Recieved this in my inbox:

The US Congress has authorized the President of the US to go to war
against Iraq. Please consider this an urgent request.

UN Petition for Peace: Stand for Peace. Islam is not the Enemy. War is
NOT the Answer. Today we are at a point of imbalance in the world and are moving toward
what may be the beginning of a THIRD WORLD WAR. If you are against this possibility, the UN is gathering signatures in an effort to avoid a tragic world event.

It's just another Internet chain letter, but surprise, surprise, the first 23 names are from France.

I'm at war with your country not for personal reasons but because you have killed so many innocents, so many children. ... My fate is in Allah's hands. ... I leave you to judge. --Convicted terrorist Richard Reid

...Ok, so his solution to the problem of us killing innocents and children is to light his shoes and blow up hundreds of innocents.... Yeahhhhh... riiiiiiight.... Just a reminder of how illogical they are.

From a Chicago Tribune column by Don Wycliff where he's arguing that Bush didn't make the case for why Iraq is a threat to us:

As I listened to the president speak that sentence about "one vial, one canister, one crate" that could "bring a day of horror like none we have ever known," my mind went back to one of the hit movies of last summer, "The Sum of All Fears."

Based on the Tom Clancy novel of that name, the movie depicted a terrorist group's successful effort to acquire and smuggle into the U.S. a nuclear bomb, which is detonated in Baltimore and devastates that city.

Interestingly, the nuke in that instance was not of Iraqi manufacture, or North Korean or any other rogue nation's. It was made in Israel, with fissile material supplied by the United States.

--Don Wycliff - Chicago Tribune

The bigger point though is that Wycliff actually seems to believe that just because Baltimore was blown up in a movie with an Israeli warhead that somehow precludes Iraq exporting weapons of mass destruction in real life. How he manages to get from Point A to Point B I have no idea.

The Wall Street Journal carries a letter from the leaders of Spain, Portugal, Italy, Britain, Hungary, Poland, Denmark, and the Czech Republic today in which they affirm their support for President Bush.
Snippet:

Europe has no quarrel with the Iraqi people. Indeed, they are the first victims of Iraq's current brutal regime. Our goal is to safeguard world peace and security by ensuring that this regime gives up its weapons of mass destruction. Our governments have a common responsibility to face this threat. Failure to do so would be nothing less than negligent to our own citizens and to the wider world.
The U.N. Charter charges the Security Council with the task of preserving international peace and security. To do so, the Security Council must maintain its credibility by ensuring full compliance with its resolutions. We cannot allow a dictator to systematically violate those resolutions. If they are not complied with, the Security Council will lose its credibility and world peace will suffer as a result. We are confident that the Security Council will face up to its responsibilities.

There's been a lot of talk about how France is only opposing the war because of their oil interests. I suspect the real reason could very well be beret exports. Just think how much France stands to lose in beret exports alone if Saddam is removed!

This sounds like it's from The Onion, but it's not. Iraq to chair U.N. disarmament conference.

Ladies and gentlemen, seldom has history offered a greater opportunity to do so much for so many. We have confronted, and will continue to confront, HIV/AIDS in our own country. And to meet a severe and urgent crisis abroad, tonight I propose the Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief - a work of mercy beyond all current international efforts to help the people of Africa. This comprehensive plan will prevent seven million new AIDS infections ... treat at least two million people with life-extending drugs ... and provide humane care for millions of people suffering from AIDS, and for children orphaned by AIDS. I ask the Congress to commit 15 billion dollars over the next five years, including nearly ten billion dollars in new money, to turn the tide against AIDS in the most afflicted nations of Africa and the Caribbean.

This is a big commitment for a country to make, and I think just goes to show how great a country America is. This isn't about improving our economy. This isn't about putting more money in voters' pockets. This is about doing something for the pure humanitarian desire to help people. The fact that even with the current economic problems we both have the will and are still well enough off to help 9 million people on another continent is just huge and speaks volumes for the spirit of America.

Realpolitik has some good cartoons today.

Sure it's for a Democrat, but how could you pass up the opportunity to get your very own Presidential Candidate Yarmulke?

An interview with a member of an Air Force rescue team that was shot down over Afghanistan has made its way onto the web. Apparently the Air Force has confirmed its authenticity.

A sample:

For the next thirteen hours, there were sporadic firefights from about 300 meters away. All of the close fighting was done because we had neutralized all close enemies. The mountaintop had three different peaks. We held the two highest ones. About 300 meters to our south, southeast was the third hilltop where the enemy was coming up. At one point Controller told me that the enemy was trying to reinforce with seventy guys. I was not clear if he was talking about seventy friendly or enemy. I then asked if the seventy guys coming up this way were not my friends. He said "Roger". I said I wanted to make sure that was clear. I tried to keep that between the PL and myself because it would have destroyed the other guys' morale. I think the PL let the team know so they could be ready. We never did see the seventy enemies.

January 28, 2003 -- WASHINGTON - Saddam Hussein has ordered official death certificates sent to Iraqi scientists' families as a chilling warning against aiding U.N. inspectors, The Post has learned. Word of the death certificates containing prominent scientists' names has reached Iraqi exile groups.

"The message is, they will die a terrible death if they cooperate - and the death will be legally listed as an accident or result of an illness," said one exile.

Iraqi scientists have refused to speak to U.N. weapons inspectors without government minders present.

What if Germany had been ordered to disarm in the years prior to WWII? What if Hitler had ignored the world community at every turn?

Wait a minute, both of those happened, so let's move on to #3.

What if the world had risen up and put Hitler in his place before he had a chance to wreak havoc across Europe?

Hitler hadn't done anything to us at that point. Simply not followed the will of the international community. Would the world not have undeniably been a better place?

The question is not what has Saddam done to us, it is what WILL Saddam do to us. We owe it to humanity to learn from the mistakes of the 20th century and put an end to the Iraqi threat. Hitler could have been turned back by a resolute international community at numerous points but wasn't. Of course Saddam may not be the next incarnation of Nazi Germany, but can we afford to take the chance?

There's no one on this Hill or in this country who likes tax cuts more than I do. I've never seen one too big for me to swallow without water. I'd even be willing to pass both the president's plan and the Democrats' plan--as long as we were willing to cut federal spending at the same time. I just firmly believe that government takes too much from our taxpayers--big and little alike. ... When it comes to out-of-control federal spending, you don't find many members of Congress who have made it a high priority. In the Senate, there's John McCain and the pork projects he ridicules; there's George Voinovich, Russ Feingold, Judd Gregg; there's Larry Craig with his balanced-budget amendment. That's not even enough for a baseball team. And yes, I'm guilty of not supporting them as I should have.

It's been said the Democrats blame the deficit on Republican tax cuts and the Republicans blame the deficits on the Democrats' social programs. And as long as they can blame each other, they will never solve the problem.

It's not about whether the inspectors find anything, it's about whether Iraq is cooperating.

He's at his best when he's mocking the French.

According to the United Nations, one man approached the hotel's security gate with a metal instrument before Iraqi guards wrestled him to the ground. He was found to have three knives, the United Nations said.

About 40 minutes later, another Iraqi man stopped a U.N. vehicle outside the headquarters, pleading "Save me! Save me!" in Arabic, according to the United Nations.

The man, apparently unarmed, forced his way into the driver's seat of the stopped vehicle. As an Iraqi guard struggled to pull him out, a U.N. inspector watched from the passenger seat.

Iraqi officials took both men into custody.
--CNN

Does anybody out there actually believe these guys will still be alive when we finally get a chance to go in and liberate the country?

From The Sun:

Today, in just five years as Chancellor, Gerhard Schroeder has stained the German flag, sabotaged German integrity and pulled the plug on the German economy.

He is the joke of European politics, a vain man clinging to power at any price. That price is paid at home by 4million jobless Germans.

It is also paid abroad as Germany’s painfully restored image is destroyed.

Schroeder, 58, sold his soul by clinging to power in a coalition with Greens. In return, he was forced to reject military action, even against a tyrant denounced by the UN.

Schroeder is a vain philanderer who sues anyone brave enough to suggest he dyes his hair or betrays his fourth wife.

He is so desperate for support that he has signed up to a shabby alliance with crooked French President Jacques Chirac.

The two men are playing a dangerous game for control of the EU.

And the greatest casualty looks like being euro-lover Tony Blair.

The Odd Couple have ganged up to carve up Europe and elbow Britain aside. Against Mr Blair’s wishes, they want a Franco-German Czar to run the expanded 25-member EU.

Rummy's ticked off the French and Germans.

"I find this comment on 'old Europe' deeply irritating. Old Europe is resilient and capable of bouncing back," French Finance Minister Francis Mer said.

In an editorial, Bild reminded Rumsfeld of his German roots and the ideals of the French Revolution which inspired the United States' constitution.

French media quoted French Defence Minister Michele Alliot-Marie as saying: "We are no longer in prehistoric times when whoever had the biggest club would try to knock the other guy out so he could steal his mammoth skin."

"Does Washington want to risk a rift in the North Atlantic alliance over Iraq, which could lead to a division of Europe into countries that follow 'modern' America and an 'old' and 'problematic' faction that no longer wants to?" the conservative Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung asked.

A Seattle based group, the Council on Political Accountability, is .squatting on domains bearing the names of over 140 politicians, to protest the GOP's supposedly racist ways. They're linking the web sites to other sites such as the National Association for the Advancement of White People and a petition to legalize cannibalization.

Jim Petro, the Ohio Attorney General is fighting to get the domain names(which are up for auction on ebay) turned over to the politicians and is looking into pressing charges under the Anti-Cyber Squatting Protection Act.

Condoleezza Rice clearly shows what it means to voluntarily disarm.

There is no mystery to voluntary disarmament. Countries that decide to disarm lead inspectors to weapons and production sites, answer questions before they are asked, state publicly and often the intention to disarm and urge their citizens to cooperate. The world knows from examples set by South Africa, Ukraine and Kazakhstan what it looks like when a government decides that it will cooperatively give up its weapons of mass destruction. The critical common elements of these efforts include a high-level political commitment to disarm, national initiatives to dismantle weapons programs, and full cooperation and transparency. --NY Times

I love it, the spam I'm receiving is now complaining about how annoying pop-ups are. :)

GUESS WHO'S PRO-LIFE [Rod Dreher] The actor Jack Nicholson, who discovered as an adult that the woman he was raised to believe was his sister was actually his mother, who had conceived him when she was a teenager. She was advised to get an abortion, but chose life. Her son became a pro-lifer. He once said, "I'm very contra my constituency in terms of abortion because I'm positively against it. I don't have the right to any other view. My only emotion is gratitude, literally, for my life." --The Corner on National Review Online

--Addendum--
1. Whether he's pro-life or simply anti-abortion it's still unusual for any big star in Hollywood to hold the beliefs he holds.
2. For the record, I take more of a states' rights view of abortion than a pro-life one. I just don't think that the Federal government has the right to tell the states what to believe on the issue of abortion.

Oliphant's cartoon today takes a good look at affirmative action and reparations.

Neal walked off Donahue's show last night.

On Monday, the foreign minister indicated that France was ready to take a leading role in attempting to slow U.S. and British war plans. As a permanent member of the United Nations, France can veto any resolution that would authorize military action. De Villepin said there was no evidence so far that justified military action, and he didn’t rule out the possibility of a French veto if the United States sought a second resolution authorizing military action. “In the event of second resolution ... we will not associate ourselves with military intervention that is not supported by the international community,” he said. “Using force like that would only be a last resort assuming all other possibilities are exhausted.” --MSNBC

Well that settles it, we'll just have to take an extra 15 seconds to get France to surrender before we can get this thing done.

So, they say we can't fight Iraq because they've done nothing wrong, but they see no problem taking on the likes of Starbucks and Citicorp? Yeah, these anti-war protestors are comepletely rational people.

WKRC has fired Pat Barry from his 3-6 PM shift. He will be replaced by Sean Hannity.

While in general I'm sad to see local hosts lose out to national syndication I'm finding it hard to mourn the loss of Barry's show specifically. While he made sense much of the time I just thought that the show focused far to much on why people weren't coming downtown and had a tendancy to devolve into disagreements about either the definition of where downtown started and ended or whether he really was rude to his callers. The show left something to be desired, but I wish Barry the best of luck in the future.

Opinion Journal explains how Bush's tax plan makes the system even more progressive.

They try to suppress black voting, they ran on the Confederate flag in Georgia and South Carolina, and from top to bottom the Republicans supported it.
--William Jefferson Clinton

It's the Republicans who are supposed to be running on the Georgia flag, right? Well try
this on for size.

NRO has obtained a photo of a lawn sign distributed by Mike Snow's campaign and stuck on lawns all over Walker County and paid for by the Georgia House Democratic Caucus (for all intents and purposes, the money is from the Georgia Democratic party).

The sign, which displays the old Georgia state flag (two-thirds of which is the Confederate battle flag), reads: "Mike Voted To Keep Our Flag … Let's Vote To Keep Mike!"

Yep, it's the Republicans who are exclusively the hypocrites... uh uh...

Thanks to NRO and Boortz through whom I found it.

Fox renews 'Simpsons' through 2005.

This will make The Simpsons the longest running comedy ever.

Now for the quibble...

"King of the Hill," meanwhile, has "aided in the branding of our network as the only broadcaster that's been able to tackle primetime animation," she said....

...except of course for Futurama which they have mistreated every step of the way. The way they've yanked that show around is a crime.

"U.N. weapons inspectors were checking Friday to see if empty chemical warheads found Thursday were mentioned in last month's 12,000-page Iraqi declaration to the United Nations."

Shouldn't it be up to Iraq to prove that they were in the declaration? Would just a page number be too much to ask for?

If you needed any more proof that what Illinois' Governor Ryan did was wrong, Ted Rall calls it "a case study of principled integrity triumphing over personal and political flaws." If that isn't a damning comment I don't know what is.

CBS is planning a miniseries depicting a young Hitler, which has led to protests from Jewish leaders, complaining that it could "humanize" Hitler. I personally don't see the problem with humanizing Hitler. Hitler wasn't some supernatural force; he was simply a man who did terrible things.

It's pretty much universally accepted that Hitler was quite possibly the most evil man ever, but I think we are doing a great disservice to future generations if we pass on only this monolithic, evil version of him. Far too much emphasis is put on what a great job was done in destroying him and sympathy for his victims, and not enough on how his existence can teach us in the future. By setting him up as evil incarnate we are setting the bar entirely too high for the recognition of future evil. As evil as anyone may be, people can point to his good points and say "He's no Hitler." I think it needs pointed out that Hitler did in fact do some good things. *insert standard Volkswagon and autobahn examples here* This isn't to say that these good things in anyway compensate for the atrocities he committed, but for comparison with future and present examples of evil *cough* *Saddam* *cough* it's important that we retain a true measure of how Hitler appeared in his day to measure future evil against.

By casting Hitler in an entirely evil light I believe we are failing to learn the true lessons of the tragedy and we turn Hitler into a fairy tale wicked witch instead of a living, breathing example of the evil that can exist in this world.

Hmmm, let's see... They have chemical warheads, and they have mustard gas that still hasn't been destroyed. Yeah, that doesn't seem good.

Orson Scott Card (my favorite author BTW, if you haven't read Ender's Game you really should) has a piece up on why we won’t invade North Korea.

“Why are we preparing to invade Iraq, which has no nukes yet, when we’re using diplomacy with North Korea, which actually has them?”

Of course, you can take that as a self-answering question. Let’s see – which is safer to invade, the country that almost has nukes, or the country that already has them?

But the real answer is much more complicated.

First, let’s keep in mind what we’re actually trying to accomplish in Iraq. We aren’t preparing to invade because Saddam Hussein’s been a bad boy, or because we want to have an America colony in Mesopotamia. It’s not a punishment, it’s not retribution.

It’s prevention.

You can’t fight a war to prevent something that’s already happened. Preventive war to keep North Korea from getting nukes is impossible.
...
Foreign policy is conducted in the real world. In the real world, madmen like Saddam Hussein respond only to credible military force – and sometimes not even then. For the safety of our friends and allies in the region (notably Israel, Turkey, Jordan and Kuwait), and to protect the First World’s vital oil supplies from domination by a ruthless enemy, it is reasonable to strike that enemy before he wreaks devastation again.

In that same real world, however, there are opponents whom it is simply too dangerous to fight, unless you are forced into it. If China or Russia attacked us, of course we would defend ourselves. But we would have to be insane to provoke either of them into war.

Ralph Nader on Crossfire : "The Pentagon is getting ready to wage war, perhaps on Iraq, but certainly on the environment..."

Just a thought but since we have thousands of nuclear warheads, If we waged a war on the environment it wouldn't stand a chance.

Do you think they will ever learn that this insanely overblown rhetoric of theirs scares away reasonable people?

Frist is calling the Dems on their politicizing or racial issues.

"I think this, unfortunately, is trying to use race and racial issues to play politics," Mr. Frist said of Democrats on "Fox News Sunday." "Judge Pickering is a well-qualified judge. The American Bar Association used those words, 'well-qualified.' I plan on supporting Pickering."
Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, South Dakota Democrat, meanwhile, renewed his party's pledge to try to block the nomination.
"I think this really lays bare the administration's real position on civil rights," Mr. Daschle said on ABC's "This Week." "This exposes the Southern strategy clearly. There is no doubt in my mind we now know from where they come. And we're going to do everything we can to stop that nomination, on the floor and in the committee, including a filibuster."

I'd take the arguments that Illinois' Governor Ryan made a thoughtful and considered decision in commuting the sentences of the entire death row population if he did it on a case-by-case basis. There has got to be one death row inmate who is clearly guilty, and with the clearly guilty having their sentences commuted this becomes not about whether the death penalty is applied fairly, it becomes about whether it should be applied at all, and that's a decision for the people of Illinois at large, not simply for the Governor.

[N]o Republican was seen waving the contract in the air in protest last week when the new Congress convened with a gavel-quick rules change quietly eliminating the four-term limit on the House speakership.
...
This nod to the value of experience on the job might be applauded but for the underlying hypocrisy.
--NY Times Editorial

I care for hypocrisy as little as the next guy, most likely even more actually, but it would be nice if the Times could see the hypocrisy of both sides equally.

...I suggest you check out Byron York's piece over at NRO. It gives a good account of the much ballyhooed cross-burning case and how it's not really the racist travesty it's made out to be by the left. Also check out Part 2 of the piece.

(Addendum: Not only did I spell "ballyhooed" right, but the spell checker even agrees. Never would have expected that.)

VH1 yesterday in their "I Love The 80's" marathon suggested pretty heavily that He-Man is flaming gay. I now find myself having to reevaluate my entire worldview. I just pray to God nobody comes up with a "The Transformers were actually a metaphor for transexualism" theory in the near future or I may be totally lost.

Eventually we're going to kick Iraq's ass and there'll be a new government installed and it won't be a dictator set up by the US, and the people will be happy, and we won't have hijacked their oil. I can't wait to see the faces of the anti-war people then.

The "heir to the Max Factor fortune" is running from the law after using the date rape drug on 3 women. Aren't the rich supposed to become criminal masterminds and engage in grand conspiracies to take over the world? Is this really the best rich, eccentric criminal we can turn out? Is it too much to ask for a few henchmen at least?

Would it kill the University to schedule classes at 2 seperate times? Why is it that every class I want/need to take is only offered MWF 2:00-3:00? *grumble*

Excerpt:

Okay, let me see if I've got all this straight now:

Trent Lott is Beelzebub incarnate, and Robert Byrd is "the conscience of the Senate."

"Education not legislation" is the only realistic answer for drug abuse, general criminal behavior, and just about any other problem - except firearms abuse, where only more legislation (in spite of the fact that there are already over 20,000 firearms laws on the books) will possibly work.

The bottom 50% of all taxpayers paid 3.9% of the taxes in 2000 while earning 13% of all income. The top 1% of taxpayers earned 20.8% of the income earned and paid 37.4% of the taxes. This last number is up from 25.1% in 1990. There were 32 million tax returns in the top 25% of income (ie, those who made over $55,225); these people earned 67.3% of the nation's income, and paid 84% of the taxes. But every single last tax cut anyone will propose ("anyone" meaning the Republicans - the Dems won't be doing it) will be a "tax cut for the rich," and this will be derided as unfair - even though they're the ones paying the damned bills in the first place. (source)

Doing anything about Saddam Hussein before he manages to aquire nuclear weapons is absolutely and damnably wrong; we ought instead to be focusing on North Korea now that it already has them.

The US has absolutely no right to interfere in the policies and decisions of foreign governments that are demonstrably hostile to us. But the US has not only the right but an absolute moral obligation to stop Israel from defending itself effectively against Palestinian suicide bombers, and to undermine other non-hostile governments when they do anything liberals don't like. US out of Iraq, and back into Bosnia instead. No blood for oil, but take all you need for any military adventures the UN deems worthwhile.

I could come up with better policy decisions for the Axis of Evil with two mentally deficient monkeys.

First things first, I'm not opposed to reinstating the draft... if it's necessary. By no measure however is it in any way necessary. We have the best-trained armed forces out there and best of all they all want to be there. We're not going and conscripting the poor and the helpless to be cannon fodder here, we're taking people who want to serve they're country and putting them to the best possible use. If the people in our military don't want to be there they can simply not join up, nobody's forcing them too. If they do that and we suddenly have a shortage of people to fight, THEN we can talk about reinstating the draft.

Of course Rangle's reasoning behind wanting the draft has nothing to do with making the military better, it's about scaring the bejeezus out of people. It's about making people so afraid that they or a loved one could die that they'll put their own well being above what is best for their country and their world. He wants all of us to face the possibility of death should we have to go to war. It's simply idiotic. By that reasoning, why don't we, when we officially start a war, just pay for the bad guys' transport to New York so that innocent Americans can be put in harms way? It would serve the exact same purpose.

As much as he might want to wrap the idea in patriotism, this idea is simply insipid. There are innumerable ways for some people to better serve their country than to actively serve in the military, and our goal should be to put each person to best use. For some that IS being in the military. For some that is building weapons for the military. For many it's simply producing the things needed to keep our everyday lives going. Everybody serves our country in a different way, and as long as they are that is all we can ask.

As a University of Cincinnati student it really pains me to say this, but... Go Bucks!

:(

There are few things as ironic as watching Phil Donahue complaining on his nationally televised show about the conservative bias of the media. Shouldn't he at least wait until he's inevitably cancelled before he starts whining about that?

That the nutjob parents of the supposed clone may not allow testing. Never would have thunk it.

Not everyone who hasn't been in the military doesn't have respect for it. (Ok, I think all those negations equal out... Hmmm...) As a matter of fact, that particular fault tends to fall more on the liberal side than the conservative.

...I think I should renew my support for Andy Serkis as Gollum/Smeagol for Best Supporting Actor. If he were just in a costume or makeup he'd be eligible, so I don't see why it shouldn't count if he supplies the voice and motions, and mannerisms, etc...

Wow, it seems like just yesterday it was 2002.