al-Qaeda's #2 were a lot of malarkey:
Terror Group Unlikely Harboring Al-Zawahri
The hunt for terrorists on Pakistan's frontier appears to be narrowing on an Uzbek terror group that once trained in Afghanistan, but experts said it was unlikely to be sheltering al-Qaida commander Ayman al-Zawahri.
The Pakistani army said Saturday that amid an offensive in South Waziristan, they have intercepted radio conversations mostly in Uzbek and Chechen.
The region is the last believed refuge of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, or IMU, which seeks to overthrow the secular government of the former Soviet republic....
[Ahmed] Rashid [author of Taliban] said Osama bin Laden and his deputy Ayman al-Zawahri don't use non-Arabs to protect them — making it unlikely that al-Zawahri is in the area, as Pakistani officials had earlier claimed.
Instead, Rashid said it was more likely that the "high-value" target Pakistanis said they are pursuing is Tahir Yuldash, the 30-something political leader of the IMU....
--AP
I expressed skepticism about this siege a couple of days ago. I don't think I expressed enough skepticism. I think this was a fraud from the word go -- either Pakistan was fooling the world about the possible "high-value target" or Pakistan and the Bushies were doing it in sync. Either way, Pakistan clearly agreed to coordinate this with a flightsuit-filled week in the Bush campaign, a week of macho talk about Iraq and 9/11 and so on, and I bet the Bushies think it was a net gain for them in either case. And it sure was for Musharraf, who lost a few troops and is going to get lots of neat U.S. weapons.
Friday, March 19, 2004
Zapatero gets results (maybe):
U.S. Considers U.N. Command in Iraq
U.S. officials are exploring ways to persuade Spain to keep its troops in Iraq, including the possibility of a separate United Nations command to oversee international forces.
Under that scenario, the U.S. military would continue to lead its own soldiers, while troops from Spain and other countries could be led by the United Nations, a State Department official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
It's not clear if the scenario would be acceptable to Spain. And Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said, "I wouldn't want to speculate on any potential U.N. resolution in the future."
...Zapatero has said "there are conditions under which they can stay," Pace said....
--AP
I love the fact that the Bushies are saying this on a Friday afternoon -- usually they pick this time of the week to do sleazy, scurrilous things, but this time they're doing it in the hope that they won't piss off their base.
Zapatero's been like a whistleblower -- he broke silence, then others had the courage to do the same thing: almost immediately there were acknowledgments of America's Iraq fiasco by government officials from Poland, South Korea, and Italy. Or use the obvious analogy: He's the boy who pointed out that the emperor is nekkid. Good for him.
U.S. Considers U.N. Command in Iraq
U.S. officials are exploring ways to persuade Spain to keep its troops in Iraq, including the possibility of a separate United Nations command to oversee international forces.
Under that scenario, the U.S. military would continue to lead its own soldiers, while troops from Spain and other countries could be led by the United Nations, a State Department official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
It's not clear if the scenario would be acceptable to Spain. And Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said, "I wouldn't want to speculate on any potential U.N. resolution in the future."
...Zapatero has said "there are conditions under which they can stay," Pace said....
--AP
I love the fact that the Bushies are saying this on a Friday afternoon -- usually they pick this time of the week to do sleazy, scurrilous things, but this time they're doing it in the hope that they won't piss off their base.
Zapatero's been like a whistleblower -- he broke silence, then others had the courage to do the same thing: almost immediately there were acknowledgments of America's Iraq fiasco by government officials from Poland, South Korea, and Italy. Or use the obvious analogy: He's the boy who pointed out that the emperor is nekkid. Good for him.
The Washington Post writes a TV commercial for Kerry, if his campaign has the good sense to produce it:
On April 23, 2003, Andrew S. Natsios, head of the U.S. Agency for International Development, laid out in a televised interview the costs to U.S. taxpayers of rebuilding Iraq. "The American part of this will be $1.7 billion," he said. "We have no plans for any further - on funding for this."
... In testimony to Congress on March 27, 2003, [Deputy Defense Secretary Paul] Wolfowitz said Iraq "can really finance its own reconstruction, and relatively soon." ...
... "I really do believe we will be greeted as liberators," Vice President Cheney said in a March 16 interview.
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, ... in February 2003, predicted that the war "could last six days, six weeks. I doubt six months."
The capture of Iraq did proceed rapidly, allowing Bush to proclaim on May 1 that "major combat operations" were over and to declare "victory" in the "Battle of Iraq." ...
Just do a series of soundbites and floating headlines like this. Remind viewers that the Bushies knew the State Department had warned of the potential for chaos, and thus much greater human and dollar costs than they were predicting.
Tie it up with Kerry saying that, whatever differences we might have haf on the war, we all deserve a president who'll level with us -- and that's the kind of president he'll be.
I think you can build a winning coalition by combining anti-war Americans and Americans are in the middle on Iraq. I think a lot of the people in the latter group agree with those in the former group that they were fed a line of bull about the war.
On April 23, 2003, Andrew S. Natsios, head of the U.S. Agency for International Development, laid out in a televised interview the costs to U.S. taxpayers of rebuilding Iraq. "The American part of this will be $1.7 billion," he said. "We have no plans for any further - on funding for this."
... In testimony to Congress on March 27, 2003, [Deputy Defense Secretary Paul] Wolfowitz said Iraq "can really finance its own reconstruction, and relatively soon." ...
... "I really do believe we will be greeted as liberators," Vice President Cheney said in a March 16 interview.
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, ... in February 2003, predicted that the war "could last six days, six weeks. I doubt six months."
The capture of Iraq did proceed rapidly, allowing Bush to proclaim on May 1 that "major combat operations" were over and to declare "victory" in the "Battle of Iraq." ...
Just do a series of soundbites and floating headlines like this. Remind viewers that the Bushies knew the State Department had warned of the potential for chaos, and thus much greater human and dollar costs than they were predicting.
Tie it up with Kerry saying that, whatever differences we might have haf on the war, we all deserve a president who'll level with us -- and that's the kind of president he'll be.
I think you can build a winning coalition by combining anti-war Americans and Americans are in the middle on Iraq. I think a lot of the people in the latter group agree with those in the former group that they were fed a line of bull about the war.
Not the most effective Bush campaign event:
Iraqi journalists gave Secretary of State Colin Powell a hostile reception in Baghdad on Friday, walking out of his news conference in protest at the killing of two of their colleagues by U.S. troops.
(Hmmm -- were these killings even reported in your local paper?)
...About 30 Arab journalists quit the hall in anger at Thursday's shooting of two Iraqis who worked for the Dubai-based satellite television channel Al Arabiya.
...Al Arabiya employees say U.S. soldiers fired on a car carrying an Arabiya crew on Thursday evening after another car ran through a checkpoint. Cameraman Ali Abdelaziz was killed and correspondent Ali al-Khatib died in hospital on Friday morning....
Meanwhil, Powell continues his remarkable transformation from relatively honest guy to party-line-spewing Bushite flack:
He told U.S. soldiers and civilians that Iraq and its neighbors need no longer fear Saddam's chemical weapons -- even though U.S. experts have not found any in a year-long hunt....
Powell's boss is, however, proving to be a uniter, not a divider:
Across town, about 7,000 Sunnis and Shi'ites marched against the occupation after Friday prayers in two main mosques. "No to America, no to Saddam," they chanted in a show of unity.
Another ally says "What's the point?":
South Korea said on Friday it had refused a U.S. request for help in offensive operations and would not deploy troops in the northern city of Kirkuk because of deteriorating security there....
Odd, given that we're doing such a good job of making the country secure:
Powell spent his entire seven-hour visit within the confines of the Green Zone, the heavily defended compound where the U.S.-led administration has its Baghdad headquarters.
He flew in from Kuwait on a U.S. military C-130 aircraft. From the airport, Powell and his party were ferried to the Green Zone in low-flying helicopters, with machinegunners posted at the doors scanning the ground for potential threats....
A U.S. military convoy came under rocket-propelled grenade fire in the northern city of Mosul on Friday and witnesses said one American soldier had been hit....
--Reuters
Iraqi journalists gave Secretary of State Colin Powell a hostile reception in Baghdad on Friday, walking out of his news conference in protest at the killing of two of their colleagues by U.S. troops.
(Hmmm -- were these killings even reported in your local paper?)
...About 30 Arab journalists quit the hall in anger at Thursday's shooting of two Iraqis who worked for the Dubai-based satellite television channel Al Arabiya.
...Al Arabiya employees say U.S. soldiers fired on a car carrying an Arabiya crew on Thursday evening after another car ran through a checkpoint. Cameraman Ali Abdelaziz was killed and correspondent Ali al-Khatib died in hospital on Friday morning....
Meanwhil, Powell continues his remarkable transformation from relatively honest guy to party-line-spewing Bushite flack:
He told U.S. soldiers and civilians that Iraq and its neighbors need no longer fear Saddam's chemical weapons -- even though U.S. experts have not found any in a year-long hunt....
Powell's boss is, however, proving to be a uniter, not a divider:
Across town, about 7,000 Sunnis and Shi'ites marched against the occupation after Friday prayers in two main mosques. "No to America, no to Saddam," they chanted in a show of unity.
Another ally says "What's the point?":
South Korea said on Friday it had refused a U.S. request for help in offensive operations and would not deploy troops in the northern city of Kirkuk because of deteriorating security there....
Odd, given that we're doing such a good job of making the country secure:
Powell spent his entire seven-hour visit within the confines of the Green Zone, the heavily defended compound where the U.S.-led administration has its Baghdad headquarters.
He flew in from Kuwait on a U.S. military C-130 aircraft. From the airport, Powell and his party were ferried to the Green Zone in low-flying helicopters, with machinegunners posted at the doors scanning the ground for potential threats....
A U.S. military convoy came under rocket-propelled grenade fire in the northern city of Mosul on Friday and witnesses said one American soldier had been hit....
--Reuters
WHAT DID YOU DO IN THE WAR, DADDY?
Timothy Noah in Slate on the guy who's questioning Kerry's patriotism:
...[Dick] Cheney's eldest daughter, Elizabeth Cheney, likely owes her very existence to her father's avoidance of the Vietnam draft.
The Washington Post's Phil McCombs made the intimate calculations in a profile published in April 1991, when Cheney was defense secretary. The timeline:
* Aug. 29, 1964: Dick and Lynne Cheney marry.
* May 19, 1965: The Selective Service classifies Dick Cheney 1-A, "available immediately for military service."
* July 28, 1965: President Lyndon Johnson says draft calls will be doubled.
* Oct. 26, 1965: The Selective Service declares that married men without children, who were previously exempted from the draft, will now be called up. Married men with children remain exempt.
* Jan. 19, 1966: The Selective Service reclassifies Dick Cheney 3-A, "deferred from military service because service would cause hardship upon his family," because his wife is pregnant with their first child.
* July 28, 1966: Elizabeth Cheney is born.
* Jan. 30, 1967: Dick Cheney turns 26 and therefore becomes ineligible for the draft.
Dedicated students of obstetrics will observe that Elizabeth Cheney's birth date falls precisely nine months and two days after the Selective Service publicly revoked its policy of not drafting childless men. This would seem to indicate that the Cheneys, though doubtless planning to have children sometime, were seized with an untamable passion the moment Dick Cheney became vulnerable to the Vietnam draft. And acted on it. Carpe diem!
Timothy Noah in Slate on the guy who's questioning Kerry's patriotism:
...[Dick] Cheney's eldest daughter, Elizabeth Cheney, likely owes her very existence to her father's avoidance of the Vietnam draft.
The Washington Post's Phil McCombs made the intimate calculations in a profile published in April 1991, when Cheney was defense secretary. The timeline:
* Aug. 29, 1964: Dick and Lynne Cheney marry.
* May 19, 1965: The Selective Service classifies Dick Cheney 1-A, "available immediately for military service."
* July 28, 1965: President Lyndon Johnson says draft calls will be doubled.
* Oct. 26, 1965: The Selective Service declares that married men without children, who were previously exempted from the draft, will now be called up. Married men with children remain exempt.
* Jan. 19, 1966: The Selective Service reclassifies Dick Cheney 3-A, "deferred from military service because service would cause hardship upon his family," because his wife is pregnant with their first child.
* July 28, 1966: Elizabeth Cheney is born.
* Jan. 30, 1967: Dick Cheney turns 26 and therefore becomes ineligible for the draft.
Dedicated students of obstetrics will observe that Elizabeth Cheney's birth date falls precisely nine months and two days after the Selective Service publicly revoked its policy of not drafting childless men. This would seem to indicate that the Cheneys, though doubtless planning to have children sometime, were seized with an untamable passion the moment Dick Cheney became vulnerable to the Vietnam draft. And acted on it. Carpe diem!
I'm seeing a lot of stories that say we have Ayman al-Zawahri surrounded and then this story, from Agence France-Presse, suggesting that Zawahiri may have escaped:
Pakistani troops who saw a heavily-guarded "foreigner" flee a siege near the Afghan border in a bullet-proof landcruiser are certain he was not Osama bin Laden, a senior security official said.
But the level and sophistication of resistance put up by scores of heavily armed fighters as he escaped made them conclude it could be the Al-Qaeda chief's number two, the official said.
"The Frontier Corps troops who saw this foreigner said they were certain it was not bin Laden, but they speculated it could be Ayman al-Zawahiri," the official, who asked not to be named, told AFP.
"The way he was whisked away, the way fighters sprang from nowhere, that made us believe that if it was not bin Laden, and we're sure it was not, that it was his deputy.
"We can't think of another Al-Qaeda leader who could have such high protocol and such sophisticated tight defence." ....
The well-protected "foreigner" who escaped Tuesday could well have slipped the net of Pakistani forces, who are still pounding the area with mortars and helicopter gunships, the official said....
I can't believe Pervez Musharraf actually wants Zawahiri captured. His siege, however, even if Zawahiri escapes (or was never there in the first place), serves the Bush campaign well, coinciding as it does with the anniversary week of the start of the Iraq war (Iraq = al-Qaeda) and the foreign-policy attacks on Kerry (plus, by happenstance, Madrid and Zapatero's election). Surely the Bush campaign had a lot to do with the timing of this raid. ("What you've got is everything -- and I mean everything -- being run by the political arm. Everything -- and I mean everything -- is being run by the Mayberry Machiavellis." --John DiIulio to Ron Suskind.)
Pakistani troops who saw a heavily-guarded "foreigner" flee a siege near the Afghan border in a bullet-proof landcruiser are certain he was not Osama bin Laden, a senior security official said.
But the level and sophistication of resistance put up by scores of heavily armed fighters as he escaped made them conclude it could be the Al-Qaeda chief's number two, the official said.
"The Frontier Corps troops who saw this foreigner said they were certain it was not bin Laden, but they speculated it could be Ayman al-Zawahiri," the official, who asked not to be named, told AFP.
"The way he was whisked away, the way fighters sprang from nowhere, that made us believe that if it was not bin Laden, and we're sure it was not, that it was his deputy.
"We can't think of another Al-Qaeda leader who could have such high protocol and such sophisticated tight defence." ....
The well-protected "foreigner" who escaped Tuesday could well have slipped the net of Pakistani forces, who are still pounding the area with mortars and helicopter gunships, the official said....
I can't believe Pervez Musharraf actually wants Zawahiri captured. His siege, however, even if Zawahiri escapes (or was never there in the first place), serves the Bush campaign well, coinciding as it does with the anniversary week of the start of the Iraq war (Iraq = al-Qaeda) and the foreign-policy attacks on Kerry (plus, by happenstance, Madrid and Zapatero's election). Surely the Bush campaign had a lot to do with the timing of this raid. ("What you've got is everything -- and I mean everything -- being run by the political arm. Everything -- and I mean everything -- is being run by the Mayberry Machiavellis." --John DiIulio to Ron Suskind.)
Thursday, March 18, 2004
Eric Alterman writes:
Howie Kurtz thought it bad luck for Kerry that he got booted off the TV because of the bomb in Iraq, and a coup for Cheney that cables carried his attack on Kerry via split screen. But wouldn't you call it a PR disaster? As Eric Boehlert points out, while Cheney was telling a partisan crowd at the Reagan Library that the war in Iraq was "making the nation and the world more secure," pictures of a Baghdad inferno flickered simultaneously on U.S. television screens.
Sorry, I'm with Kurtz on this one -- alas. Americans still can't sort all this out -- as the song goes, Americans can't tell you the difference between Iraq and Iran. If they see violence in a Muslim nation, it's terrorism, and if it's by enemies of the U.S., the answer surely must be to get angrier, talk tougher, and wave the flag harder. So even though it's Bush and Cheney's fiasco, they won that news cycle.
Howie Kurtz thought it bad luck for Kerry that he got booted off the TV because of the bomb in Iraq, and a coup for Cheney that cables carried his attack on Kerry via split screen. But wouldn't you call it a PR disaster? As Eric Boehlert points out, while Cheney was telling a partisan crowd at the Reagan Library that the war in Iraq was "making the nation and the world more secure," pictures of a Baghdad inferno flickered simultaneously on U.S. television screens.
Sorry, I'm with Kurtz on this one -- alas. Americans still can't sort all this out -- as the song goes, Americans can't tell you the difference between Iraq and Iran. If they see violence in a Muslim nation, it's terrorism, and if it's by enemies of the U.S., the answer surely must be to get angrier, talk tougher, and wave the flag harder. So even though it's Bush and Cheney's fiasco, they won that news cycle.
A response to Dick Cheney's attack on John Kerry, from the blog Abject Funk:
Today Big Dick claimed that if John Kerry was president, Saddam would still be in power.
He's right, he probably would be, and in charge of a politically, militarily, and economically isolated nation without any capability of threatening the U.S. or anyone else. Now that shit scares me.
Thankfully, our troops are now the targets of daily attacks and it only costs about $200 billion a year to have them over there. That shit makes me feel safer, and that we really are winning the war on terror. It's also nice that we have a terrorist free-for-all zone of our own creation smack dab in the center of the Middle East. That was freakin' brilliant. Iraq is now the center of the war on terror only because we have provided the targets and a lawless situation that is a suicidal fundamentalist's wet dream....
Indeed.
(Link via Pandagon.)
Today Big Dick claimed that if John Kerry was president, Saddam would still be in power.
He's right, he probably would be, and in charge of a politically, militarily, and economically isolated nation without any capability of threatening the U.S. or anyone else. Now that shit scares me.
Thankfully, our troops are now the targets of daily attacks and it only costs about $200 billion a year to have them over there. That shit makes me feel safer, and that we really are winning the war on terror. It's also nice that we have a terrorist free-for-all zone of our own creation smack dab in the center of the Middle East. That was freakin' brilliant. Iraq is now the center of the war on terror only because we have provided the targets and a lawless situation that is a suicidal fundamentalist's wet dream....
Indeed.
(Link via Pandagon.)
Aznar, noble champion of democratic freedom:
Spain's outgoing ruling party has threatened to sue Oscar-winning Spanish director Pedro Almodovar after he accused it of planning a "coup".
The Popular Party (PP) was infuriated by the director's allegation that it planned to postpone Sunday's general election in a bid to maintain power.
"We were on the point (of having) a PP coup d'etat," Mr Almodovar told a press conference on Tuesday.
"The PP will bring a complaint before the appropriate courts," it said.
The director referred to media claims that outgoing Spanish prime minister Jose Maria Aznar had planned to postpone the election with demonstrations outside PP headquarters in Madrid....
--BBC
(Thanks to INTL-News for spotting this.)
Spain's outgoing ruling party has threatened to sue Oscar-winning Spanish director Pedro Almodovar after he accused it of planning a "coup".
The Popular Party (PP) was infuriated by the director's allegation that it planned to postpone Sunday's general election in a bid to maintain power.
"We were on the point (of having) a PP coup d'etat," Mr Almodovar told a press conference on Tuesday.
"The PP will bring a complaint before the appropriate courts," it said.
The director referred to media claims that outgoing Spanish prime minister Jose Maria Aznar had planned to postpone the election with demonstrations outside PP headquarters in Madrid....
--BBC
(Thanks to INTL-News for spotting this.)
I've added Political Animal, Kevin (Calpundit) Drum's new Washington Monthly blog, to the links. (Yeah, I criticized him a few days ago for seeming to fall into the Iraq = al-Qaeda trap, but that was a minor quibble.)
Right-wing bullshit -- it never dies: This is from a sickeningly Pollyannaish Economist article called "Smile, These Are Good Times. Truly":
Strip out immigrants, and the picture of stagnant median incomes vanishes. Indeed, for the nine-tenths of the population that is native-born, middle-income trends continue their improvement of the 1950s and 1960s. For these people, inequality is not rising, but falling. Gregg Easterbrook cheekily points out in his excellent recent book, “The Progress Paradox” (Random House), that if left-leaning Americans seriously want better statistics about middle-income gains, then they should simply close their borders.
I guess this falls into the category of "too good to check" -- in this case, check in an issue of The New York Times from about six weeks ago:
Only a great influx of immigrants - many of them poor, but richer than they were in their home countries - has made inequality appear to widen in the statistics, Mr. Easterbrook says. "Factor out immigration," he writes, "and the rise in American inequality disappears." ...
It happens, however, not to be true. The millions of immigrants who have entered the country in recent decades have indeed made inequality look larger than it otherwise would. But even among households headed by native-born Americans, the rich have done far better than others over the past 20 years - as well as over the past 30, 40 or 50 years, according to government statistics and the economists who study them...."The fact of the matter is, income trends have favored people at the top of the income distribution, and that's true of native-borns, too," said Gary Burtless, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington, whose research is cited in Mr. Easterbrook's book. "There is no data source that disagrees with that simple statement. In fact, the better the data, the more that the skew appears."
Yes, native-born Americans across the income spectrum do make more money than before, but there's a big catch:
...Even in the bottom half of the distribution, the average native-born family makes about 20 percent more than it did in 1970, after adjusting for inflation, according to an analysis of census data by Andrew A. Beveridge and Susan Weber, both of Queens College. But ... less than half of the rise in pay among lower-income households comes from actual wage increases. Most of the rise is a result of families putting in more hours on the job as many women have joined the work force....
Yes, it's good that women aren't staying barefoot and pregnant. But, in terms of total hours worked per household, American families are running harder just to stay more or less in place (and you can add in more teenagers working at low-wage jobs, as the Economist does, cheerily). By contrast, as the Times notes, we just pay the well-to-do more per hour.
Even Easterbrook knows he was overstating the case:
Mr. Easterbrook, a senior editor at The New Republic who is a visiting fellow at Brookings, acknowledged last week that he had gone too far in the book. His discussion of inequality occupies a very small part of "The Progress Paradox," he said, and he was mainly arguing that immigration played a role in the rise in inequality. "Even if there were not that increase in immigration, there would certainly be a rise in inequality," he said in an interview. "I did a poor job of writing that page."
But isn't it more pleasant to say that everything really is coming up roses, and people who don't agree are just whiners?
Strip out immigrants, and the picture of stagnant median incomes vanishes. Indeed, for the nine-tenths of the population that is native-born, middle-income trends continue their improvement of the 1950s and 1960s. For these people, inequality is not rising, but falling. Gregg Easterbrook cheekily points out in his excellent recent book, “The Progress Paradox” (Random House), that if left-leaning Americans seriously want better statistics about middle-income gains, then they should simply close their borders.
I guess this falls into the category of "too good to check" -- in this case, check in an issue of The New York Times from about six weeks ago:
Only a great influx of immigrants - many of them poor, but richer than they were in their home countries - has made inequality appear to widen in the statistics, Mr. Easterbrook says. "Factor out immigration," he writes, "and the rise in American inequality disappears." ...
It happens, however, not to be true. The millions of immigrants who have entered the country in recent decades have indeed made inequality look larger than it otherwise would. But even among households headed by native-born Americans, the rich have done far better than others over the past 20 years - as well as over the past 30, 40 or 50 years, according to government statistics and the economists who study them...."The fact of the matter is, income trends have favored people at the top of the income distribution, and that's true of native-borns, too," said Gary Burtless, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington, whose research is cited in Mr. Easterbrook's book. "There is no data source that disagrees with that simple statement. In fact, the better the data, the more that the skew appears."
Yes, native-born Americans across the income spectrum do make more money than before, but there's a big catch:
...Even in the bottom half of the distribution, the average native-born family makes about 20 percent more than it did in 1970, after adjusting for inflation, according to an analysis of census data by Andrew A. Beveridge and Susan Weber, both of Queens College. But ... less than half of the rise in pay among lower-income households comes from actual wage increases. Most of the rise is a result of families putting in more hours on the job as many women have joined the work force....
Yes, it's good that women aren't staying barefoot and pregnant. But, in terms of total hours worked per household, American families are running harder just to stay more or less in place (and you can add in more teenagers working at low-wage jobs, as the Economist does, cheerily). By contrast, as the Times notes, we just pay the well-to-do more per hour.
Even Easterbrook knows he was overstating the case:
Mr. Easterbrook, a senior editor at The New Republic who is a visiting fellow at Brookings, acknowledged last week that he had gone too far in the book. His discussion of inequality occupies a very small part of "The Progress Paradox," he said, and he was mainly arguing that immigration played a role in the rise in inequality. "Even if there were not that increase in immigration, there would certainly be a rise in inequality," he said in an interview. "I did a poor job of writing that page."
But isn't it more pleasant to say that everything really is coming up roses, and people who don't agree are just whiners?
Wednesday, March 17, 2004
You may think that one of the great things about this country is that for generations it's been possible for people from vastly different backgrounds to come together and raise families. National Review's Michael Graham, by contrast, thinks it's a big joke:
On this Saint Patrick's Day, I plan to raise a pint of Beamish to my favorite Irish American: Soledad O'Brien.
CNN's O'Brien has previously been named to Irish American magazine's "Top 100 Irish Americans" list. Interestingly, she also received the "Hispanic Achievement Award in Communications" and she's a member of the National Association of Black Journalists, too.
One can only imagine what St. Patrick's Day is like around her house.
Given examples like Ms. O'Brien, it's hardly surprising that John Kerry of Boston, Mass. has a less-than-linear lineage of his own....
Ha ha ha ha ha! Isn't it sidesplittingly funny that Soledad O'Brien has ancestors from more than one ethnic group?
I won't even get into the fact that, based on a literal reading, Graham apparently believes that John Kerry has mixed ancestry because Soledad O'Brien does.
On this Saint Patrick's Day, I plan to raise a pint of Beamish to my favorite Irish American: Soledad O'Brien.
CNN's O'Brien has previously been named to Irish American magazine's "Top 100 Irish Americans" list. Interestingly, she also received the "Hispanic Achievement Award in Communications" and she's a member of the National Association of Black Journalists, too.
One can only imagine what St. Patrick's Day is like around her house.
Given examples like Ms. O'Brien, it's hardly surprising that John Kerry of Boston, Mass. has a less-than-linear lineage of his own....
Ha ha ha ha ha! Isn't it sidesplittingly funny that Soledad O'Brien has ancestors from more than one ethnic group?
I won't even get into the fact that, based on a literal reading, Graham apparently believes that John Kerry has mixed ancestry because Soledad O'Brien does.
Well, this sort of thing was bound to happen:
The county that was the site of the Scopes "Monkey Trial" over the teaching of evolution is asking lawmakers to amend state law so the county can charge homosexuals with crimes against nature.
The Rhea County commissioners approved the request 8-0 Tuesday.
Commissioner J.C. Fugate, who introduced the measure, also asked the county attorney to find a way to enact an ordinance banning homosexuals from living in the county.
"We need to keep them out of here," Fugate said...
--ABC News
From another version of the story, here's a little more detail:
Fugate's motion prompted some people in the audience to applaud. Three audience members who spoke before Fugate's motion advocated prayer in schools and denounced drinking alcohol and county zoning....
County zoning?
One more detail:
In 2002, a federal judge ruled unconstitutional the Rhea County school board's Bible Education Ministry, a class taught in the public schools by students from a Christian college.
Lovely.
Here's the opinion of one of the bright lights over at Free Republic:
this is to cool
The county that was the site of the Scopes "Monkey Trial" over the teaching of evolution is asking lawmakers to amend state law so the county can charge homosexuals with crimes against nature.
The Rhea County commissioners approved the request 8-0 Tuesday.
Commissioner J.C. Fugate, who introduced the measure, also asked the county attorney to find a way to enact an ordinance banning homosexuals from living in the county.
"We need to keep them out of here," Fugate said...
--ABC News
From another version of the story, here's a little more detail:
Fugate's motion prompted some people in the audience to applaud. Three audience members who spoke before Fugate's motion advocated prayer in schools and denounced drinking alcohol and county zoning....
County zoning?
One more detail:
In 2002, a federal judge ruled unconstitutional the Rhea County school board's Bible Education Ministry, a class taught in the public schools by students from a Christian college.
Lovely.
Here's the opinion of one of the bright lights over at Free Republic:
this is to cool
If I'm correctly reading what conservative commentators are saying, isn't it simply too much of a risk to allow anyone to run for high office, anywhere in the West, who disagrees with George W. Bush on how to fight the war on terror? By letting such candidates run, aren't we just inviting terrorists and evildoers to do their worst? Shouldn't we legally prohibit all such candidacies -- in the name of freedom?
Quarter of IT jobs will move offshore by 2010
A quarter of traditional IT jobs in Western countries will move to offshore locations such as India by 2010 as the global outsourcing trend continues to boom, according to the latest figures from Gartner.
The research shows that outsourcing as a whole is outstripping the IT services market in Europe, growing by 3.1 per cent in 2004 and predicted to rise to 8 per cent by 2007, with the offshore element tipped to grow hugely. Gartner predicts almost a third of leading European businesses will include an offshore element in their IT plans by 2005....
--silicon.com
Roger Cox, a Gartner vice president, says you shouldn't be so glum:
"That 25 per cent is over a long period of time," he said. "And if we turn back to a period of growth then you'll find those jobs could go entirely into growth," he told silicon.com.
But what does "go entirely into growth" mean? Does it mean "go into creating new jobs in the West"? Or does it mean "go directly into CEOs' pockets"? We have "growth" now -- GDP growth, stock-market growth over the last year or so. We just don't have any damn jobs.
(Link via INTL-News.)
A quarter of traditional IT jobs in Western countries will move to offshore locations such as India by 2010 as the global outsourcing trend continues to boom, according to the latest figures from Gartner.
The research shows that outsourcing as a whole is outstripping the IT services market in Europe, growing by 3.1 per cent in 2004 and predicted to rise to 8 per cent by 2007, with the offshore element tipped to grow hugely. Gartner predicts almost a third of leading European businesses will include an offshore element in their IT plans by 2005....
--silicon.com
Roger Cox, a Gartner vice president, says you shouldn't be so glum:
"That 25 per cent is over a long period of time," he said. "And if we turn back to a period of growth then you'll find those jobs could go entirely into growth," he told silicon.com.
But what does "go entirely into growth" mean? Does it mean "go into creating new jobs in the West"? Or does it mean "go directly into CEOs' pockets"? We have "growth" now -- GDP growth, stock-market growth over the last year or so. We just don't have any damn jobs.
(Link via INTL-News.)
Mississippi's Haley Barbour -- governor, piggish fat-cat lobbyist, friend to racists, and, possibly, future GOP presidential candidate -- is welching on a promise and stiffing people:
The Gulfport Branch NAACP has inquired whether Gov. Haley Barbour's campaign will repay the city for President Bush's November visit.
...Barbour's campaign pledged to foot the bill for the political event in an article published in The Sun Herald two days after the presidential visit.
"Haley's campaign is paying the cost of the president's visit to the Coast," said Henry Barbour, Haley Barbour's nephew and campaign spokesman. "The campaign has not yet received the bill. When we receive the bill, we will be glad to pay it."
Shortly after Bush's visit, the city billed Barbour's campaign $20,275 for security costs. The bill has not been paid. Harrison County billed the campaign nearly $2,800. It was unclear Monday whether the county bill had been paid.
..."Didn't Haley Barbour raise $11 million for his campaign?" [Gulfport city council member Chuck]Teston said. "We're in a financial crisis in Gulfport. I think it's only fair that (Barbour's campaign) pay the money back."
According to campaign finance reports, Barbour's campaign raised nearly $11 million in 2003....
--The Sun-Herald (South Mississippi)
The Gulfport Branch NAACP has inquired whether Gov. Haley Barbour's campaign will repay the city for President Bush's November visit.
...Barbour's campaign pledged to foot the bill for the political event in an article published in The Sun Herald two days after the presidential visit.
"Haley's campaign is paying the cost of the president's visit to the Coast," said Henry Barbour, Haley Barbour's nephew and campaign spokesman. "The campaign has not yet received the bill. When we receive the bill, we will be glad to pay it."
Shortly after Bush's visit, the city billed Barbour's campaign $20,275 for security costs. The bill has not been paid. Harrison County billed the campaign nearly $2,800. It was unclear Monday whether the county bill had been paid.
..."Didn't Haley Barbour raise $11 million for his campaign?" [Gulfport city council member Chuck]Teston said. "We're in a financial crisis in Gulfport. I think it's only fair that (Barbour's campaign) pay the money back."
According to campaign finance reports, Barbour's campaign raised nearly $11 million in 2003....
--The Sun-Herald (South Mississippi)
For the 936th time, the U.S. tries to prove that it's really serious this time about crushing the Iraqi insurgency -- and you can tell because it's launched yet another "operation" with a name that sounds like the band your kid brother used to be in:
BAGHDAD, Iraq - U.S. and Iraqi military forces launched a big operation in Baghdad to weed out insurgents and capture illegal weapons on Wednesday with troops, helicopters and armored vehicles raiding suspected rebel hideouts.
The operation launched Wednesday is called "Iron Promise" ...
--AP
"Iron Promise" -- whoa, cool. A little bit metal, a little bit emo.
BAGHDAD, Iraq - U.S. and Iraqi military forces launched a big operation in Baghdad to weed out insurgents and capture illegal weapons on Wednesday with troops, helicopters and armored vehicles raiding suspected rebel hideouts.
The operation launched Wednesday is called "Iron Promise" ...
--AP
"Iron Promise" -- whoa, cool. A little bit metal, a little bit emo.
Tuesday, March 16, 2004
Surrender to terrorists in Spain? Looks as if the guy who did that was Bush's buddy Aznar:
Spain accused of easing up on terror watch
Signs emerge of serious intelligence and security failures before bombings
Spain cut the number of police units responsible for watching radical Islamists in the months before last week's Madrid bombings, reducing numbers by up to a half in some cities and sending them back to ordinary police work, it was claimed yesterday.
A report in the newspaper El Mundo emerged amid numerous signs of serious police and intelligence failures in the run-up to the attacks that killed 201 commuters.
They include allegations that:
· Spanish police possessed phone taps linking a prime suspect in the bombings, the Moroccan Jamal Zougam, with Mohamed Fizazi, a jailed leader of the May bombings in Casablanca, Morocco;
· Arguments between Morocco and Spain over the island of Perejil, fishing rights and immigration had seriously hampered coordination on shared terrorism threats;
· Paperwork that should have allowed police to trace the sale in Spain of the explosives used in the attacks has reportedly gone missing; and
· Spanish police knew that Mr Zougam was closely connected to Salaheddine Benyaiche, another north African Islamist also imprisoned in Morocco for the Casablanca attacks.
It has also been revealed that of six other people now being hunted by Spanish police in connection with the blasts, the majority were already well-known for radical Islamist connections....
--The Guardian
Same pattern as in this country: Act macho by sending troops to Iraq, act macho by getting into fights with other countries that threaten cooperation on anti-terrorism intelligence, shortchange the cops because cops arresting terrorists doersn't let you act as macho as kicking ass in a war. Aznar? Good riddance to bad rubbish.
Spain accused of easing up on terror watch
Signs emerge of serious intelligence and security failures before bombings
Spain cut the number of police units responsible for watching radical Islamists in the months before last week's Madrid bombings, reducing numbers by up to a half in some cities and sending them back to ordinary police work, it was claimed yesterday.
A report in the newspaper El Mundo emerged amid numerous signs of serious police and intelligence failures in the run-up to the attacks that killed 201 commuters.
They include allegations that:
· Spanish police possessed phone taps linking a prime suspect in the bombings, the Moroccan Jamal Zougam, with Mohamed Fizazi, a jailed leader of the May bombings in Casablanca, Morocco;
· Arguments between Morocco and Spain over the island of Perejil, fishing rights and immigration had seriously hampered coordination on shared terrorism threats;
· Paperwork that should have allowed police to trace the sale in Spain of the explosives used in the attacks has reportedly gone missing; and
· Spanish police knew that Mr Zougam was closely connected to Salaheddine Benyaiche, another north African Islamist also imprisoned in Morocco for the Casablanca attacks.
It has also been revealed that of six other people now being hunted by Spanish police in connection with the blasts, the majority were already well-known for radical Islamist connections....
--The Guardian
Same pattern as in this country: Act macho by sending troops to Iraq, act macho by getting into fights with other countries that threaten cooperation on anti-terrorism intelligence, shortchange the cops because cops arresting terrorists doersn't let you act as macho as kicking ass in a war. Aznar? Good riddance to bad rubbish.
We made the monster. Has it broken out of the lab?
Iraq woos Iran and US grows insecure
The eagerness of post-Saddam Iraq to reach out to its Shiite neighbours in Iran, a sworn enemy of the United States, has become a new pressure point as Iraq's Shiite majority stonewalls in the face of US attempts to dictate the shape of a new government in Baghdad....
The Iraqis sent a delegation to Tehran, presenting it as a neighbourly visit. But the Americans would have been stunned by the inclusion in the team of their hand-picked candidate as the likely next leader of Iraq - the returned exile and former banker Ahmed Chalabi.
US retaliation was swift. It closed all but three of the crossing points on the Iraq-Iran border. This was presented by the chief of the US occupation, Paul Bremer, as just another security measure, but observers here saw the border tightening as a rebuke to the Iraqi Shiites.
The Shiites responded by making it known that they might oppose a role for the United Nations in brokering an agreement on the shape of Iraq's next interim government....
The anxiety in Washington is that Iran and Iraq will form a Shiite rump to compete for dominance with US-backed and Sunni-led regimes in the region....
--Sydney Morning Herald
(Thanks to Rational Enquirer for the link.)
Iraq woos Iran and US grows insecure
The eagerness of post-Saddam Iraq to reach out to its Shiite neighbours in Iran, a sworn enemy of the United States, has become a new pressure point as Iraq's Shiite majority stonewalls in the face of US attempts to dictate the shape of a new government in Baghdad....
The Iraqis sent a delegation to Tehran, presenting it as a neighbourly visit. But the Americans would have been stunned by the inclusion in the team of their hand-picked candidate as the likely next leader of Iraq - the returned exile and former banker Ahmed Chalabi.
US retaliation was swift. It closed all but three of the crossing points on the Iraq-Iran border. This was presented by the chief of the US occupation, Paul Bremer, as just another security measure, but observers here saw the border tightening as a rebuke to the Iraqi Shiites.
The Shiites responded by making it known that they might oppose a role for the United Nations in brokering an agreement on the shape of Iraq's next interim government....
The anxiety in Washington is that Iran and Iraq will form a Shiite rump to compete for dominance with US-backed and Sunni-led regimes in the region....
--Sydney Morning Herald
(Thanks to Rational Enquirer for the link.)
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