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Liberty and Power

  • Apr 17, 2004

    The Moon is Down, Again!

    by Liberty and Power

    Art, films and literature often offer insights which help to explain human situations perhaps better than does history. This Easter season, “The Passion of the Christ” provided us an example of the way in which imperial occupiers, and some of their Quislings, treated dissidents.

    My favorite, however, on the integral interaction between occupiers and those being occupied, is John Steinbeck’s 1942 book, The Moon is Down, shortly thereafter made into a film starring Cedric Hardwicke

  • Apr 16, 2004

    The Children's Crusade

    by Liberty and Power

    Yes, David Beito and Jonathan Dresner, our Volokh Conspiracy colleagues are way behind the times. I too presented the possibility of the three-state solution on November 26, 2003. At this point, I doubt that anything will solve the mess that the U.S. has created.

    I do like the fact, however, that a number of people who supported this fiasco of

  • Apr 16, 2004

    Does He Even Hear What He Says?

    by Liberty and Power

    President Bush quoted in Bob Woodward's new book about the road to war in Iraq:"Going into this period, I was praying for strength to do the Lord's will.... I'm surely not going to justify war based upon God. Understand that. Nevertheless, in my case I pray that I be as good a messenger of His will as possible."

    Huh?

  • Apr 15, 2004

    Kerry's Lily White Campaign Staff

    by Liberty and Power

    Carlos Watson of CNN reports that"The Kerry campaign, as of yet, has no one of color in the innermost circle, including Kerry's campaign manger, campaign chairperson, media advisor, policy director, foreign policy advisor, genral election manager, convention planner, national finance chairman, and head of VP search team." Read the rest here.
  • Apr 15, 2004

    Drugs and Terror

    by Liberty and Power

    It's reported by the NY Times that the"Islamic terrorists responsible for the Madrid train bombings financed their plot with sales of hashish and Ecstasy ..." This article, by Dale Fuchs, tells us that the terrorists used"traffickers as intermediaries," swapping"the drugs for the 440 pounds of dynamite used in the blasts ... Money from the drug tr

  • Apr 14, 2004

    Cohen on The Iraqi Quagmire

    by Liberty and Power

    A very nice piece by Richard Cohen on"The Iraqi Quagmire" appears in yesterday's New York Daily News. Cohen is careful to distinguish between the Iraq and Vietnam situations, but he sees that in both cases, there is the same operative principle:"We don't know what the hell we're doing. ... The lesson of Vietnam is that once you make the initial mistake, little you do afterward is right."

  • Apr 14, 2004

    Shut Up and Obey

    by Liberty and Power

    [cross-posted at Austro-Athenian Empire]

    During last night's press conference, when asked about the similarities between the Iraq and Vietnam quagmires, our Commander-in-Chief replied:"I think that analogy is false. I also happen to think that analogy sends the wrong message to our troops and sends the wrong message to the enemy."

    The point of this answer was obviously not to give grounds for thinking the analog
  • Apr 14, 2004

    Bush Redux

    by Liberty and Power

    What's the sense of saying anything about the President's press conference? He's just going through the familiar motions and will never admit to any mistakes. Well, at least you have to give him points on stubborn commitment.

    Everything he said and everything I could have said is summed up here. But for a look at some unfortunate future possibilities as the U.S. stays the course in Iraq, it is always good to look at

  • Apr 13, 2004

    Response to Beito: Grade Inflation and Information

    by Liberty and Power

    Many schools, particularly law schools, give an overall class rank based on GPA. While David's point has merit, it would mean that recruiters and HR professionals would have to acquire more information from a transcript than before -- GPA is popular because it is supposed to contain much information in one number. Use of rankings admits that the information content of that number has been reduced by inflation (just as price inflation reduces the information content in changing prices for milk
  • Apr 12, 2004

    Gasp!

    by Liberty and Power

    The Vietnam analogy makes it onto the webpage of the American Spectator:

    Close your eyes and you're back in Saigon in 1966 listening to Robert McNamara rhapsodize about the future of Vietnam. All that's missing is the body counts.

    The piece makes some rather loopy assertions and slaloms in and out of running-off-the-rails stream-of-consciousness, but it's still more interesting and insightful than any war coverage

  • Apr 12, 2004

    Excuse me?

    by Liberty and Power

    From today's Washington Times:

    "Israeli political sources said yesterday that Prime Minister Ariel Sharon will get a written U.S. pledge that in exchange for a Gaza pullout, Israel will be able to keep parts of the West Bank under a future peace deal."

    Does the West Bank belong to the United States now?

  • Apr 12, 2004

    How to Frustrate the Anti-Semites

    by Liberty and Power

    The Nazi-style anti-Semitic group"JewWatch" has managed to get its site into the #1 spot for Google hits on the word"Jew." A counter-effort is underway, to get as many sites as possible to post links to the (sane, objective) Wikipedia definition of"Jew" (like this: Jew) to push that site in the #1 spot instead. If you have a personal website, see this site