JustOneMinute

Orrin Judd Drops The Gloves

His perfectly reasonable argument concludes thusly:

...let us have no illusions about it, if the violence continues or escalates--especially if the survival of Israel or any other Western nation were ever at stake--rather few will be troubled if the Israelis decimate the Palestinians and we the Sauds or the Pakistanis or the Syrians or whoever. The object of the struggle does not really concern Islam but the West. Islam, strange as it seems, is incidental to our ends.

It makes more sense in context. I am inclined to split the difference - if the survival of a Western nation was truly at stake, we would be troubled, as we contemplated the ashes of our erstwhile enemies.

UPDATE: The Well-Armed Liberal has thoughts on the "War of Civilizations" theme - echoing Teddy Roosevelt, he denies that it is a big schtick. And Brad DeLong has a "be very afraid" reminder in my comments below. The rest of you will remember "Bomber" Harris immediately, but it took me a minute to get off of Hiroshima.

Mind Your "P's" And, Well, "P's"

From the NY Times:

...the official North Korean news agency issued a more qualified endorsement of talks, expressing a willingness to take part "if they provide a process of putting into practice the proposal for a package solution based on the principle of simultaneous actions."

Please. We are delighted that the North Koreans are no longer stockpiling the letter "P". We look forward to progress on "L", "U", "T", and so on.

Assemble The Circular Firing Squad

The latest from Adam Nagourney of the NY Times: "Dean Walks a Tightrope Over Positions on Gun Control".

Let's pause for a moment. There are a number of issues on which the passionate, check-writing, Barbra Streisand wing of the Democratic Party are hopelessly out of touch with America. Every four years, we have flashbacks to found childhood memories of "S-P-U-D", as the Dem nominee runs frantically away from his base. This list will be incomplete, and we encourage folks to submit their personal faves, but quickly, Dems who hold the position of "the base" on gun control, capital punishment, or partial-birth abortion are not electable.

Bill Clinton knew this, and disgraced himself to create a "tough on crime" image in 1992. Al Gore was a mute on gun control in the closing weeks of the 2000 race, with Pennsylvania and Michigan up for grabs. And so it goes.

But enough nostalgia. One of the hopes to which Dean supporters cling is that, as Governor of Vermont, he had a mainstream position on gun control. Within the context of the Dem nominating process, however, mainstream won't cut it:

Polls show overwhelming support among Democratic primary voters for federal regulation of gun ownership. But that is not the case among general-election voters as a whole. Dr. Dean himself has said that Al Gore would be president today were it not for support of gun control. Like many other Democrats, he is mindful of Mr. Gore's losses in the 2000 election in states where gun control is not popular, like Tennessee, Florida, Arkansas and West Virginia.

And, a bit earlier in the story, the circular firing squad:

...a spokeswoman [for Dean] said there was no contradiction between his current position and what he told the N.R.A. in its 1992 questionnaire, a copy of which was provided to The New York Times by aides to a rival Democratic candidate who is a stronger advocate of gun control.

The truth will set you free.

P. Krugman - Keep Hope Alive!

Prof. Krugman reassures his followers that the economy may yet stall - how does he type with his fingers crossed?

I am especially amused by his big finish:

To put it more bluntly: it would be quite a trick to run the biggest budget deficit in the history of the planet, and still end a presidential term with fewer jobs than when you started. And despite yesterday's good news, that's a trick President Bush still seems likely to pull off.

The "jobs" question is worth pondering.  Here is a Brad DeLong post, and a post by Steve Antler that picks up a comment made by Jim Glass, found courtesy of Steve Verdon, and providing an answer to the wish I made out loud in the comments here.  We are quoting Prof. DeLong here, if the preceding was somehow unclear:

Asking that Bush leave "the job market no worse than he found it" is setting the bar too high by perhaps 2 million jobs or so. It would have been very hard for any set of economic policies to have sustainably kept the economy at the high-pressure state it was in in 2000.

Well, yes - the late 90's economy was a bubble; bubbles tend not to be sustainable; trying to get "back to the bubble" may not be realistic or desirable.  As Steve Verdon and others explain, Paul Krugman made a similar point in the mid-90's when he argued that employment below 6% would end badly (although he was worried about inflation - oops!).  Now, times have changed, and although the last period with employment below 6% appears after the fact to have been unsustainable, it has become Prof. Krugman's new baseline.  Political expedience, or strict economic analysis?  You decide.

But enough about jobs.  I am tickled by the "biggest budget deficit in the history of the planet" notion.  Imagine, if you will, that George Bush had announced yesterday that, under his stewardship, the US economy had grown more than in any previous quarter in history.  Liar!  Growth at 7.2% was good, but we have done better!  In fact, we did better under (choke) Reagan.

Well, who's a liar?  Sure, we did better under Reagan in percentage terms.  But in nominal, no adjustment for inflation or anything else terms, this is our biggest quarterly increase ever. 

And no one cares.  Because the correct growth measure is as a percent of GDP.  And if Bush said otherwise, we would all agree he was being duplicitous, or stupid.

Or maybe we wouldn't.  But when Prof. Krugman describes the "biggest budget deficit in the history of the planet" he can only be speaking in nominal terms.  Japan has had larger budget deficits as a percent of GDP - they are still on the planet, yes?  And the inevitable growth of their economy is finally occurring, after a mere ten year lag.

And the US has had larger deficits on a percentage basis as well.  All of which the Earnest Prof knows, but evidently forgets when he is excited.  Or, as when contemplating the recent quarter's results, depressed.  Being a Serious Economist is apparently a sometime thing when he is preparing polemics for the NY Times.

MORE:  I cannot shake the feeling that Prof. Krugman excoriated someone for mixing nominal, real, and percentage comparisons.  It might be lovely to find it.

UPDATE:  Burn, baby, burn!  It's a disco inferno!

The Brutal Side Of George Stephanopoulos

Speaking to what we presume was a stunned college audience, George S. appraised the Democratic field:

...He was especially discouraged by front-runner Howard Dean's campaign based on antiwar outrage, believing Americans will prefer Republican optimism.

"I was meeting with Bush officials today," Stephanopoulos said, "and they were salivating to run against Howard Dean so they can accuse him of raising taxes."

Despite his doubts about Dean, Stephanopoulos did not express confidence in any other primary candidates.

He said Gen. Wesley Clark has lost support because he lacks a defined platform, Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., was hurt by waffling on the war issue; Rep. Dick Gephardt, D-Mo., is seen as too old; and Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., is too young. He added that Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., originally polled high but hasn't been able to excite Democrats or raise money.

Too weaselly, too old, too young, too dull - hey, but what about Dennis?

Though He Walks Through The Valley Of The Shadow...

The Man Sans Q will find a way to make me laugh.

Krugman - A Reader Revolt At The Times

In an ongoing effort to pretend that they have a dialogue with their readers, the NY Times insists on printing an arbitrarily selected "sample" of "Letters to the Editor".

Today, the editors have chosen to go negative on Paul Krugman's two recent columns on Mahathir and anti-Semitism. Three letters pan Krugman; two, filed under "With Friends Like These", support him. Let's turn on the Evil Excerpter, and have at it:

Tom Friedman Sets A Meme to Catch A Meme

In consecutive columns, Tom Friedman raises the bar on "high variance" by going from the stupidest idea yet to a very good idea.

Good idea first, writing about the bombings in Iraq:

What to do? The first thing is to understand who these people are. There is this notion being peddled by Europeans, the Arab press and the antiwar left that "Iraq" is just Arabic for Vietnam, and we should expect these kinds of attacks from Iraqis wanting to "liberate" their country from "U.S. occupation." These attackers are the Iraqi Vietcong.

Hogwash. The people who mounted the attacks on the Red Cross are not the Iraqi Vietcong. They are the Iraqi Khmer Rouge — a murderous band of Saddam loyalists and Al Qaeda nihilists, who are not killing us so Iraqis can rule themselves. They are killing us so they can rule Iraqis.

They are the Khmer Rouge. This is not Viet Nam, it is Cambodia. That analogy will give even the most earnest of lefties a moment of pause.

OK, dumb idea - expand NATO to include Israel, Iraq, and Egypt. No, I am not kidding, although perhaps he is.

NATO was barely functional in dealing with the wreckage of Yugoslavia. Now, expanding NATO to include the Baltic States has lovely symbolic value in terms of welcoming these countries into the West. It has almost no military significance - these countries cannot be defended, but Russia is unlikely to attack them.

Iraq, Israel, and Egypy might actually find themselves in a war that most NATO members have neither the will nor skill to fight. The same Europeans that could barely embrace an effort in Yugoslavia will never support any sort of European adventure in the Middle East. Silly notion.

NOTE TO SELF: Who linked to Friedman's column? And, by extension, who might I be teeing off? "Technorati" comes up dry, but I know I saw one fan.

UPDATE: The fan steps forward, and defends himself with pride (in the comments). As well he might - I liked this post of his, just after the Friedman post.

Groan

The InstaPundit is shocked. Dan Drezner is appalled. Don Luskin is threatening legal action against Atrios? Since I said a few days ago that he had gone too far with the "anti-Semitism" thing, I suppose I can just hide behind my earlier story.

But wait! What had I said about the stalking thing? Staring at my posts, and the various comments, I extract this:

I am taking Ms. Grey's side on one point - I thought Don Luskin's account of his sojourn into the heart of darkness could have been a minor comedy classic. Playing it for doom and gloom was, well, gloomy. And doomed.

And, a bit later:

"I continue to think [the stalking debate is] pretty funny."

However, lawsuits aren't funny. Even if some lawyer has advised him that he has a case, this cannot be the best way to approach it. Nor is this likely to be an effective tactic in demonstrating that Prof. Krugman has lost perspective and judgement.

Fortunately, there is always over-reach from the other side to bail us out of a jam. Atrios wants everyone to de-link Don Luskin. Soon enough, we predict this will evolve to "de-link anyone who links to Luskin", a la the Little Green Football/Rittenhouse Review laugh fest a while back. Whether we reach the third level is anyone's guess.

Whether the best way to combat the stifling of opinions is to stifle opinions remains an open question.

UPDATE: Back in 1997, Clinton acolyte Sidney Blumenthal sued ur-blogger Matt Drudge for $30 million, in what some thought might be an attempt to silence and intimidate. We have no doubt that a younger Atrios was horrified by Mr. Blumenthal's behavior.

But time heals all wounds, and only a few years later, Atrios was hawking Mr. Blumenthal's book. And the lawsuit was settled, too - Mr. Blumenthal agreed to pay $2,500 to Matt Drudge to let the mess die.

I will take his current call for a boycott just that seriously.

General Clark, The Bloom, And The Rose

Daniel Drezner links to some pummeling of the General in the blogosphere. If Josh Marshall, Earnest Lefty, is unhappy with Gen. Clark, that matters.

Yesterday, I commented on entrails suggesting unhappiness with Clark at the NY Times, and noted somewhat more vivid evidence at Slate.

Today, Adam Nagourney takes a turn tweaking the Clark campaign:

DURHAM, N.H., Oct. 29 — Wesley K. Clark has a history of dalliances with the Republican Party. Caught up in conflicting statements on issues, he has endured what even his supporters describe as a rough first few weeks as a Democratic presidential candidate. Indeed, his stands on many issues are mysteries even to the Democrats who rushed to Little Rock, Ark., his hometown, to sign on with his campaign.

..."Wherever you go, far from Washington, Democrats share one thing in common: We've got to get George Bush out of the White House," said Eli Segal, General Clark's campaign chairman. "I've never seen this kind of passion before."

"The general is going to have to stand for things — not going to have to stand for things, does stand for things," Mr. Segal continued. "But part of his appeal is that Democrats are far less concerned on where Democrats stand on specific issues."

The embarrassing, raw quote is there for a reason.

Great Moments In Self-Awareness

According to the Denver Post, during a fund-raising speech Howard Dean declared himself to be a "metrosexual", and almost instantly backpedaled.

One imagines that, in the millisecond between assertion and retraction, Dean's entire Southern "strategy" passed before his eyes.

Awkward Balancing Acts - At Home

Politics stop sat the waters edge, except when it doesn't. Osama and others really did conclude, from Lebanon, Somalia, and, yes, Kosovo, that America lacks commitment and will cut and run rather than endure casualties.

With an election to be won, Democrats need to mind the fine line between constructive criticism and opportunistic posturing as they position themselves on Iraq. Will Saletan, writing in Slate, whistles Gen. Clark out of bounds, in a piece sub-titled "Clark's hypocritical obstructionism on Iraq".

And more bad news for the General - the Girl on the Bus for the NY Times seems to be off the bus. Was it only a week ago that Katharine Q. Seelye's admiration for the General knew no bounds? (Or was I just wrong, wrong, WRONG? Naah.) Her latest strikes a similar note to Mr. Saletan, if you look hard enough:

DURHAM, N.H., Oct. 28 — In a blistering review of President Bush's national security policy, Gen. Wesley K. Clark said on Tuesday that the administration could not "walk away from its responsibilities for 9/11."

"You can't blame something like this on lower-level intelligence officers, however badly they communicated in memos with each other," said the retired general, the latest entrant in the Democratic presidential field. "It goes back to what our great president Harry Truman said with the sign on his desk: `The buck stops here.' And it sure is clear to me that when it comes to our nation's national security, the buck rests with the commander in chief, right on George W. Bush's desk."

"And," he added, "we've got to say again and again and again, until the American people understand: strong rhetoric in the aftermath is no substitute for wise leadership."

General Clark's remarks were his most scathing of the campaign to date and went further than those of a number of other Democratic candidates in laying blame on the administration for intelligence failures.

Emphasis added. We know how sensitive Dems are to being "out of the mainstream", so we note this comment as a foreshadowing of imminent disaster.

Awkward Balancing Acts - Abroad

From the NY Times:

Arab World Is of Two Minds About U.S. Involvement in Iraq

CAIRO, Oct. 28 — The bright red headline across four columns in an Egyptian government-owned newspaper, Al Gumhuria, on Tuesday trumpeted the latest bombings in Iraq as somehow religiously sanctioned: "Five Consecutive Martyrdom Operations Rock Baghdad."

Yet both Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher and the Arab League condemned the bombings, singling out the attack on the International Committee of the Red Cross as particularly appalling. In Beirut, the respected daily Safir labeled the bombings a "crime," not least because in the paper's view they will serve to prolong the American presence.

It Isn't Whether You Win Or Lose...

Ira Berkow of the NY Times with a feel-good story about high school football.

A 'Touchdown' Teaches a Lesson for Life
By IRA BERKOW

SOMERS, N.Y. — On a recent Saturday morning, on the home football field of the Somers Middle School here, in this quiet town about an hour's drive north of New York City, the coach of the Somers team of primarily seventh graders called a play to begin the second quarter. He had alerted the opponents, John Jay Middle School, as well.

It was hardly something that Vince Lombardi or Bill Parcells might do. But when Bud Von Heyn, the Somers coach, met before the game with Jeff Tepper, the John Jay coach, to go over the ground rules, Von Heyn said: "I need a favor from you." Tepper listened, and agreed.

"O.K., guys, line up," Von Heyn told his young players, in their red jerseys and white pants and silver helmets, on the sideline. "We're going to run the E. J. Shuffle."

Then Von Heyn shouted across the field to the John Jay coach. "Here we go, Jeff."

VPW - The Media Push

Tom Daschle and I share the same puzzlement - why is the media abandoning (again) the Valerir Plame Wilson affair?

The Financial Times (via Mark Kleiman) picked up on the latest Dem publicity venture.

The focal point is comments made by Vincent Cannistraro, former CIA agent. Mr. Kleiman closes with:

I'm waiting to hear all about Cannistraro, who served on the NSC staff under Reagan, is just another partisan Democrat.

We can help. Although I have not succeeded implacing Mr. Cannistraro amongst the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity ("VIPS", a group whose agenda is more clear than their credibility), Mr. C. has been firmly on one side of this issue since before Ms. Plame was an issue. Well, this is not the link I was looking for, but we will accept it as a pale substitute:

"Patrick Lang, a former CIA analyst on Iraq, has said intelligence was ''exploited and abused and bypassed'' by the White House. Vincent Cannistraro, a former head of CIA counter-terrorism operations, said many intelligence officials ''believe it is a scandal.'' Cannistraro said Bush had a ''moral obligation to use the best information available, not just information that fits your preconceived ideas.'' '

MORE: Our take on motive, helpfully titled "The Motive Was News Management".

Mark Kleiman Is Clear And Concise

I have annoyed lefty friends of mine with the following thought - if I were at a Hollywood cocktail party, I could probably find 99 out of 100 people there convinced that strong intellectual protection laws for music and films was vital for Hollywood. However, I suspect that aboot 100 out of 100 would decry drug prices as "too high".

But it is the same problem! Doesn't mean we need the same solution. Mark Kleiman explains.

Since I like William Safire, I will agree with him that Canadian and European free-riding and underinvestment in pharmaceutical research is an ongoing challenge. I suspect Mr. Kleiman would concur.

MORE: We will let the Europeans address the free-riding question themselves, with excerpts below.

And we wonder - the Defense industry does expensive, research-intensive projects for (effectively) one customer, the US Government (here I am thinking of the top-shelf products that are not sold abroad). The US Government, in turn, is spending tax dollars wisely on behalf of We The People. Might Big Pharma end up operating under a similar model? And do we have so much confidence in the military-industrial complex that we feel comfortable with that as an endpoint?

New Hampshire, Ho!

That's "Ho" as in , "Westward, ho!", not the hip-hop sense. Just wanted to clear that up.

Anyway, the NY Times informs us today of the "Free State Project" - evidently, Libertarians are hoping to colonize, and eventually civilize, one of the fifty states. After extensive discussions New Hampshire was selected, bypassing Alaska, Delaware, Idaho, Maine, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Vermont and Wyoming. Quite reasonably, "One frequently asked question on the project's Web site was "Can't you make a warmer state an option?" '.

The Times tells us that:

Once here, they plan to field candidates in elections and become active in schools and community groups, doing all they can to sow the libertarian ideals of curbing taxes, minimizing regulation of guns and drugs, privatizing schools and reducing government programs.

"We want to make New Hampshire our home, and we want to make it a better place for everybody," said Elizabeth McKinstry, a project spokeswoman. "Many times government gets in the way."

Fascinating. And we see some local reaction.

Looks Like General Boykin Is In Trouble Again

Having already offered to open a can of whup-ass on Allah, the General opens a second front.

Unfortunately, he was not available for comment on the disturbing news found here.

The CIA At War

We commented earlier on the political forces buffeting the CIA: House and Senate committees are examining pre-war intelligence, wondering where the WMDs are; the State Dept intelligence unit disputes the CIA account of a trailer as a mobile bio-weapons lab; and the White House is accused of politicizing intelligence.

On that last bit, the CIA prepares a semi-annual on the pursuit of WMDs by various countries. Here we have the June 2000 and June 2002 reports.

Now, one of the criticisms of the CIA was that it annoyed the State Dept by being a hawk on Iraqi chemical and biological programs, and annoyed the neocons by being a dove on Iraqi nuclear ambitions. If we can safely assume that the evil neocon influence was absent from the June 2000 report, the transition is interesting, and seems to square with the criticism:

I Want To Believe

Glenn and Andrew (but neither George nor Ringo) link to a post asserting that Schroeder's brand of anti-Americanism is no longer playing effectively in Germany.

I infer from the title of the blog in question that they (the folk(s) at "Davids Medienkritik") follow Germany a lot more closely than I do. However, this piece in the Economist suggests that Schroeder's trouble are tied to the economy, and his attempts at reform.

Is there more evidence of an anti-American tie-in, gents?

CONTINUING: "Guter Job" to German banking association economist and the chief economist of Deutsche Bank, Norbert Walter, for this coinage, where he predicts that German GDP will be essentially unchanged from a year earlier" "It's still difficult to say whether we'll have a red or a black zero".

Lots of Google hits for "Black Zero", but not as he used it.

UPDATE: There is a subtle editing change suggested by a comment below.

Others Have "The Onion" - I Have TAPPED

We mocked TAPPED last March when they revealed their ignorance and bigotry on the subject of evangelical Christians by approvingly linking to this piece.

So, in what will no doubt come as disturbing news to them, the NY Times has a front pager by Elisabeth Bumiller on the influence of evangelicals in the White House.

Here we go - the evil Religious Right, the partial birth abortion ban, school prayer, you could write this yourself, yes? Actually, no. And we suspect most Times' readers got a bit of a Sunday Surprise as well:

...Close to three years later, the White House has lived up to Mr. Rove's promise to engage not only in peace talks in Sudan, but on other human rights issues of critical importance to American religious groups, most notably sex trafficking and AIDS.

... "There are these issues below the radar screen that are of deep concern to the evangelical community, and while they are sincerely held by the administration, they also have the benefit of allowing the president to say, `I have responded to what you wanted me to do,' " Rabbi Saperstein said. "But they're not issues that will alienate large segments of the center in America. These are all-win issues for the administration."

The religious dynamic at the White House reflects a larger change within American evangelicals themselves, and their interest over the last decade in moving beyond the divisive domestic issues that consumed them a generation ago — abortion, school prayer, homosexuality, pornography — into an international arena.

... "Evangelicals today are more interested in making a difference than in making a statement," said the Rev. Richard Cizik, the vice president for governmental affairs of the National Association of Evangelicals, which represents 43,000 congregations. "We made a lot of statements in the 1980's and got zip."

Mr. Cizik said that evangelicals were now more willing to work with Jewish and feminist groups on certain foreign policy issues...

VPW - The Wash Times Mutters About A Party

The WaPo was there.

From the Washington Times, Oct. 23:

Officials also tell us that Mrs. Plame and her husband, former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson, had a party at their house in early July that included several members of the press. The party has raised questions among some officials about whether Mrs. Plame may have given up her covert status under the Intelligence Identities Protection Act by mingling with reporters.

From the WaPo, Oct. 8:

One evening this summer, former diplomat Joseph Wilson sat amid the African-themed decor of his spacious Washington home, sipping a glass of beer and talking about a trip he took to Niger for the CIA. His wife, Valerie, was in the kitchen, preparing chicken for a cookout and arranging red, white and blue napkins.

..When Valerie E. Wilson -- maiden name Plame -- introduced herself to a reporter in her home on July 3, there was no hint she was anything other than a busy mother with an unflagging smile and classy wardrobe. She talked a bit about the joys and challenges of twins, then faded into the background.

One might have thought her to be a financial manager, maybe a real estate agent -- but never a spy. Few knew her secret: At 22, Plame had joined the Central Intelligence Agency and traveled the world on undercover missions.

Can't Spell "Pelosi Democrats" Without "L-O-S-E-R-S"

With a catchy headline, I am halfway done! Now all I need is something to get outraged about. David Brooks covered Iraqi reconstruction, Nancy Pelosi responded, there must be something...

How 'Bout Them Jets!

What could be better than football on a beautiful fall day?

Max Frankel Reviews Wesley Clark's Latest

Writing in the NY Times Sunday Book Review, Max Frankel reviews "'Winning Modern Wars", General Clark's follow-up to ''Waging Modern War".

The reviewer seems to be a skeptic:

Clark glibly lists these objectives, and many more, without suggesting any priorities of effort. And he makes no attempt to explain how any American leader could effectively reconcile so many conflicting ambitions and sovereignties. His self-confidence seems rooted in his experience as commander of the NATO forces that bombed and pacified Kosovo in 1999, a headstrong performance that enlarged his faith in international collaborations while it poisoned his relations with peers and superiors at the Pentagon.

UPDATE: An Alert Reader gives us the WSJ review by Newt Gingrich, also not wholly favorable.

We are reminded of Mr. Gingrich's past success as a firebrand by this big finish:

For those who believe lawyers can replace soldiers and courts can replace battlefields in defeating terrorists and dictators, they have found their candidate. For those who believe that Kosovo was a greater success than Afghanistan and Iraq, they have found their candidate. For those who believe that, instead of invading, we should have spent several years arguing with France and Germany to create a coalition that would have bombed Iraq endlessly while Saddam set about destroying the oil fields, they have found their candidate. Finally, for those who believe Israel is the aggressor and the terrorist bombings can be ignored, they have found their candidate.

"Winning Modern Wars" will prove to be a useful book, but probably more to Karl Rove and the Bush-Cheney campaign than to its author's presidential ambition.

Let's Declare Victory And Exit

Where are we now? Iraq? Yankee Stadium? NO! We are in Malaysia, contemplating the aftermath of Prof. Krugman's recent column. I have my thoughts and some links here. However, the emerging consensus seems to be that the most cogent analysis was presented by Doc Drezner, who is HUGE in India. And if Brad Delong is with him who shall stand against him?

So, a good day for the Dark Force. But let's not overdo it - I think that Don Luskin, who plays pit bull to Paul Krugman's pant leg, goes too far here:

...the storm is just getting started. So far no one has revealed the ties between Krugman and Mahathir, or pointed out how Krugman appears to have been personally complicit in Mahathir's anti-Semitism.

Complicit? Well, it is defined here as "Associated with or participating in a questionable act or a crime; having complicity: newspapers complicit with the propaganda arm of a dictatorship."

I guess "associated with" is the key here, although before this week I surely did not associate Prof. Krugman with Malaysia. Now, we learn that he gave some advice which was independently adopted by the Malyasian Government, and he spoke at a conference in Malaysia.

Let's not get thrown out trying to turn a double into a triple. Defenders of Prof. Krugman will focus on the most extreme arguments as characteristic of them all - let's not make their job easier.

UPDATE: Defenders of Prof. Krugman will include Prof. Krugman himself, who ducks the issues raised by folks like Dan Drezner, pretends he is Joseph Wilson (and pretends the motive was to smear Wilson), and responds to Don Luskin. We especially like the generous use of "they" in the Earnest Prof's piece; "these people" got laughs when Adam Sandler used it in Anger Management, so we salute that as well.

MORE: The Man Without Qualities dissents.

UPDATE: Whirling fan impacted by dark mass.

Sidebar To A Sidebar

Doc Drezner links to a fascinating back and forth between Matt Yglesias of TAPPED and Rich Lowry of NRO on the question of how well President Clinton fought the war on terror.

Read it all!

And the sidebar, from this by Mr. Yglesias:

Nevertheless, because Lowry wants to play the culpability game, let me suggest that an accusation of weakness on terrorism can be more plausibly pointed at the pre-9-11 Bush administration than at Clinton's. By all indications, Bush, upon entering office, actually reduced the priority given to fighting terrorism from a level that was, in retrospect, already inadequate. According to Time, Clinton officials developed, in the waning days of their administration, a plan for combating al-Qaeda more vigorously, but -- wanting to avoid sticking the incoming administration with a policy it had not designed -- they delayed implementing the plan and instead passed the matter on to the incoming national-security team.

Uhh, lefty myth, sorry. Would you believe me if I cited the Man Without Shakespeare, whose title for this post I will carry with me forever? Oh, then how about Bob Somerby at the Daily Howler (scroll down a bit), who good-naturedly notes the Sandy Berger recantation.

Star Search

The next Dem nominee, as the Dems take a page from the Nancy Reagan playbook.

A Word To The Wise Is Sufficient

But stronger hints are available.

We Sense Disenchantment From The Girl On the Bus

Ms. Seelye, the NY Times reporter for the Clark campaign, has impressed us as a reliable Clark booster.

Perhaps it is just our sour mood, but today we sense disenchantment:

Under the Weather, Clark Carries on in a Whisper

CONCORD, N.H., Oct. 23 — Gen. Wesley K. Clark, who is trying to get his five-week-old presidential campaign off the ground, has instead run himself into the ground.

Too much talking, too much flying in planes with bad air and too little sleep combined a while back to leave the 58-year-old retired general with a bad cold, a viral infection and laryngitis, knocking him off the campaign trail for nearly a week and making a hash of his schedule.

And though he re-emerged on Tuesday in New Hampshire, roaming along Main Street in Nashua, he was more in mime than in campaign mode. The onetime commander of allied forces in Europe has been reduced to whispering, no longer campaigning but instead "listening."

"I commanded combat troops for thirty years, but please - don't make me fly Business Class again!"

C'mon - what sort of lifestyle are the other candidates living? Is Clark running for President, or Marcel Marceaus's job? Instead of "A Choice, Not An Echo", how about "A Voice, Not A Whisper"?

Maybe the General can save himself some health problems and dramatize our vulnerability to terror attack by appearing everywhere in a bio-hazard suit. It could scarcely be more ridiculous.

The Boy On The Bus Is Waay Off The Bus

We noted the "Girl on the Bus" covering Gen. Clark's campaign yesterday; today, we pick up on the NY Times' David Halbfinger, who is covering the Kerry campaign.

Mr. Halbfinger writes himself onto the front page (mercifully for Kerry's team, below the fold). Brutal and malicious excerpts (i.e., most of the story) follow:

Kerry Still Dogged by Questions on Vote to Authorize Iraq War

It dogs him at nearly every step on his presidential campaign: If Senator John Kerry is so critical of the Bush administration's handling of the war in Iraq and its aftermath, why did he vote to authorize the use of force in the first place?

The question comes at house parties, Q. and A.'s and fund-raisers, and from every kind of voter: retirees and students, housewives and doctors, those already aligned with outspoken antiwar candidates like Howard Dean or Representative Dennis J. Kucinich and those who say they prefer Mr. Kerry but are nervous about what they see as his most glaring soft spot.

Downhill from here, folks.

Mr. Kerry's vote last week against President Bush's request for $87 billion for military efforts and reconstruction in Iraq and Afghanistan has not necessarily helped. He is having once again to square his vote in favor of last year's Iraq resolution with his opposition to the president's postwar policy.

"I voted against that $87 billion in Washington yesterday," he told an audience in Waterloo, Iowa, on Saturday. "But let me make it clear, I'm for winning the war in Iraq."

What's clear is that, once again, Sen. Kerry is firmly on both sides of the issue.

A Few Good Yankees

"Imus in the Morning" was broadcast from Vermont today, and some disgruntled citizens of Red Sox Nation were whining about the World Series - oh, we're tired of watching the Yankees, we want to see some new teams. Please. Last year, the Angels and the Giants played a fascinating series - dramatic comebacks, the many home runs by perhaps the best player ever to use controlled substances, JT Snow simultaneously scoring a run and saving a three year old's life - and nobody cared.

Do you want the truth? You can't handle the truth. We live in a world that has a World Series. And that Series has to be watched by fans. Whose gonna do it? A bunch of Homerdomers? A bunch of Urban Cowboys?

They have the luxury of not knowing what I know - that the Red Sox defeat, while tragic, probably saved viewership. And the existence of Yankees fans, while while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, probably brings in sponsors.

You don't want the truth. Because deep down, in places you don't talk about at parties, you want the Yankees in that Series. You need the Yankees in that Series.

We use words like victory, tradition, commitment...we use these words as the backbone to a life spent defending something. You use 'em as a punchline.

I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain this to a bunch of fans who rise and sleep under the blanket of national interest the Yankees provide, then question the manner in which they provide it! I'd rather you just said thank you and went on your way. Otherwise, I suggest you pick up the telephone and tell your team to sign a free agent or two. Either way, I don't give a damn what you think you're entitled to!

This is far from over.

The Girl On The Bus Is On The Bus

Katharine Q. Seelye is the NY Times "Girl On the Bus" for the Clark Presidential campaign. She also appears to be "on the bus" with Gen. Clark in the finest Ken Kesey sense. When last we noted her coverage of Wesley Clark, our advice was "Get a room". Her latest story reveals undimmed ardor:

MANCHESTER, N.H., Oct. 22 — Gen. Wesley K. Clark on Wednesday outlined his plan for the economy, which he said would save more than $2.3 trillion over 10 years by repealing some of President Bush's tax cuts, eliminating government waste and managing the war in Iraq better.

Umm, save whom? From whence comes this $2.3 trillion?

...His economic plan, which his advisers sketched out after his speech, relied on these four main elements:

- Repealing the Bush tax cuts for people earning more than $200,000, for a savings of $1.1 trillion over 10 years...

"Repealing the Bush tax cuts". Is that anything at all like "raising taxes"? And shall we guess that "raising taxes" results in "savings" for the government? How thrifty of them.

- Streamlining government to eliminate waste and inefficiency, for a savings of $225 billion..

Bold and visionary! I haven't heard a candidate decry government waste and inefficiency since, I'm guessing, 1999, before the last Presidential election. Or was it 1995, or 1991, or 1987, or... oh, whatever. Is any of this meant to be taken seriously, and why report it seriously?

- Eliminating corporate welfare and tax loopholes, for a savings of $300 billion.

Bold and Visionary, II! If Gen. Clark were still campaigning in Iowa, ethanol subsidies would be a vital national program. Now it is corporate welfare. The rest of that $300 billion has similar constituencies, I suspect - one man's loophole is another woman's vital incentive.

- Improving management of the war in Iraq, for a savings of $125 billion. His advisers, using numbers from House Democrats, said that in a worst-case scenario, President Bush could be expected to spend $418 billion in Iraq over the next decade. They said that General Clark would resolve the postwar situation more quickly, but did not say how, and that he would work with allies to share the costs and use competitive bidding for reconstruction contracts.

Ms. Seelye briefly re-enters low Earth orbit, and points out some obvious problems with these figures. "He would resolve the postwar situation more quickly". Oh, good idea! Sort of like Sen. Kerry's constant criticism that Bush, Blair and Powell should have used the good diplomacy, instead of the pale substitute.

Evidently bored with re-writing the Clark press release, Ms. Seelye offers a flicker of content near the close. Too little, too late.

Do People Read What They Link To?

Prof. DeLong suspects that Glenn Reynolds does not, and offers the recent ADL letter about Paul Krugman as an example. And, since it is a blog, we see in an update that Glenn has made a correction.

But Prof. DeLong tries for an extra base:

I don't know how much Glenn Reynolds reads of the stuff he links to. I suspect the answer is "most"--that he has turned into a guy who never lets the facts get in the way of a bad slur.

But it is clear, as Tim Lambert notes, that Reynolds doesn't remember his own archives...

Via Eschaton, Prof. DeLong then reprises two InstaPosts:

May 7, 2003: ...Donald Luskin is stalking Paul Krugman...

Oct 21, 2003: PAUL KRUGMAN'S UNRAVELLING: He's accusing Donald Luskin of being a stalker, in the literal, not figurative sense.

I believe the actual term is "critic."

Ahh, an amusing contradiction! Actually, it is amusing - if we follow the link Glenn provided in May over to Don Luskin's article, we find this:

The good news is that Krugman is clearly shaken by the new experience of having somebody dare to challenge his insouciant lying. He's even starting to get personal — referring to me in his latest posting as his "stalker-in-chief."

And that is in this posting at Prof. Krugman's website, helpfully linked by Don Luskin as "five". Which naturally precedes, and evidently inspired, both Don Luskin and Glenn Reynolds.

Good job by Tim Lambert in helping us figure out who started the "stalking" meme.

Read it all.

MORE: Let's not lose sight of the Krug-quote that re-opened this on national television:

That's a guy, that's a guy who actually stalks me on the web, and once stalked me personally.

Presumably, the "personally" is what Glenn had in mind when he wrote "in the literal, not figurative sense". But you knew that. Didn't you?

My original comment is here. And Glenn is on this like Hideki Matsui on a hanging... well, anyway, he is on it.

Prof. Krugman Addresses PM Mahathir

Paul Krugman opens his latest column:

The Europeans killed 6 million Jews out of 12 million. But today the Jews rule this world by proxy: They get others to fight and die for them." So said Mahathir Mohamad, the prime minister of Malaysia, at an Islamic summit meeting last week. The White House promptly denounced his "hate-filled remarks."

Indeed, those remarks were inexcusable.

Indeed they were. What the Earnest Professor writes next, then, cannot be an excuse. A rationalization, perhaps, an interpretation, an attempt to put the remarks into context, but surely not an excuse.

But they were also calculated — for Mr. Mahathir is a cagey politician, who is neither ignorant nor foolish. And to understand why he made those remarks is to realize how badly things are going for U.S. foreign policy.

The fact is that Mr. Mahathir, though guilty of serious abuses of power, is in many ways about as forward-looking a Muslim leader as we're likely to find. And Malaysia is the kind of success story we wish we saw more of: an impressive record of economic growth, rising education levels and general modernization in a nation with a Muslim majority.

He made the trains run on time! One can only wonder how the Earnest Professor, if plopped back in, oh, 1936, might have assessed the success of the various European leaders at rallying their countries from the depression.

VPW - Cool Links From Readers

A number of commenters have left some great links in the comments of the previous post; we unearth them here.

The Boston Globe peers behind the Brewster-Jennings cover story used by Ms. Plame, and found very little:

Former intelligence officials confirmed Plame's cover was an invention and that she used other false identities and affiliations when working overseas. ''All it was was a telephone and a post office box,'' said one former intelligence official who asked not to be identified. ''When she was abroad she had a more viable cover.''

Well, then, losing that firm as a cover may not be losing the CIA any sleep. If other agents also used it domestically (on FEC filings, for example), they might be at risk, but it may well be the case that no one used it for serious overseas work.

The Wall Street Journal has a story by David S. Cloud titled "Memo May Aid Leak Probe", and we may excerpt it generously at the end of this post. A highlight:

The memo [according to two people familiar with it], prepared by U.S. intelligence personnel, details a meeting in early 2002 where CIA officer Valerie Plame and other intelligence officials gathered to brainstorm about how to verify reports that Iraq had sought uranium yellowcake from Niger.

VPW - Seymour Hersh's Conspiracy, Part II

We left off, in the post below, marveling at but not dismissing Seymour Hersh's suggestion that disgruntled ex-CIA operatives prepared the forged Niger documents. [LATE UPDATE: Vigorous debunking by Dennis Hans] The next thought follows as night the day - might there be a connection to the Wilson/Plame scandal? The Ambassador's jaunt to Africa was triggered, in part, by intel generated by the forgeries.

Oh, brother. If I limit myself to presenting a few dots, can I count on you to connect them? That way, we can be over the top together.

Via Seamole, we note this:

In June, Wilson gave a "State of the Movement Address" at the 2003 Iraq Forum sponsored by the Education for Peace in Iraq Center (EPIC), splitting the keynote duties with "veteran CIA analyst" Ray McGovern, yes the same Ray McGovern who runs the "Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity" (VIPS) group that has been bashing Bush and associating with all things leftie.

And here we have a letter from the VIPS, helpfully dated July 15:

...By now you are all too familiar with the play-by-play. The Iraq-seeking-uranium-in-Niger forgery is a microcosm of a mischievous nexus of overarching problems.

...Surely Dr. Rice cannot persist in her insistence that she learned only on June 8, 2003 about former ambassador Joseph Wilson’s mission to Niger in February 2002, when he determined that the Iraq-Niger report was a con-job. Wilson’s findings were duly reported to all concerned in early March 2002. And, if she somehow missed that report, the New York Times’ Nicholas Kristoff on May 6 recounted chapter and verse on Wilson’s mission, and the story remained the talk of the town in the weeks that followed.

Well, the VIPS people certainly were interested in the Ambassador's story. And they knew him, or at least, met at a conference. And could VIPS have been behind some of the helpful leaks to Nick Kristof, and others? Since Mr. Kristof mentions the VIPS letter in his July 15 column, we rate this as better than vaguely possible. But not all of those leaks panned out, or at least, the CIA denies them.

Krugman's "The Great Unraveling"

Evidently, the title is autobiographical - Don Luskin explains.

MORE: Hmm, could the Earnest Prof be a serial offender? Here he Meets The Press, and is asked about the Krugman Truth Squad:

...If you take on our current leadership, um [deep breath], you will be pursued, you will be stalked. So far, so far just stalked, uh, intellectually, but it's, it's pretty scary sometimes."

VPW - Let's Take His Word For It

Alex Parker is raving about the new Seymour Hersh piece. I await my own reaction, and, to whet your appetite, recycle this bombshell on the forged Niger documents [LATE UPDATE - Vigorous debunking here; comments below]:

Another explanation was provided by a former senior C.I.A. officer. He had begun talking to me about the Niger papers in March, when I first wrote about the forgery, and said, “Somebody deliberately let something false get in there.” He became more forthcoming in subsequent months, eventually saying that a small group of disgruntled retired C.I.A. clandestine operators had banded together in the late summer of last year and drafted the fraudulent documents themselves....

The thinking, he said, was that the documents would be endorsed by Iraq hawks at the top of the Bush Administration, who would be unable to resist flaunting them at a press conference or an interagency government meeting. They would then look foolish when intelligence officials pointed out that they were obvious fakes. But the tactic backfired, he said, when the papers won widespread acceptance within the Administration. “It got out of control.”

We recall Seymour Hersh's "too-few-troops" story during the Iraqi war, where one of his sources proved to be less than prophetic. Still...

VPW - We Attempt To Think Like A Righty

Easy assignment, huh? Re-reading my tiresome flogging of Ambassador Wilson, below, a thought occurs. Imagine, if you will that you are in the White House, and it is your happy task to follow developments in the yellowcake scandal. Nick Kristof wrote about it in May; evidently, he made enough of a splash that Condi Rice was asked about it on "Meet The Press" (Note to self - find it [More - in his July column, Kristof cites George S. on "This Week", June 8), and Mr. Kristof wrote about this, too.

Now, the Ambassador prints his famous July 6 NY Times piece, George Tenet presents his July 11 statement debunking parts of it, as discussed earlier, and what do you do?

Now, here is where some lefties get stuck, since the notion that the Ambassador might be misleading folks is too bitter a pill. But the earnest White House staffer is no lefty; we need to think like an Evil Righty (I can help).

So, Mr. Kristof has two columns with seemingly bad information. Whatever his sources, he needs to treat them a bit more skeptically, and he might benefit from a deeper understanding of the backstory. So, what does this staffer do?

Well, he might write a sternly worded letter to the NY Times; he might send an e-mail to the InstaPundit; or he might call up Bob Novak and whine to him.

Or, he might call Nick Kristof! Walter Pincus of the WaPo also had some bad dirt, so call him too. In which case, they might be among the Select Six who received pre-Novak leaks about Ambassador Wilson and his wife.

Well, that was the theory. And, pleasant surprise, Mr. Kristof has a column on July 15, which starts promisingly:

After I wrote a month ago about the Niger uranium hoax in the State of the Union address, a senior White House official chided me gently and explained that there was more to the story that I didn't know.

VPW - We Ponder Anew Ambassador Wilson

Ambassador Wilson troubles me. I outlined some of his earlier annoyances in an open letter to Timothy Noah at Slate. To summarize - Ambassador Wilson misrepresented, on the pages of the NY Times, what he reported to the CIA about his trip to Niger; he hyped the claims of damage to national security caused by the release of his wife's maden name; and when he suggested that Karl Rove was the culprit, he said "And trust me, when I use that name, I measure my words", but he later retracted that.

Now let's lengthen the list. According to the WaPo, the talkative Ambassador was a source for a Nick Kristof column on May 6, and a Walter Pincus WaPo story on June 12. We go to Mr. Kristof first, with help from Alex Parker:

VPW - We Continue To Mock Boston

In a pleasant merging of the Valerie Plame Wilson scandal and the Boston Red Sox debacle, today we mock an editorial in the Boston Globe, which calls for President Bush to be more involved in uncovering the truth:

Bush has left the work of locating the leakers to the Justice Department and the FBI, while he plays the role of a detached observer. This stance makes him look like a weak leader presiding over a band of unruly subordinates who feud with each other, betraying patriotic Americans like Ms. Wilson, with no fear of being brought to hand by the president.

I gave the long answer here, so I will excerpt Alex Parker, who, for the benefit of my left leaning readers, tilts your way:

...I also don't buy into the "Bush should find the leakers himself" meme. For one, what did anyone expect? Two, it would resolve nothing: whoever Bush frog-marched out of the White House, that action would be treated by his critics with about the same credulity that O.J. would receive announcing he's found the real killers. But it would give Bush an alabi for the general public--he would be admired for his honesty, all while engaging in a cover-up.

Well, yes. I am not thrilled with "Bush - OJ", but why would sacking two officials, or five, or a dozen, satisfy the critics? As Bogie noted in "Key Largo", what they want is "more".

And we have MORE! The very useful Parker Collection of Intimigate links.

UPDATE: Brad DeLong wants President Bush (and me) to do the right thing. Well, I am not convinced that letting the process work, with a professional investigation handled by professionals, is the wrong thing. Ashcroft will at some point have to separate himself from this, and at roughly the same point, I will have to firmly grasp the distinction between a special prosecutor and an independent counsel. I want the credible outsider operating under the aegis of the DoJ, especially since the special prosecutor statute has lapsed.

And a link to the non-supportive reaction of four Senators to the current investigation.

UPDATE: Let's give Alex Parker the mike, so that my Evil Excerpter doesn't put him in a corner - his new post amplifies his previous thoughts, and is titled "President Bush is morally culpable".

MORE: Mark Kleiman is not pleased. I sense an avenging Strawman - Are we to suppose that the President cares, and should care, exclusively about the PR aspects of this and not at all about the national security aspects?

Well, the President has said he doesn't like leaks. DCI Tenet has not complained to him at their weekly meetings about the national security implications (or had not, as of a few weeks ago). And I continue to doubt that a chicken-sans-head investigation will really resolve the national security issues here.

A Day May Come

I see in your eyes, the same fear
that would take the heart of me.

A day may come... when the courage of men fails.
When we forsake our friends...
and break all bonds of fellowship...
but it is not this day.

This day... we fight!

Joe Torre, rallying his Yankees in the eighth inning last night? No.

The 1978 one-game playoff between the Red Sox and Yankees has been called one of the greatest games ever played. Move it over - the Yankess beat the Red Sox 6-5 last night in an instant classic.

Euphoric coverage available at the NY Daily News, starting with a modest and restrained front page which I can't seem to permalink.

Props to Pedro, who spoke with the press after the game: "I'm the ace, it's not time to think about the pitch count," Martinez said. "I always want to stay in. I did whatever I could. They can point the finger at me."

They won't - Grady Little will never be forgiven for riding his stallion a little too far.

Joe Torre points out that the Red Sox have plenty to be proud of - they had a great season, a tremendous series against the Athletics, and played a game for the ages last night.

My theory - if you can watch a game that folks will be talking about twenty five years later, enjoy it - all the geezers who go on about the Bucky Dent game can pipe down (hmm, that includes me...). This game topped it, and gives a new generation of Red Sox fans something to stew over.

Now, the Yankees are not well positioned to counsel others in dealing with heartbreak and defeat. However, Joe Torre was asked about his feelings after the Yankees lost the absurdly dramatic Series to the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2001. I paraphrase - "the fans wanted to see a team that never gave up and never gave in. You can't control the outcome; all you can control is your effort, and the way you react afterwards. We were all disappointed that we lost, but we don't feel like we let anyone down, and I don't think our fans feel like we let them down."

He was right - it's not whether you win or lose, it really is how you play the game. There is a reason baseball is also called "The Show". Andrew Sullivan's boyfriend gets it.

Great Moments in Criminal Investigations

The NY Times describes the hearing on the Kobe Bryant rape situation. Among the key witnesses was the detective who took the statement from the young woman. We excerpt:

Using the testimony and report of the prosecution's lead investigator, Doug Winters, the Bryant defense highlighted several discrepancies in the accuser's story.

...Winters had testified last week that the woman told him she twice said "No" in attempting to stop Bryant from assaulting her. But in cross-examination Wednesday, Winters conceded that the accuser had not told him she said "No" when he first interviewed her on July 1, the day after their encounter.

"I asked the accuser why she never told Mr. Bryant no," Winters wrote in his investigative report. Winters said the accuser had talked about having said no in subsequent interviews. Mackey zeroed in on Winters's first interview, asking if the young woman had clearly indicated she had said no to Bryant.

"I don't recall specifically if she said that," Winters said.

Mackey: "You would have put that in your report?"

Winters: "Maybe, yes."

Maybe? In the course of investigating an alleged rape, we presume that the question of whether the young woman verbally objected might have come up in conversation. And it did! By his own notes, he asked her just that question.

But now he can't remember actually troubling himself to listen to her answer. He "might have" written it down if she had said yes? Or, he might not have?

Clown show. The jury will love this.

Parsing the Curses

The Gods of Baseball seek entertainment for themselves, and for us - tonight, a dramatic, climactic, epic, and really big showdown, clash, confrontation and ball game between the Red Sox and the Yankees.

Last night, the hapless Cubs completed a championship-level collapse by losing Game Seven, at home, to the Florida Marlins. This fulfills the Billy Goat Curse, which is quite specific: "Wrigley would never host another World Series".

But what do we make of the Curse of the Bambino? If the curse has meaning, surely the Red Sox cannnot defeat the Yankees in a seventh game in the House That Ruth Built? Or, if the Red Sox do prevail, doesn't it follow that the curse is lifted?

Not necessarily. A Red Sox sportswriter was asked this very question, and his answer was emphatic - the Curse of the Bambino is about the Red Sox winning the World Series. The Yankees are merely an obstacle, a diversion, and a distraction from the ultimate objective. If the BoSox can advance to the Series and win it, then clearly, the Curse has been lifted in fine style. However, if the Red Sox beat the Yankees and flop to the Fish, then the curse will be stronger than ever, and the new question plaguing Red Sox Nation will be, what do we have to do to win this thing?

True Yankee fans find these Red Sox distinctions tedious, of course, since the World Series is meaningless unless we are in it - last year the Angels and Giants provided quite a show, and so what?

Play ball.

MORE: Dan Drezner has advice from Adam Smith, who, IIRC, was the (sometime) defensive replacement for Bill Buckner.

UPDATE: The key tonight for both sides is to relax and concentrate. Execute. Do the little things that got you here.

I, for example, am struggling to remember - was I listening on the radio, or watching on television, when the Yankees had the big inning against Derek Lowe? Was I wearing my lucky tin-foiled lined Yankees cap when Manny Ramirez flopped in Game Five with the bases loaded? Was I watching in the den, or the bedroom when Jason and Bernie failed to deliver the runners from second and third in Game Six - I don't want to repeat that mistake!

Frankly, I worry that under playoff pressure, I am folding up like a cheap suitcase... Do I have what it takes to spectate at this level? Troubling.

We Salute Jane Galt's Positive Attitude

In an admirable attempt to find something nice to say about Paul Krugman, the mysterious Jane Galt lauds his latest effort as "outstanding".

In her comments, Ms. Galt assures us that she is not being sarcastic - she thinks "the column is a very good look at what I consider to be a major macroeconomic weakness of the American economy: our propensity to borrow from abroad to finance our current consumption, with no clear idea where the growth is going to come from that will allow us to pay back that money without pinching. Unless we have unrealistic growth, Krugman is right: the current account must eventually correct, which means our currency must fall."

In an update, Ms. Galt refers us to Arnold Kling as a voice of reason. Don Luskin, and The Man Sans Q have more. I absurdly compress their Soundbite: Prof. Krugman is applying a model developed to predict third world debt crises to a developed economy, and he is using a Dowdified version fo the Lehman Bros. press release for his scary quote.

Prof. Brad DeLong is less worried than the Special Agent Krugman about the consequences of a dollar collapse - as Prof. Krugman himself noted, our foreign debt is denominated in dollars, which makes a big difference in the impacy of a dollar collapse on lives in the US. And, Prof. DeLong provides an anonymous dissent - the proportion of dollar assets held by foreigners is not in divergence from historical norms, so what is the worry?

My soundbite - the US employed tax cuts and interest rate cuts to stimulate our economy during a recession; that was sensible. Since we are a somewhat open economy, demand in the US creates jobs overseas. This is also a good thing - although Mr. Greenspan is no doubt frustrated that his efforts have led to robust employment in China rather then here, consider the alternatives - a weak job market in the US may result in such political instability that we elect a Democrat as President in 2004; a weak job market in China could result in violent revolution.

The US is the global leader and the global engine of growth - policies to raise taxes or reduce our current account defict while Japan and Europe totter near recession would be madness.

And in the long run? The Economist has a fascinating feature providing a wealth of country briefings, and quick summary statistics. So, I see that the US, Germany, and France had a debt/GDP ratio in 2002 of roughly 60%; Japan was at 145%.

Budget deficits? In 2002, Germany and France had deficits of more than 3% of GDP; the US was less than 2% (projections are a bit less encouraging); Japan was more than 7%.

And the demographic problem facing Europe and Japan is well known - they have generous health and social insurance, high taxes, rigid labor markets, a below-replacement birth rate, and no signifcant ability to absorb immigrants.

So who is facing a long term crisis? By the one measure of the current account, the US has a problem. Viewed more broadly, the problems lie elsewhere. And, as at least one of the posters above noted, investors can only flee the dollar in preference for another currency; neither the Euro nor the yen seem to be an obvious safe haven.

MORE: A link to the CBO budget projections. What is the possible timing of the imminent fiscal threat? Prof. Krugman warns us that " The crisis won't come immediately. For a few years, America will still be able to borrow freely, simply because lenders assume that things will somehow work out.

But at a certain point we'll have a Wile E. Coyote moment."

Hmm. Shalle we say, less than ten? Over that period, the CBO projects debt held by the public (as a percent of GDP) to soar from 34% all the way to 40% before falling back below 34% (although projections are less optimistic if tax breaks scheduled to expire are extended; whetehr they will be in the face of imminent financial panic is a separate question).

And what of the Economist's 60% figure I cited earlier? The balance appears to be the Social Security trust fund, and the Government retirement funds, "Principally Civil Service Retirement, Military Retirement, Medicare, and Unemployment Insurance." The gross federal debt as a percent of GDP appears to rise from 60% to less than 70% before leveling off.

The City Of Slumped Shoulders

Eight in the eighth! A classic Cubby swoon, and we await tonight's adventure.

And in Boston, the Fenway crowd was silent and scared for most of the game - I thought I was watching 33,000 turkeys who had just learned about Thanksgiving. They met their fate at the hands of David Wells and Mariano Rivera, and the Yankees go up in the Series 3 games to 2.

A Heads-Up To My Friends On The Left

This headline is an eye-catcher - "Iraq War Swells Al Qaeda's Ranks, Report Says":

War in Iraq (news - web sites) has swollen the ranks of al Qaeda and galvanized the Islamic militant group's will, the International Institute for Strategic Studies said on Wednesday in its annual report.

The 2003-2004 edition of the British-based think-tank's annual bible for defense analysts, The Military Balance, said Washington's assertions after the Iraq conflict that it had turned the corner in the war on terror were "over-confident."

The report, widely considered an authoritative text on the military capabilities of states and militant groups worldwide, could prove fodder for critics of the U.S.-British invasion and of the reconstruction effort that has followed in Iraq.

Washington must impose security in Iraq to prevent the country from "ripening into a cause celebre for radical Islamic terrorists," it concluded. "Nation-building" in Iraq was paramount and might require more troops than initially planned.

On the plus side, war in Iraq has denied al Qaeda a potential supplier of weapons of mass destruction and discouraged state sponsors of terrorism from continuing to support it," the report said.

"On the minus side, war in Iraq has probably inflamed radical passions among Muslims and thus increased al Qaeda's recruiting power and morale and, at least marginally, its operating capability," it said.

"The immediate effect of the war may have been to isolate further al Qaeda from any potential state supporters while also swelling its ranks and galvanizing its will."

If their point is that failure to rebuild Iraq will result in a setback in the war on terror, well, we concur. Who doesn't?

The comments to the press are here.

And, the heads-up - if the International Institute for Strategic Studies is authoritative now, they may have been authoritative when they assessed Iraq's WMD capability in September 2002. I have excerpts here.

VPW - Alex Parker Has the Required Reading List

Alex Parker has put together the key stories for the Valerie Plame Wilson affair. I am especially intrigued by the early articles by Nick Kristof and Walter Pincus, where Amb. Wilson appears as an anonymous source (later outed).

My nominee for "what is missing?" Dan Drezner has already suggested Paul Krugman's column from July 22. I would also add the statement from DCI Tenet on July 11, giving the CIA description of the Wilson report.

Honorable mentions? Howard Dean included this in his "16 Questions" for George Bush, so let's give Dean and the staff props for knowing a scandal when they see it.

And Mr. Parker links to the Intelligence Agents Protection Act, which seems to be the relevant statute, but elsewhere there is a link which also defines some of the relevant terms - "covert agent", for example, has a specific definition which includes an overseas posting in the previous five years; that is not obvious from the underlying statute. Talk is cheap - I have a link I like better, but can I find it?

More recently, I was a big fan of the Howard Fineman piece in Newsweek, which spent a lot of time on the background of the White House-CIA feud over Iraq.

So, very good job by Mr. Parker, and an extremely useful link.

Drezner Gets Results!

Bush declares himself to be President! The Doctor has thoughts.