Osama Loves .....

Ramirez cartoon:

Thanks to No Left Turns.

<i>Hamdan</i> a Republican Victory?

Andrew Cochran at Counterterrorism blog thinks that the Supreme Court ruling in Hamdan that slaps down the administration's attempts to put some Gitmo detainees before a war crimes tribunal, so far from being the defeat the media are portraying it to be, is actually a win, both militarily and politically, for the President. Here's his reasoning:

The news networks are proclaiming that the Supreme Court handed the President a "strong rebuke" in the Hamdan case by declaring the proposed Gitmo trials are illegal under U.S. law and international Geneva conventions.

Oh, really?

The decision is actually a huge political gift to President Bush, and the detainees will not be released that easily. The President and GOP leaders will propose a bill to override the decision and keep the terrorists in jail until they are securely transferred to host countries for permanent punishment. The Administration and its allies will release plenty of information on the terrorist acts committed by the detainees for which they were detained (see this great ABC News interview with the Gitmo warden). They will also release information about those terrorist acts committed by Gitmo prisoners after they were released. They will challenge the "judicial interference with national security" and challenge dissenting Congressmen and civil libertarians to either stand with the terrorists or the American people. The Pentagon will continue to release a small number of detainees as circumstances allow. The bill will pass easily and quickly. And if the Supremes invalidate that law, we'll see another legislative response, and another, until they get it right. Just watch.

If Congress and the President do seek legislation that would make trying these prisoners legal, and it appears Senators Graham and Kyl are going to do just that, it will make life miserable for Democrats who will have to either support the legislation or explain to their constituents why they're trying to get terrorist killers released from prison. Whatever reason they come up with, it won't be embarrassing.

One of the oddest things about this decision, by the way, is that the Court ruled that the prisoners can be held for the duration of hostilities. Given that the war on terror could last for the rest of this century the upshot is that the administration can essentially hold these guys for life and never try them in court, but if they do try them it has to be in federal court rather than before a military tribunal.

That's just what we need - hundreds of terrorist trials clogging our court system while their buddies on the street threaten the jurors with their lives. What civilian jurors, or judges and lawyers, for that matter, will want to be involved in these trials?

America would greatly benefit from one more Bush Supreme Court pick before he's done. Perhaps Ginsburg (73) or Stevens (86) will soon retire.

Lerner and Wallis

Martin Edlund at Slate dissects the strategy of the religious left's two most prominent figures and concludes that they're like two immiscible liquids. Michael Lerner and Jim Wallis both seek to sway the devout toward the ideals of the Democratic party (whatever they may be), but they have two very different and mutually incompatible messages for two very different constituencies.

The difference is starkly illustrated by a pair of conferences hosted by each of these religious gurus. Lerner's conference drew:

...liberal people of faith who feel alienated by the narrow politics of the religious right, and the 26 percent of Americans who self-identify-according to a recent Newsweek/Beliefnet poll-as "spiritual but not religious." There was a strong Christian presence among the 1,200 attendees at the NSP conference, but it leaned heavily toward liberal denominations. Quakers and Unitarians outnumbered Evangelicals and Catholics. They were joined by scores of liberal Jews, fewer Muslims, and a sprinkling of Buddhists, Sufis, Baha'i, Wiccans, Native American shamans, and various metrospiritual seekers. Even secular humanists were welcomed.

Together the attendees all prayed in concentric circles, sang John Lennon's "Imagine" (with the line "and no religion too" tastefully amended), and meditated while eating vegan boxed lunches.

Wallis, on the other hand, wants to attract:

...two voting blocs that will be critical to the 2008 election, moderate evangelicals and Catholics. His plan is to focus on poverty, an issue he believes all Christians can get behind, rather than ceding the floor to gay marriage and abortion, which the religious right uses to estrange Christians from the Democratic Party.

Wallis' conference this week, Pentecost 2006, will bring hundreds of Christian activists to Washington to promote a Covenant for a New America aimed at eradicating poverty at home and abroad. Unlike Lerner's conference, Wallis' isn't going to be dominated by the liberal fringes: Among the speakers are Republican Sens. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania and Sam Brownback of Kansas, two of the most prominent voices on the religious right.

The source of Wallis' appeal is his apparent moderation, both political and theological. His argument is compelling in its simplicity: An overriding commitment to social justice is more basic to Christianity than the issues championed by Christian fundamentalists. But to prevail he must avoid seeming too militantly progressive.

Which means not being identified with the Michael Lerners in the party.

Wallis is much better positioned to appeal to voters who might otherwise drift Republican than Lerner is, but in my opinion his problem is this: Any candidate which implements his approach will, in order to appeal to the constituency that Wallis targets, have to base his call for social justice on Biblical mandates and principles. Otherwise, people will just see it as more Great Society liberalism that seeks to solve problems by throwing money at them.

This means that the candidate will have to firmly espouse a Biblical worldview or risk sounding phony. However, and this is the problem, anyone who firmly espouses a Biblical worldview is going to alienate much of the Democratic base which is resolutely secular. So a social justice candidate risks either sounding phony, like John Kerry did when he talked about faith, or sounding genuine and scaring away the secularists.

Examining Liberal Pretensions

Christopher Hitchens skewers his erstwhile comrades on the left for the stark inconsistencies in their position on Iraq. He titles the essay Four Projects for Righteous Anti-War Types, and he asks firstly where those who were so vocal in their opposition to land mines have disappeared to now that IEDs are being employed with such deadly effectiveness against Americans and their allies.

He also wonders why there are no human shields rushing to protect Iraqi schools and hospitals from the savageries of the insurgency as they rushed before the war to shield Iraqis from American bombs, at least until the bombs actually began to fall. He would like to know, too, why the left has changed its mind on sanctions which, they told us during the Clinton years, were killing Iraqi children. In the run-up to the war, however, it seemed that sanctions had suddenly become a much better way to deal with Saddam than deposing him. Finally, Hitchens notes that, now that Islamists make it a special point to target homosexuals, the left has quietly abandoned its demand to allow gays to serve in the military.

Hitchens is almost always a good read, and this column is particularly effective in exposing liberal pretensions of principled opposition to the war and inviting the left to show a little more sincerity by being a lot more consistent.

Golden Mosque Attack Leader Captured

Those who say the Iraqi insurgency is a home-grown affair might wish to read this report by Omar at Iraq the Model on the capture of the leader of the plot to blow up the Samarra Mosque:

In a news conference currently being broadcast on TV, Iraq's national security advisor Muwaffak al-Rubaie says Iraqi security forces arrested Abu Qudama al-Tunisi in a raid in the suburb of al-Dhuloiya north of Baghdad. 15 other foreign terrorists were killed in the raid according to al-Rubaie.

The terrorist of Tunisian origin confessed that he was responsible for the attack that destroyed the Askari Shrine in Samarra back in February 22 of this year. Muwaffak al-Rubaie said the security forces are still searching for Haitham al-Badri who is believed to be the field commander under whom Abu Qudama was operating.

Al-Rubaie described Al-Badri is a terrorist with connections to elements in the past regime who later became one of the leaders of Ansar al-Sunna and later al-Qaeda organization in Iraq.

Al-Rubaie adds that this terror cell was responsible for the assassination of the late al-Arabiya reporter Atwar Bahjat.

Al-Rubaie described how the bombing was organized and says details were taken from the confessions of the captured Abu Qudama:

Four Saudis, two Iraqis and one Tunisian entered the mosque at night, handcuffed and locked up the guards in a room and spent the night planting the bombs all around the mosque. Next day they kidnapped and murdered Atwar Bahjat while she was trying to cover the news of the bombing.

So, the captured leader was Tunisian, the perps were predominately Saudi and the fifteen killed in the raid were described as "foreign" terrorists. At least this cell sounds like it enjoyed enough diversity to delight the administrators at any American university.

Getting What They Wanted in Gaza

Hamas wanted war with Israel and it appears that now they're going to get it. They killed two soldiers and kidnapped a third, holding him in Gaza. The Israelis demanded the soldier be returned but Hamas demanded that Israel release all prisoners under 18 and all females. Israel refuses to negotiate and has apparently moved into Gaza in force and appears to have blocked all escape routes for Palestinian fighters.

Meanwhile, Palestinians in the West Bank kidnapped and murdered the 18 year old Israeli shown in this photo.

Now Israel has captured dozens of Hamas officials and is holding them in prison.

Hamas is the duly-elected governing party of the Palestinian people and they are carrying out acts of terrorism against Israel. The Israelis say they only want to get their kidnapped soldier back, but if that's all this is about there will be more kidnappings and murders to come. Hamas will not stop terrorizing Israelis no matter what concessions the Israelis make short of abandoning their country to the Palestinians. Surely the Israelis recognize that they are in a war over their right to exist, and the only way to protect their people is to eliminate the Palestinian killers.

Check out Captain's Quarters for updates on this unfolding conflict.

ID T-Shirts

CafePress has Intelligent Design T-shirts available some of which are quite clever and fun. Here's one of our favorites:

Go here to see their selection.

A Scientist Talks Religion

Noted physicist Steven Weinberg opines on science and religion:

In my experience most physicists are not particularly religious. A few are - no question about it. But most are not. In fact, I would say they're not so much irreligious as simply uninterested in this subject. They don't know enough or think enough about religion to qualify as atheists. And but I think that's not so limited to physicists. In my experience many Americans think of religion as important, and want to do whatever they can to support it. But if you ask them what they themselves believe, you'll find they're very uncertain about their religious beliefs. They don't actually accept the theology of their official church.

One piece of evidence I give for this is the fact that I have very good friends who belong to religious denominations whose teaching is that since I don't accept their teaching I am damned for all eternity. And you would think that these friends would try to convert me. But they never do. Now, you could explain this in various ways. It may be that they really don't like me very much and are just as glad to see me damned for all eternity -- that's a possible explanation.

But another explanation which I tend to think is more likely is that although they know what their church teaches and they give lip service to it, they really don't believe that if you don't follow that particular form of worship you're damned for all eternity. And when you talk to them about what they believe they're likely to say something like this: "That I think there is a great mystery; we don't know what it's all about. Who knows what's going to happen when we die? Who knows whether there's a heaven or hell? I was born into this faith. I think it's important to have a faith, therefore I will continue to attach myself to this faith." But it really is pretty much what Susan Sontag a long time ago called "piety without content." They believe in religion more than they believe in what religion teaches.

Weinberg is right about the impression of a lack of confidence in their beliefs that Christians often display. Not only is this true with regard to beliefs about eternal life but also with regard to beliefs about abortion. Many Christians believe, for example, that all abortions are tantamount to the murder of innocent children. Yet, very few are willing to storm abortion clinics and shut the places down as they would if born children were being slaughtered therein.

Perhaps deep down they don't really believe that abortions are the moral equivalent of killing toddlers, just as maybe deep down they don't really believe that God is going to condemn people to eternal hell because they did not hold a particular proposition about Jesus as part of their noetic set.

The rest of the interview with Weinberg is also interesting and can be accessed at the link.

Tehran's Guilt

Former FBI Director Louis Freeh, in this 2003 column, implicitly reminds Americans why hitting Tehran hard would be retaliation, not pre-emption, for the deaths of nineteen servicemen in the Khobar Towers attack.

Along the way he also reminds us why the Clinton years were so shameful.

Thanks to Michelle Malkin for the tip.

The War Against the Taliban

Bill Roggio reports on the security situation in Afghanistan. Here's the first part of his report:

The latest round of fighting in southeastern Afghanistan has claimed over 82 Taliban fighters in two separate engagements in Kandahar and Uruzgan provinces. Security Watchtower provides a breakdown of the estimated casualties of Taliban and Coalition forces in southeastern Afghanistan since the beginning of April. An estimated 600 Taliban have been killed and 22 captured, with 41 Afghan and Coalition security forces killed or wounded combined. The estimated Taliban casualties do not contain the number of wounded, which is often twice the number killed in combat.

As the Coalition ramps up its forces and adds another 9,000 troops to the southeastern theater, the Taliban continues to take a pounding on the battlefield. The security situation in the region is fluid, but the Coalition is clearly gaining the upper hand as it moves forces and devotes energy into regions largely ignored by the central Afghan government. Coalition and Afghan sources estimate the Taliban strength between 2,000 to 5,000 active fighters, while the Taliban puts their strength at 12,000. Using the high Coalition estimate of 5,000 and an estimate of 1,800 Taliban killed and wounded, the Taliban has experienced a 36% attrition rate over the past three months. Using the Taliban estimate of 12,000 strong, the Taliban has experienced a 15% attrition rate. Both are frighteningly high numbers, and belie the reports of a sophisticated and powerful Taliban resurgence in Afghanistan.

To underscore this point, I sat in on a platoon level briefing prior to a Canadian assault earlier this month on the Dari and Panjwai districts in Kandahar province. Intelligence indicated the Taliban were massed in the hundreds, and possessed assault rifles, RPGs (rocket propelled grenades), mortars and other more sophisticated weaponry (I will omit the weapons for security purposes). The grunts of Charlie Company of the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry, mobile assault team and the tip of the spear for Canadian forces, laughed at the intelligence reports the Taliban possessed mortars and other weapons, as they have shown little inclination to bring these weapons to bear on the battlefield. Mortars are hardly sophisticated weapons, they are a staple weapon of platoon and company sized infantry units. That the Taliban cannot effectively deploy these weapons speaks volumes of their sophistication and training.

This is all good news, of course, but the flip side is that Taliban strength is growing in western Pakistan. Read the rest of Roggio's report at the link for the details.

Churchill Gets the Boot

The DenverChannel.com News reports that:

The University of Colorado announced Monday that it will dismiss controversial professor Ward Churchill.

"Today, I issued to Professor Churchill a notice of intent to dismiss him from his faculty position at the University of Colorado Boulder," CU Interim Chancellor Phil DiStefano said Monday afternoon.

Churchill has 10 days to appeal, which entails making a request to have the university president or chancellor forward the recommendation to the faculty senate Committee on Privilege and Tenure. A special panel will then conduct hearings on the matter and make a recommendation to the president on whether grounds for dismissal are supported.

Another committee found Churchill guilty of research misconduct and another panel recommended that he be fired because of "repeated and deliberate" infractions of scholarship rules.

Churchill should never have been hired in the first place, and his dismissal is a small, but welcome, rollback of the grip the hard left has on major American universities.

Supreme Court Pontifications

The Supreme Court ruled 5-4 the other day to uphold a Kansas death penalty law. One aspect of the case that caught our especial attention was the dissent of Justice David Souter who wrote that the Kansas law was "morally absurd," and that maintaining a system like the one in Kansas "is obtuse by any moral or social measure."

This from the man who thought it perfectly appropriate and "moral" for a local government to take property from one private citizen in order to give it to another private citizen so that the second owner could make more money from it. Souter's vote in the Kelo case makes us wonder about his ability to recognize a law that is "obtuse by any moral or social measure."

It certainly has convinced us that the last thing Justice Souter is qualified to bestow upon the nation is a lecture on morality.

Did Iran Deliver Zarqawi?

If true, this report at Counterterrorism blog is major news:

A credible Moroccan newspaper, La Gazette du Maroc, is affirming that Zarqawi was caught thanks to Iran and was the first gift to the US.

Sounds like a conspiracy theory? Maybe not. Citing Iranian sources and Iraqi sources close to ex PM Alawi, the paper states that Jordanian intelligence may have gotten help from Iran in pinpointing Zarqawi's location. A few weeks ago the Iranian FM met with King Abdullah in Amman to allegedly negotiate the deal. Then a few days later the Iranian FM was in Bagdad meeting with Iraki PM AL Maliki and allegedly US Ambassador Khalilzad.

Coincidence or not the US position softened around that time when for the first time Secretary of State Rice announced a possible ouverture to Iran. People close to Reza Pahlavi, the Shah's son, also believe that Zarqawi was indeed handed by Iran as part of a package.

Keep in mind that this info is really very speculative but might not be as far-fetched as one thinks.

It certainly sounds plausible given, among other things, Zarqawi's atrocities against Shia Muslims and the fact that Iran is predominately Shiite. Add to that Zarqawi's attempts to foment war between Iran and the U.S., a war that Iran can't possibly welcome, and we have to say we wouldn't be surprised if this report were true.

What we'd like to know, though, is how Iran knew Zarqawi's whereabouts when nobody else did.

More Murtha

Okay. No more polite averting of our eyes at Rep. Murtha's embarrassing nuttiness. He has with this statement officially enrolled himself in the left-wing lunatic fringe:

American presence in Iraq is more dangerous to world peace than nuclear threats from North Korea or Iran, Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa., said to an audience of more than 200 in North Miami Saturday afternoon.

Let's do a little thought experiment. Suppose one, and only one, of the three countries - the U.S., Iran, or N. Korea - could, and would, have nuclear weapons and a very powerful military. Which country would anyone with even a rudimentary hold on reality want it to be? Which of the three has threatened to destroy an entire country with nuclear weapons? Which of the three is ruled by a mentally deranged tyrant who deliberately starves his people and threatens his neighbors with incineration? Which of the three has in the last five years removed two cruel and oppressive tyrannical regimes in the Middle East and moderated the behavior of several others? To which of the three do suffering people throughout the world turn for hope and relief?

Statements like Mr. Murtha's really should disqualify him from being considered a serious voice in foreign affairs.

Iraqi Violence

Strategy Page has an interesting insight into the state of violence in Iraq:

June 22, 2006: The bloodshed in Iraq is getting worse, and involving U.S. troops less and less. In the last year, over 10,000 Iraqi civilians died from terrorist and internecine violence. That's about twice as many deaths as the year before. In the last year, fewer than 400 civilian deaths were the result of American military action, and some $20 million in compensation was paid out to the next-of-kin for those civilian deaths. This is four times as much as was spent in 2004, largely because the compensation program has been more energetically applied. These payments are a part of Iraqi culture. Even Saddam used them, during the war with Iran in the 1980s, and avoided a lot of ill-will because of it. Works for U.S. troops as well.

Iraqis have, over the last three years, come to accept the fact that this violence is an Iraqi problem. Until the last year, most of the killers were former Saddam enforcers. Those thugs are still around, but in the last year, most of the blood is being shed by Kurds and Shia Arabs seeking vengeance against Sunni Arabs in general, and known Sunni Arab thugs in particular. American troops are no longer feared as much as they used to be, for the Iraqi killers are more common and prolific. For Sunni Arabs, U.S. troops are often seen as protectors. Moreover, Iraqis have noted that when Americans stage a raid, there is rarely any gunfire at all. But Iraqi troops and police are much more trigger happy. The Americans like to come in quiet, and at night, with no lights (because of the night vision gear.) Iraqi security forces come in with lots of shouting, lights and gunfire.

The terrorists rarely get a shot at American troops any more. But Iraqi civilians are another matter, and the usual target these days are people who can't defend themselves.

I wonder if they even know why they kill each other anymore. It almost seems as if killing is just something Arabs do to relieve their boredom.

Don't Kill the Geese

Ah, those greedy capitalists. First Bill Gates sets up a charitable foundation and then retires to help manage it. Then Dick Cheney makes the largest single charitable contribution of any politician in American history. Then the second richest man in the world, Warren Buffett, gives his fortune to Bill Gates' foundation. How does one keep one's equilibrium when the world simply refuses to conform to the popular wisdom that the wealthy are evil, tightfisted, robber barons?

It's worth noting, perhaps, that if the left had their way there'd be no Bill Gates or Warren Buffett. There'd be no private wealth and thus no private philanthropy. All charity would be at the beneficence of the government which would acquire its resources by taxing the people at levels that would remove all incentive to accumulate Gates/Buffett scale fortunes. No one would be wealthy. Everyone would be middle class at best and the government, unable to mine more silver in the exhausted ore of the middle class would be unable to keep up its support for the kinds of charitable work done by private foundations.

In other words, the poor need the rich. The rich invest. The rich create jobs, and the rich make it possible for charitable organizations to do their work. This is not to say that the rich are ipso facto virtuous. Of course they are not, but the problem is with individual morality not with wealth. Those who insist we soak the rich in taxes and confiscate their wealth are as short-sighted as the man who wanted to kill the goose that laid golden eggs in order to have a tasty dinner.

Enlisting Congress Against ID

The Edge runs a letter signed by a number of Darwinian worthies which, along with a book hostile toward Intelligent Design, they sent to every member of Congress. Here are some excerpts from the letter with my remarks:

June 16, 2006

To Members of Congress:

We, the authors and editor of Intelligent Thought, are sending you a copy of the book in hopes that you will consider its message. The book is largely about Intelligent Design (ID), the latest incarnation of creationism. ID is a movement that threatens American science education and with it American economic predominance and credibility.

This is a common scare tactic frequently employed to "poison the well" against ID. It's noteworthy that rarely does anyone ever say precisely how ID threatens science education. Suppose a biology teacher took time to point out to her class, after teaching the lessons on evolution, that some scientists and philosophers believe that this process is purely mechanistic while others, a smaller number, believe it required intelligent input, and explained some of the reasons why. Suppose, too, that a physics or earth-space science teacher discussed with his classes the astonishing fine-tuning of the cosmos and the remarkable fitness of the universe, our galaxy, our solar system and our earth for intelligent life. Suppose further that he concludes that some scholars see in this a fortuitous accident whereas others see in it intention and purpose. How, exactly, would any of this endanger science education?

The recent federal court decision in Dover, Pennsylvania found that ID was not a scientific theory, but a form of religion in disguise. Judge John Jones III, a churchgoing Republican appointed by President Bush, concluded that teaching this doctrine in the public schools represents both bad education and an unconstitutional violation of the First Amendment. President Bush's science advisor, John H. Marburger, has affirmed that 'evolution is the cornerstone of modern biology' and 'intelligent design is not a scientific concept.' And Newt Gingrich has stated that ID has nothing to do with science and shouldn't be taught in science courses.'

One of the three authorities cited above is a scientist. One is a judge and the other is a politician. This is a good example of a logical fallacy called an appeal to irrelevant authority. What Judge Jones or Newt Gingrich say about the nature of ID is totally beside the point. What is germane is what philosophers of science are saying about it and in that field there are a lot of top people who would argue that there is simply no good reason for banishing design arguments from science. See for example, Del Ratszch's outstanding work on this subject Nature, Design, and Science.

Reason and law triumphed in Dover. But ID and its spinoffs continue to threaten American education by ignoring the massive evidence for evolution-the central principle that unites all the biological sciences- and by substituting adherence to religious dogma for the scientific method.

It is simply false to state that ID ignores the evidence for evolution. What it opposes is the claim that evolution is a purely mechanistic process. It is also false to claim that it substitutes religious dogma for the scientific method. There's no "religious dogma" in any of the major ID sources and I challenge any of the signatories of the letter to provide an example to support their allegation.

Our country cannot afford substandard science teaching. Indeed, a national science test just administered by the Department of Education showed a decade-long erosion of scientific proficiency among American high school seniors. We won't cure this problem by questioning scientifically established facts (evolution) and theories (natural selection) and replacing them with unsupported conjectures based on faith.

Nor do we cure substandard teaching by ignoring the difficulties with exclusively physicalist explanations or by encouraging sudents to accept on faith that those difficulties will be somehow, someday resolved.

The controversy over ID vs. evolution is not a scientific controversy. Every scientific body in the US has opposed ID and affirmed the reality of evolution. The "controversy" is about whether sectarian religious views should be taught in the science classroom.

The controversy is not about whether sectarian religious views will be taught in the public school classroonm because clearly no one is pushing for that. The controversy is about whether one metaphysical view - materialism - should be immunized in our public schools against any challenge from competing metaphysical hypotheses.

A list of the signers of the letter can be found at the link. These people know that as long as they can misrepresent and distort the nature of ID they will be able to hold on to their philosophical monopoly in the public schools. They also know that if they were to portray ID accurately they would quickly lose their influence and thus their dominance. Consequently, we will continue to see ID misrepresented as a religious doctrine, a variety of creationism, a scientific fraud, and so on. It's the only way the metaphysical naturalists who dominate the scientific establishment can hold on. They know that the day the door is open to honest debate will be the day that Darwinian materialism begins its decline into scientific and philosophical obsolescence.

Tanks

Here are some interesting facts about the military's M-1 tank courtesy of Strategy Page:

Of the 1,100 American M-1 tanks that have served in Iraq, about seven percent have been badly damaged, at least badly enough to get them shipped back to the factory for rebuilding. Some 70 percent of the Iraqi based M-1s have been in combat. As infantry have known since World War I, tanks draw fire. But they are well protected, and fewer than twenty of the 4,400 tank crewmen involved have been killed, two thirds of those while standing up in a turret hatch, with at least head and shoulders exposed. The main cause of lost tanks is, as it has been since World War II, is mines and bombs. A few tanks have rolled over particularly large bombs, which in some cases flipped the tank. But other times, mines blow off one of the tracks, immobilizing the tank and making it the center of a fierce fight. But the terrorists and anti-government forces have come to avoid American tanks. Yes, these 69 ton behemoths can be hurt, but only at great risk and cost to the attacker. In addition to the M-1s three machine-guns, the 120mm gun has special shells for urban warfare, shells that are particularly deadly against gunmen trying to hide in buildings.

One reason the Iraqi military is not yet ready to fight on its own is that it lacks this kind of weaponry and the training it takes to use it. There's little doubt that eventually some of these needs will be met, but it will take time. To expect the Iraqis to fight their own fight without the armor, air power, UAV's, etc. that American forces have at their disposal is unrealistic. The need for this kind of combat support will keep at least some American troops in Iraq for a long time to come, or at least until the Last Helicopter party wins the presidency.

Russian Diplomats Murdered

How will the Russian government react to this:

A group linked to al Qaeda said it has killed four Russian diplomats it had held hostage, according to a statement and video on a Web site Sunday.

The group -- the Mujahedeen Shura Council -- said it had beheaded three of the men and shot one to death. A video also posted on the Web site appeared to show one of the men being beheaded, another man already beheaded and a third man being shot in the head. The fourth man did not appear in the video.

The same group posted a statement last Monday demanding Moscow withdraw its troops from Chechnya and "release all our brothers and sisters" from prison within 48 hours. In the statement last week, the group added, "God enabled the lions of unification to capture four Russian diplomats in Iraq and kill a fifth," alluding to an attack June 3, when a car belonging to the Russian Embassy in Iraq came under fire.

Embassy official Vitaly Titov was killed in the attack, and diplomats Fyodor Zaitsev, Rinat Agliuglin, Anatoly Smirnov and Oleg Fedoseyev were kidnapped.

We could not bring ourselves to watch it, but if you care to there's a video here.

Counterterrorism Blog reminds us that:

Russia has been known for dealing with terrorists with sometimes excessive force. And not only with Chechen rebels. For example, in September 1985 when four Russian diplomats were kidnapped in Beirut by Hezbollah, the then USSR responded in kind by first abducting a family member of an Hezbollah leader and then killing him very, very gruesomely. The hostages were given back right away and Russia was never targeted in Lebanon again.

Russia has no friends among the Islamic jihadis. They are hated by the Islamists for their war against the Chechens today and for what they did in Afghanistan in the 1970s. It's hard to imagine that the Russians will do nothing, but it's also hard to imagine what might be within their power to do.

Culture of Corruption

The Washington Times wonders why it is that a corruption-conscious media has, with very few exceptions, ignored the record of Rep. Jack Murtha. Of course the fact that he's an antiwar Democrat may not be irrelevant to the question.

Read the Times' editorial and for exercise ask yourself whether you would only be finding this stuff out for the first time now if Murtha were a pro-administration Republican. Here's the core of it:

Last June, the Los Angeles Times reported how the ranking member on the defense appropriations subcommittee has a brother, Robert Murtha, whose lobbying firm represents 10 companies that received more than $20 million from last year's defense spending bill. "Clients of the lobbying firm KSA Consulting -- whose top officials also include former congressional aide Carmen V. Scialabba, who worked for Rep. Murtha as a congressional aide for 27 years -- received a total of $20.8 million from the bill," the L.A. Times reported.

In early 2004, according to Roll Call, Mr. Murtha "reportedly leaned on U.S. Navy officials to sign a contract to transfer the Hunters Point Shipyard to the city of San Francisco." Laurence Pelosi, nephew of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, at the time was an executive of the company which owned the rights to the land. The same article also reported how Mr. Murtha has been behind millions of dollars worth of earmarks in defense appropriations bills that went to companies owned by the children of fellow Pennsylvania Democrat, Rep. Paul Kanjorski. Meanwhile, the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan campaign-finance watchdog group, lists Mr. Murtha as the top recipient of defense industry dollars in the current 2006 election cycle.

As Rep. Joe Wilson, South Carolina Republican, has said, "If there is a potential pattern where Congressman Murtha has helped other Democrats secure appropriations that also benefited relatives of those members, I believe this would be something that merits further review by the ethics committee."

It's odd that the media, which has been fairly unbiased in going after corrupt politicians recently, has gone silent on Mr. Murtha's questionable actions. Or maybe it isn't. Since December, Mr. Murtha has become the darling of the antiwar crowd, and, as we've seen with other such darlings, scrutinizing their behavior is considered disrespectful. But as we're on the subject, few might recall that after the massive 1980 Abscam scandal, Mr. Murtha was named by the FBI as an "unindicted co-conspirator."

The LA Times broke this story a year ago, but because Murtha has become useful to the anti-war crowd in the interim neither they nor anyone else in the liberal media have shown much interest in pressing the issue.