Time to go, Kofi! Part II

Victor Davis Hanson has another wonderful article, this time over at OpinionJournal.com. Here's part of it.

First, the U.N. is not the idealistic postwar organization of our collective Unicef and Unesco nostalgia, the old perpetual force for good that we once associated with hunger relief and peacekeeping. Its membership is instead rife with tyrannies, theocracies and Stalinist regimes. Many of them, like Algeria, Cuba, Iran, Vietnam and Zimbabwe, have served on the U.N.'s 53-member Commission on Human Rights. The Libyan lunocracy--infamous for its dirty war with Chad and cash bounties to mass murderers--chaired the 2003 session. For Mr. Bush to talk to such folk about the need to spread liberty means removing from power, or indeed jailing, many of the oppressors sitting in his audience.

Second, urging democratic reforms in Palestine, as Mr. Bush also outlined, is antithetical to the very stuff of the U.N., an embarrassing reminder that nearly half of its resolutions in the past half-century have been aimed at punishing tiny democratic Israel at the behest of its larger,more populous--and dictatorial--Arab neighbors. The contemporary U.N., then, has become not only hypocritical, but also a bully that hectors Israel about the West Bank while it gives a pass to a nuclear, billion-person China after swallowing Tibet; wants nothing to do with the two present dangers to world peace, a nuclear North Korea and soon to follow theocratic Iran; and idles while thousands die in the Sudan.

Third, the present secretary-general, Kofi Annan, is himself a symbol of all that is wrong with the U.N. A multibillion dollar oil-for-food fraud, replete with kickbacks (perhaps involving a company that his own son worked for), grew unchecked on his watch, as a sordid array of Baathist killers, international hustlers and even terrorists milked the national petroleum treasure of Iraq while its own people went hungry. In response, Mr. Annan stonewalls, counting on exemption from the New York press on grounds of his unimpeachable liberal credentials. Meanwhile, he prefers to denigrate the toppling of Saddam Hussein as "illegal," but neither advocates reinstitution of a "legal" Saddam nor offers any concrete help to Iraqis crafting consensual society. Like the U.N. membership itself, he enjoys the freedom, affluence and security of a New York, but never stops to ask why that is so or how it might be extended to others less fortunate.

Allah Is In the House

You can always tell a good scandal when it produces so many great quotes and "memes" as we bloggers like to say. One of the best recently is from Allah Is In the House pundit in his comment on the continuing craziness over CBS way.

"I tell you when they make the movie of this story, the whole soundtrack is
going to be calliope."

Living Without TV

I think it was watching all the faces on the movie "Network" in the 70s sticking out their windows and yelling "I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore!" that may have first given me the idea that I could do something about the uninvited guest in my living room: to wit, the advertising delivery vehicle known as TV. We ought to call it ADV. "Network" and, I suppose, the sight of all those TVs flying through windows from high rise apt. buildings on episodes of Second City TV. In any case, it was 1981, and I was living in Middleton, a suburb of Madison, Wisconin on the other side of Lake Mendota, when I picked up the old black and white TV I'd had since marriage 4 years before, and carried it outside to the apartment parking lot, and heaved it into the dumpster where it landed with a resounding crash. And I've been free ever since. I've now lived almost as many years without TV as I did with it. And my two children in college never had TV in their home growing up, other than a VCR to watch homeschool educational videos and rental movies on. The benefits of life without TV are just so overwhelmingly positive and I can think of no drawbacks or negatives whatsoever. Go here for a review of Marie Winn's The Plug-in Drug and here for Jerry Mander's Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television.

Mrs. Ritter

Mrs. Ritter was my eighth grade English teacher who forced us all to memorize poetry. But she was the last teacher to ask me to memorize anything. That was 1967. I wish we had learned more. Think what it would be like to have one's mind full of Shakespear and Herbert, Keats and Wordsworth and Tennyson. But that advantage was taken away from several generations of schoolchildren by the mavens of ed schools in the 60s and 70s. The City Journal has a great deal to say on this in an article by Michael Knox Beran "In Defense of Memorization." After googling Beran, I see that Faraz Rabbani (in Amman, Jordan) of Seeker's Digest, a fellow blogger, has already linked to City Journal back in July. And a nice looking blog, it is, too.

No less important, memorizing poetry turns on kids’ language capability. It not only teaches them to articulate English words; it heightens their feel for the intricacies and complexities of the English language—an indispensable attainment if they are to go on to speak, write, and read English with ease. Susan Wise Bauer, author of The Well-Educated Mind: A Guide to the Classical Education You Never Had, argues that memorization “builds into children’s minds an ability to use complex English syntax.” The student “who memorizes poetry will internalize” the “rhythmic, beautiful patterns” of the English language. These patterns then become “part of the student’s ‘language store,’ those wells that we all use every day in writing and speaking.” Without memorization, the student’s “language store,” Bauer says, will be limited: memorization stocks “the language store with a whole new set of language patterns.”

It also stocks those bins with a generous supply of the English language’s rich accumulation of words. Research suggests that the size of a child’s vocabulary plays an important part in determining the quality of his language-comprehension skills. “The greater and wider the vocabulary,” says education historian Ravitch, “the greater one’s comprehension of increasingly difficult material.” Bauer points out that if “a student reads a word in a novel, she might or might not remember it for later use. But when she commits it to memory in proper context (as the memorization of lines of poetry requires), she is much more likely to have it at her ‘mental fingertips’ for use in her own speaking and writing.”

My Guy! Victor Davis Hanson on Iraq and Exit Strategy on National Review Online

Victor Davis Hanson on Iraq and Exit Strategy on National Review Online: "It is always difficult for those involved to determine the pulse of any ongoing war. The last 90 days in the Pacific theater were among the most costly of World War II, as we incurred 50,000 casualties on Okinawa just weeks before the Japanese collapse. December 1944 and January 1945 were the worst months for the American army in Europe, bled white repelling Hitler's last gasp in the Battle of the Bulge. Contemporaries shuddered, after observing those killing fields, that the war would go on for years more. The summer of 1864 convinced many that Grant and Lincoln were losers, and that McClellan alone could end the conflict by what would amount to a negotiated surrender of Northern war aims.
It is true that parts of Iraq are unsafe and that terrorists are flowing into the country; but there is no doubt that the removal of Saddam Hussein is bringing matters to a head. Islamic fascists are now fighting openly and losing battles, and are increasingly desperate as they realize the democratization process slowly grinds ahead leaving them and what they have to offer by the wayside."
Proof of the value to the Republic of a Classics education!

We need to hear more from the Major.

Here are some thoughts from a "Major in the USMC on the Multi-National Corps staff in Baghdad" found on Captain's Quarters.

You may not have even heard about the city of Samarra. Two weeks ago, that Sunni Triangle city was a “No-go” area for US troops. But guess what? The locals got sick of living in fear from the insurgents and foreign fighters that were there and let them know they weren’t welcome. They stopped hosting them in their houses and the mayor of the town brokered a deal with the US commander to return Iraqi government sovereignty to the city without a fight. The people saw what was on the horizon and decided they didn’t want their city looking like Fallujah in April or Najaf in August.

Boom, boom, just like that two major “hot spots” cool down in rapid succession. Does that mean that those towns are completely pacified? No. What it does mean is that we are learning how to do this the right way. The US commander in Samarra saw an opportunity and took it – probably the biggest victory of his military career and nary a shot was fired in anger.

Via, where else? Instapundit.

One of those emails.

This was passed to me, but I can't understand it. Maybe you can,
I'm trying to get all this political stuff straightened out in my head
so I'll know how to vote come November. Right now, we have one guy saying
one thing. Then the other guy says something else. Who to believe. Lemme
see; have I got this straight?

Clinton awards Halliburton no-bid contract in Yugoslavia - good...
Bush awards Halliburton no-bid contract in Iraq - bad...

Clinton spends 77 billion on war in Serbia - good..
Bush spends 87 billion in Iraq - bad...

Clinton imposes regime change in Serbia - good...
Bush imposes regime change in Iraq - bad...

Clinton bombs Christian Serbs on behalf of Muslim Albanian terrorists-
good...
Bush liberates 25 million from a genocidal dictator - bad...

Clinton bombs Chinese embassy - good...
Bush bombs terrorist camps - bad...

Clinton commits felonies while in office - good...
Bush lands on aircraft carrier in jumpsuit - bad...

No mass graves found in Serbia - good...
No WMD found Iraq - bad...

Stock market crashes in 2000 under Clinton - good...
Economy on upswing under Bush - bad...

Clinton refuses to take custody of Bin Laden - good...
World Trade Centers fall under Bush - bad...

Clinton says Saddam has nukes - good...
Bush says Saddam has nukes - bad...

Clinton calls for regime change in Iraq - good...
Bush imposes regime change in Iraq - bad...

Terrorist training in Afghanistan under Clinton - good...
Bush destroys training camps in Afghanistan - bad...

Milosevic not yet convicted - good...
Saddam turned over for trial - bad...

Ahh, it's so confusing!

Seems to be all over the internet. Some questions about location of mass graves in Balknas. Perhaps none in Serbia proper, though certainly elsewhere in Balkans.

Oh! Never Mind....

Oh, my, you mean retired Col. Walter Staudt is alive? Wonder why CBS hadn't bothered to confirm its story with him? Hmmmmm? Thanks to Bill Hobbs via Instapundit.

Taranto too funny!

Yeah, That's the Ticket!--II
"A fraternity member has been busted for apparently finding a unique way to supplement his college income--fake parking tickets," reports the Associated Press:

Prosecutors said Anthony R. Gallagher, 23, allegedly earned hundreds of dollars by putting fake parking tickets on cars and having duped owners send him their payments. . . .

Prosecutors said Gallagher established a post office box to receive payments for the $40 tickets and had placed payments, amounting to hundreds of dollars, in a separate bank account.

We just hope the prosecutors don't act precipitously here. They ought to refrain from filing any charges against Gallagher unless they uncover convincing evidence that the people who got the phony tickets were not parked illegally at the time. After all, just because the tickets were fake doesn't mean they weren't accurate.

Time to go, Kofi!

Now comes world renowned statesman Kofi Annan (shouldn't he have a Nobel by now? Along with Jimmy and Yasser?) to tell us the War for the Liberation of Iraq is illegal. I'd say, Kofi, that you'd probably be best to stop doing business with the Great Satan, which means you won't want to be eating at the Four Seasons in NYC, etc. etc. Better take everybody home with you. Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

More on Kofi from the WSJ's Opinion Journal.

The Secretary-General's latest posturing is far from harmless. The U.N. has been given the lead role in organizing the elections in Iraq scheduled for January. But Mr. Annan's "illegal" comments, which have been replayed across the Arab world, have given an added feeling of legitimacy to every jihadist hoping to disrupt the vote.

His comments also suggest that Mr. Annan belongs in the same category as France and Russia in never intending the "serious consequences" threatened by Resolution 1441. We wonder: Could the corrupt Oil for Food program and all the revenues it generated for the U.N. have anything to do with it?

Helprin again.

Did you ever say to yourself, "why can't I write like that?"

"The optimism and confidence of the fin de siècle — the one a hundred years ago — became the First World War; the Second World War; the Holocaust; the Cold War and its attendant, costly, proxy wars; and a century as much or more of alienation, misery, and death as of progress and the alleviation of suffering. Churchill was able to make an exception to the rule of blindness in the age of appeasement only because he had been an optimist prior to the Great War, and had bitterly learned the lesson he went on to teach — not that one policy or another is always right, but that throughout history grandiose expectations are almost always confounded and overturned in tragedy."

"Taqiyah." A word you should know.

Mark Helprin writes, in December of 1999, no less,
"The Encyclopaedia Britannica, a source with no known links to Ariel Sharon, describes it as "the practice of concealing one's belief," in which "the Qur'an allows Muslims to profess friendship with the unbelievers . . . on the condition that their hearts contradict their tongues." This is not merely a religious dispensation but a cultural pattern that debases the value of assurances and treaties."
If not a prophet, he's certainly a Daniel come to judgment.

Helprin on "How to Win the War"

There are not many around writing with as much penetrating insight and trenchant analysis as Mark Helprin. Raised on the Hudson and in the British West Indies, Helprin holds degrees from Harvard College and Harvard's Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, and did postgraduate work at the University of Oxford. He served in the British Merchant Navy, the Israeli infantry, and the Israeli Air Force. His articles for the Claremont Institute and Claremont Review of Books need to be seen and heeded by more of our leaders and media elites. Here it is. Send it to them. And this. And this, too. As much as I'm in favor of Bush's re-election, the war can't continue in the way it's been going.

At Powerline. Via Instapundit

The new climate of fear, seen at Powerline. Via Instapundit.

Unforgivable

I neglected to mention a man on my link buttons at home and at work whom I check every day, namely, Methodist minister and former US Army Artillery officer, Donald Sensing, he of One Hand Clapping.

LILEKS (James) :: The Bleat :: Thursday

LILEKS (James) :: The Bleat :: Thursday
Mr. James Lileks, surely the most winsome and winning of the Upper Midwestern bloggers, is one of the sites I ckeck every day, along with Instapundit.com, getreligion.org and Arts and Letters Daily . You especially have to click on its Nota Bene feature.

Democrat Thuggery

Democrat Thuggery
In the photo {above], three-year-old Sophia Parlock cries while sitting on her father's shoulders. Her Bush-Cheney sign was grabbed by Democratic thugs and ripped to pieces, reducing the child to tears. We are picking up more and more reports of this kind of behavior by Democrats on the campaign trail. A week or two ago, this partisan violence, once unheard of in Minnesota politics, occurred at the Minnesota State Fair when Democratic thugs roughed up a couple of Republican college students. (via Powerline)

A Dance to the Music of Time, Nicolas Poussin 

A word or 5000

I should say something about the title, which comes from a favorite novel series, A Dance to the Music of Time, by Anthony Powell. "Dance" consists of 12 novels published mid 20th century, built around the life of an Englishman, Nick Jenkins, and his observations of friends and events from WWI to the late 60s. The title comes from a rather well known painting by Nicholas Poussin. see above:
More later.