Today's DirecTV HD DVR Is Actually Yesterday's HD DVR

Today's DirecTV HD DVR Is Actually Yesterday's HD DVR
By Shane C. Buettner (image placeholder)
(image placeholder)April 23, 2006 — This morning I picked out the weekly Best Buy flyer from my Sunday paper and saw a DirecTV HD TiVo on special for $399 after mail-in rebate. My initial thought was, "cool! Looks like the new MPEG4 compatible HD DVR is finally out!" This thought died of loneliness seconds later as I realized the HD DVR in the ad is the trusty HR10-250 that sits in my own equipment rack. A terrific machine, but not compatible with the new MPEG4 compressed HD channels that DirecTV has very quietly rolled out in the last several months.
A very cool thing has happened late last fall, and that is that DirecTV rolled out a ton of new HD in the form of more local network affiliates. Living in the San Francisco bay area, for example, my HD network affiliates come from LA, and elsewhere on the west coast, not our own "locals" from the bay area. Then in November, DirecTV rolled out the HD locals into 12 markets, including the bay area, with 24 more to follow in the first half of 2006.
To crunch that many more channels into the existing bandwidth pipe, DirecTV was required to use the more aggressive MPEG4 video compression, one of the three codecs spec'd for both HD DVD and Blu-ray. The switch to MPEG4 not only requires a new DirecTV HD receiver, but a new 5-LNB dish as well. Although the vast majority of DirecTV's HD offerings are still offered in MPEG2, without these new components you cannot receive the new MPEG4 HD locals, or any other MPEG4 HD offerings DirecTV might offer in the future.
While DirecTV has released a new MPEG4 compatible receiver, the H20, and the new 5-LNB dish, the MPEG4 compatible DVR is due in stores this summer. And further, while the new H20 receiver is compatible with the 3-LNB vintage oval HD dishes, older HD receivers, including the DirecTV TiVo currently available on special, are not compatible with the new 5-LNB dishes.
Nowhere in the Best Buy ad are these facts mentioned, and from my own experiences at retail, and accounts from people I know, I wouldn't bet my life on you being armed with these facts at Best Buy or Circuit City. I don't begrudge DirecTV or its resellers one bit for trying to sell every last one of those HD TiVo boxes. I just think that potential consumers should be fully aware of the situation and make an informed decision accordingly.
Last summer I made a very similar decision. I'd already heard rumors of a late fall MPEG4 rollout of new HD channels, but I was sick and tired of not watching HD on my own schedule. I decided to bite the bullet and get the HR10-250 DirecTV HD TiVo, knowing full well that it would most likely have a very short life span. And when I bought mine, it was $650 after a $50 rebate, not $399 with rebate. I haven't regretted the decision for one minute. I've watched more HD in these last months than I ever have, and enjoyed every minute of it. But, I made this decision with my eyes wide open, and I just want you to be able to do the same. Caveat emptor!

Free Advice for President Bush

Free Advice for President Bush
From PowerLine Blog

The President hasn't asked for my advice, but here it is anyway.
You know how the Democrats are always after you to admit that you made a mistake?  You've wisely ignored them; they don't have your interests at heart, and the policies they're talking about weren't mistakes.  The time has come, though, to go on national television and say you were wrong, and you've changed your mind.  About immigration.

Give a major speech in prime time. Say that you still think that a long-term solution to the immigration issue should include a guest worker program.  Acknowledge, however, that many Americans disagree and there is currently no consensus on a long-range policy.  Say that, more fundamentally, you're now convinced that our first priority has to be getting control over our borders.  Until we control our borders, and know who is coming and going, any immigration policy we may announce will be meaningless anyway.

So, discussion about long-term approaches to immigration will continue.  But in the meantime, your priority will be securing the borders and enforcing the laws currently on the books.  Which means that the crackdown on employers of illegals will be expanded.  Announce some specific measures to begin securing the Mexican border, preferably including some kind of fence.

This simple act will cause your approval ratings to begin rebounding, re-energize Republicans, and assure that the party keeps its Congressional majorities in November.  If you really want to get the conservative base back in your corner, go and meet with the Minutemen--on camera--and tell them you appreciate what you're doing.

That's step one. Here's step two. It was announced this morning that Republicans in the House and Senate have agreed to extend the capital gains cut for another two years.  You think this is sound public policy because it will be good for the economy.  You're right, but no one cares.  The economy has been terrific for years; how much good has it done you or the Republican Party?  That's right.  Little or none.

You need to couple this tax cut with spending cuts. Tax cuts unaccompanied by spending restraint are rightly viewed with cynicism by both conservatives and liberals. Focus on earmarks; even the liberals don't try to defend them.  Threaten to veto any spending bill that contains a single earmark.  Then do it.  If that creates a temporary problem with the appropriations process, talk about the need for a line-item veto.  Not only will an all-out attack on earmarks warm the hearts of the Republican faithful, it will be broadly supported across the political spectrum.

If you do these two things, you will reinvigorate your administration.  You will demonstrate that as President, you are still the nation's most powerful political figure.  You will regain the trust and enthusiastic support of the Republican Party.  And you will assure that, with continuing Republican control of Congress, the remainder of your administration will be devoted to productive work on behalf of the American people, not defending yourself against politically-motivated "investigations" and impeachment proceedings.

Double Standards

Double-Standards
By Mark Levin

Early on, prosecutors claimed they had evidence of over ten felonies. They demanded that Rush plead guilty to some felony—any felony. He refused, always insisting on his innocence. So, they leaked more lies to the media, hoping to intimidate him. They seized his medical records. They gave his medical records to the media. The media took those records and turned them into graphics for television. Reporters and commentators were studying his prescriptions, discussing both the kinds and amount of medicine he had taken. They were beside themselves with glee. Newsweek, AP and the Palm Beach Post, Rush's local paper, were especially vicious, serving as lap-dogs for the prosecutors.

In court, Rush fought these people every step of the way—all the way to the Florida Supreme Court. He spent millions of dollars defending himself—despite the fact that he had been a first-time abuser, went to rehab, and was clean. And then last October, the lead prosecutor sauntered into court and in response to questioning told the judge—we have no evidence that Rush Limbaugh has committed any crime! None.

So, I am very angry. You will hear commentator after commentator speaking sympathetically about Patrick Kennedy and his addiction to painkillers. You will hear people say that he is addicted, he has a serious health problem, he deserves to be praised for his forthrightness today, and we should leave him alone. And many of these commentators will be the same people who were giddy in their ceaseless attacks on Rush.

I am angry at the double standard, where liberals are regularly treated one way and conservatives another. I am also glad Patrick Kennedy won't be abused as Rush was. But you can be sure that the next conservative with a problem won't be treated like Kennedy.

But there are some aspects to the Kennedy matter that require answers. If Patrick Kennedy, who is not a first offender, is addicted to painkillers, from where did he get them? And there are news reports that he had been drinking earlier at a Capitol Hill bar and alcohol was later smelled on his breath. So, why was the officer on the scene prevented by more senior police officers from performing a routine sobriety test?

I truly wish Patrick Kennedy well. But you bet I'm angry.

Going Nuclear

Going Nuclear
A Green Makes the Case
By Patrick MooreSunday, April 16, 2006; B01
In the early 1970s when I helped found Greenpeace, I believed that nuclear energy was synonymous with nuclear holocaust, as did most of my compatriots. That's the conviction that inspired Greenpeace's first voyage up the spectacular rocky northwest coast to protest the testing of U.S. hydrogen bombs in Alaska's Aleutian Islands. Thirty years on, my views have changed, and the rest of the environmental movement needs to update its views, too, because nuclear energy may just be the energy source that can save our planet from another possible disaster: catastrophic climate change.
Look at it this way: More than 600 coal-fired electric plants in the United States produce 36 percent of U.S. emissions -- or nearly 10 percent of global emissions -- of CO2, the primary greenhouse gas responsible for climate change. Nuclear energy is the only large-scale, cost-effective energy source that can reduce these emissions while continuing to satisfy a growing demand for power. And these days it can do so safely.
I say that guardedly, of course, just days after Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced that his country had enriched uranium. "The nuclear technology is only for the purpose of peace and nothing else," he said. But there is widespread speculation that, even though the process is ostensibly dedicated to producing electricity, it is in fact a cover for building nuclear weapons.
And although I don't want to underestimate the very real dangers of nuclear technology in the hands of rogue states, we cannot simply ban every technology that is dangerous. That was the all-or-nothing mentality at the height of the Cold War, when anything nuclear seemed to spell doom for humanity and the environment. In 1979, Jane Fonda and Jack Lemmon produced a frisson of fear with their starring roles in "The China Syndrome," a fictional evocation of nuclear disaster in which a reactor meltdown threatens a city's survival. Less than two weeks after the blockbuster film opened, a reactor core meltdown at Pennsylvania's Three Mile Island nuclear power plant sent shivers of very real anguish throughout the country.
What nobody noticed at the time, though, was that Three Mile Island was in fact a success story: The concrete containment structure did just what it was designed to do -- prevent radiation from escaping into the environment. And although the reactor itself was crippled, there was no injury or death among nuclear workers or nearby residents. Three Mile Island was the only serious accident in the history of nuclear energy generation in the United States, but it was enough to scare us away from further developing the technology: There hasn't been a nuclear plant ordered up since then.
Today, there are 103 nuclear reactors quietly delivering just 20 percent of America's electricity. Eighty percent of the people living within 10 miles of these plants approve of them (that's not including the nuclear workers). Although I don't live near a nuclear plant, I am now squarely in their camp.
And I am not alone among seasoned environmental activists in changing my mind on this subject. British atmospheric scientist James Lovelock, father of the Gaia theory, believes that nuclear energy is the only way to avoid catastrophic climate change. Stewart Brand, founder of the "Whole Earth Catalog," says the environmental movement must embrace nuclear energy to wean ourselves from fossil fuels. On occasion, such opinions have been met with excommunication from the anti-nuclear priesthood: The late British Bishop Hugh Montefiore, founder and director of Friends of the Earth, was forced to resign from the group's board after he wrote a pro-nuclear article in a church newsletter.
There are signs of a new willingness to listen, though, even among the staunchest anti-nuclear campaigners. When I attended the Kyoto climate meeting in Montreal last December, I spoke to a packed house on the question of a sustainable energy future. I argued that the only way to reduce fossil fuel emissions from electrical production is through an aggressive program of renewable energy sources (hydroelectric, geothermal heat pumps, wind, etc.) plus nuclear. The Greenpeace spokesperson was first at the mike for the question period, and I expected a tongue-lashing. Instead, he began by saying he agreed with much of what I said -- not the nuclear bit, of course, but there was a clear feeling that all options must be explored.
Here's why: Wind and solar power have their place, but because they are intermittent and unpredictable they simply can't replace big baseload plants such as coal, nuclear and hydroelectric. Natural gas, a fossil fuel, is too expensive already, and its price is too volatile to risk building big baseload plants. Given that hydroelectric resources are built pretty much to capacity, nuclear is, by elimination, the only viable substitute for coal. It's that simple.
That's not to say that there aren't real problems -- as well as various myths -- associated with nuclear energy. Each concern deserves careful consideration:
· Nuclear energy is expensive. It is in fact one of the least expensive energy sources. In 2004, the average cost of producing nuclear energy in the United States was less than two cents per kilowatt-hour, comparable with coal and hydroelectric. Advances in technology will bring the cost down further in the future.
· Nuclear plants are not safe. Although Three Mile Island was a success story, the accident at Chernobyl, 20 years ago this month, was not. But Chernobyl was an accident waiting to happen. This early model of Soviet reactor had no containment vessel, was an inherently bad design and its operators literally blew it up. The multi-agency U.N. Chernobyl Forum reported last year that 56 deaths could be directly attributed to the accident, most of those from radiation or burns suffered while fighting the fire. Tragic as those deaths were, they pale in comparison to the more than 5,000 coal-mining deaths that occur worldwide every year. No one has died of a radiation-related accident in the history of the U.S. civilian nuclear reactor program. (And although hundreds of uranium mine workers did die from radiation exposure underground in the early years of that industry, that problem was long ago corrected.)
· Nuclear waste will be dangerous for thousands of years. Within 40 years, used fuel has less than one-thousandth of the radioactivity it had when it was removed from the reactor. And it is incorrect to call it waste, because 95 percent of the potential energy is still contained in the used fuel after the first cycle. Now that the United States has removed the ban on recycling used fuel, it will be possible to use that energy and to greatly reduce the amount of waste that needs treatment and disposal. Last month, Japan joined France, Britain and Russia in the nuclear-fuel-recycling business. The United States will not be far behind.
· Nuclear reactors are vulnerable to terrorist attack. The six-feet-thick reinforced concrete containment vessel protects the contents from the outside as well as the inside. And even if a jumbo jet did crash into a reactor and breach the containment, the reactor would not explode. There are many types of facilities that are far more vulnerable, including liquid natural gas plants, chemical plants and numerous political targets.
· Nuclear fuel can be diverted to make nuclear weapons. This is the most serious issue associated with nuclear energy and the most difficult to address, as the example of Iran shows. But just because nuclear technology can be put to evil purposes is not an argument to ban its use.
Over the past 20 years, one of the simplest tools -- the machete -- has been used to kill more than a million people in Africa, far more than were killed in the Hiroshima and Nagasaki nuclear bombings combined. What are car bombs made of? Diesel oil, fertilizer and cars. If we banned everything that can be used to kill people, we would never have harnessed fire.
The only practical approach to the issue of nuclear weapons proliferation is to put it higher on the international agenda and to use diplomacy and, where necessary, force to prevent countries or terrorists from using nuclear materials for destructive ends. And new technologies such as the reprocessing system recently introduced in Japan (in which the plutonium is never separated from the uranium) can make it much more difficult for terrorists or rogue states to use civilian materials to manufacture weapons.
The 600-plus coal-fired plants emit nearly 2 billion tons of CO2annually -- the equivalent of the exhaust from about 300 million automobiles. In addition, the Clean Air Council reports that coal plants are responsible for 64 percent of sulfur dioxide emissions, 26 percent of nitrous oxides and 33 percent of mercury emissions. These pollutants are eroding the health of our environment, producing acid rain, smog, respiratory illness and mercury contamination.
Meanwhile, the 103 nuclear plants operating in the United States effectively avoid the release of 700 million tons of CO2emissions annually -- the equivalent of the exhaust from more than 100 million automobiles. Imagine if the ratio of coal to nuclear were reversed so that only 20 percent of our electricity was generated from coal and 60 percent from nuclear. This would go a long way toward cleaning the air and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Every responsible environmentalist should support a move in that direction.
Patrick Moore, co-founder of Greenpeace, is chairman and chief scientist of Greenspirit Strategies Ltd. He and Christine Todd Whitman are co-chairs of a new industry-funded initiative, the Clean and Safe Energy Coalition, which supports increased use of nuclear energy.

One Down 49 to GO!

One Down – 49 to GO!

The state of Georgia approved a sweeping measure on Monday to crack down on illegal immigrants and the people who hire them as a passionate debate on immigration heats up in the United States.
The law could fuel a national controversy as the federal government and other states consider how to deal with millions of undocumented workers while immigrants, many of whom are Hispanic, are displaying their political power through mass demonstrations in cities across the United States.
The Georgia Security and Immigration Compliance Act, signed into law by Gov. Sonny Perdue, denies many state services paid for by taxpayers to people who are in the United States illegally. It also forces contractors doing business with the state to verify the legal status of new workers, and requires police to notify immigration officials if people charged with crimes are illegal immigrants.
"It's our responsibility to ensure that our famous Georgia hospitality is not abused, that our taxpayers are not taken advantage of and that our citizens are protected," Perdue said before signing the law. Other provisions of the law prohibit employers from claiming a tax deduction for wages of $600 or more paid to undocumented workers, impose prison terms for human trafficking and limit the services commercial companies can provide to illegal immigrants.

We have room for but one flag

Theodore Roosevelt's ideas on Immigrants and being an AMERICAN in 1907. "In the first place, we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But this is predicated upon the person's becoming in every facet an American, and nothing but an American ... There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag ... We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language ... and we have room for but one sole loyalty and that is a loyalty to the American people." Theodore Roosevelt 1907

First a Wall -- Then Amnesty

First a Wall -- Then Amnesty
By Charles KrauthammerFriday, April 7, 2006; A19
Every sensible immigration policy has two objectives: (1) to regain control of our borders so that it is we who decide who enters and (2) to find a way to normalize and legalize the situation of the 11 million illegals among us.
Start with the second. No one of good will wants to see these 11 million suffer. But the obvious problem is that legalization creates an enormous incentive for new illegals to come.
We say, of course, that this will be the very last, very final, never-again, we're-not-kidding-this-time amnesty. The problem is that we say exactly the same thing with every new reform. And everyone knows it's phony.
What do you think was said in 1986 when we passed the Simpson-Mazzoli immigration reform? It turned into the largest legalization program in American history -- nearly 3 million people got permanent residency. And we are now back at it again with 11 million more illegals in our midst.
How can it be otherwise? We already have a river of people coming every day knowing they're going to be illegal and perhaps even exploited. They come nonetheless. The newest amnesty -- the "earned legalization" being dangled in front of them by proposed Senate legislation -- can only increase the flow.
Those who think employer sanctions will control immigration are dreaming. Employer sanctions were the heart of Simpson-Mazzoli. They are not only useless; they are pernicious. They turn employers into enforcers of border control. That is the job of government, not landscapers.
The irony of this whole debate, which is bitterly splitting the country along partisan, geographic and ethnic lines, is that there is a silver bullet that would not just solve the problem but also create a national consensus behind it.
My proposition is this: A vast number of Americans who oppose legalization and fear new waves of immigration would change their minds if we could radically reduce new -- i.e., future -- illegal immigration.
Forget employer sanctions. Build a barrier. It is simply ridiculous to say it cannot be done. If one fence won't do it, then build a second 100 yards behind it. And then build a road for patrols in between. Put in cameras. Put in sensors. Put out lots of patrols.
Can't be done? Israel's border fence has been extraordinarily successful in keeping out potential infiltrators who are far more determined than mere immigrants. Nor have very many North Koreans crossed into South Korea in the past 50 years.
Of course it will be ugly. So are the concrete barriers to keep truck bombs from driving into the White House. But sometimes necessity trumps aesthetics. And don't tell me that this is our Berlin Wall. When you build a wall to keep people in, that's a prison. When you build a wall to keep people out, that's an expression of sovereignty. The fence around your house is a perfectly legitimate expression of your desire to control who comes into your house to eat, sleep and use the facilities. It imprisons no one.
Of course, no barrier will be foolproof. But it doesn't have to be. It simply has to reduce the river of illegals to a manageable trickle. Once we can do that, everything becomes possible -- most especially, humanizing the situation of our 11 million illegals.
If the government can demonstrate that it can control future immigration, there will be infinitely less resistance to dealing generously with the residual population of past immigration. And, as Mickey Kaus and others have suggested, that may require that the two provisions be sequenced. First, radical border control by physical means. Then, shortly thereafter, radical legalization of those already here. To achieve national consensus on legalization, we will need a short lag time between the two provisions, perhaps a year or two, to demonstrate to the skeptics that the current wave of illegals is indeed the last.
This is no time for mushy compromise. A solution requires two acts of national will: the ugly act of putting up a fence and the supremely generous act of absorbing as ultimately full citizens those who broke our laws to come to America.
This is not a compromise meant to appease both sides without achieving anything. It is not some piece of hybrid legislation that arbitrarily divides illegals into those with five-year-old "roots" in America and those without, or some such mischief-making nonsense.
This is full amnesty (earned with back taxes and learning English and the like) with full border control. If we do it right, not only will we solve the problem, we will get it done as one nation.

McKinney Did NOT Apologize For Her Actions!

McKinney Did NOT Apologize For Her Actions!

She apologized that the incident happened. She specifically said there shouldn’t have been any “touching”. ANY! That’s bullshit! The guard was certainly justified in tapping her on the shoulder.

Imagine this. NBC hires a look-alike to walk past the metal detectors. The imposter has no “pin” and doesn’t stop when the guard yells 3 times to “Stop”.

Now suppose the guard just shrugs and lets her pass. What do you think the “film at 11” is going to portray?

She should still be indicted!

The Mexican Solution

The Mexican Solution by: Center for Security Policy

(Washington, D.C.): The Congress has received lots of free advice lately from Mexican government officials and illegal aliens waving Mexico's flag in mass demonstrations coast-to-coast. Most of it takes the form of bitter complaints about our actual or prospective treatment of immigrants from that country who have gotten into this one illegally - or who aspire to do so.
If you think these critics are mad about U.S. immigration policy now, imagine how upset they would be if we adopted an approach far more radical than the bill they rail against which was adopted last year by the House of Representatives - namely, the way Mexico treats illegal aliens.
In fact, as a just-published paper by the Center for Security Policy's J. Michael Waller points out, under a constitution first adopted in 1917 and subsequently amended, Mexico deals harshly not only with illegal immigrants. It treats even legal immigrants, naturalized citizens and foreign investors in ways that would, by the standards of those who carp about U.S. immigration policy, have to be called "racist" and "xenophobic."
Mexico's Glass House
For example, according to an official translation published by the Organization of American States, the Mexican constitution includes the following restrictions:

1. Pursuant to Article 33, "Foreigners may not in any way participate in the political affairs of the country." This ban applies, among other things, to participation in demonstrations and the expression of opinions in public about domestic politics like those much in evidence in Los Angeles, New York and elsewhere in recent days.


2. Equal employment rights are denied to immigrants, even legal ones. Article 32: "Mexicans shall have priority over foreigners under equality of circumstances for all classes of concessions and for all employment, positions, or commissions of the Government in which the status of citizenship is not indispensable."


3. Jobs for which Mexican citizenship is considered "indispensable" include, pursuant to Article 32, bans on foreigners, immigrants, and even naturalized citizens of Mexico serving as military officers, Mexican-flagged ship and airline crew, and chiefs of seaports and airports.


4. Article 55 denies immigrants the right to become federal lawmakers. A Mexican congressman or senator must be "a Mexican citizen by birth." Article 91 further stipulates that immigrants may never aspire to become cabinet officers as they are required to be Mexican by birth. Article 95 says the same about Supreme Court justices.

In accordance with Article 130, immigrants - even legal ones - may not become members of the clergy, either.

1. Foreigners, to say nothing of illegal immigrants, are denied fundamental property rights. For example, Article 27 states, "Only Mexicans by birth or naturalization and Mexican companies have the right to acquire ownership of lands, waters, and their appurtenances, or to obtain concessions for the exploitation of mines or of waters."


2. Article 11 guarantees federal protection against "undesirable aliens resident in the country." What is more, private individuals are authorized to make citizen's arrests. Article 16 states, "In cases of flagrante delicto, any person may arrest the offender and his accomplices, turning them over without delay to the nearest authorities." In other words, Mexico grants its citizens the right to arrest illegal aliens and hand them over to police for prosecution. Imagine the Minutemen exercising such a right!


3. The Mexican constitution states that foreigners - not just illegal immigrants - may be expelled for any reason and without due process. According to Article 33, "the Federal Executive shall have the exclusive power to compel any foreigner whose remaining he may deem inexpedient to abandon the national territory immediately and without the necessity of previous legal action."

The Bottom Line
As the immigration debate in the Senate moves into a decisive phase this week, legislators who believe America's southern border must be secured, the Nation's existing immigration laws enforced and illegal aliens not rewarded with permanent residency and a direct path to citizenship are being sharply criticized and, in some cases, defamed as bigots and xenophobes. Yet, even their maximalist positions generally pale in comparison with the treatment authorized by the Mexican constitution.
So the next time such legislators - and the majority of Americans for whom they speak - are assaulted by Mexican officials, undocumented aliens waving Mexican flags in mass demonstrations here in the United States, clergy and self-described humanitarians, businessmen and other advocates of illegal immigration ask them this: Would they favor having the U.S. impose the same restrictions on immigrants - legal and illegal - that Mexico imposes on their counterparts there?
Nothing of the kind is in the cards, of course. Nor should it be. Legal immigration and the opportunity for foreign investors and other nationals legitimately to contribute to this country are not only one of its hallmarks; they are among the reasons for its greatness.
Still, we should not allow the hypocrisy of others' treatment of undocumented aliens in their countries to induce us to refrain from taking effective steps to prevent further illegal immigration: by building a fence along our southern border; by enforcing immigration laws in the workplace and elsewhere; and by discouraging more such violations - with potentially grave national security implications - by dealing effectively with those who have already broken those laws by coming here without permission.

Crunch Time on Illegal Immigration

Crunch Time on Illegal Immigration
Tuesday , March 28, 2006
By Bill O'Reilly
(image placeholder)


There is a civil war brewing in this country between the forces that want open borders, no restrictions on who enters the USA, and those of us who are demanding that the federal government stop millions of people from illegally entering America.
Now over the weekend, hundreds of thousands of pro-illegal immigrant demonstrators took to the streets of Los Angeles and Denver, saying no to tough enforcement of immigration laws and demanding the USA grant them concessions.
It's clear by this display that millions of Americans support a so-called humane approach to the illegal problem, including amnesty and full benefits for illegals already here.
On the other side are millions of Americans who say no to amnesty and no to the continuing border chaos. Thus, you have a very intense difference of opinion.
Overwhelmingly, the American media favor as "comprehensive approach" to the problem. That means little punitive action. Writing in The New York Times Monday, far left columnist Paul Krugman summed that position up:
"Basic decency requires that we provide immigrants, once they're here, with essential health care, education for their children, and more."
Krugman and many on the left are big on those carrots, but short on any sticks. They reject tough enforcement of immigration law.
But there is a solution that carries both a stick and a carrot. One, immediately move the National Guard to the border to back up the border patrol. If this is done, there's no need for a $1 billion wall. Illegal crossings would decline drastically.
Two, detain anyone caught trying to cross the border illegally and deport them ASAP. No more catch and release.
Three, inform businesses that hiring illegal workers will lead to expensive fines first time, prison time for employers second time.
Four, allow those illegals already in the USA to register as foreign residents without fear of reprisal. An illegal would have 60 days to do that. Failure to register would be a felony with mandatory prison time.
Five, once the foreign resident is registered, he or she would be issued temporary working papers and would have to pay a $3,000 fine for breaking the immigration law. The money would be deducted from paychecks over a three-year period.
Six, after three years, that foreign resident could apply for citizenship, but such a privilege would not be guaranteed. The applicants would take their place in line behind those who have obeyed the immigration rules.
Seven, a legal guest worker program would be set up to meet the needs of businesses. Foreign countries could send a list of applicants and a pool would be formed.
Any finally, any immigrant evading taxes in the USA would be immediately deported. So there you have it. Comprehensive plan to stop the madness, but Congress not going to do it.
On Monday, the Senate Judiciary Committee approved an amendment that would allow Americans to provide care for illegal aliens while adding more border patrol agents. Same old, same old. Not going to solve the problem.
And that's "The Memo."

Missed Tributes

Missed Tributes
By Ben Stein
Published 3/6/2006 2:08:21 AM


Now for a few humble thoughts about the Oscars.I did not see every second of it, but my wife did, and she joins me in noting that there was not one word of tribute, not one breath, to our fighting men and women in Iraq and Afghanistan or to their families or their widows or orphans. There were pitifully dishonest calls for peace -- as if the people we are fighting were interested in any peace for us but the peace of the grave. But not one word for the hundreds of thousands who have served and are serving, not one prayer or moment of silence for the dead and maimed.Basically, the sad truth is that Hollywood does not think of itself as part of America, and so, to Hollywood, the war to save freedom from Islamic terrorists is happening to someone else. It does not concern them except insofar as it offers occasion to mock or criticize George Bush. They live in dreamland and cannot be gracious enough to thank the men and women who pay with their lives for the stars' ability to live in dreamland. This is shameful.The idea that it is brave to stand up for gays in Hollywood, to stand up against Joe McCarthy in Hollywood (fifty years after his death), to say that rich white people are bad, that oil companies are evil -- this is nonsense. All of these are mainstream ideas in Hollywood, always have been, always will be. For the people who made movies denouncing Big Oil, worshiping gays, mocking the rich to think of themselves as brave -- this is pathetic, childish narcissism.The brave guy in Hollywood will be the one who says that this is a fabulously great country where we treat gays, blacks, and everyone else as equal. The courageous writer in Hollywood will be the one who says the oil companies do their best in a very hostile world to bring us energy cheaply and efficiently and with a minimum of corruption. The producer who really has guts will be the one who says that Wall Street, despite its flaws, has done the best job of democratizing wealth ever in the history of mankind.No doubt the men and women who came to the Oscars in gowns that cost more than an Army Sergeant makes in a year, in limousines with champagne in the back seat, think they are working class heroes to attack America -- which has made it all possible for them. They are not. They would be heroes if they said that Moslem extremists are the worst threat to human decency since Hitler and Stalin. But someone might yell at them or even attack them with a knife if they said that, so they never will.Hollywood is above all about self: self-congratulation, self-promotion, and above all, self-protection. This is human and basic, but let's not kid ourselves. There is no greatness there in the Kodak theater. The greatness is on patrol in Kirkuk. The greatness lies unable to sleep worrying about her man in Mosul. The greatness sleeps at Arlington National Cemetery and lies waiting for death in VA Hospitals. God help us that we have sunk so low as to confuse foolish and petty boasting with the real courage that keeps this nation and the many fools in it alive and flourishing on national TV.

Port Split - By Lawrence Kudlow

March 9, 2006Port SplitBy Lawrence Kudlow
As the review period intensifies over plans for Dubai Ports World to take over some operations at six U.S. ports, President Bush is facing an uphill battle to get the deal through. Congressional opposition is widespread, and a number of polls say the American public is largely against it. Unfortunately, conservatives are badly split on the issue. Commentators such as Charles Krauthammer, David Brooks, Jack Kemp and I are in favor of the deal, while others like Bill Bennett, Michelle Malkin and Pat Buchanan are very much opposed.
From my standpoint, taking into account all the editorializing, talk-show tempests and political sound bites of recent weeks, I have yet to see any real evidence that the deal will compromise U.S. national security. Objections raised by the Coast Guard have been resolved, and the fact stubbornly remains that along with U.S. Customs and Homeland Security, it is the Coast Guard, not DP World, that will ultimately run the show when it comes to protecting port operations. If additional screening and surveillance safeguards need to be built into the deal, including radiation tests, so be it.Retired U.S. Coast Guard Capt. John Holmes, who headed ports in Los Angeles and Long Beach, Calif., on 9-11, made the point to me that the same longshoreman and stevedores now employed at U.S. ports will continue to unload cargoes, although a thoroughgoing check of all personnel credentials is essential. He also reminded that U.S. companies have been out of the port management business for some time -- this is a foreign-run function and will remain so.
Meanwhile, some conservative critics have latched on to the 60-year-old Arab League boycott of Israel. But this is more rhetoric than reality. State-owned DP World operates out of the United Arab Emirates, but the nation is a member of the World Trade Organization and is negotiating a free-trade deal with the United States. What's more, DP World does huge business with Israel's largest shipping line, Zim Integrated Shipping. Zim's chairman, Idan Ofer, defended DP World in a Wall Street Journal story, expressing his "complete dismay at the way (DP) is being pilloried in the United States."
In fact, the Bush administration's plan to create a U.S. free-trade zone across the Middle East is one of the most positive initiatives in the effort to defeat fundamentalist Islamic terrorism. Let's not forget that the Emirates in the post-9/11 world have become a strong American ally. It was one of the first nations to join the U.S. initiative to inspect cargo in foreign ports and have greatly strengthened its anti-money-laundering and terror-financing clause. It also accepts U.S. aircraft carriers and subs at its deep-water ports and dry-dock facilities. Among these facilities is the DP World-administered Jebel Ali port in Dubai.
What's more, the Emirates allow U.S. military planes to land and refuel at their air bases. If the Emirates ever retaliated and cut off U.S. military access, we would never be able to conduct operations anywhere in the region.
Yes, DP World is a state-owned enterprise. But if that criterion were used to oppose an economic relationship, we'd have to terminate all activity with communist China and state-owned oil companies in Saudi Arabia, Russia, Venezuela and Mexico. Instead, I would argue that increased economic connectivity, supported by the free flow of trade, investment and labor, makes for better political relations between nations. Connectivity liberalizes authoritarian regimes in the direction of democratization.
When you scratch this debate among conservatives deep enough, what you are left with is a clear demarcation between free-traders and protectionists. Those conservatives who oppose the deal are lining up with xenophobic protectionists like my old friend Patrick Buchanan. On the other hand, conservatives in favor of the deal align themselves with the pro-growth, free-trade tradition embodied by Jack Kemp. The Kemp adherents believe in breaking down global barriers in order to enhance prospects for prosperity and freedom everywhere. That's in large part what the United Arab Emirates/DP World episode is all about.
Whether it's anti-Arab Islamophobia or anti-Mexican Hispanophobia, the fear-mongers in the conservative ranks do not truly believe in economic opportunity. Nor do they believe in Ronald Reagan's "City on a Hill" vision of America, where it is our charge to lead the world toward free-market prosperity, political democratization and true freedom for all peoples.
Yes, there is a rift in the conservative ranks. Opposing President Bush are those with a vision of pessimism, defeatism and fear. Supporting the president are those with a Reaganite vision that brims with opportunity, victory and success in the spread of freedom and democratization. Can there be any serious question that the resounding conservative Republican ascendancy and success of the past 25 years launched by Ronald Reagan and advanced by George W. Bush is built on optimism -- and positive results? I think not.
Lawrence Kudlow is a former Reagan economic advisor, a syndicated columnist, and the co-host of CNBC's Kudlow & Company. Visit his blog, Kudlow's Money Politics.

From Ben Stein

Herewith at this happy time of year, a few confessions from my beating heart:I have no freaking clue who Nick and Jessica are. I see them on the cover of People and Us constantly when I am buying my dog biscuits and kitty litter. I often ask the checkers at the grocery stores. They never know who Nick and Jessica are either. Who are they? Will it change my life if I know who they are and why they have broken up? Why are they so important? I don't know who Lindsay Lohan is, either, and I do not care at all about Tom Cruise's wife.Am I going to be called before a Senate committee and asked if I am a subversive? Maybe, but I just have no clue who Nick and Jessica are. Is this what it means to be no longer young. It's not so bad.Next confession: I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors was  Jewish. And it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautiful lit up, bejeweled trees Christmas trees. I don't feel threatened. I don't feel discriminated against. That's what they are: Christmas trees. It doesn't bother me a bit when people say, "Merry Christmas" to me. I don't think they are slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of like it. It shows that we are all brothers and sisters celebrating this happy time of year. It doesn't bother me at all that there is a manger scene on display at a key intersection near my beach house in Malibu. If people want a creche, it's just as fine with me as is the Menorah a few hundred yards away. I don't like getting pushed around for being a Jew and I don't think Christians like getting pushed around for being Christians. I think people who believe in God are sick and tired of getting pushed around, period. I have no idea where the concept came from that America is an explicitly atheist country. I can't find it in the Constitution and I don't like it being shoved down my throat. Or maybe I can put it another way: where did the idea come from that we should worship Nick and Jessica and we aren't allowed to worship God as we understand Him? I guess that's a sign that I'm getting old, too. But there are a lot of us who are wondering where Nick and Jessica came from and where the America we knew went to.

Cheney’s Hunting Accident

Cheney’s Hunting Accident

“…but I’d rather go hunting with Dick Cheney than ride with Ted Kennedy!”

It’s How You Spin It, Stupid!

It’s How You Spin It, Stupid!

MSNBC Headlines:

• Captive reporter makes plea


• 2 Marines killed in Iraq


• WP Ex-CIA official says U.S. ‘misused’ Iraq data


• White House knew early of Katrina levee breaches


• Officials: Malaysian linked to 2002 Calif. terror plot


• Gretzky denies gambling, won’t quit as coach

Look at bullet #4.  In the story you find that the White House found out about the breaches at 11:13 a.m.  The levee’s broke at 8:30.  That’s 2 hours and 43 minutes.

The headline reads like the White House (bad, bad Bush) knew about the levee breaches BEFORE they happened.

It’s just crap………

My name is Mary Jo Kopechne

My name is Mary Jo Kopechne.I would have been 65 years of age this year.Read about me and my killer below:When Sen. Ted Kennedy was merely just another Democrat bloating on Capitol Hill on behalf of liberal causes, it was perhaps excusable to ignore his deplorable past.But now that he's become a leading Republican attack dog, positioning himself as Washington's leading arbiter of truth and integrity, the days for such indulgence are now over.It's time for the GOP to stand up and remind America why this chief spokesman had to abandon his own presidential bid in 1980 - time to say the words "Mary Jo Kopechne" out loud.As is often the case, Republicans have deluded themselves into thinking that most Americans already know the story of how this "Conscience of the Democrat Party" left Miss Kopechne behind to die in the waters underneath the Edgartown Bridge in July 1969, after a night of drinking and partying with the young blonde campaign worker. But most Americans under 40 have never heard that story, or details of how Kennedy swam to safety, then tried to get his cousin Joe Garghan to say he was behind the wheel.Those young voters don't know how Miss Kopechne, trapped inside Kennedy's Oldsmobile, gasped for air until she finally died, while the Democrats' leading Iraq war critic rushed back to his compound to formulate the best alibi he could think of.Neither does Generation X know how Kennedy was thrown out of Harvard on his ear 15 years earlier -- for paying a fellow student to take his Spanish final. Or why the US Army denied him a commission because he cheated on tests.As they listen to the Democrats' "Liberal Lion" accuse President Bush of "telling lie after lie after lie" to get America to go to war in Iraq, young voters don't know about that notorious 1991 Easter weekend in Palm Beach when Uncle Teddy rounded up his nephews for a night on the town, an evening that ended with one of them credibly accused of rape.It's time for Republicans to state unabashedly that they will no longer "go along with the gag" when it comes to Uncle Ted's rants about deception and moral turpitude inside the Bush White House.And if the Republicans don't, let's do it ourselves by passing this forgotten disgrace around the Internet to wake up memories of what a fraud and fake Teddy really is.The Democrat Party should be ashamed to have the national disgrace from Massachusetts as their spokesman.

Facts vs. Fiction: A Report from the Front

Facts vs. Fiction: A Report from the Front By Karl Zinsmeister
Your editor has just returned from another month in Iraq—my fourth extended tour in the last two and a half years. During November and December I joined numerous American combat operations, including the largest air assault since the beginning of the war, walked miles of streets and roads, entered scores of homes, listened to hundreds of Iraqis, observed voting at a dozen different polling sites, and endured my third roadside ambush. With this latest firsthand experience, here are answers to some common queries about how the war is faring.

Has the Iraq war been too costly?

Well, nearly every war is riddled with disappointment and pain, Iraq certainly included. But judged fairly, Iraq has been much less costly and debacle-ridden than the Civil War, World War II, Korea, and the Cold War—each considered in retrospect to have been noble successes.

President Lincoln had to try five different commanders before settling on Ulysses Grant, and even Grant stumbled many times on the way to victory. The Union Army suffered 390,000 dead in four years, with fully 29 percent of the men who served being killed or wounded in what some critics claimed was “an unnecessary war.”

World War II was a serial bloodbath. Battles like Iwo Jima, Anzio, Ardennes, and Okinawa each killed, in a matter of days and weeks, several times the number of soldiers we have lost in Iraq. Intelligence was wrong. Planning failed. Brutal collateral damage was done to civilian non-combatants. Soldiers were killed by friendly fire. POWs were sometimes executed. Military and civilian leaders miscalculated repeatedly. During WWII, 7 percent of our G.I.s were killed or wounded.

Korea was first lost before it could be re-taken, at great cost, and thanks to political interference the war ended in a fruitless stalemate. Fully 8 percent of the American soldiers who fought on the Korean peninsula were killed or wounded.

The Cold War spawned by President Roosevelt’s expedient alliance with Stalin and other communists brought totalitarian bleakness and death to millions, endless proxy wars that consumed hundreds of billions of dollars and tens of thousands of American and allied lives, and a near-nuclear exchange during President Kennedy’s watch.

Yet ugly as they were, each of the wars above eventually made the world a less bloody place by removing tyrants and transforming cultures. Those same goals drive our war against Middle Eastern extremism that is now centered in Iraq.

In Iraq, 4 percent of our soldiers have been killed or wounded. Those losses are lower than we suffered in nine previous wars. The Civil War, Mexican War, War of Independence, Korean War, WWI, WWII, Vietnam, and Philippine War were all half-again or more as costly as Iraq has been.

But aren’t our losses mounting?

In the last ten months of 2003, Iraq hostilities claimed 324 U.S. service members. In 2004, 710 were lost. In 2005, total fatalities were 712. Troops wounded in action are down from 7,920 in 2004 to 5,961 in 2005.

Deaths of foreign civilians in Iraq have also tumbled: In 2004, 196 were killed. In 2005 the toll was 104.

Economic losses are also moderating. Attacks carried out on oil and gas facilities in Iraq can serve as an indicator of this. There were 146 such attacks in 2004, versus 101 in 2005.

Meanwhile, the estimated number of terrorists killed or detained in Iraq was 24,470 in 2004, and 26,500 in 2005.

How is the morale of our soldiers holding up?

Accepting the possibility of being hurt is a part of security work. It’s easy to overlook the reality that 800 public safety officers have been killed in the line of duty right here on our own home shores since the beginning of the Iraq war. This summer, the U.S. general in charge of our National Guard put his Iraq casualties in some perspective: “I lose, unfortunately, more people through private automobile accidents and motorcycle accidents over the same period of time.”

While always wrenching, the risks in Iraq have been overblown. And the morale of soldiers, in my experience, is much higher than one might expect. Other journalists who have spent weeks and weeks with soldiers, like Robert Kaplan, have similarly observed that our G.I.s are generally not disenchanted, but remain very spirited.

The proof of the pudding: Individuals who have actually served in Iraq and Afghanistan are signing up again at record rates. Re-enlistment totals in the active Army over the last three years are more than 6 percent above targets. Over a third of Army re-enlistments now take place in combat zones.

Today’s supposed hemorrhaging in military manpower is mostly a fiction manufactured by the media. Moderate shortfalls in recruiting new bodies have hit reserve and National Guard units. The latest Army Reserve recruiting class, for instance, totaled only 96 percent of the goal.

All active duty branches, however, are exceeding their recruiting requirements in the latest monthly figures from the Department of Defense (released in December). The Army and Marine Corps (who are doing most of the hard service in Iraq) were each at 105 percent of their quotas. After a dip early in 2005, the Army has met or exceeded its goals for new recruits in every month since June. One source of pressure on the active-duty Army is the process of expanding from 482,000 soldiers to 512,000, as a dozen new combat brigades are added to the force.

We are at war, and our Army and Marines are being used hard. But there is no crisis of alienated servicemen.

But don’t American combat losses fall disproportionately on minorities and the poor?

That’s another myth. Though blacks and Hispanics make up 15 percent and 18 percent of America’s young-adult population respectively, they have each represented less than 11 percent of the fatalities in Iraq. Fully 75 percent of the soldiers killed in Iraq have been whites (who make up 61 percent of our military-age population).

Demographic data show, furthermore, that U.S. service-members come from a cross-section of American society, and basically match the wider population in family educational and socioeconomic status.

If there is an imbalance in who is carrying the military load in Iraq it is between Red and Blue America. In two years of fighting in Iraq, 33 percent of U.S. military fatalities came from rural areas, though only 20 percent of the U.S. population is rural. Both city dwellers (29 percent of the U.S. population, 26 percent of Iraq fatalities) and suburbanites (51 percent of the population, 41 percent of the dead) are underrepresented among today’s war casualties.

John Kerry recently claimed U.S. soldiers are “terrorizing” Iraqis. The #2 Democrat in the Senate, Richard Durbin, compared American fighters to “Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad regime—Pol Pot or others—that had no concern for human beings.” Ted Kennedy suggested G.I.s torture like Saddam Hussein. What have you observed?

None of the above. I mostly see soldiers fighting with startling care and commitment. Take, for instance, Staff Sergeant Jamie McIntyre of Queens, New York, who recently had this to say:

“I look at faces and see fellow human beings, and I say, ‘O.K. This is the sacrifice I have to make to bring them freedom.’ That’s why I joined the military. Not for the college money, for doing what’s right. Fighting under our flag. That’s what our flag stands for. I believe in that stuff. Yeah, we might lose American soldiers, but they are going to lose a society, lose a people. You’ve got to look at the bigger picture. I’ve lost friends, and it hurts. It definitely hurts. But that’s even more reason why I say stay. It’s something that has to be done. If we don’t do it, who will?”

An e-mail I received on December 26 from a friend serving in Baghdad provides two good examples of the sort of disciplined dedication one sees regularly in Iraq:

“We lost a young soldier…. This soldier didn’t have to be here and he didn’t have to die on Christmas Day. He was wounded in action in April and evacuated to the States for recovery. After three months on the mend, he requested to come back to rejoin his team. His name was Specialist Sergio Gudino.

“Also on Christmas Day, a newly hired Iraqi interpreter pulled a gun on one of our soldiers who works with sensitive intelligence. The Iraqi spy made Specialist Steven Clark bring him to his work space so he could look at his computer work station. The interpreter briefly turned his back to Clark and our guy immediately pulled his 9mm pistol and emptied his magazine into the Iraqi. The interpreter also got six shots off, one of which hit the soldier in his left breast pocket, but a notebook and ID card stopped the bullet. When I talked to Clark he said, ‘I thought I was going to die and couldn’t believe it when the guy turned his back to me.’ Interesting detail: this soldier has been awarded the Purple Heart FOUR times. He’s another one who doesn’t have to be here. Message to all the naysayers back home: If you think these kids aren’t committed to this mission, and don’t believe in what they are doing, guess again.”

“The idea that we’re going to win the war in Iraq is an idea which is just plain wrong,” opined Democratic chairman Howard Dean in December. Who agrees with him?

Well, most academics and journalists seem to. Military leaders, however, do not.

In September and October 2005, Princeton Survey Research asked various American leadership groups whether they believe the U.S. will succeed or fail in establishing a stable democratic government in Iraq. Most academics agree with Howard Dean: only a quarter say we will “succeed.” Most journalists agree with Dean: Only one third answer “succeed.” Among military officers, however, two thirds say the U.S. will succeed in Iraq.

Progress does seem dreadfully slow.

It is. Defanging the Middle East is a vast undertaking. But again, wars have never been easy or antiseptic. Even after the hostilities of World War II were over, the U.S. occupied Japan for seven years of stabilization and reconstruction, and West Germany for four years (the first year, the Germans nearly starved).

And a guerilla war like we face in Iraq generally requires even more stamina. Eliminating a terror insurgency has historically taken a decade or two. It’s like eradicating smallpox; you must squeeze and squeeze and squeeze, and show great patience. Our occupation of the Philippines after the Spanish-American War is a closer example of what we face in Iraq; we fought an extensive insurgency there for years, then remained in the country for nearly a century, with very positive eventual results.

Interestingly, our soldiers appear to better understand the incremental nature of this war than many reporters, pundits, and politicians. “Americans seem to kind of want this McDonald’s war, where you drive up, you order it, you pay for it, you go to the next window and get a democracy. That’s not the way it works,” cautioned Army reservist Scott Southworth recently. “It takes a lot of effort; it takes a lot of time.”

Morass or not, this war seems to be especially unpopular on the homefront.

Actually, a substantial minority has opposed almost every war prosecuted by our nation. This was true right from the American Revolution—which a large proportion of Tory elites (including most New York City residents) insisted was an ill-considered and quixotic mistake.

Only in 20/20 hindsight have our wars been reinterpreted as righteous and widely supported by a unified nation. Even World War II, the ultimate “good” war fought by the “greatest” generation, was deeply controversial at the time. Fully 6,000 Americans went to prison as war resisters during the years our troops were conquering fascism in Europe and Japan.

There’s no reason to think of the Iraq war as more unpopular than any other U.S. war. If it is prosecuted to success, there’s little doubt that the war against terror in Iraq will in retrospect look just as wise and worthy as previous sacrifices. But there is a wild card: Would the nation have retained the nerve to finish previous successful wars if there had been contemporary-style news coverage of battles like Camden, the Wilderness, or Tarawa?

Where is some evidence that we’re making headway?

In December, Iraqis filed a record number of tips informing on insurgents. That shows growing political and social cooperation. Iraq is also beginning to recover economically. Over the last generation, this was one of the globe’s worst-governed nations, and recovering from the long neglect of plants, factories, utility lines, canals, roads, schools, houses, and commercial districts will take decades. Every time I walk Iraq’s streets and farmyards I am stunned by the raggedness of its physical and social fabric.

But despite the best efforts of terrorists to further damage economic infrastructure, a rebound has begun. The World Bank and International Monetary Fund estimate that Iraqi national income per capita exceeded $1,050 in 2005—up more than 30 percent from the year before the war began ($802 in 2002). One consumer survey by British researchers found that average household income rose 60 percent from February 2004 to November 2005. The IMF projects that Iraq’s gross domestic product will grow 17 percent in 2006 after inflation.

Evidence of growth can be seen in the jump in car usage. The number of registered autos has more than doubled, and traffic is estimated to be five times as heavy as before the war. Purchases of nearly all consumer goods—air conditioners, refrigerators, freezers, washing machines, farm machinery, computers—are soaring. Cell phone ownership has jumped from 6 percent in early 2004 to over 65 percent today.

TV satellite dishes are as ubiquitous as mobile phones, and now sprout from even the rudest abodes in Iraq’s most out-of-the-way corners. Fully 86 percent of Iraqi households reported having satellite TV at the end of 2005. The number of Iraqi commercial TV stations is now 44, and there are 72 commercial radio stations (there were none of either prior to 2003). The number of newspapers exceeds 100.

After two decades of classroom deterioration, Iraqi children are now flooding back to school. Making this possible is a jump in teacher salaries from just a few dollars per month under Saddam to an average of $100 per month today. Parents are delighted: the proportion saying their locals schools are good has risen to 74 percent. By 3:1 they say local education is better than before the war.

Then why do Iraqis seem so dissatisfied?

Make no mistake: Iraq is broken. Most residents have never known proper sewage service, 24 hour electricity, or decent health care.

And improvement could be faster. Both terror attacks and the Arab tradition of endemic corruption are making today’s economic recovery less booming than it would otherwise be. Another damper has been the failure of our Western allies to make good on their promises of Iraq aid: Of the $13.6 billion European and other nations pledged to help rebuild Iraq, only a couple billion has so far been delivered.

All the same, progress is visible in Iraq, not just to observers like me but to Iraqis themselves. There is ample proof of this in the latest scientific poll of the Iraqi public, released December 12 by Oxford Research International. Asked how things are going for them personally, 71 percent of Iraqis now say life is “good,” compared to 29 percent who say “bad.” A majority insist that despite the war, life is already better for them than it was under Saddam Hussein. By 5:1 they expect their lives will be even better one year from now. Seven out of ten Iraqis think their country as a whole will be a better place in one year.

Iraqis are particularly pleased about trends in security. By 61 to 38 percent, they say security where they live is now “good” rather than “bad.” Back at the beginning of 2004 those numbers were reversed (49 percent good, 50 percent bad). On a vast range of specific subjects—from the availability of clean water and medical care to their ability to buy household basics—Iraqis say things are good and getting better. Fully 70 percent say “my family’s economic situation is good,” and 78 percent rate their new freedom of speech as “good.”

The Iraqis don’t seem to be doing much for themselves.

Actually, the ranks of Iraqi security forces passed the number of U.S. soldiers in the country back in March 2005. At present, their total exceeds 200,000 men. Iraqi soldiers, police, and guards were much more in evidence, and more competent, when I accompanied them on raids and searches in late 2005 than they were during my earlier reporting visits in 2003-2005. As of December 2005, one quarter of all military operations conducted in Iraq were carried out exclusively by Iraqi units. Another half were carried out by joint Iraqi-U.S. forces.

Despite many cruel suicide attacks, Iraqis continue to sign up in droves to become soldiers and police, and they are fighting. In 2003 and 2004, Iraqi soldiers and police frequently turned tail when engaged. Since the January 2005 election, however, not a single Iraqi army unit has been defeated in battle, and not one police station has been abandoned.

“Every police station here has a dozen or more memorials for officers that were murdered,” notes Sergeant Walter Rausch of the 101st Airborne. “These are husbands, fathers, and sons killed every day. The media never reports the heroism I witness every day in Iraqis.”

The Iraqi public, however, is noticing. In November 2005, 67 percent expressed confidence in the new Iraqi army (up from 39 percent two years earlier); 68 percent say they have confidence in the police (up from 45 percent).

Iraqi units still depend upon American counterparts for transport, planning, training, heavy weaponry, and leadership, but in most combat operations I accompanied this winter, and nearly all traffic control points and perimeter guard posts, Iraqis were the lead elements. After bearing the brunt of daily casualties over the last year, the number of Iraqi security forces killed is now declining. Monthly deaths of Iraqi soldiers and police climbed steadily to a peak of 304 in July 2005, then fell just as steadily to 193 by December 2005.

Are there signs of the Iraqis weaning themselves from dependence on the U.S.?

In the first two years after the U.S. arrived, nearly every conversation between Iraqis and Americans that I witnessed ended with a wish list. Can you do this? We need that. What will you give me?

That has largely changed. Vast swathes of the country are now policed and administered solely by Iraqis. And residents are beginning to look to their own government, ministries, security forces, and internal leaders for solutions they used to beg Americans to provide.

Late in 2005, American journalist Hart Seely described a meeting he monitored between reporters from Iraq’s brand new independent press and leaders of Iraq’s brand new army. No open dialogue like that had ever taken place before in Iraq, and it was tentative and halting. But “it was the Iraqi media pulling information from Iraqi generals—not looking to the Americans for answers.” That’s progress.

Do average Iraqis support the insurgents?

Those carrying out terror in Iraq, never more than a small fraction of the population, are now deeply resented by most residents. Though Americans are the outsiders who come from furthest away, physically and culturally, in most of Iraq it’s now the insurgents who are viewed as the most threatening alien invaders.

It is a fact almost never reported in the U.S. that a significant number of the suicide bombers who carry out the most horrendous attacks in Iraq are coerced or manipulated into doing so. Naked deception plus religious, economic, strong-arm, and pharmacological pressures are commonly used to enlist foreign and Iraqi triggermen.

At one base where I was embedded for a time, a car loaded with explosives pulled up to the front gate and detonated. Construction of the bomb was botched, however, and the badly burned driver survived long enough to talk to guards at the entrance. It turned out the wife and children of the driver (who was handcuffed to the steering wheel) had been kidnapped, and he was informed they would be killed if he didn’t drive the car as instructed. A triggerman in a following vehicle actually initiated the blast, wirelessly, then fled.

Sometimes the drivers of car bombs do not even know what they are carrying. In addition, many fighters have been found, when wounded or killed, to be full of drugs. (TAE first reported this after the battle of Fallujah, in our J/F 2005 issue.)

Western reporters have emphasized the many ethnic and religious schisms that divide Iraqis. They rarely note that there are also some countervailing common interests, social forces, and leaders who pull Iraqis together. An observation passed to me by a U.S. commander after the December 15 election illustrates some of these positive forces:

“The highlight of my day was in Mahmoudiyah (south Baghdad) where there were no polling stations in the January election, and where many Sunnis refused to vote in October. I watched as two affluent local sheiks walked into the polling station together holding hands (a big sign of respect here). One sheik was Shia, the other Sunni. I stopped them and offered my congratulations on a great day for the people and country of Iraq. They both told me how much they appreciated what the United States had done for them, and that they could never repay us. I told them we neither needed nor expected repayment, but if they wanted to show their appreciation they needed to ensure that the move toward democracy continued and that Sunni and Shia come together to live in peace. The Sunni sheik said, ‘We are tired of violence and fighting that destroys our people and our country.’ These two guys got it.”

But in the wider Muslim world, hasn’t the Iraq war done irreparable damage to America’s image?

As terrorists’ attacks have shed light on their goals and principles, and as the U.S. has shown it is serious about promoting democracy in Iraq and then going home, new views of America are evolving in Islamic countries. According to surveys in 17 nations carried out in 2005 by an organization chaired by Madeleine Albright, support for terrorism in defense of Islam has “declined dramatically” in the last couple years—from 73 percent to 26 percent in Lebanon, from 40 percent down to 13 percent in Morocco, from 41 percent to 25 percent in Pakistan.

Support for Osama bin Laden has plummeted in nearly every Islamic nation. Rationalizing suicide bombing and violence against civilian targets is way down. A majority of Muslims in many nations now “see Islamic extremism as a threat to their countries.” And majorities of Muslims in many countries now believe that “the U.S. favors democracy in their country”—and rather like the idea. The upshot: positive views of the U.S. are rising—up 23 percentage points in Indonesia, up 15 points in Lebanon, up 16 in Jordan.

Isn’t it a pipe dream to think we can introduce democracy to the Middle East—so long dominated by strongmen?

That’s the $64,000 question, and no one knows the answer for sure. But there are signs in Iraq that a surprisingly patient representative politics may be breaking out for the first time ever. To begin, 8 million Iraqis voted for an interim government in January 2005, and almost 10 million voted on the constitution. Then (in a nation with just 14 million adults) 11 million voted in December 2005 for the first permanent parliament.

At this point, all of Iraq’s major factions, including the disaffected Sunnis, are participating in the political process, and many barriers have been breached for the first time. For instance, 31 percent of the legislators elected to the interim parliament were female—which is not only unprecedented for the Middle East but higher than the fraction of women in the U.S. Congress. Power in Iraq’s new National Assembly is reasonably balanced, with no one faction holding a whip hand against the others, and compromise is the requirement of the day.

The new Iraqi constitution guarantees freedom of religion and conscience, and provides forms of due process unknown in any other Middle Eastern country. How scrupulously these will be defended remains to be seen. But there is a framework for basic decencies and liberties that no other Arab nations even pretend to honor. As Christopher Hitchens has put it, “in a country that was dying on its feet and poisoning the region a couple of years ago, there is now a real political process that has serious implications for adjacent countries.”

Noting what is happening in Iraq and Afghanistan, more and more Muslims are now saying they are ready to live under selfrule. In the 2005 survey in 17 countries I mentioned above, the proportion saying democracy is not just for the West but could work well in their own country exceeded 80 percent in places like Morocco, Lebanon, and Jordan. Even in problematic countries like Pakistan, the portion of the public favoring multiparty democracy has become larger than any other faction.

Why do I never hear any of this in most reporting?

A good question. More than perhaps any news event in a generation, coverage of the Iraq war has been unbalanced and incomplete. The dangers that keep most Western reporters completely cloistered in the artificial bubble of a few heavily guarded hotels create many distortions. But the disdain of the press corps for this war is also crystal clear in the overall reporting.

One media critic (Arthur Chrenkoff) did a content analysis of a typical day (January 21, 2005), and counted this breakout of freshly published stories on Iraq:

• 1,992 covering terrorist attacks
• 887 essays alleging prisoner abuse by the British
• 289 about American casualties or civilian deaths in Iraq
• 27 mentions of oil pipeline sabotage
• 761 reports on public statements of terrorists
• 357 on U.S. anti-war protestors
• 121 speculations on a possible American pullout
• 118 articles about strains with European nations
• 217 stories worrying over the validity of the upcoming January 30 Iraqi election
• 216 tales of hostages in Iraq
• 123 quoting Vice President Cheney saying he had underestimated reconstruction needs
• 2,642 items on a Senate grilling of Condoleezza Rice over Iraq policy

Balanced against these negative stories, Chrenkoff ’s computer search found a grand total of 96 comparatively positive reports related to Iraq:

• 16 reports on successful operations against insurgents
• 7 hopeful stories about Iraqi elections
• 73 describing the return of missing Iraqi antiquities

Tendentious reporting is clouding understanding and spawning inaccuracies. In January 2005, for instance, the New York Times editorial board had become convinced that civil war was just around the corner in Iraq and suggested “it’s time to talk about postponing [Iraq’s first] elections.” Less than two weeks later came the popular outpouring that inspired observers around the globe. Snookered yet again by over-gloomy reporting, the Times insisted on October 7 that Iraqis were “going through the motions of democracy only as long as their side wins.” Just days after, the minority Sunnis announced they were joining the political process, and turned out in force to vote on the constitution, and then in Iraq’s historic parliamentary election.

Many other establishment media organs have been equally out of line. When Iraq’s unprecedented new constitution was ratified by 79 percent of voters (in a turnout heavier than any American election), the Washington Post buried that story on page 13, and put this downbeat headline on it: “Sunnis Failed to Defeat Iraq Constitution: Arab Minority Came Close.” The four top headlines on the front page of the Post that same day: “Military Has Lost 2,000 in Iraq,” “The Toll: 2,000,” “Bigger, Stronger, Homemade Bombs Now to Blame for Half of U.S. Deaths,” and “Bush Aides Brace for Charges.”

Well, even if Iraq is a democracy, it’s a very partial and imperfect one.

There is no reason to be Pollyannish about Iraq. Like nearly every Arab nation, it is not a competent society at present. Trade, manufacturing, and farming have been suffocated by bad governance. Public servants routinely skim funds. Trash is not picked up, property rights are not respected, rules are not enforced, altruism is non-existent.

Having been one of the most brutalized societies on earth over the last generation, it would be absurd to expect prone Iraq to jump to its feet at this critical transition and dance a jig. Newborn representative governments are always imperfect, inept, even dirty at times—witness El Salvador, Russia, Taiwan, South Africa.

Yet, a quiet tide is rippling up the Tigris and Euphrates. The November 2005 study by Oxford Research found that when Iraqis are asked what form of political system will work best in their nation for the future, 64 percent now say “a democratic government with a chance for the leader to be replaced from time to time.” Only 18 percent choose “a government headed by one strong leader for life,” and just 12 percent pick “an Islamic state where politicians rule according to religious principles.” This surge toward representative toleration—which did not enjoy majority support in Iraq as recently as early 2004—ought not to be taken for granted. It is an historic groundswell.

Iraq is now creeping away from murderous authoritarianism to face the more normal messes of a creaky Third World nation: corruption, poverty, health problems, miserable public services. And that is vastly preferable to what came before.


Karl Zinsmeister is editor in chief of TAE.

7 myths about the Challenger shuttle disaster

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7 myths about the Challenger shuttle disaster It didn't explode, the crew didn't die instantly and it wasn't inevitable
By James Oberg
NBC News space analyst
Special to MSNBC
Updated: 3:55 p.m. ET Jan. 26, 2006

HOUSTON - Twenty years ago, millions of television viewers were horrified to witness the live broadcast of the space shuttle Challenger exploding 73 seconds into flight, ending the lives of the seven astronauts on board. And they were equally horrified to learn in the aftermath of the disaster that the faulty design had been chosen by NASA to satisfy powerful politicians who had demanded the mission be launched, even under unsafe conditions. Meanwhile, a major factor in the disaster was that NASA had been ordered to use a weaker sealant for environmental reasons. Finally, NASA consoled itself and the nation with the realization that all frontiers are dangerous and to a certain extent, such a disaster should be accepted as inevitable.
At least, that seems to be how many people remember it, in whole or in part. That’s how the story of the Challenger is often retold, in oral tradition and broadcast news, in public speeches and in private conversations and all around the Internet. But spaceflight historians believe that each element of the opening paragraph is factually untrue or at best extremely dubious. They are myths, undeserving of popular belief and unworthy of being repeated at every anniversary of the disaster.
The flight, and the lost crewmembers, deserve proper recognition and authentic commemoration. Historians, reporters, and every citizen need to take the time this week to remember what really happened, and especially to make sure their memories are as close as humanly possible to what really did happen.
If that happens, here's the way the mission may be remembered:
  Few people actually saw the Challenger tragedy unfold live on television.
  The shuttle did not explode in the common definition of that word.
  The flight, and the astronauts’ lives, did not end at that point, 73 seconds after launch.
  The design of the booster, while possessing flaws subject to improvement, was neither especially dangerous if operated properly, nor the result of political interference.
  Replacement of the original asbestos-bearing putty in the booster seals was unrelated to the failure.
  There were pressures on the flight schedule, but none of any recognizable political origin.
  Claims that the disaster was the unavoidable price to be paid for pioneering a new frontier were self-serving rationalizations on the part of those responsible for incompetent engineering management — the disaster should have been avoidable.
Myth #1: A nation watched as tragedy unfoldedFew people actually saw what happened live on television. The flight occurred during the early years of cable news, and although CNN was indeed carrying the launch when the shuttle was destroyed, all major broadcast stations had cut away —  only to quickly return with taped relays. With Christa McAuliffe set to be the first teacher in space, NASA had arranged a satellite broadcast of the full mission into television sets in many schools, but the general public did not have access to this unless they were one of the then-few people with satellite dishes. What most people recall as a "live broadcast" was actually the taped replay broadcast soon after the event.
Myth #2: Challenger explodedThe shuttle did not explode in the common definition of that word. There was no shock wave, no detonation, no "bang" — viewers on the ground just heard the roar of the engines stop as the shuttle’s fuel tank tore apart, spilling liquid oxygen and hydrogen which formed a huge fireball at an altitude of 46,000 ft. (Some television documentaries later added the sound of an explosion to these images.) But both solid-fuel strap-on boosters climbed up out of the cloud, still firing and unharmed by any explosion. Challenger itself was torn apart as it was flung free of the other rocket components and turned broadside into the Mach 2 airstream. Individual propellant tanks were seen exploding — but by then, the spacecraft was already in pieces.
Myth #3: The crew died instantlyThe flight, and the astronauts’ lives, did not end at that point, 73 seconds after launch. After Challenger was torn apart, the pieces continued upward from their own momentum, reaching a peak altitude of 65,000 ft before arching back down into the water. The cabin hit the surface 2 minutes and 45 seconds after breakup, and all investigations indicate the crew was still alive until then.
What's less clear is whether they were conscious. If the cabin depressurized (as seems likely), the crew would have had difficulty breathing. In the words of the final report by fellow astronauts, the crew “possibly but not certainly lost consciousness”, even though a few of the emergency air bottles (designed for escape from a smoking vehicle on the ground) had been activated.
The cabin hit the water at a speed greater than 200 mph, resulting in a force of about 200 G’s — crushing the structure and destroying everything inside. If the crew did lose consciousness (and the cabin may have been sufficiently intact to hold enough air long enough to prevent this), it’s unknown if they would have regained it as the air thickened during the last seconds of the fall. Official NASA commemorations of “Challenger’s 73-second flight” subtly deflect attention from what was happened in the almost three minutes of flight (and life) remaining AFTER the breakup.
Myth #4: Dangerous booster flaws result of meddlingThe side-mounted booster rockets, which help propel the shuttle at launch then drop off during ascent, did possess flaws subject to improvement. But these flaws were neither especially dangerous if operated properly, nor the result of political interference.
Each of the pair of solid-fuel boosters was made from four separate segments that bolted end-to-end-to-end together, and flame escaping from one of the interfaces was what destroyed the shuttle. Although the obvious solution of making the boosters of one long segment (instead of four short ones) was later suggested, long solid fuel boosters have problems with safe propellant loading, with transport, and with stacking for launch — and multi-segment solids had had a good track record with the Titan-3 military satellite program. The winning contractor was located in Utah, the home state of a powerful Republican senator, but the company also had the strengths the NASA selection board was looking for. The segment interface was tricky and engineers kept tweaking the design to respond to flight anomalies, but when operated within tested environmental conditions, the equipment had been performing adequately.
Myth #5: Environmental ban led to weaker sealantA favorite of the Internet, this myth states that a major factor in the disaster was that NASA had been ordered by regulatory agencies to abandon a working pressure sealant because it contained too much asbestos, and use a weaker replacement. But the replacement of the seal was unrelated to the disaster — and occurred prior to any environmental ban.
Even the original putty had persistent sealing problems, and after it was replaced by another putty that also contained asbestos, the higher level of breaches was connected not to the putty itself, but to a new test procedure being used. “We discovered that it was this leak check which was a likely cause of the dangerous bubbles in the putty that I had heard about," wrote physicist Richard Feynman, a member of the Challenger investigation board.
And the bubble effect was unconnected with the actual seal violation that would ultimately doom Challenger and its crew. The cause was an inadequate low-temperature performance of the O-ring seal itself, which had not been replaced.
Myth #6: Political pressure forced the launchThere were pressures on the flight schedule, but none of any recognizable political origin. Launch officials clearly felt pressure to get the mission off after repeated delays, and they were embarrassed by repeated mockery on the television news of previous scrubs, but the driving factor in their minds seems to have been two shuttle-launched planetary probes. The first ever probes of this kind, they had an unmovable launch window just four months in the future. The persistent rumor that the White House had ordered the flight to proceed in order to spice up President Reagan’s scheduled State of the Union address seems based on political motivations, not any direct testimony or other first-hand evidence. Feynman personally checked out the rumor and never found any substantiation. If Challenger's flight had gone according to plan, the crew would have been asleep at the time of Reagan's speech, and no communications links had been set up.
Myth #7: An unavoidable price for progressClaims that the disaster was the unavoidable price to be paid for pioneering a new frontier were self-serving rationalizations on the part of those responsible for incompetent engineering management — the disaster should have been avoidable. NASA managers made a bad call for the launch decision, and engineers who had qualms about the O-rings were bullied or bamboozled into acquiescence. The skeptics’ argument that launching with record cold temperatures is valid, but it probably was not argued as persuasively as it might have been, in hindsight. If launched on a warmer day, with gentler high-altitude winds, there’s every reason to suppose the flight would have been successful and the troublesome seal design (which already had the attention of designers) would have been modified at a pace that turned out to have been far too leisurely. The disaster need never have happened if managers and workers had clung to known principles of safely operating on the edge of extreme hazards — nothing was learned by the disaster that hadn’t already been learned, and then forgotten.
NBC News space analyst James Oberg spent 22 years at NASA's Johnson Space Center as a Mission Control operator and an orbital designer.
© 2006 MSNBC Interactive
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© 2006 MSNBC.com
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