The War Grows in Afghanistan

Michael Yon emails:

Greetings from Afghanistan,

The heavy fighting has ended for 2008, but the real kick-off for this war likely will occur around March or April 2009.  The enemy has been busy working on our logistics shipments through Pakistan. About 200 trucks were reportedly burned in the last two days.

Counterinsurgency “experts” who make field trips to Afghanistan seem to go home with Kool Aide dripping off their lips. A reasonable observer might say that any “expert” who did not see these problems growing by early 2006, should be stricken from the list of reliable sources.

And he invites you to read a short dispatch.

H-S Precision: Still Running a Clue Deficit

If you’re a “valued customer” of H-S Precision, you may want to stop being one.

Their “apology” isn’t even what we’d call “on the paper”.

I’m picturing one of those cute bumper stickers

“Be patient. Darwin isn’t finished with me yet.”

Pearl Harbor Day

The “Date which will live in infamy” still relevant.

Helen McDonald, a historian with the Nimitz Foundation, sees an even more disturbing parallel between the late 1930s and the present. “The U.S. was still in a deep depression” in the years prior to the attacks, she says. Even with a war raging overseas, “we were really more focused on our own problems.”

It’s a question worth pondering this Pearl Harbor Day: How can we adequately remember heroes of past wars when we can’t even focus on the two wars we’re fighting now? As the surge strategy in Iraq brought about a sharp decline in U.S. military deaths — from around 80 a month to 17 in November — first the campaign, then the economic crisis crowded the war off the nightly newscasts and front pages.

National Geographic has a remembrance.

And here’s a video for Alive Day.

Okie-Freakin-Dokie

“MARK INDIA!”

That’s a successful GBI kill of an ICBM. Read all about it.

Update:

Here’s video.

Clowns to the left of me…

Jokers to the right.

To paraphrase that crack-addled philosopher from Los Angeles, “Can’t we all just get a clue?”

Stupid Is as Stupid Does

Mark Alexander’s piece in today’s Patriot Post is required reading. I previously wrote that recent election results indicate an intellectual decline in America. Alexander cites hard numbers to indicate this is, indeed, the case. I’m posting the entire column here because links on the new Patriot Post site don’t work too well.

PATRIOT PERSPECTIVE
Stupid is as stupid does
By Mark Alexander

After the most recent presidential election, when, as you may recall, our once great nation exposed its collective flank — unmitigated ignorance — to the world, a reputable pollster, John Zogby, endeavored to determine how 66 million of us could be so profoundly stupid.

We reported his findings in our “Non Compos Mentis” section two weeks ago, including, for example, that 56.1 percent of Obama supporters did not know his political career was launched by two former terrorists from the Weather Underground; that 57 percent did not know which political party controlled congress; that 72 percent did not know Joe Biden withdrew from a previous presidential campaign because of plagiarism in law school; and that 87 percent thought Sarah Palin said she could “see Russia from my house,” even though that was “Saturday Night Live” comedian Tina Fey in a parody of Palin.

The Zogby polling was designed to determine how much influence the media had on shaping public opinion, and, thus, the outcome of the election. Of course, establishing that the political landscape would look very different if the media were neutral is filed under “keen sense of the obvious.”

However, a report issued last week by the Intercollegiate Studies Institute is more relevant to understanding why Barack Obama received so much support from those between 18 and 30 years of age — support that put him over the top.

For the last two years, ISI has assessed the civil literacy of young people at American colleges and universities, testing both students and faculty. The civics test included a cross section of multiple-choice questions about our system of government, history and free enterprise — questions to assess the knowledge that all Americans should possess in order to understand their civic responsibility and make informed decisions in matters such as elections.

More than 14,000 freshmen and seniors at 50 schools nationwide were given the 60-question exam. More than 50 percent of freshmen and 54 percent of seniors failed the test. (So they get dumber?)

This year, ISI went beyond the “institutions of higher learning” to assess civic literacy across demographic groups. The 2008 civics quiz asked similar questions to those asked to college and university students in previous years, but also included questions about civic participation and policy issues. The results were then subjected to multivariate regression analysis in order to determine if college and university graduates had a higher civic IQ than the rest of society.

As you might expect, 71 percent of Americans failed the test, with an average score of 49. Educators did not fare much better, scoring an average of 55 percent. As the researchers noted, “Fewer than half of all Americans can name all three branches of government, a minimal requirement for understanding America’s constitutional system.”

College grads flunked, answering 57 percent of the questions correctly, compared to 44 percent for high school grads.

Less than 24 percent of those with college degrees knew that the First Amendment prohibits establishing an official religion for the United States. Further, only 54 percent can correctly identify the basic tenets of the free enterprise system.

Would you be shocked to know that elected officials have a lower civic IQ than the public they ostensibly serve? Indeed, these paragons of representative government answered just 44 percent of the questions correctly. Almost a third of elected officials could not identify “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” as the inalienable rights in our Declaration of Independence.

Our Founders, those venerable Patriots who signed our Declaration of Independence and codified the liberty that is declared in our Constitution, understood that liberty could not long survive an epidemic of ignorance.

According to George Washington: “The best means of forming a manly, virtuous, and happy people will be found in the right education of youth. Without this foundation, every other means, in my opinion, must fail.”

John Adams wrote: “Liberty cannot be preserved without a general knowledge among the people, who have a right, from the frame of their nature, to knowledge, as their great Creator, who does nothing in vain, has given them understandings, and a desire to know; but besides this, they have a right, an indisputable, unalienable, indefeasible, divine right to that most dreaded and envied kind of knowledge; I mean, of the characters and conduct of their rulers. … Wisdom and knowledge, as well as virtue, diffused generally among the body of the people, being necessary for the preservation of their rights and liberties…”

Thomas Jefferson insisted: “Enlighten the people, generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like spirits at the dawn of day. … If a nation expects to be ignorant — and free — in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.”

James Madison agreed: “A people who mean to be their own Governors, must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives. … What spectacle can be more edifying or more seasonable, than that of Liberty and Learning, each leaning on the other for their mutual & surest support?”

Today, however, it would seem that ignorance is not only blissful but virtuous.

I can hardly wait to see the list of side effects

Where can I get a prescription?

Cool as the Center Seed of a Cucumber

Television news producers are known for their unflappable, calm demeanor.

Especially at MSNBC.

(Caution: language)

Update:

Thanks to reader Bob for providing this correction: It’s a fake. Now, why this producer did this is quite the mystery. To show his great sense of humor? To reflect well on the network? No accounting for taste, I guess.

Especially at MSNBC.

1400 Megapixels

A giant camera in Hawaii is scanning the skies to protects us from NEOs (Near Earth Objects).

Probably.

CNN Screws the Pooch

PZ Meyers notes that CNN is heading for irrelevance at full throttle.

I’ve never been a fan of CNN. Part of me just thinks “good riddance” and “so much less bad science reporting out there”. But PJ may be right: It’s a symptom of intellectual rot in this country. So is the growing popularity of “alternative” medicine, absurd ads for supplements that only the ignorant and stupid could buy, and some election results I could think of.

A truly educated public would be more skeptical. And would not watch CNN.

Hypocrisy 101

Henry Payne reports.

Last summer, Pennsylvania senator Bob Casey joined his Democratic colleagues in piling $85 billion in new regulatory costs on the Detroit Three by mandating a 40-percent fuel-efficiency increase by 2020.

“The energy bill passed by the Senate takes an important step forward to increase our energy, economic, and environmental security,” said the senator. “And the CAFE standard increase contained in the bill is long overdue.”

At this afternoon’s Senate Banking Committee hearings, Casey — unapologetic for his role in burdening the industry now before him seeking a handout — demanded quick passage of $34 billion in taxpayer money to save the Detroit companies from bankruptcy. Casey moaned about the economic devastation an auto company failure would visit on his state.

Blast from the Past

Leroy Pyle, one of the best cops in the country (and now, thanks to his serial truth-telling a politically-active ex-cop) is seen here in a video from about 20 years ago patiently explaining what an “assault rifle” is and isn’t.

It’s good stuff if you’re not sure what the difference between semi-automatic and full auto is.

Wrapping Up Iraq

Michael Yon sends his last dispatch from Iraq. He’s now in Afghanistan, saying

I’m in Zabul Province, Afghanistan, but will soon fly to Bahrain for some important war-related business. After Bahrain, it’s back to Iraq then over to Washington DC, then down to CENTCOM in Florida…then Christmas, and back to the war. The primary current objective is to continue to build situational awareness pertaining to Afghanistan. This is going to be a very long war, and 2009 is tantamount the kickoff.

He also links to an important document on irregular warfare.

But around the equator it’s all still “global warming”

Science Daily:

The sun’s magnetic field may have a significant impact on weather and climatic parameters in Australia and other countries in the northern and southern hemispheres. According to a study in Geographical Research, the droughts are related to the solar magnetic phases and not the greenhouse effect.

Update:

Apparently the Byzantines also drove Hummers.

The Left-Wing Version of Lehman Brothers

VDH sums up California.

We have an enormously expensive, but incompetent government at all levels. It has a horrendously expensive bicameral Legislature, hundreds of boards and bureaus that serve as $100,000+ sinecures for political insiders and term-limited ex-politicians. Those with advanced degrees fly to our low- or no-income tax neighboring states, coupled with an influx of tens of thousands without high school diplomas. We have a political discourse that is polarized, self-censored, and completely framed by race, class, and gender agendas — reflecting the curricula of our high-schools, colleges, and universities. The electorate is as volatile as it is unhinged.  One day it will vote billions of dollars in new bonds for massive new projects, the next it will vote to fund massive prison complexes for “3-strikes and you’re out” prisoners, and on yet another it will vote to pass liberal feel-good nostrums that nullifiy what came before.

How We Found the Missing Memristor

It’s not often that fundamental discoveries come along. This one could be revolutionary.

For nearly 150 years, the known fundamental passive circuit elements were limited to the capacitor (discovered in 1745), the resistor (1827), and the inductor (1831). Then, in a brilliant but underappreciated 1971 paper, Leon Chua, a professor of electrical engineering at the University of California, Berkeley, predicted the existence of a fourth fundamental device, which he called a memristor. He proved that memristor behavior could not be duplicated by any circuit built using only the other three elements, which is why the memristor is truly fundamental.

Memristor is a contraction of “memory resistor,” because that is exactly its function: to remember its history. A memristor is a two-terminal device whose resistance depends on the magnitude and polarity of the voltage applied to it and the length of time that voltage has been applied. When you turn off the voltage, the memristor remembers its most recent resistance until the next time you turn it on, whether that happens a day later or a year later.

Islamic World Completely Won Over by Obama

Yes, now that the evil cowboy Bush is leaving the White House, Islam, the Religion of Peace, extends an olive branch to Obama. Don’t you feel safer already?

I tell you, hoarse yelling and finger wagging by clowns dressed like barbarians are so convincing I may just have to convert myself!

Here’s the offer: Convert and have “glory”, or don’t and we’ll start killing people.

Now explain to me, please, how Islam is not a protection racket?

One of my favorite bits of payola is demanding food, medicine and housing. Say, Hassan, how about getting all those Islamic researchers and scientists to whip up your own medicine for you? Say what? You don’t have the capability? You mean you couldn’t even produce any of the television equipment you used to make this video?

Secular Right

The ultra-observant will note a new entry in the Honor Roll links over there on the right: Secular Right. It’s a very new blog started up by John Derbyshire and some others to push back against articles such as Can Atheists Be Good Citizens?

It seems to be turning into a nice resource, and a home for those of us who would answer the above question, “well, duh.” And it’s a big tent: They “embrace mysterians, agnostics and apatheists”, all of whom need, apparently, entertainment.

Win Ben Stein’s Mind

I occasionally agree with Roger Ebert on film, and almost never on politics. But all I can say about his spanking of Ben Stein and his dishonest little movie is right on, Roger!

Ben Stein is only getting warmed up. He takes a field trip to visit one “result” of Darwinism: Nazi concentration camps. “As a Jew,” he says, “I wanted to see for myself.” We see footage of gaunt, skeletal prisoners. Pathetic children. A mound of naked Jewish corpses. “It’s difficult to describe how it felt to walk through such a haunting place,” he says. Oh, go ahead, Ben Stein. Describe. It filled you with hatred for Charles Darwin and his followers, who represent the overwhelming majority of educated people in every nation on earth. It is not difficult for me to describe how you made me feel by exploiting the deaths of millions of Jews in support of your argument for a peripheral Christian belief. It fills me with contempt.

H-S Precision Update

Remember the rifle stock company who had a murderer endorse their product? It apparently thinks that people who are offended by shooting unarmed women in the head are “kooks” and the “fringe element”. They’re willing to throw the civilian market under the bus in order to keep their plum government contracts.

Remington, apparently, is now aware of the situation and not pleased. All of their distributors need to feel the heat. They need to be run out of business, and then out of town on a rail.

Istanbul, Not Constantinople

But I’m going back to calling it Bombay, not Mumbai.

“We didn’t get the memo about Obama”

Iowahawk is dead on target here with this darkly humorous piece.

“Boy, talk about having egg on the face,” said a visibly embarrassed Kasab. “If we knew Bush was on his way out, obviously we would have called off the crazy random baby-shootings and martyrdom stuff, and signed on with the Peace Corps or Habitat for Humanity. At this point I guess all I can say is ‘my bad.'”

Mr. Orwell, Call Your Office

Roger Kimball has just noticed that democracy is dead in England.

The horrific story of the latest adventure conducted by the religion of peace in Bombay riveted the public’s attention to such an extent that one of the most egregious violations of political freedom in a Western democracy has, at least on this side of the Atlantic, gone almost without comment. I mean the sudden arrest in London last week of of Damian Green, a conservative MP and Shadow Minister for Immigration, who was seized by anti-terrorist personnel from the Metropolitan police, held for questioning for 9 hours, and whose private papers and computer files in his home and office in the House of Commons were confiscated. The Honorable Member’s offense? Embarrassing Gordon Brown’s government. How did he do this? By revealing in debate on the floor of the House of Commons and in various lapses, failures, and dirty-little-secrets about the government’s immigration policy…

Stick a fork in Great Britain, folks. As an ex-Brit told me nearly twenty years ago, the English lost their freedom so gradually and so long ago that they don’t even realize it’s gone. And now that we’ve elected Obama I fear we’re heading down the same path. Can anybody who was half paying attention during the campaign imagine an Obama administration not doing something like this?

You’ll Thank Me When You’re Older

The Decade with No Name

I was born in the 50’s, survived the 60’s and the 70’s, became an adult in the 80’s and started a family in the 90’s. All of which got me and a lot of other folks used to having a name for each decade. I remember that, toward the end of the 90’s, there was a lot of hand-wringing about what to call that next decade, the one that started with 2000, the one we’re in now.

Yes, I know. The decade and the millenium really started in 2001. But 1970 was quite rightly the first year of the 70’s and not the last of the 60’s. That’s because you started saying the year with the word “seventy”.

Some predicted our current decade would be called the “Aughties”. Other, even lamer, ideas were proffered.

None stuck.

Here we are, about to turn the page to 2009, the last year of the Decade with No Name and people still refer back to the 80’s and 90’s but just don’t mention this block of years as a decade with any identity. I think that, to a certain extent, “21st century” has filled the void. But it looks like we’ll slouch all the way past it without having settled on a name for this decade.

Perhaps it’ll pick up a nickname during the Teens or Twenties.

The Constitution Says Hillary Cannot Be Appointed

A caller to Brian Sussman’s show tonight had an interesting point. Article I, Section 6 of the constitution says, in part:

No Senator or Representative shall, during the Time for which he was elected, be appointed to any civil Office under the Authority of the United States, which shall have been created, or the Emoluments whereof shall have been encreased during such time[.]

Since the Secretary of State was given a raise (the emolument having been encreased) during Hillary’s term in the Senate, and since she still is a Senator, that means she cannot be appointed to that position. The Founders specifically did not want the corruption that would come from voting to create or give a raise to a nice job and then taking it.

For an Obama administration, which doesn’t understand the role of judges and will no doubt be quite content to pretend that certain Amendments are devoid of meaning, this will surely be but a speed bump. But the language seems clear to me.

Update:

Apparently Volokh thinks the wording is “ambiguous”, but cites two law professors who agree with me. Mickey Kaus has the rim shot:

It’s Not the Cold War

You need to read Mark Steyn.

What’s relevant about the Mumbai model is that it would work in just about any second-tier city in any democratic state: Seize multiple soft targets and overwhelm the municipal infrastructure to the point where any emergency plan will simply be swamped by the sheer scale of events. Try it in, say, Mayor Nagin’s New Orleans. All you need is the manpower. Given the numbers of gunmen, clearly there was a significant local component. On the other hand, whether or not Pakistan’s deeply sinister ISI had their fingerprints all over it, it would seem unlikely that there was no external involvement. After all, if you look at every jihad front from the London Tube bombings to the Iraqi insurgency, you’ll find local lads and wily outsiders: That’s pretty much a given.

But we’re in danger of missing the forest for the trees. The forest is the ideology. It’s the ideology that determines whether you can find enough young hotshot guys in the neighborhood willing to strap on a suicide belt or (rather more promising as a long-term career) at least grab an AK and shoot up a hotel lobby. Or, if active terrorists are a bit thin on the ground, whether you can count at least on some degree of broader support on the ground. You’re sitting in some distant foreign capital but you’re minded to pull off a Bombay-style operation in, say, Amsterdam or Manchester or Toronto. Where would you start? Easy. You know the radical mosques, and the other ideological-front organizations. You’ve already made landfall.

“We thought we were safe…”

“…and then CNN walked in.”

Silly tourists. Don’t they know by now that Western media outlets are only interested in helping terrorists?

A Good Primer on the Creationist Threat

One of our real heroines, Dr. Barbara Forrest, gave a talk at SMU about why Texas shouldn’t let creationists mess with science education. About an hour, but very informative.