Some new terminology from the US military in Iraq --
Coalition Forces captured a key financier of Special Groups terrorists during a pre-dawn raid Monday in Western Baghdad. The detained individual is believed to be a Special Groups leader for the Bayaa province in Western Baghdad.
No shots were fired when Coalition Forces conducted a ground assault to capture or kill a suspected key financier of the "Special Groups" that are believed to have direct ties to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps – Quds Force (IRGC-QF). These Special Groups terrorists are suspected of killing Iraqi citizens, directing attacks against Coalition Forces, and promoting sectarian violence.
Special Groups therefore seem to be neither al-Qaeda in Iraq or Mahdi Army. One hopes that it's not simply a residual classification developed to rationalize the seemingly conflicting goals attributed to terrorists in Iraq, of both being in league with Shia Iran but trying to bring down a Shia-supported government through attacks on the Shia population.
UPDATE 15 AUGUST: The "Special Groups" appear to have graduated from lower case letters when they were discussed about a month ago by White House Baghdad operative Kevin Bergner. Bergner is making waves today with a news briefing that seems to be just a repetition of the claims from the earlier story, although this anecdote --
Ali Musa Daqduq contends the Iraqi special groups could not have conducted this complex operation without the support and direction of the Quds Force
-- to claim that the other source, Qayis Khazali, was smiling when he said "there's no way could do this without that source of support [Iran]". So the US evidence for their claim that the support has to be coming from Iran is captured terrorists agreeing with them that the support has to be coming from Iran?
And remember, this is all the in the context of the high probability that Bush's "enhanced interrogation techniques" are being used in Iraq.
Monday, August 13, 2007
Amnesia
One of the strange things in Karl Rove's farewell interview with the Wall Street Journal editorial page -- itself probably in farewell mode with Murdoch coming -- is this:
Yet even with a unified Democratic Party and the war, he argues, [2006] was "a really close election." The GOP lost the Senate by its 3,562 vote margin of defeat in Montana, and in the House the combined margin in the 15 seats that cost control was 85,000 votes.
This is the man whose boss, even on their own dodgy count, was put in the White House in 2000 by 537 votes, or, if you prefer, the 1 vote margin that he had on the Supreme Court.
Yet even with a unified Democratic Party and the war, he argues, [2006] was "a really close election." The GOP lost the Senate by its 3,562 vote margin of defeat in Montana, and in the House the combined margin in the 15 seats that cost control was 85,000 votes.
This is the man whose boss, even on their own dodgy count, was put in the White House in 2000 by 537 votes, or, if you prefer, the 1 vote margin that he had on the Supreme Court.
Word of the day
al-bling
Which presumably is defined as over-the-top displays of wealth in the Arab world, notably Dubai.
Which presumably is defined as over-the-top displays of wealth in the Arab world, notably Dubai.
Sunday, August 12, 2007
Bone and blood is the price of coal
If the US had real media ethics discussions, one might focus on how it is that the owner of the collapsed Utah coal mine is allowed to be the public face of progress reports in the search for the missing miners. There was a clip just now of Robert Murray attributing the lack of progress to "seismic forces that still haven't settled down" -- when all experts believe that the only "seismic forces" are those that were caused by the collapse of the mine. Murray is therefore being allowed to push his view that an earthquake caused the collapse, which could well be his defence in future civil or criminal litigation over the accident. Nice to have such advance access to the jury pool.
Saturday, August 11, 2007
Free association, Bush style
George Bush, during a Q&A with journalists immediately prior to the arrival of Nicolas Sarkozy, sans famille, to Maine --
Q Do you think he's bringing cheese?
PRESIDENT BUSH: I think he's bringing goodwill. He's bringing a good brain, good vision and goodwill. I'm looking forward to seeing him.
One wonders if he'd been warned at some point that the French eat brains. More photos of the visit here [here are the official White House photos].
UPDATE: French media wonder why there weren't lobsters -- the obvious Maine specialty -- on the menu:
Avant de partager un pique-nique de hamburgers et de hot-dogs -et non des homards, la spécialité locale- et de déguster une tarte aux myrtilles, M. Sarkozy, M. Bush et le père de ce dernier ont eu un entretien de 45 minutes.
Q Do you think he's bringing cheese?
PRESIDENT BUSH: I think he's bringing goodwill. He's bringing a good brain, good vision and goodwill. I'm looking forward to seeing him.
One wonders if he'd been warned at some point that the French eat brains. More photos of the visit here [here are the official White House photos].
UPDATE: French media wonder why there weren't lobsters -- the obvious Maine specialty -- on the menu:
Avant de partager un pique-nique de hamburgers et de hot-dogs -et non des homards, la spécialité locale- et de déguster une tarte aux myrtilles, M. Sarkozy, M. Bush et le père de ce dernier ont eu un entretien de 45 minutes.
Projection
George Bush in his taped radio address --
THE PRESIDENT: Good morning. In America, August is considered a slow news month.
The people who wonder what George Bush was doing in August 2001 and August 2005 beg to differ.
THE PRESIDENT: Good morning. In America, August is considered a slow news month.
The people who wonder what George Bush was doing in August 2001 and August 2005 beg to differ.
Friday, August 10, 2007
So sophisticated only the Iranians could have done it
It's really a goldmine of press releases from Multi-National Forces Iraq today. Will those evil terrorists stop at nothing to advance their goals? --
A platoon from Troop B, 3-7 Cavalry was on patrol when they received information that a bomb was being transported by bicycle to a local mosque.
“We set up a screen around the area where we knew he would be, so that any direction he took off in we could grab him,” said Pittsburgh native 2nd Lt. Kyle Graham, who led the patrol.
Once they spotted the bicycle, the Soldiers gave chase in their humvees and cut the suspect off near a market. Graham, a former football player, was halfway out of his vehicle before it had stopped. He exited the truck and wrestled the startled suspect to the ground.
A platoon from Troop B, 3-7 Cavalry was on patrol when they received information that a bomb was being transported by bicycle to a local mosque.
“We set up a screen around the area where we knew he would be, so that any direction he took off in we could grab him,” said Pittsburgh native 2nd Lt. Kyle Graham, who led the patrol.
Once they spotted the bicycle, the Soldiers gave chase in their humvees and cut the suspect off near a market. Graham, a former football player, was halfway out of his vehicle before it had stopped. He exited the truck and wrestled the startled suspect to the ground.
We do need the 82nd Airborne escorting kids to kindergarten
Arch neo-con Bill Kristol, in a clinical demonstration of how it really is possible to write without thinking for a second about how it reads to people outside the cocoon --
I spent a week in Iraq recently, and here's what impressed me most: the Americans ...I'm not an uncritical cheerleader for the American military ... The rule in Iraq is that brigade and battalion commanders--and even captains and lieutenants--are also taking on responsibilities as diplomats, politicians, development consultants, educators ... My traveling companions (military experts Fred Kagan and Kim Kagan ... the soldiers who have done well in Iraq will be major figures in American life for the next couple of decades. These men and women are no less suited to national leadership than are entrepreneurs, lawyers or local community leaders ...
I spent a week in Iraq recently, and here's what impressed me most: the Americans ...I'm not an uncritical cheerleader for the American military ... The rule in Iraq is that brigade and battalion commanders--and even captains and lieutenants--are also taking on responsibilities as diplomats, politicians, development consultants, educators ... My traveling companions (military experts Fred Kagan and Kim Kagan ... the soldiers who have done well in Iraq will be major figures in American life for the next couple of decades. These men and women are no less suited to national leadership than are entrepreneurs, lawyers or local community leaders ...
They are taking our land, That belongs to the clans
Continuing in the bizarre tradition of naming military operations in Iraq in ways that invert the role of superpower and underdog -- a tradition that goes all the way up to George W. Bush (and Condi Rice) linking his side in the war to America's struggle for independence -- we have this press release from Multinational Forces Iraq:
DIYALA RIVER VALLEY, Iraq – Building upon recent success in the Diyala River Valley, Iraqi and Coalition Soldiers conducted Operation William Wallace, Aug. 8, to destroy al-Qaeda elements in the Abu Tina area.
If they mean this William Wallace, that naming choice needs a lot of explaining.
DIYALA RIVER VALLEY, Iraq – Building upon recent success in the Diyala River Valley, Iraqi and Coalition Soldiers conducted Operation William Wallace, Aug. 8, to destroy al-Qaeda elements in the Abu Tina area.
If they mean this William Wallace, that naming choice needs a lot of explaining.
Thursday, August 09, 2007
Yesterday's Men
In a further preview of the analytical mode of the forthcoming Fox Business Channel, anchor of that channel and of Fox News Neil Cavuto opened an interview yesterday with George Bush as follows --
NEIL CAVUTO, HOST: This is a FOX News Alert. Did something the president of the United States told us today move the markets today? They were up big much of the day, and then ending up even bigger.
Well, today George Bush said even more about the economy -- he devoted much of a surprise news conference to it -- and the market tanked. Down nearly 400 points by the end. Now back to you in the studio Neil.
NEIL CAVUTO, HOST: This is a FOX News Alert. Did something the president of the United States told us today move the markets today? They were up big much of the day, and then ending up even bigger.
Well, today George Bush said even more about the economy -- he devoted much of a surprise news conference to it -- and the market tanked. Down nearly 400 points by the end. Now back to you in the studio Neil.
Only bad people do that
Consider this exchange from George Bush's news conference today --
Q Thank you, sir. A two-part question. The New Yorker reports that the Red Cross has found the interrogation program in the CIA detention facilities use interrogation techniques that were tantamount to torture. I'm wondering if you have read that report and what your reaction to it is? [rest of question]
THE PRESIDENT: [...] Your other question, sir?
Q Red Cross report?
THE PRESIDENT: I haven't seen it. We don't torture.
Thus he says both that he didn't read the report describing the torture, but claims that there's no torture. Thus proving that his claim "We don't torture" is not an empirical statement, but a matter of definition: torture is defined as something that America doesn't do. The denials are thus, as they always have been, meaningless.
Q Thank you, sir. A two-part question. The New Yorker reports that the Red Cross has found the interrogation program in the CIA detention facilities use interrogation techniques that were tantamount to torture. I'm wondering if you have read that report and what your reaction to it is? [rest of question]
THE PRESIDENT: [...] Your other question, sir?
Q Red Cross report?
THE PRESIDENT: I haven't seen it. We don't torture.
Thus he says both that he didn't read the report describing the torture, but claims that there's no torture. Thus proving that his claim "We don't torture" is not an empirical statement, but a matter of definition: torture is defined as something that America doesn't do. The denials are thus, as they always have been, meaningless.
Wednesday, August 08, 2007
Baltic belly
The other news in the George Bush medical exam forms, besides his undisclosed incident of Lyme Disease, is that he is still not fully recovered from the bug he picked up at the G8 summit in June --
He is recovering from an inner ear infection and sinus infection, as well as a virus that resulted in a stomach bug in June and still causes some mild dizziness or disorientation.
Incidentally, one of the few outside witnesses to the nature of Bush's condition on that G8 morning is Nicolas Sarkozy -- whom Bush has invited for lunch this weekend in Maine. Just a coincidence, of course, but it will get strange if Bush has another of those episodes over the weekend.
He is recovering from an inner ear infection and sinus infection, as well as a virus that resulted in a stomach bug in June and still causes some mild dizziness or disorientation.
Incidentally, one of the few outside witnesses to the nature of Bush's condition on that G8 morning is Nicolas Sarkozy -- whom Bush has invited for lunch this weekend in Maine. Just a coincidence, of course, but it will get strange if Bush has another of those episodes over the weekend.
The cat stays at home
When Pakistan's President General Pervez Musharraf announced that he would not be attending a much-hyped meeteing of elders ("jirga") in Afghanistan, it first looked like a major snub to Hamid Karzai and, indirectly, George Bush. But was it in fact an application of the time-honoured principle of strongmen rulers that you never take unnecessary trips abroad when your opponents might be cooking something up back home? It's beginning to look like the latter. Political chaos in Pakistan while the world is on holidays? Could be a fun August.
Tuesday, August 07, 2007
Takes one to know one
The apparently unironic top summary of a Wall Street Journal op-ed by Ion Mihai Pacepa --
Take it from this old KGB hand: The left is abetting America's enemies with its intemperate attacks on President Bush.
Now his claim that as someone who used to stir up leftist agitation against US presidents, he sees the same tactic again. But then he says things like "For communists, only the leader counted, no matter the country, friend or foe" -- in his unconditional defence of George W. Bush. He never seems to have stopped to see how much he has tied himself in knots.
UPDATE 9 AUGUST: Not entirely surprisingly, Powerline's Hindrocket and Trunk team up to argue that the WSJ article proves that the young anti-war John Kerry was in fact a Soviet agent.
Take it from this old KGB hand: The left is abetting America's enemies with its intemperate attacks on President Bush.
Now his claim that as someone who used to stir up leftist agitation against US presidents, he sees the same tactic again. But then he says things like "For communists, only the leader counted, no matter the country, friend or foe" -- in his unconditional defence of George W. Bush. He never seems to have stopped to see how much he has tied himself in knots.
UPDATE 9 AUGUST: Not entirely surprisingly, Powerline's Hindrocket and Trunk team up to argue that the WSJ article proves that the young anti-war John Kerry was in fact a Soviet agent.
Will the last US libertarian please turn out the lights?
From the White House Fact (sic) Sheet explaining the new electronic surveillance law (the "Protect America Act") --
The Act Provides For The FISA Court To Direct Third Parties To Assist The Intelligence Community In Its Collection Efforts. The Act permits the Director of National Intelligence and the Attorney General to direct third parties to provide the information, facilities, and assistance necessary to conduct surveillance of foreign intelligence targets located overseas.
Apart from anything else, the above bullet point is atrociously written, as it refers to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Court, which is judicial, in the 1st sentence, but then refers to the director of national intelligence and the Attorney General in the second, which is entirely executive branch. Unless that's become the judicial branch in the new law.
The Act Provides For The FISA Court To Direct Third Parties To Assist The Intelligence Community In Its Collection Efforts. The Act permits the Director of National Intelligence and the Attorney General to direct third parties to provide the information, facilities, and assistance necessary to conduct surveillance of foreign intelligence targets located overseas.
Apart from anything else, the above bullet point is atrociously written, as it refers to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Court, which is judicial, in the 1st sentence, but then refers to the director of national intelligence and the Attorney General in the second, which is entirely executive branch. Unless that's become the judicial branch in the new law.
Monday, August 06, 2007
Nothing changes
The latest White House Fact (sic) Sheet on terrorism has the following interesting features, inter alia:
As examples of disrupted al Qaeda bomb plots it lists the Heathrow liquid bomb plot along with the dude who was thinking about bringing down the Brooklyn Bridge with a blow-torch, which doesn't do a whole lot for the credibility of the former.
It claims -- In North Africa, we are working with our partners to counter al Qaeda's further expansion in the Maghreb – evident in the emergence of "al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb" (AQIM).
Note therefore that a name change of an incumbent North African terror group to AQIM is taken as evidence of al Qaeda's further expansion, while a name change of an incumbent Iraqi terror group to al Qaeda in Iraq is taken as evidence that al Qaeda was there all along.
It lists the London and Glasgow car bombs under attacks carried out by "Al Qaeda And Those Inspired By Its Hateful Ideology" even though there is yet to be any actual evidence that this is the case, except in the vacuous sense of Muslims doing bad stuff being so defined.
As examples of disrupted al Qaeda bomb plots it lists the Heathrow liquid bomb plot along with the dude who was thinking about bringing down the Brooklyn Bridge with a blow-torch, which doesn't do a whole lot for the credibility of the former.
It claims -- In North Africa, we are working with our partners to counter al Qaeda's further expansion in the Maghreb – evident in the emergence of "al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb" (AQIM).
Note therefore that a name change of an incumbent North African terror group to AQIM is taken as evidence of al Qaeda's further expansion, while a name change of an incumbent Iraqi terror group to al Qaeda in Iraq is taken as evidence that al Qaeda was there all along.
It lists the London and Glasgow car bombs under attacks carried out by "Al Qaeda And Those Inspired By Its Hateful Ideology" even though there is yet to be any actual evidence that this is the case, except in the vacuous sense of Muslims doing bad stuff being so defined.
Inshore tax haven
Today's Wall Street Journal reports (link should work for non-subs) on an emerging cross-community consensus in Northern Irelannd that the region should get a preferential corporate tax rate to allow it to better complete with the Republic --
A city like Belfast can provide accommodation and office space at far cheaper rates than London and Dublin, while it also has decent transport links with two nearby airports. Northern Ireland's capital also has a steady supply of graduates from its two universities -- many of those are leaving the area now, but could be persuaded to stay if more high-profile businesses set up there.
And those businesses would be attracted by a lower tax rate. Now, as Chancellor, Gordon Brown wasn't very happy about the ability of Microsoft and other tech firms to pull a big chunk of their UK sales revenue into the Republic as royalty payments to low tax subsidiaries, so on the face of it he wouldn't like a differential tax regime within the realm either. On the other hand, it might attract some extra revenue that would otherwise go to the Republic. Hard to know which side of Gordon wins out in that one.
Incidentally, Aer Lingus does seem to think Belfast has good prospects, at least as compared to Shannon, so maybe the logical consequence of a more stable Northern Ireland -- more competition with the Republic -- is beginning to happen.
A city like Belfast can provide accommodation and office space at far cheaper rates than London and Dublin, while it also has decent transport links with two nearby airports. Northern Ireland's capital also has a steady supply of graduates from its two universities -- many of those are leaving the area now, but could be persuaded to stay if more high-profile businesses set up there.
And those businesses would be attracted by a lower tax rate. Now, as Chancellor, Gordon Brown wasn't very happy about the ability of Microsoft and other tech firms to pull a big chunk of their UK sales revenue into the Republic as royalty payments to low tax subsidiaries, so on the face of it he wouldn't like a differential tax regime within the realm either. On the other hand, it might attract some extra revenue that would otherwise go to the Republic. Hard to know which side of Gordon wins out in that one.
Incidentally, Aer Lingus does seem to think Belfast has good prospects, at least as compared to Shannon, so maybe the logical consequence of a more stable Northern Ireland -- more competition with the Republic -- is beginning to happen.
Sunday, August 05, 2007
Moral hazard
REUTERS/Larry Downing; caption
For all the ease with which the word Orwellian has been tossed around in the last few years, it still has value when applied to George Bush's statement today welcoming passage of the Protect America Act -- the Act which in effect gives him to power to drop eaves without a warrant on any Internet conversation involving Americans (given the vagueness of its criteria for determining what is foreign intelligence):
When Congress returns in September the Intelligence committees and leaders in both parties will need to complete work on the comprehensive reforms requested by Director McConnell, including the important issue of providing meaningful liability protection to those who are alleged to have assisted our Nation following the attacks of September 11, 2001.
Which comes pretty close to an admission that the US has tortured people, although George makes it sound like it's just an insurance issue. Speaking of liability, it's not clear what the coverage is for Afghan presidents or first ladies who might fall out of Golf Cart One (yes, it's really called that) when its deranged driver takes a bend too quickly. Luckily such a disaster was averted despite the sharp turn shown above.
UPDATE: Some think that the "liability" referred to above is of phone companies who may have assisted in illegal eavesdropping activities, and not a broader retroactive legalisation of torture. With this crowd, you never know.
A court-phobic publisher
A short note on one issue that still hasn't gone away -- Charlie Haughey's personal passports-for-sale program in the 1990s. In an old post we linked to this story mentioning one particular recipient. Anyway, from a surprisingly readable Mark Steyn column --
Who is Sheikh Khalid bin Mahfouz? Well, he's a very wealthy and influential Saudi. Big deal, you say. Is there any other kind? Yes, but even by the standards of very wealthy and influential Saudis, this guy is plugged in: He was the personal banker to the Saudi royal family and head of the National Commercial Bank of Saudi Arabia, until he sold it to the Saudi government. He has a swanky pad in London and an Irish passport and multiple U.S. business connections, including to Thomas Kean, the chairman of the 9/11 Commission.
So there's that passport Charlie sold to him again. Now we thought we'd read somewhere that the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs had revoked all the passports associated with that deal, as the residency requirement was never met, but it's not an easy thing to figure out.
Steyn's point is that bin Mahfouz is engaging in "libel chill", using the threat of a libel action against Cambridge University Press to get it pull its book Alms for Jihad: Charity And Terrorism in the Islamic World, by J. Millard Burr and Robert Collins. This follows an earlier legal action against Rachel Ehrenfeld, author of Funding Evil -- How Terrorism is Financed and How to Stop It, which has restricted the book's availability outside the USA.
There is however another oblique Irish angle to the case which makes us wonder if Cambridge University Press is being too timid. Charlie Haughey's successor Albert Reynolds is the unwilling creator of the so-called Reynolds defence in libel actions in English courts, which opens up a potentially broad public interest defence for controversial claims, even ones that turn out to be factually wrong. The defence has already been used successfully in another Saudi-links-to-terrorism in London. So there's a lingering sense that there's more to the story about CUP's attitude to the book.
Who is Sheikh Khalid bin Mahfouz? Well, he's a very wealthy and influential Saudi. Big deal, you say. Is there any other kind? Yes, but even by the standards of very wealthy and influential Saudis, this guy is plugged in: He was the personal banker to the Saudi royal family and head of the National Commercial Bank of Saudi Arabia, until he sold it to the Saudi government. He has a swanky pad in London and an Irish passport and multiple U.S. business connections, including to Thomas Kean, the chairman of the 9/11 Commission.
So there's that passport Charlie sold to him again. Now we thought we'd read somewhere that the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs had revoked all the passports associated with that deal, as the residency requirement was never met, but it's not an easy thing to figure out.
Steyn's point is that bin Mahfouz is engaging in "libel chill", using the threat of a libel action against Cambridge University Press to get it pull its book Alms for Jihad: Charity And Terrorism in the Islamic World, by J. Millard Burr and Robert Collins. This follows an earlier legal action against Rachel Ehrenfeld, author of Funding Evil -- How Terrorism is Financed and How to Stop It, which has restricted the book's availability outside the USA.
There is however another oblique Irish angle to the case which makes us wonder if Cambridge University Press is being too timid. Charlie Haughey's successor Albert Reynolds is the unwilling creator of the so-called Reynolds defence in libel actions in English courts, which opens up a potentially broad public interest defence for controversial claims, even ones that turn out to be factually wrong. The defence has already been used successfully in another Saudi-links-to-terrorism in London. So there's a lingering sense that there's more to the story about CUP's attitude to the book.
Saturday, August 04, 2007
The Natural Law Party was right?
It's amazing what Google turns up. With the breaking news from the BBC that the source of the foot and mouth outbreak in Surrey is now considered highly likely to be a vaccine strain that somehow got out in the open from the nearby lab and production facility in Pirbright, take a look at the issues identified in this September 2001 NLP webpage, which specifically raises the biosecurity issue with vaccine manufacture at the Surrey facility. Unfortunately most of the links are dead, but we wonder how long this still live page will last?
Note also the date on the page -- 10 September 2001. The next day, the world moved on to other issues. But the previous issue remained.
UPDATE: Google this too before pages start getting pulled.
UPDATE 2: The link to Merial is confirmed. Merial's link to United Biomedical is not clear.
Note also the date on the page -- 10 September 2001. The next day, the world moved on to other issues. But the previous issue remained.
UPDATE: Google this too before pages start getting pulled.
UPDATE 2: The link to Merial is confirmed. Merial's link to United Biomedical is not clear.
Business viewspaper
Tony O'Reilly, in an interview with the New York Times --
Q. Rupert Murdoch’s pursuit of The Wall Street Journal evoked a lot of discussion about editorial interference. As a newspaper owner with strong views of your own, what’s your take?
A. Rupert interferes in his papers because he has the time, inclination and the talent to. But people forget how clever Rupert is. It would be a commercial mistake, and Rupert has made very few commercial mistakes in his life.
I bought my first newspaper in 1973, the same year I was made president of Heinz. I made an election not to interfere in my newspapers. I had no time — I was selling ketchup in Pittsburgh and soup in London. I decided not to interfere, and because of that, my own views in regard to the war in Iraq would be more akin to Tony Blair’s. I think he’s been a fantastic prime minister of Great Britain.
It's unfortunate that the only context New York Times readers get for this answer is that of O'Reilly's ownership of the (London) Independent, because anyone familiar with his running of the Irish Independent would have a different view. It would become much too long a post to provide the details, but the crux is the editorial attitude of the Independent to the Republic's last non-Fianna Fail government, the 1994-97 Rainbow.
And in particular, the possible links between that attitude and two business activities of O'Reilly -- a company providing microwave television service which was angry about the pace at which the government was shutting down unlicensed microwave operators, and a company which bid unsuccessfully for a mobile telephone license. All of a sudden, it was payback time.
Q. Rupert Murdoch’s pursuit of The Wall Street Journal evoked a lot of discussion about editorial interference. As a newspaper owner with strong views of your own, what’s your take?
A. Rupert interferes in his papers because he has the time, inclination and the talent to. But people forget how clever Rupert is. It would be a commercial mistake, and Rupert has made very few commercial mistakes in his life.
I bought my first newspaper in 1973, the same year I was made president of Heinz. I made an election not to interfere in my newspapers. I had no time — I was selling ketchup in Pittsburgh and soup in London. I decided not to interfere, and because of that, my own views in regard to the war in Iraq would be more akin to Tony Blair’s. I think he’s been a fantastic prime minister of Great Britain.
It's unfortunate that the only context New York Times readers get for this answer is that of O'Reilly's ownership of the (London) Independent, because anyone familiar with his running of the Irish Independent would have a different view. It would become much too long a post to provide the details, but the crux is the editorial attitude of the Independent to the Republic's last non-Fianna Fail government, the 1994-97 Rainbow.
And in particular, the possible links between that attitude and two business activities of O'Reilly -- a company providing microwave television service which was angry about the pace at which the government was shutting down unlicensed microwave operators, and a company which bid unsuccessfully for a mobile telephone license. All of a sudden, it was payback time.
This one goes up to 95.4
On one of the Fox News Channel's Saturday business shows (which may be called The Co$t of Freedom), there was a series of boosterish factoids flashing on the bottom of the screen. One said --
America's Employment Rate: 95.4%
If you're used to hearing more about unemployment rates, you'd be confused. Here's what clearly happened. The latest unemployment number for the US came out yesterday and it was up to 4.6 percent. This was deemed to be not Good News From America so they just flipped the number by subtracting it from 100 and so making it sound like a high number. How could something at 95.4% (other than a Saddam Hussein election result) be bad?
Two problems. First, by this standard, lots of areas have impressive sounding employment rates. For example, the Euro area would have an employment rate of 93%. So the greatness of George W. Bush only buys the US a lousy 2.4%?
Second, their style of economics would get an F. They think that the employment rate is the difference between the unemployment rate and 100. It's not. The employment rate is the percentage of the working age population with jobs. The working age population includes lots of people not in the labour force (which is the base for the unemployment rate) because of stay-at-home parents, students, and people who've stopped looking for work. For the US, it's 63.6%. But that's not a number that sounds good for the Fox News editors.
One might dismiss this as a pedantic quibble, except that these are the people who are planning on running a full time business news channel in a couple of months. Looks like they already have their mode of analysis up and running.
America's Employment Rate: 95.4%
If you're used to hearing more about unemployment rates, you'd be confused. Here's what clearly happened. The latest unemployment number for the US came out yesterday and it was up to 4.6 percent. This was deemed to be not Good News From America so they just flipped the number by subtracting it from 100 and so making it sound like a high number. How could something at 95.4% (other than a Saddam Hussein election result) be bad?
Two problems. First, by this standard, lots of areas have impressive sounding employment rates. For example, the Euro area would have an employment rate of 93%. So the greatness of George W. Bush only buys the US a lousy 2.4%?
Second, their style of economics would get an F. They think that the employment rate is the difference between the unemployment rate and 100. It's not. The employment rate is the percentage of the working age population with jobs. The working age population includes lots of people not in the labour force (which is the base for the unemployment rate) because of stay-at-home parents, students, and people who've stopped looking for work. For the US, it's 63.6%. But that's not a number that sounds good for the Fox News editors.
One might dismiss this as a pedantic quibble, except that these are the people who are planning on running a full time business news channel in a couple of months. Looks like they already have their mode of analysis up and running.
Friday, August 03, 2007
If anyone is calling anyone else, we need to know why
George Bush, using an endlessly repeated formulation for why he couldn't comply with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which requires a warrant for electronic eavesdropping on Americans:
If al Qaeda is calling somebody in America, we need to know why, in order to stop attacks.
In a new White House fact sheet, explaining why George Bush wants a drastic revision of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act --
Some have suggested that FISA must be reformed, but only to permit collection against certain overseas threats like al Qaeda terrorists. This is unacceptable. There are many threats that confront our Nation, including military, weapons proliferation, and economic, and we must be able to conduct foreign intelligence effectively on all of them.
Notice the scope of the latitude he claims he needs has gone from al Qaeda to just about anything, and that when granted his initial exception, he introduces a demand for far more. As has been clear for a while, it's getting near time to assume any electronic conversation anywhere in the world could fall under the scope of a warrant-free Global War on Terror -- including on Americans, since the argument will inevitably follow that verifying physical location is impossible on the Internet.
UPDATE: Things are getting very strange in the rush to get the new FISA legislation passed. Did the White House lean on their intelligence chief to get him to reject a compromise proposal? They say they did not. But this is a serious bit of business to be transacting in a rush on Friday night.
FINAL UPDATE 5 AUGUST: The White House is apparently claiming that under current arrangements, it needed a warrant to listen in on conversations between evildoers in Iraq --
Administration officials were concerned that the new court restrictions had slowed their ability to eavesdrop on militants in Iraq who were holding three American soldiers in May, according to an Associated Press report on Friday. Asked about the report, Senator Kit Bond, Republican of Missouri, would not discuss specifics, but said, “The inability to collect on foreign targets not only impacts our security in the United States but our military abroad.”
It's weird that no one will ask for clarification of the precise circumstance under which the bad guys in Iraq were using US wires to communicate with each other. US e-mail accounts (gmail, hotmail) perhaps?
If al Qaeda is calling somebody in America, we need to know why, in order to stop attacks.
In a new White House fact sheet, explaining why George Bush wants a drastic revision of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act --
Some have suggested that FISA must be reformed, but only to permit collection against certain overseas threats like al Qaeda terrorists. This is unacceptable. There are many threats that confront our Nation, including military, weapons proliferation, and economic, and we must be able to conduct foreign intelligence effectively on all of them.
Notice the scope of the latitude he claims he needs has gone from al Qaeda to just about anything, and that when granted his initial exception, he introduces a demand for far more. As has been clear for a while, it's getting near time to assume any electronic conversation anywhere in the world could fall under the scope of a warrant-free Global War on Terror -- including on Americans, since the argument will inevitably follow that verifying physical location is impossible on the Internet.
UPDATE: Things are getting very strange in the rush to get the new FISA legislation passed. Did the White House lean on their intelligence chief to get him to reject a compromise proposal? They say they did not. But this is a serious bit of business to be transacting in a rush on Friday night.
FINAL UPDATE 5 AUGUST: The White House is apparently claiming that under current arrangements, it needed a warrant to listen in on conversations between evildoers in Iraq --
Administration officials were concerned that the new court restrictions had slowed their ability to eavesdrop on militants in Iraq who were holding three American soldiers in May, according to an Associated Press report on Friday. Asked about the report, Senator Kit Bond, Republican of Missouri, would not discuss specifics, but said, “The inability to collect on foreign targets not only impacts our security in the United States but our military abroad.”
It's weird that no one will ask for clarification of the precise circumstance under which the bad guys in Iraq were using US wires to communicate with each other. US e-mail accounts (gmail, hotmail) perhaps?
He wants his due
REUTERS/Jason Reed
As the caption says - U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney looks for his limousine - with a facial expression that will probably have severe implications for whichever flunky wasn't quick enough on this occasion.
One out of three is bad
From George Bush's letter inviting leaders of the world's largest economies to send delegations to his PR stunt of a conference in September on global warming ("climate change") --
James L. Connaughton, Chairman of the Council on Environmental Quality, will serve as my personal representative, and our delegation will consist of senior officials responsible for economic, energy, and climate policy.
Note the emphasis in the senior officials -- a growth dude, an oil dude, and then a climate dude. Not for the first time, the real agenda hidden in plain bureaucratic sight.
UPDATE 4 AUGUST: While we're on the topic of global warming policy, a bizarre statement from US Transportation Secretary Mary Peters in the context of the Minneapolis bridge collapse which seemed to imply that spending less on roads and bridges was part of a new Bush policy on climate change --
For example, we don't want to contradict a policy objective that says we need to use less foreign oil, we need to use cleaner-burning fuels, and then do something that would perhaps cause us to use more fuel. Fuel efficiency is important, all those things.
James L. Connaughton, Chairman of the Council on Environmental Quality, will serve as my personal representative, and our delegation will consist of senior officials responsible for economic, energy, and climate policy.
Note the emphasis in the senior officials -- a growth dude, an oil dude, and then a climate dude. Not for the first time, the real agenda hidden in plain bureaucratic sight.
UPDATE 4 AUGUST: While we're on the topic of global warming policy, a bizarre statement from US Transportation Secretary Mary Peters in the context of the Minneapolis bridge collapse which seemed to imply that spending less on roads and bridges was part of a new Bush policy on climate change --
For example, we don't want to contradict a policy objective that says we need to use less foreign oil, we need to use cleaner-burning fuels, and then do something that would perhaps cause us to use more fuel. Fuel efficiency is important, all those things.
Thursday, August 02, 2007
Not a fellow fly-boy
AFP; caption
Quite telling that Bush's idea of a gift for Gordon Brown comes from assuming that Gordon wants what would Bush would want for himself.
Same as it ever was
Dan Froomkin nicely lays out the sequence in which Karl Rove's claim of unlimited immunity from testifying before Congress about his activities is rooted in a memo written by William Rehnquist for Richard Nixon -- that would be later Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist, who put George Bush in power with the Bush vs Gore decision, and of course his then boss, Richard "If the President does it, it's legal" Nixon, himself the precedent for Bush's claim of unlimited executive authority. But Nixon had the decency to resign.
Politics before people
George Bush just did a short public statement after his Cabinet meeting, billed as his remarks of condolence for the Minneapolis I-35W bridge collapse. Here's the text. It's actually 2 short paragraphs about the bridge, and then what was clearly a long-prepared rant about how Congress won't do what he wants on the budget, complete with tiresome calculations that revolve around the fact that it's easy to make small percentages of the US economy sound like big scary numbers (e.g. "Democrats in Congress would have spent an extra $300,000 since I began these remarks").
The decision was thus made by him or his handlers that this budgetary stunt was going ahead, disaster in Minnesota bedamned.
UPDATE: Holden says the word count is 141 words on the bridge collapse, 504 words blasting Dems on the budget.
FINAL UPDATE: Bush enthusiast Captain Ed describes the statement as "obviously impromptu." Not impromptu enough to have decided to dump his canned statement about the budget.
The decision was thus made by him or his handlers that this budgetary stunt was going ahead, disaster in Minnesota bedamned.
UPDATE: Holden says the word count is 141 words on the bridge collapse, 504 words blasting Dems on the budget.
FINAL UPDATE: Bush enthusiast Captain Ed describes the statement as "obviously impromptu." Not impromptu enough to have decided to dump his canned statement about the budget.
Wednesday, August 01, 2007
Who says he's joking?
Saudi Arabian Foreign Minister Saud al Faisal, in a press Q&A with Condoleezza Rice and Robert Gates --
And as I said, as a sign of good gesture, we also let them [Iraq] beat our soccer team in the final round. (Laughter.)
And as I said, as a sign of good gesture, we also let them [Iraq] beat our soccer team in the final round. (Laughter.)
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