A SUMMER EXPERIMENT
Since we launched To The Point at the end of March, 2003, we have issued the TTP Weekly Report every single week for the last three+ years. I'm really proud of that and have every intention of continuing this record. It's going to be challenging to do so this summer, so here we go with an experiment. I haven't been stuck in DC for these past three years straight, but wherever I wandered off to in the world during that time, it's been for a short while, like a couple of weeks or so here and there. This summer is different, for I'll be out of the country for all of July and August. Sometimes I'll be in places where there will be an Internet connection, and sometimes not. Wherever I'm in the former, you'll hear from me - but there may be a gap or two when I'm in the latter. The TTP staff will make sure that the Weekly Report gets out in time, and with our brilliant regulars like Joel Wade, Michael Ledeen, Jack Kelly, Neal Asbury, Dagny D'Anconia, and Dennis Turner. As for me, I'll be providing at least a "sitrep" (situation report) on each country I'm in. As of now, that will be: Japan, Thailand, Cambodia, India, Pakistan, Turkey, Israel, Croatia, Montenegro, Austria, Switzerland, France, and Spain. Plus a surprise or two.
BILL KELLER BELONGS IN JAIL FOR TREASON
We spend tens of billions of dollars each year on (often not very good) intelligence. But all al Qaeda needs to buy is a subscription to the New York Times. The administration has sound legal grounds for prosecuting the Times under the Espionage Act, Gabriel Schoenfeld argued in a lengthy essay in Commentary in March. Newsday columnist James Pinkerton thinks the Times should be prosecuted, but that the Bush administration lacks the political courage to do so. For the sake of the nation's security, the Times must be prosecuted, most especially its Editor, Bill Keller. (Google "Bill Keller" + "treason" and you'll get close to 40,000 hits.)
THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE UGLY IN MEXICO
Last month we discussed in Bad News for Hugo how the ugliest man in Mexico right now is Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez. By getting voters to think that Lopez Obrador would be a Mexican Chavez if elected president this Sunday (July 2), Felipe Calderon has a chance of beating him. It's a given in most every conservative mind that an Obrador victory would be a disaster for the US, and a Calderon one vastly preferable. That's because Obrador is an anti-American Marxist and Calderon is a pro-American free market advocate. It seems a no-brainer to root for Calderon. I, too, will be rooting for Felipe this Sunday. Regrettably, the odds favor Obrador. We can hope he loses, but if he wins, we'd better start thinking fast how to turn the danger of his victory into an opportunity. Let's start now.
THE WEASELS HAVE WON
It was back in October 2004, in Porter At The Pass, that we first discussed the true nature of the CIA:
Most folks think the CIA is a right-wing outfit. It is not. The CIA has been dominated by incompetent left-wing hyper-liberals for years.These CIA lefties - known as "Rogue Weasels" by their more competent counterparts - were conducting a covert war against the Bush Administration by leaking damaging classified information to leftwing journalists in the press. When George Bush finally got rid of George Tenet and installed Porter Goss as CIA Director, the weasels began a covert war against their own agency - as discussed in The Rogue Weasels Club last December. That's because Porter was trying to root them out. One of the chief weasels Porter was able to dump was Deputy Director of Operations Stephen Kappes, who had been a principal conduit of classified information leaked to Washington Post reporters Dana Priest and Walter Pincus. How the weasels struck back and got their revenge on Porter was explained in Porter and Casey last month. Now this week, we have final confirmation of the weasels' triumph.
THERE’S ALWAYS A MOSQUE
Some day we will be forced to deal fully with the war we are in, and when that happens we're going to discover a lot of very nasty problems about the future of America. One of them has to do with, of all things, the First Amendment. Consider this story from Wednesday's (June 21) London Times about British jihadis coming to Queens to recruit Americans. And where did they recruit them? In a mosque, of course. Because there's always a mosque, as my Italian friend Magdi Allam has been repeating for several years. Not all mosques are jihadi, but all jihadis come from a mosque.
MOONBAT RIGHT
We call To The Point "The Oasis for Rational Conservatives." We've gotten a flood of emails this week asking if articles on certain websites claiming that George Bush has "a secret plan to abolish American sovereignty" are being pushed by Irrational Conservatives. The answer is yes. We all focus so much on the moonbats of the left - barking mad hairshirts like Algore, Moveon.org folks driven treasonously insane by Bush Derangement Syndrome - that it's important to recognize there are moonbats of the right. For some weird reason which has to do with psychology rather than reality, a small but loud subset of conservatives easily falls prey to conspiracy theories about cabals of powerful people meeting in secret to take over the world: the Bilderbergers, the Trilaterialists, the Council on Foreign Relations, or some such. The world headquarters of this subset of conservatives is on a grassy knoll in downtown Dallas.
HACKING WINDOWS UPDATES
By some counts, 99 versions of 17 different products are affected by vulnerabilities disclosed this past week by Microsoft in 12 different vulnerability reports. The updates are all available through the usual channels: Windows Update, Microsoft Update, Software Update Services, and direct downloads through the advisory pages linked to above. As you all know by now, you can't get the updates until Microsoft verifies that you have a genuine copy of Microsoft Windows. What you don't know is how Microsoft verifies it.
THE NET NEUTRALITY CON
You probably have seen the ads about the "net neutrality" bills before Congress, concerning who gets to manage and set fees for access to the Internet. The House of Representatives has just done the right thing by defeating the so-called net neutrality proposals, and the issue is now before the Senate. The "net neutrality" advocates are a strange coalition of leftist political groups hostile to property rights, self-appointed consumer groups totally ignorant of good economics, and a few large business users of the Internet (such as Google) who want the telecom companies to provide them a free ride for their demands for a more robust network. To understand the fight, you need to be aware of the economic interests of the various players.
YES, THE MEDIA WANT US TO LOSE IN IRAQ BUT THEY MAY NOT SUCCEED
Dan Rather's 44-year relationship with CBS News came to an unceremonious end this week. This should remind us that of the many differences between the Vietnam war and the war in Iraq, the three most important are talk radio, Fox News, and the Internet. Mr. Rather must think his fate unfair. He was in effect fired when the documents on which he based an expose of President Bush's National Guard service were shown to be clumsy forgeries. But Walter Cronkite, who told a much bigger lie, is still an esteemed figure at CBS. The one great similarity between Vietnam and Iraq is that our enemies, despairing of victory on the battlefield, sought to win with a propaganda campaign. In Vietnam, this strategy succeeded. If it fails in Iraq, it will be chiefly because of the emergence of the new media.
CHENEY COOLING ON CONDI
A year and a half ago, just after GW’s second inauguration, in Cheney and Condi, you first learned of the Bush-Cheney plan to have Condi Rice replace Dick Cheney as Vice-President.
Then, in 44, you learned that Bush’s private nickname for Condi is “44” – meaning that as his dad and he are known in the White House as “41” and “43,” he intends for her to be the 44th President of the United States.
But in Cooling on Condi, we let the other shoe drop and discussed Condi’s inability to control her State Department’s compulsion for appeasement regarding Iran.
Nonetheless, all indications have continued that the Cheney-Condi Switch was still on track, scheduled to be implemented this fall as an ultimate October Surprise to lock in GOP House/Senate victories in November.
Until now. Earlier this month, Condi insultingly and gratuitously dissed Cheney, and threw her lot in completely with the spineless pinstripes infesting Foggy Bottom. And over no small matter, but the most critical foreign policy issue of the moment.