Klein's Quips

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January 31, 2006

Bush's State of the Union

President Bush's speech tonight left me pretty underwhelmed, although few State of the Union Address's are anything more than a laundry list of proposals that won't see the light of day.

One thing that jumped out at me was that Bush didn't take a particularly hard line on Iran, which is the most pressing national security threat. He said:

The Iranian government is defying the world with its nuclear ambitions, and the nations of the world must not permit the Iranian regime to gain nuclear weapons. America will continue to rally the world to confront these threats.

Sure, Iranians "must" not have nukes, but what is he doing to ensure that they won't? What will be the consequences for Iran when it defies the rest of the world?

As for Hamas, Bush said:

The Palestinian people have voted in elections. And now the leaders of Hamas must recognize Israel, disarm, reject terrorism, and work for lasting peace.

Again, Bush can say they "must" do all of those things, but it's clear that they won't. So what then?

Moving on to domestic matters, I found it laughable that Bush would try to portray himself as a budget hawk given that he has expanded the size of the federal government more than any president since LBJ.

He said:

Every year of my presidency, we've reduced the growth of non-security discretionary spending, and last year you passed bills that cut this spending. This year my budget will cut it again, and reduce or eliminate more than 140 programs that are performing poorly or not fulfilling essential priorities. By passing these reforms, we will save the American taxpayer another $14 billion next year, and stay on track to cut the deficit in half by 2009.

Great. Cutting $14 billion, when the 2006 deficit is projected to be $390 billion. Not to mention that in the speech he also proposed to increase funding for alternative fuels, science research and training teachers, among other initiatives.

I found myself bristling when Democrats applauded Bush's statement that, "Congress did not act last year on my proposal to save Social Security..." Yeah, ignoring a looming fiscal crisis and denying Americans the opportunity to have more control over their retirement is really something to be proud of.

Unlike some conservatives, I'm not going to blame Bush for the defeat of Social Security. Even though he could have done a better job selling it, he did go to bat on the issue last year, and it was really wobbly moderate Republicans that pulled the rug out from under him without putting up a fight.

Tonight he mentioned that, "By 2030, spending for Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid alone will be almost 60 percent of the entire federal budget." To solve the problem, he said he wanted to create a commission to study the matter, which as we all know, means nothing. Late last year the commission he appointed to study tax reform came back with several proposals to simplify the tax code. Tax reform was supposed to be one of the main pillars of his second term agenda, but there wasn't a reference to it tonight. So, I’m not holding my breath for entitlement reform.

Of course, we shouldn't expect the same president who pushed the multi-trillion dollar prescription drug plan to be a successful champion of entitlement reform.

Posted by Philip Klein at 11:23 PM | Comments (1)

Poor Libertarians

In op-ed in today’s Wall Street Journal (link unavailable) called “Libertarian Orphans” David Boaz points to a Gallup Poll as evidence that 20 percent of the country is libertarian and he laments that these people are underrepresented in politics and the media. But libertarians have nobody to blame but themselves. Libertarians may want to laugh at the religious right, but whatever you may think about their views, they undeniably earned their place at the table. For decades religious conservatives have been politically active, they have organized, donated their money and they have shown up for Republicans on Election Day. Meanwhile, libertarians by nature tend to be too cynical about politics to become active and get involved in campaigning, and would rather sit back and be critics, or work in think tanks or intellectual journals. Some libertarians think that the Democrats are the lesser of two evils, some think that the Republicans are and others would rather vote for a Libertarian Party candidate in protest. Still others will brag about how they didn’t vote at all, as if this makes them morally superior because they will never feel responsible for what happens. Now, these are all defensible positions on some level, but the bottom line is that when you add them all up, it means that libertarianism will never translate into political power. For a group of people who oppose anti-poverty programs out of a belief that in a capitalist system anybody who works hard and has talent can succeed, libertarians are awful defeatist when it comes to politics. Rather than fight the fight, they’d rather sit back so that they can complain about the outcome.

So, to answer a question posed by Boaz, “What’s a libertarian to do”? I’d argue that they should get more politically active. Libertarians who won’t participate in the political system are the ones to blame for the under representation of libertarians in politics, and nobody else.

Over the next week, I hope to post some additional thoughts on the nature of libertarianism.

Posted by Philip Klein at 8:11 PM | Comments (1)

January 30, 2006

Palestinian Grievances

All the talk about Hamas's election triumph being the result of Palestinian suffering has reminded me of something Mark Helprin once wrote in a prescient article written about a year before the Second Intifada:

Germany did have grievances that were real and of great moment, but they were as nothing compared with its ambitions, to which they were merely the preliminary.

The brilliant essay, "Cape and Sword" is always worth a read.

Posted by Philip Klein at 9:00 PM | Comments (0)

U.S., EU Already Showing Signs of Softening on Hamas Aid

From the NY Times:

LONDON, Jan. 30 — Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and senior European envoys signaled today that there would no immediate suspension of aid for the Palestinian Authority following the victory by Hamas in last week's Palestinian elections, but they continued to warn that aid could be cut off once a Hamas-led government takes power in coming weeks.

The diplomats' instinct, various officials said, was to avoid provoking an immediate confrontation with Hamas, especially as it puts together its regime. They were also trying to avoid actions seen as prejudging what Hamas will do and to keep the door open to aid if Hamas renounces violence and recognizes Israel's right to exist...

Reading between the lines, it seems as though as long as Mahmoud Abbas stays on as president and perhaps a non-Hamas prime minister is appointed, aid will be continue, and the world will have caved in to terrorism.

Other parts of the story deserve some comment:

Their discussion came as the Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, and a leader of Hamas today urged Western countries not to cut aid, citing the hardships it would impose on the impoverished Palestinians.

If they were so worried about losing aid, the Palestinians should have considered that when they decided to vote for a terrorist group.

So far Hamas has disavowed any intention of changing its strategy or its covenants opposing the existence of Israel. But there is still hope, however tenuous, among some Europeans and Americans of some kind of modification of these tenets.

Hope? Based on what?

Posted by Philip Klein at 5:07 PM | Comments (0)

John McLaughlin Joins the Hamas Apologists

In yesterday's McLaughlin Group, John McLaughlin joined the chorus of voices trying to portray Hamas as a moderate group. You come to expect that type of nonsense from the rest of the panel, which includes Eleanor Clift and serial Israel-basher Pat Buchanan, but it is disappointing that McLaughlin himself would prove so naive. Thank God Mort Zuckerman and Tony Blankley were on the panel to set him straight. I'll link to a transcript of the show when it comes available. But one part that really bugged me was when McLaughlin displayed pictures of top Hamas leaders and insisted they were moderates without giving evidence to support his claim.

For instance, McLaughlin said Mahmoud Zahar was a "closet pragmatist." This is the same Zahar, who, as I detail below, has not backed down from Hamas's stated goal of destroying Israel. The same Zahar who once bragged to the New York Times about how many Israelis Hamas killed in two attacks including the notorious massacre at a Passover Seder. From the NY Times article of April 4, 2002, which is available here if you subscribe to TimesSelect:

''Forty were killed and 200 injured -- in just two operations,'' another of the leaders, Mahmoud al-Zahar, said with a smile.

Some pragmatist.

McLaughlin also said of Khaled Mash'al that "he's probably, ultimately, a pragmatist." It's hard to reconcile that with Mash'al's appearance on Al-Jazeera over the weekend, in which he said, in response to U.S. and European calls to renounce terrorism: "We are committed to the resistance and adhere to its weapons."

You can read a transcript of the Al-Jazeera interview here or view the video here.

Supporters of Israel have been fooling themselves into thinking that with Hamas's victory, the mask is removed from the Palestinian leadership and now the rest of the world will realize that Palestinians aren't serious about peace. Wake up people! Already, you have the likes of John McLaughlin trying to portray terrorists as "pragmatists."

Posted by Philip Klein at 3:48 PM | Comments (0)

Palestinians Vote For Terror, Media Says Vote Was About Corruption

The popular narrative being circulated in the media (both by Hamas apologists and even many supporters of Israel) is that Hamas's landslide victory in the Palestinian elections was merely a response to massive corruption by the ruling Fatah party. Clearly, the legacy of Yasser Arafat's corrupt dictatorship had a lot to do with Hamas's smashing victory, and could very well be the most important reason. But elections are rarely decided by one issue alone, and as I will demonstrate below, terrorism was clearly a key part of Hamas's platform. In any event, Hamas's commitment to destroy Israel certainly didn't hurt them. Also, let's not forget that Hitler gained support in Germany in the early 1930s, because the nation was going through economic crisis and burdened by reparations, but that doesn't make the Germans any less morally culpable for giving power to the greatest monster of the 20th Century.

In this interview with Al-Jazeera conducted last Monday, just before the election, Hamas leader Khaled Mash'al lays out Hamas's platform, which is based on a rejection of the Oslo peace process framework and and continued "restistance" to Israel (a code word for terrorist attacks). Here are some telling excerpts:

Today we enter the Legislative Council with the platform of the resistance, which most of the forces in the Palestinian people agree on, Allah be praised...

The Palestinian people, with its will, its sacrifice, its Intifada, is creating something new, on which this Legislative Council is based. That's why Hamas and the other forces are joining the Legislative Council on the basis of continued resistance, adhering to the weapons of the resistance, adhering to the Palestinian rights, to rectifying internal Palestinian affairs, to reform, to fighting corruption this is our platform, and we do not base ourselves on Oslo...

Oslo did not manage to dismantle the settlements in Gaza or the West Bank through negotiations. All there was was redeployment with no sovereignty over Gaza, one-third of which consisted of settlements under Israeli sovereignty. On the other hand, when we united around resistance, we managed to force our enemy to withdraw from Gaza...

Some people believe that a brilliant politician is one who buys and sells, closes deals, sits down with the enemy to negotiate, swims with him, hang out in pyjamas, and smoke cigars together at Oslo, this doesn't make sense. What did the Vietnamese do? They forced America to withdraw by means of resistance. When America was worn out, they went to Paris, and forced America to leave Vietnam. We, in Hamas, represent a realistic view, not a utopian one...

Another top Hamas leader, Mahmoud Zahar, took the oppourtunity of a campaign rally to remove any doubts that Hamas's goal was still the destruction of Israel. As this article from Arutz Sheva reads:

On January 13, A-Zahar said at a rally in Khan Yunis that the Hamas would not enter into negotiations with Israel in light of the Oslo accords, which he says, after 10 years, proves that negotiations are only an illusion. He declared that the Hamas still holds true to pursuing jihad or holy war with Israel and the liberation of all of Palestine.

A-Zahar went on to negate any form of cooperation with Israel, which he referred to as the “Zionist occupier.” He characterized the Jewish state as “an enemy, not a neighbor, friend, or partner.”

A-Zahar outlined his party’s electoral platform as follows:

· Islam is the source and ultimate authority for the Hamas

· The entire land of Palestine, every inch of it, is the property of the Islamic and Arabic nation that can never be relinquished.

· The right of return of Palestinian refugees is a legitimate right. Every Palestinian is entitled to decide when and how to return to his homeland.

· Continuation of the struggle (against Israel) in all of its manifestations.

The Hamas leader added that once the elections were over, his party would “instill the significance of the struggle in the minds of our children and teach them that it is forbidden to compromise on any aspect of it.”

Let's face facts. Palestinians may have voted against corruption, but it was also clearly a vote in favor of terrorism.

Posted by Philip Klein at 1:35 PM | Comments (0)

Hamas Leaders Urge Continued Funding

From the Washington Post:

"We are asking you to cooperate with our mission by keeping an open mind," Ismail Haniyeh, the top candidate on Hamas' national list, told journalists at his house in a beachside refugee camp here. "We are asking you to respect these results and respect the will of the Palestinians."

Giving even an inch to Hamas now will only lead to greater concessions down the road. There can be no open mind with Hamas. Even Europe considers them a terrorist group. And if Hamas is "the will of the Palestinians," well, then, that just reflects poorly on the Palestinians. Cut aid. Sever all ties with this terrorist regime. Let the Palestinian people learn a lesson in democracy: elections have consequences.

UPDATE:
Leading up to the election, Ismail Haniyeh, who is quoted above, said in an interview with the French news agency AFP that:

"Hamas supports the establishment of a Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital in the territories occupied [by Israel] in 1967 - as an interim solution. However, Hamas will continue to maintain its views regarding the boundaries of historical Palestine, and [in terms of] refusing to recognize the legitimacy of the occupation."

In other words, the destruction of Israel is their long term strategy. Let us never lose sight of the type of people we are dealing with here.

Posted by Philip Klein at 1:12 PM | Comments (0)

Guardian Columnist: Hamas Refusal to Recognize Israel Not "Urgent Problem" for Europeans

Jonathan Steele, in a column in the Guardian, hails Hamas's victory as "the best news from the Middle East for a long time."

He writes:

In Israel and Washington reaction to Hamas's victory has been predictably negative. European governments should take a more sensitive view...

If Europe, weak though its power may currently be, wants to have an independent role in the Middle East, clearly different from the manipulative US approach, it is vital to go on funding the PA regardless of the Hamas presence in government...

Above all, Europe should not get hung up on the wrong issues, like armed resistance and the "war on terror". Murdering a Palestinian politician by a long-range attack that is bound also to kill innocent civilians is morally and legally no better than a suicide bomb on a bus. Hamas's refusal to give formal recognition of Israel's right to exist should also not be seen by Europe as an urgent problem...

There was a day when Europeans didn't see Hitler's hatred of the Jews as an "urgent problem" either.

Read Steele's whole column here.

Posted by Philip Klein at 2:09 AM | Comments (0)

Hamas: Europe Will Cave in 6 Months

In a revealing interview with the Times of London, Mahmoud Zahar made comments that suggest that all of the talk from European leaders about denying aid to Palestinians is just that: talk. Zahar said:

“The European people came to me in the last month and they said within six months they are going to do their best to change the attitudes of their administration, because they do not accept Hamas is a terrorist organisation.

“Sooner or later the European countries in particular are going to change their mind concerning their attitude with Hamas.”

Read the whole thing here.

Posted by Philip Klein at 2:02 AM | Comments (0)

January 27, 2006

Hamas Legitimized

Make no mistake, Hamas’s landslide victory in this week’s Palestinian election is the first step of a process that will culminate with the terrorist group being celebrated by the international community. Such a turn of events may sound unlikely right now, because even Europeans recognize that Hamas is a terrorist group that is sworn to the destruction of Israel. But before Yasser Arafat was awarded the peace prize in 1994, he had a decades long record as a terrorist, as somebody who ordered the massacre of 11 Israeli athletes at Munich and 25 Israeli schoolchildren in Ma’alot. That record, and the fact that he continued to order terrorist attacks while talking peace, never seemed to hurt him.

While most leaders were clear to point out what Hamas really is about after the election results, it is only a matter of time before Hamas is rehabilitated by the international community.

The first indication of this is whether the U.S. and EU cut funding to the Palestinian Authority. While Bush said yesterday, "a political party that articulates the destruction of Israel as part of its platform is a party with which we will not deal,” he said that he was waiting to see what the composition of the government was. This leaves open the possibility that funding would continue if Mahmoud Abbas remains president and/or if a leader from a party outside of Hamas is appointed prime minister.

With Hamas now in control, the Palestinian government has become a democratically- elected terrorist state, and anything short of a suspension of all funding is a capitulation to terrorism, pure and simple. If President Bush does not lead the pack by suspending aid, there’s no way the EU can be counted on to do so.

Meanwhile, there are other ominous signs that the ligitimization of Hamas has started. Look at this quote from today's San Francisco Chronicle:

"We in the West are going to have to stop looking at Hamas as if they're al Qaeda or the Taliban: They're not," said Clayton Swisher, the programs director at the Middle East Institute who served as an election monitor with the joint National Democratic Institute and the Carter Center delegation this week and traveled around the territories.

"We'll have to deal with a group that is authentic of the Palestinian street," Swisher said in a telephone interview from Jerusalem. "We have to come to terms with this."

And check out this article from the Times of London, about the EU, with the aid of the U.S., facilitating the return of an exiled Hamas leader:

Khaled Mashal, the exiled supreme leader of Hamas and one of Israel's most wanted men, has signalled his intention to return to the Gaza Strip following the organisation's landslide victory in the Palestinian parliamentary elections.

The European Union is said to be facilitating Mashal's return from Damascus next week, when he will begin talks with President Mahmoud Abbas over a possible political partnership with the ousted Fatah party to form a new government.

Quoting sources close to the Palestinian Authority and Hamas, the Palestinian newspaper Al Quds said that the EU was lobbying the United States, which was in turn appealing to Israel not to block Mashal's repatriation.

Mashal, a former physics teacher considered by Israel to be the director of Hamas's terrorist arm, escaped an assassination attempt by Mossad agents in Jordan in 1997. He retains an uncompromising stance against Israel, and his potential return to help steer his victorious organisation is likely to further enrage Israeli authorities.

Within five years, supporters of Israel will be writing articles trying to remind people that Hamas is a terrorist group.

Posted by Philip Klein at 9:49 AM | Comments (4)

January 23, 2006

The Swiftboating of 'Munich'

'Munich' producer Kathleen Kennedy blames the vast right wing conspiracy for the film's lackluster box office returns to date:

"We live in a time where there is a very loud and strong right-wing constituency that is hellbent on suppressing any of this kind of dialogue. I've just been surprised at Hollywood and our own industry. It reveals more conservatism than I thought was there."

Poor Spielberg!

Read the whole thing here.

Posted by Philip Klein at 10:45 AM | Comments (2)

January 20, 2006

Osama's bin Readin' the NY Times

The latest Osama bin Laden statement, if accurate, confirms that the anti-war movement has done real damage in the fight against terrorism. In the statement (available here), bin Laden is clearly addressing the Angry Left, even adopting much of their language. Here are some excerpts from his remarks, and you can determine if they are that far off from a NY Times editorial:

You can give us this truce so we can build Iraq and Afghanistan that you have destroyed.

This will prevent the loss of millions of dollars, billions of dollars that go to corrupt businessmen in the United States...

But I wanted to talk to you because of the lies that have been given to you by your President Bush when he commented on the results of the opinion polls in your country that showed the majority was for the pull out of U.S. forces in Iraq.

You [Bush] opposed this opinion by saying a pull out of U.S. forces would send the wrong message and that it is better to fight them in their land than they fight us in our land.

I have an answer for this. I'm saying that the war in Iraq is lit up like crazy and the operations are estimated in our favor in Afghanistan and the number of dead and injured on your side is greater and greater, in addition to material losses.

The result of the opinion polls are wise and Bush must follow it. Iraq has now become a point of attraction to all qualified people the mujahadeen who by the grace of God were able to infiltrate all the security measures that were taken by Coalition forces. And as proof to that: The bombings that you saw in many important capitals of the world...

So you see how Bush was misleading people. The opinion polls are for the pull out and it's important that opinion polls say the people didn't want to fight the Muslims in their land and they didn't want the Muslims to fight them in their land.

I propose a long-term truce that will give the two sides stability and security.

And this is the most important, most diligent solution as a result of which there will be no losses.

Apparently, bin Laden realizes that his only hope in defeating the U.S. is to divide the country. However noble liberals think their motives are, make no mistake that the anti-war activists are playing right into bin Laden's hands.

Posted by Philip Klein at 1:16 AM | Comments (2)

Latest MSM Scandal

In the biggest scandal to hit big media so far in 2006, CNN/Hollywood Reporter bungles this story about Gwen Stacy, who will be introduced as Peter Parker's love interest in "Spider-Man 3." The article reads:

Bryce Dallas Howard ("The Village") is in negotiations to play Peter Parker's love interest Gwen Stacy in "Spider-Man 3," which is scheduled to roll this month.

Gwen is pivotal in Spider-Man lore as Peter's high school crush, his first girlfriend and his first love...

In "Spider-Man," Columbia Pictures put Mary Jane Watson, a later love interest of Peter's who was a model, in the Gwen role, casting Kirsten Dunst as the high school crush...

First off, Peter Parker didn't meet Gwen Stacy until college. Secondly, his first girlfriend was Betty Brant, J. Jonah Jameson's secretary at the Daily Bugle. Thirdly, he started dating Mary Jane Watson before Gwen. Then a complicated love triangle developed, or actually "love square," if you include Harry Osborn.

It's clear that this story is an absolute disgrace! An outrage! Where's Michelle Malkin when you need her?

Posted by Philip Klein at 12:39 AM | Comments (0)

Giuliani: What America Needs Most?

James Q. Wilson on Rudy Giuliani in the latest issue of The Claremont Review of Books:

Republicans should keep in mind that, more than four years after 9/11, Giuliani still commands Americans' respect and admiration. His worst behavior as mayor leads me to suspect that he is only as domineering and publicity-driven as many of our presidents (good or bad) have been. His best behavior as mayor suggests many of the qualities a good president should have, such as honesty, decency, and a commitment to make government work better and to enable the middle class to live better. As the presidential primaries approach, Republicans concerned with the country's moral character may want to ask themselves whether, in the present predicament, what the country needs most is a strong executive, unafraid of criticism, to prosecute the war we are in.

Read the whole thing here.

Posted by Philip Klein at 12:36 AM | Comments (0)

January 16, 2006

Spielberg's 'Munich' Fails On Every Level

I was initially hesitant to see 'Munich,' after reading Spielberg's interview in Time, but after several people whose opinions I respect gave it a good review, I decided to give it a chance. Unfortunately, my initial instincts proved correct. I admit that I am somewhat biased against the movie for political reasons, which is why I'd like to evaluate it on four levels: purely as a film, as an historical piece, as a morality play and as a political statement. When I say it fails on every level, this is what I mean.

The movie itself was weak. I just didn't find the characters all that compelling and I didn't feel any suspense during the parts when they were killing off the terrorists. In a movie that is supposed to explore moral complexity, I thought that most characters lacked any subtlety. Even though the film is nearly three hours long, I don't think any of the characters other than Avner (Eric Bana), the leader of Israel's Mossad team, come off as anything but cardboard. The dialogue was also atrocious, with characters constantly spouting out their moral and political philosophy in convenient pronouncements. Also, I thought Spielberg made some rather odd cinematic choices that I personally didn't feel worked. For instance, Spielberg waited until nearly the end of the movie to show a reenactment of the actual explosion that killed the Israeli athletes at the Munich airport, and he intercut it with a sex scene between Avner and his wife. It comes off as bizarre and arguably distasteful.

As for the film's historical value, it does cover itself by saying "inspired by real events." Certainly, I don't get my history from Hollywood, and I understand that making a good historical movie often requires taking some liberties. Typically, I take historical films with a grain of salt and try not to be a purist. But while I'm willing to excuse historical liberties taken concerning Johnny Cash in "Walk the Line," or in "Capote," I'm more uncomfortable when it is a movie about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The reason is that, as it is, one of the primary problems to understanding the conflict is the amount of misinformation that is disseminated. It's upsetting for this film to come out, because it adds yet another prominent bit of misinformation out there that further fogs the truth. As Brett Stevens wrote:

"Vengeance," the George Jonas book upon which the film is largely based, is widely considered to be a fabrication. The book is based on a source named Yuval Aviv, who claimed to be the model for Avner but was, according to Israeli sources, never in the Mossad and had no experience in intelligence beyond working as a screener for El Al, the Israeli airline.

Sure, you can argue that the mission was secret and that there's no way of knowing what actually happened. But when it comes to creating a fictional version of Prime Minister Golda Meir and fabricating the quote that was used in all of the previews, "Every civilization finds it necessary to negotiate compromises with its own values," it becomes troubling.

What's even more frustrating is that in the film, Spielberg adopts the Palestinian narrative for why Israel exists (i.e. that Jews took the land and the world allowed it because of the Holocaust). The truth is that Jews started peacefully migrating to Israel in large numbers in the 1880s and had a large population there even before the Holocaust (not to mention a presence in the area dating back thousands of years). In once scene, an Israeli Mossad agent on the team says, "How do you think we got the land, by being nice?" And later Avner's mom, after recalling the Holocaust says, "We had to take it, because nobody will give it to us." So in other words, according to this film, there is no denying that Israelis took the land from the Palestinians by force, and the only dispute is whether Jewish suffering during the Holocaust justified it. This is precisely the attitude of anti-Semites who talk about how Jews exploit the Holocaust. But even if Spielberg wanted represent both points of view, he at least owed it to the Israeli side to have the Israeli characters make the best argument for their country's existence.

It is true that the film portrayed the Mossad agents sympathetically and showed the great lengths they go to to protect innocent life. But while Avner and his fellow Mossad agents are portrayed sympathetically, the Israeli government itself is not. The government officials (especially Geoffrey Rush's character) come off as soulless amoral bureaucrats who are just using the agents as pawns. When Rush's character tells Avner to avoid killing civilians when he's explaining the mission, he seems more concerned that it would complicate the mission than he is about actually protecting innocents. By the end of the movie, the Israeli government becomes so morally contemptible to Avner that he refuses to go on another mission, moves to America, and even suspects the Israeli government of trying to kill him and his family.

On a moral level, I have a problem with the film as well. Characters say things such as "Just because Palestinians do wrong, we don't have to do wrong as well." Or other such comments that seem to suggest that assassinating terrorists involves moral compromises (again, look at the fabricated Gold Meir quote). Sure, some of the compromises in the film deal with paying despicable characters for information, but that's not the only thing that there seems to be moral conflict about. I guess one reason that I had a problem enjoying this movie is that I simple see no moral problems--zero—with killing terrorists who have plotted to kill your civilians in the past and are continuing to do so. Especially since the rest of the world is caving into terrorism, with Germany releasing prisoners who were a part of the Munich massacre.

The other major problem I have with the film is the whole idea that if you kill a terrorist leader, he'll just be replaced by somebody worse, so what's the point? This is absurd. Clearly, if an organization keeps on having leadership changes, and its leaders are always in constant fear of being killed, and they have to hide out and go to great lengths (and use more manpower) to protect themselves, they will be less effective than they would otherwise be. Real world evidence clearly demonstrates this. Targeted assassinations by Israel during the Second Intifada were instrumental in reducing the number of suicide bombings. Al Qaeda, too, is clearly having more trouble carrying out large scale attacks against America now than it did before we started going after them.

Essentially, at the end of the movie, after all that Avner has been through, he evolves into a modern day liberal. While in the beginning of the movie, he accepts the mission out of patriotism and duty, at the end of the movie, he refuses to go on another mission. In the final scene, Avner is:

a) Distrustful of his government (he asks, how do you know the people I killed
were really terrorists? What was the evidence? How can you be sure the
evidence was right?).

b) Naive (He asks, why couldn't we just arrest them?)

c) Defeatist ( He says, if you kill a terrorist, you just create a new terrorist, so it will never end).

Having reached all of these conclusions, he decides that there's no point to stay in Israel and fight terrorism, he may as well give up the futile battle, move to America, and live out his life in a fool's paradise in Brooklyn.

Posted by Philip Klein at 12:13 AM | Comments (1)

January 14, 2006

Foiled Again

Al-Qaeda No. 2 wasn't on site during U.S. attack

Posted by Philip Klein at 9:32 AM | Comments (0)

January 13, 2006

The Hajj Lottery

According to my calculations, based on this AP dispatch, 3,243 people have been killed in nine different incidents at the annual Muslim pilgramage to Mecca since 1987. Most of the deaths occured as a result of stampedes as pilgrams rush to throw stones at walls that are supposed to represent the devil. The whole thing reminds me of the Shirley Jackson short story, "The Lottery."

Posted by Philip Klein at 11:50 AM | Comments (0)

January 10, 2006

Revealing Sharon

As the world waits to learn more about the status of Ariel Sharon, I can't help but wonder whether Israel will allow him to appear in public, should he recover from his stroke in some capacity. This is a definite dilemma, which obviously isn't pressing this moment, but could come up weeks or months down the line. On the one hand, should he survive and maintain some brain activity and motor functions, there will probably be a desire and natural curiosity among Israelis to see him. At the same time, Sharon has always projected an image of power, and parading him in public in a partially crippled state, with slurred speech, could hurt morale in Israel and be viewed by Palestinian terrorists as a symbol of weakness, emboldening them. In the meantime, all we can do is hope for the best.

Posted by Philip Klein at 10:52 AM | Comments (0)

January 9, 2006

Alito

I just got finished watching Judge Samuel Alito's opening statement. Try as they might (and they might not even bother trying), Democrats will have a tough time portraying this intellegent, humble, family man with a Philadelphia accent as some sort of fire breathing radical.

Posted by Philip Klein at 4:05 PM | Comments (1)

A Million Little Lies?

James Frey fabricated major parts of his bestselling memoir, A Million Little Pieces, according to an expose by The Smoking Gun. His book, which is about his drug addictions and run-ins with the law, was a featured selection of the Oprah Book Club that everybody seems to be reading.

From The Smoking Gun:

Police reports, court records, interviews with law enforcement personnel, and other sources have put the lie to many key sections of Frey's book. The 36-year-old author, these documents and interviews show, wholly fabricated or wildly embellished details of his purported criminal career, jail terms, and status as an outlaw "wanted in three states."

In additon to these rap sheet creations, Frey also invented a role for himself in a deadly train accident that cost the lives of two female high school students.

Read the whole thing here.

Apparently, Frey has said that he and his publisher went out of their way to make sure that all of the facts are accurate. I haven't read the book myself, but somehow it doesn't surprise me that a guy who is on drugs for much of the action of the book would be foggy on some stuff. It seems to me that Frey could have absolved himself from criticism by including the following disclaimer in the book:

This book is based on true events, but keep in mind that I was drunk off my gourd and smoking a lot of crack back then.

Of course, he probably wouldn't have become a best-selling memoirist if he did so.

Posted by Philip Klein at 1:22 PM | Comments (1)

Violence in Gaza

Since he came into office this time last year, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has been urged by Israel and the United States to move agressively against militants and terrorist groups, but he has failed to do so. The prospect of him taking such action has been greeted in Palestinian circles as something that Abbas would be doing merely as a concession to the U.S. and Israel. But as the recent flare up in violence in Gaza demonstrates, disarming militant groups is something that needs to happen if Palestinians are ever to have a viable state.

From the NY Times:

GAZA, Jan. 8 - Virtually sealed off from the outside world, residents of this violence-riddled strip of land along the Mediterranean Sea liken it to a giant, deteriorating prison, and at its worst it feels like the film "Escape From New York," where inmates ran the show.

The economy beats feebly, filling the streets with armed men and markets and chaotic traffic during the day and emptying them but for scattered police patrols and idle young men at night. The Palestinian Authority, charged with governing the territory together with the West Bank, maintains tenuous control.

"The intifada has ended, but the violent energy is still there," said Eyad Sarraj, a psychiatrist and human rights activist living here.

In Gaza City on Saturday night, one man was killed during a gun battle between armed militants and the police, while elsewhere in town another armed group threatened to destroy the local offices of the satellite television station Al Arabiya, which is based in Dubai. The men were angry at the station for broadcasting a documentary that suggested that female Palestinian suicide bombers had been put under pressure by male relatives.

Farther south that same day, gunmen cordoned off a neighborhood in Khan Yunis, Gaza's second largest city, while members of a well-known drug-smuggling family battled with the Palestinian police. Eleven policemen were reported wounded.

And in Rafah, along the Egyptian border, armed men from the Abu Taha family stopped cars on Sunday, checking identification papers in hopes of catching members of Al Masri, the rival family with which they have been waging a deadly feud.

While the world is watching Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's fight for life and wondering who will govern Israel in his absence, people in Gaza are far more preoccupied with growing lawlessness and tension between armed factions since Israel's withdrawal.

Read the whole thing here.

Posted by Philip Klein at 12:11 AM | Comments (0)

January 6, 2006

"A Calamity for Israel"

That's how Charles Krauthammer describes Ariel Sharon's stroke, in a column that expresses many sentiments I have had here, only more eloquently. He writes:

The stroke suffered by Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon could prove to be one of the great disasters in the country's nearly 60-year history. As I write this, Sharon's condition remains uncertain, but the severity of his stroke makes it unlikely that he will survive, let alone return to power. That could be disastrous because Sharon represented, indeed embodied, the emergence of a rational, farsighted national idea that seemed poised in the coming elections to create a stable governing political center for the first time in decades.

Read the whole thing here.

One of the greatest tragedies in American history is that the country was deprived of Abraham Lincoln's post-Civil War leadership when he was assasinated. The timing of Sharon's stroke may prove just as tragic for Israel.

Posted by Philip Klein at 4:49 PM | Comments (0)

Florida and School Vouchers

I haven't had the time to read the entire decision yet (available here), but it's disappointing to say the least that the Florida Supreme Court struck down the state's school voucher program.

The court's decision hinged on a part of Florida's constitution that says, "It is... a paramount duty of the state to make adequate provision for the education of all children residing within its borders..." It further states that, "Adequate provision shall be made by law for a uniform, efficient, safe, secure and high-quality system of free public schools."

The court ruled that private schools which are funded through the voucher system aren't "uniform when compared with each other or the public system." My problem with this interpretation is that the language of the constitution only says that funding must be "adequate" and that there has to be a system of "uniform" schools. But it doesn't say that all state funding must go exclusively to schools that are "uniform."

Under Florida's voucher program, called the Opportunity Scholarship Program, students at schools that have failed to meet the state's minimum standards have the option of either staying in their public school or receiving funding from the state to go to a private school. The key is that there is still a "uniform" public school system in place that all Florida children have access to if that's what they and their parents want. All the voucher program does is give them the additional choice of attending a private school. There are currently 733 students enrolled in private schools as a result of the program.

Unfortunately, the decision cannot be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court because the case does not involve federal issues. The only hope seems to be amending Florida's constitution, which is clearly a huge hill to climb.

Posted by Philip Klein at 3:19 PM | Comments (3)

January 5, 2006

Say It Ain't So!

2nd Ave. Deli shuts down:

(New York-AP, Januaray 5, 2006) - One of the most famous delis in New York City may have served its last corned beef on rye.

The owner of the 2nd Avenue Deli said he closed the restaurant Sunday after a lease dispute with the building's new owners.

"My current rent is $24,000 a month for 2,800 square feet," Jack Lebewohl told The New York Times. "They want $33,000. I can't afford that."

Hopefully, this is just part of some bargaining tactic and the deli will reopen. The loss of this institution would be tragic.

Posted by Philip Klein at 11:55 PM | Comments (1)

January 4, 2006

Sharon's Stroke

As of this writing, the latest news reports are that Ariel Sharon is fighting for his life. According to this account of Israel's Channel 10, half of his body is paralyzed. We'll no more as the hours progress, but right now all we can do is hope for the best.

However, even if Sharon were to make a remarkable medical recovery, there's no way he can recover politically from having two strokes in less than three weeks. Given Sharon's health issues, this turn of events should come as a surprise to nobody, but it could have disastrous consequences for Israel. Sharon possesses a unique blend of hawkishness and pragmatism. He was uncompromising in his fight against terrorism during the Second Intifada and his policies have helped reduce suicide bombings to a mere trickle. By building a security fence and withdrawing from Gaza, he made Israel's security less contingent on developments in the Palestinian territories. And not only did his policies make sense, but he had the sheer force of will and the stature to see them through. If this is the end of Sharon's political career, it is a huge loss for Israel.

Posted by Philip Klein at 9:22 PM | Comments (2)

January 3, 2006

Wiretapping

The debate over the Bush Administration's authorization of the use of wiretapping is another gut check for Americans in our fight against terrorism. Throughout its history, America has always struggled to balance its commitment to liberty with the flexibility to do what's necessary to respond to foreign threats. From the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798, to Lincoln's suspension of habeas corpus during the Civil War, to FDR's internment of the Japanese in WWII, there is a long history of compromising liberty in the name of national security. Now, I'm not defending any of these actions. But I bring these up to demonstrate that this issue has always been a struggle and that compared to something like internment, the Bush Administration's use of wiretapping is quite benign.

This is not to say that in times of war, the president should run roughshod over the law and assume dictatorial powers. When evaluating a given policy, we should consider how helpful it is to the war effort and balance that against how big of a compromise is involved with civil liberties. Monitoring the phone calls of a limited number of people who are communicating with terrorists clearly is an important part of a strategy for gathering intelligence in the War on Terror. And on the other side, it's hard to see why this represents such a major violation of civil liberties. If there were evidence that the Bush Administration used the program to gather information on political opponents, that's one thing. But as it stands now, the program is extremely limited to people who are in contact with terrorists. This is exactly the type of thing we should be doing.

The bottom line is that as a society, we have to recognize that during wartime the executive has to take actions that we would be uncomfortable with under normal circumstances. Civil libertarians may have many legitimate concerns about the threats to liberty during wartime, but their problem is that they don't recognize that a tradeoff exists. They create a fantasy world in which we can win a war while keeping everything the same as it was while we were at peace.

Posted by Philip Klein at 10:05 PM | Comments (0)