I’d dismissed the Ben Domenech (the RedState blogger just hired by the Washington Post) issue as a combination of blogger inside baseball and the usual spittle-flecked rant against the right by Duncan Black.

But looking deeper into it, it sure looks like the guy is a) careless with words – a bad characteristic for a professional writer (if he thinks Coretta King was a Communist, and said so carelessly, that’s worse to me than if he’d meant it. If he’d meant it, we could judge him and in this case most likely dismiss him as a moron. If he’s that careless with words, he say anything and we’d wonder what we should take seriously…); and b) a serial plagiarizer.

Now I don’t think that b) is particularly an issue for blogs (if it matters enough to be read, the blogger involved will almost certainly get busted) or for the right (unlike Matt Stoller who says: This Ben Domenech debacle is more than a sad story of a young conservative with integrity problems. The toxic brew of racism and dishonesty is really part of their DNA, and it has practical real world consequences.), but I do think it’s a significant issue for journalism, and since a job at the Post is a job in journalism – I think he ought to step out or be shown the door.

My second-least favorite academic, Juan Cole (I know, I still read him, even though his site is little more than a list of those who have been killed in Iraq) approvingly cites a U Mich study that defines “civil war”:

‘ That there should be a political controversy over whether there is a civil war in Iraq is a tribute to the Bush administration’s Orwellian attention to political rhetoric. By the most widely accepted social science measure, Iraq is incontestably in a civil war.

“Sustained military combat, primarily internal, resulting in at least 1,000 battle-deaths per year, pitting central government forces against an insurgent force capable of effective resistance, determined by the latter’s ability to inflict upon the government forces at least 5 percent of the fatalities that the insurgents sustain.” (Errol A. Henderson and J. David Singer, “Civil War in the Post-Colonial World, 1946-92,” Journal of Peace Research, Vol. 37, No. 3, May 2000.) ‘

(Note that it’s from a Salon article by the Clueless Professor – I won’t link to Salon, because I’m kinda torqued that they’d sell subscriptions by promising more Abu Ghreib pictures)

Hmmm. Gang warfare in the United States cost over 900 lives in 2004. 153 police officers were killed in the line of duty, and I’d bet a third of them were killed by gang members – so to meet Cole’s standard, we’re on the borderline of a civil war – even as crime rates hit all-time lows.

I’d better buy some more ammo…

Neo – Neocon has started a series of posts on propaganda in wartime; her latest is focused on the famous “Four Freedoms” paintings Norman Rockwell did during WWII.

By odd synchronicity, we’d just watched James Cagney’s WWII film “Yankee Doodle Dandy” – it turns out that Littlest Guy shares our affection for musicals, so we’re bringing him from Sondheim to Singin’ In The Rain to Yankee Doodle Dandy as a quick tour d’horizon.

And about fifteen minutes into YDD, I picked up the Netflix sleeve to see when it had been made – and noted, as I’d expected, that it had been made during WWII.

The naked patriotism – bleeding over to jingoism – of the film can be captured in two quotes and an image.

The image is the poster for the film (lifted from Tim Dirks site “The Greatest Films” – http://www.filmsite.org/ as are the cites) seen here:

One quote from the start of the film:

George: (smiling to himself) I was a pretty cocky kid in those days – a pretty cocky kid. A regular Yankee Doodle Dandy, always carrying a flag in a parade or following one.

President: I hope you haven’t outgrown the habit.

George: Not a chance.

President: Well that’s one thing I’ve always admired about you Irish-Americans. You carry your love of country like a flag, right out in the open. It’s a great quality.

George: I inherited that – I got that from my father. He ran away to the Civil War when he was thirteen – the proudest kid in the whole state of Massachusetts.

President: So you’ve spent your life telling the other forty-seven states what a great country it is.

One from the end:

President: Why, I wanted to hear the story of your life. It has a direct bearing on my sending for you. Do you know what this is?

George: The Congressional Medal of Honor.

President: Let’s see what the inscription says: ‘To George M. Cohan, for his contribution to the American spirit. Over There and Grand Old Flag Presented by Act of Congress.’ I congratulate you, Mr. Cohan. (He hands the medal to George) I understand you’re the first person of your profession to receive this honor. You should be very proud.

George: Oh, I am proud. In fact, I’m flabbergasted. First time in my life, I’m speechless. Are you sure there isn’t some mistake?

President: Quite sure.

George: (modestly) But this medal is for people who’ve given their lives to their country or done something big. I’m just a song and dance man. Everybody knows that.

President: A man may give his life to his country in many different ways, Mr. Cohan. And quite often he isn’t the best judge of how much he has given. Your songs were a symbol of the American spirit. Over There was just as powerful a weapon as any cannon, as any battleship we had in the First World War. Today, we’re all soldiers, we’re all on the front. We need more songs to express America. I know you and your comrades will give them to us.

George: Mr. President, I’ve just begun to earn this medal. It’s quite a thing.

[emphasis added]

Add the lyrics to one of his songs:

Johnnie, get your gun, get your gun, get your gun
Take it on the run, on the run, on the run
Hear them calling you and me, Ev’ry son of liberty.
Hurry right away, No delay, Go today,
Make your daddy glad to have had such a lad,
Tell your sweetheart not to pine, To be proud her boy’s in line.
Over there, Over there,
Send the word, Send the word, Over there
That the Yanks are coming, The Yanks are coming,
The drums rum-tumming ev’rywhere.
So prepare, Say a prayer,
Send the word, Send the word, To beware
We’ll be over, We’re coming over,
And we won’t come back till it’s over, Over There.

You’ll have a funny set of reactions to the film if you watch it today – first, you’ll be gobsmacked by the fact that Jimmy Cagney is a hoofer! …and quite a good one.

Then you’ll get a sense of the true datedness of the film from the inferences on race and gender…”… about you Irish-Americans.”

But a part of it is that I can’t imagine a film today that wore our flag so nakedly on its sleeve.

And I wonder whether and how we can fight or win a war without doing so.

The New York Times has an editorial slamming the Administration for their

accommodation of the mining industry — notably by packing the mine safety agencies with pro-management appointees — has produced a marked decline in major fines for negligent companies. A recent data analysis by The Times documented a risky, business-friendly downturn in penalties since 2001.

Sadly, the professional journalists at the Times couldn’t so the five minutes of research that would have told them that – with the exception of an outlier to date this year – deaths under the Bush Administration are significantly lower than those under pro-labor Clinton.

Go back and read my old post (linked above) and marvel at the diligence of our national newspaper of record.

Over at Michael Totten’s joint, Lee Smith Tony Badran writes the post I’ve been meaning to about the hysterical (as in ha-ha hysterical) Harvard study on the pernicious power of the “Israel Lobby” in defining US foreign policy.

A few great grafs:

Pretty much any American who has ever been in a motorized vehicle knows that the centerpiece of US Middle Eastern policy is Washington’s relationship with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and has been so since the mid-30s. It is a vital national interest – not just because cheap fuel permits Americans to drive SUVs, but because protecting the largest known oil-reserves in the world ensures a stable world economy. Moreover, the US military counts on access to that oil in the event it has to wage war – an activity that demands a lot of oil.

Walt and Mearsheimer’s article explains how “the thrust of US policy in the region derives almost entirely from domestic politics,” which I agree with, because like many Americans I’ve ridden in a car before and I believe that the ability to get people and things from one place to another is a big part of successful domestic politics. It’s not entirely clear that the authors of this really long article have ever been in a car before, because when they’re talking about domestic politics, they’re not talking about cars, or the economy or even our military, but “the activities of the ‘Israel Lobby.'”

…

True or False: “By contrast, pro-Arab interest groups, in so far as they exist at all, are weak, which makes the Israel Lobby’s task even easier.”

True – not. Psyche. Yeah, true if you exclude the obviously limited influence that oil companies have exercised in US policymaking over the last seventy years. And it’s not just the oil companies doing Gulf bidding; virtually every American ambassador who’s served in Riyadh winds up with a nice package to keep selling the Saudi line back in Washington. Yes, you’re right, AIPAC’s annual budget is a whopping $40 million dollars – or precisely equivalent to the private donation Saudi prince Walid Bin Talal recently gave to two US universities to start up Islamic centers. What? Come on Steve, he gave half of it to Harvard! OK, give me the car keys. The keys to the car, it’s how you got here. In a car. It has four wheels and a motor. It runs on gas. Gas comes from a place called Saudi Arabia….

Go read the whole thing. Biggest Guy spent a few days hanging out at Harvard when we were doing the college-tour thing and he wrote the school off as “lame”.

Hmmm. If this is what Cambridge’s best and the brightest have to offer, he’s even smarter than I thought he was…

Chris Bertram crows over Johann Hari’s repentant (and statistics-challenged) column in which he sorrowfully apologizes for having supported the war.

I’ll update my criticism of Hari’s facts when I get a chance to later today or tonight, but Chris somehow forgot to highlight this part of Hari’s column:

POSTSCRIPT: There’s been a collosal response to this article and I’m still picking through the e-mails. Over fifty from Iraqis, of which some mournfully agree, although this e-mail was more typical:

“Your article in the Independent today, 20/3/2006, was really disappointing to all of your admirers. You let them down. You changed your mind and switched from pro-war to join the anti-war campaigners, means that you gave in bowed to the aggressors. So instead of blaming the terrorists for this mass killing in Iraq at the hand of the terrorists, you put the blame on Bush and Blair for liberating Iraqi people from the worst dictator in history. If your new stance is right, then it was wrong to stand up against Hitler in the WW II, because that war caused humanity 55 million casualties. So it was better not oppose the Axis sates. Is that fair? Is this is the justice that we are looking for? If the tyrants were left to do as they like because of the possible revenge from their followers, then our glob will be place for the tyrants only and the whole planet population will be living like sheep.

Abdulkhaliq Hussein”

I certainly can’t add anything to that. And Hari has no answer to it.

I can’t let the anniversary of the start of the Iraq war go unremarked.

My thoughts are with everyone over there – our troops, our allies, and most of all the Iraqis.

Knowing everything I know today, I would have made the same decision three years ago – to support the invasion.

Knowing everything I know today, I still don’t know how it will come out. And neither does anyone else; so when you read proclamations of victory or defeat, I’d take a moment and reflect first on the messiness of history.

We are in an arduous struggle against a strong and evil enemy. We hope to win without becoming evil ourselves, and while that makes the struggle far harder, it is the only thing that makes it worthwhile.

[edited amazingly clunky grammar]

Lots of real-life stuff this weekend, and today I need to go fix TG’s motorcycle and one of my own.

But I scanned my Bloglines feeds this morning, and came across one thing you folks probably haven’t read and should.

It’s by Marc Cooper, a man who brutally kills defenseless fishes for fun and between times writes hella smart commentary at the L.A. Weekly and his own blog.

Pajamas Media also has a round-up of blog postings on the Cuban anniversary. All of the links are to conservative or right-wing blogs.
The reason is unfortunate. There are no liberal blogs marking this anniversay today. At least none that can be easily found.

I don’t believe for one moment that this owes to some sort of liberal “softeness” on Castro (though there’s certainly a sweet spot for him among the more stridently leftist folks). No, the silence on Cuba owes to something else: a smothering parochialism that has set down upon much of the liberal left and extinguished much more honorable traditions of internationalism. Liberals and progressives nowadays are defined more than anything by their sheer opposition to George Bush and no longer feel themselves part of a bigger cause – like, say, freedom.

For too many of them it’s a simple formula: Whatever Bush is for, I’m against. Period. Next question?
The result is a strange liberalish mirror-image of Buchananist isolationism: “I can’t be criticizing some foreign government I have no control over when I have to spend all my energy fighting the ills of my own government,” as some have crudely and previously put it on this blog. Or, worse, “I’m not going to gang up on Fidel when we Americans have created such a horror in [fill in the blank] Iraq or Haiti or Afghanistan”.

I see. Well, at least during the lulls in your ongoing heroic struggle against rampant Republicanism, take a moment out to quietly remember those prisoners of conscience who languish in Cuban prisons. They deserve your support and solidarity, even if it isn’t George Bush who put them there.

It become – sadly – very rare to read commentators on either side who won’t do or say anything to score points on “the opposition”. I’m slowly losing interest in them; it’s the iconoclasts – who I believe might actually let a fact stand in the way of a good opinion – who are the folks I’m most interested in listening to.

Just saw it (blogging from my Treo in the theater lobby). Go see it.

It’s not a great film – but it’s a powerful one.

Note: I’m going to close comments off – in a week or so when more people have actually seen it, I’ll toss a post and we can debate it.

Kevin Drum is all upset that a safe ports bill – HR4899 – was just put down by the GOP.

I’m huge on port security, and have been for years:

The power goes out, the telephones, cell phones, and computers don’t work. My backup AM/SW/SSB radio in the garage doesn’t work, and I step onto my driveway and look toward San Pedro and see a dark mushroom cloud.

We’ll skip over the fact that all the electronics in the area are kaput because of EMP, and hypothesize a working TV or radio, which informs me that it appears that a small…5KT…nuke has just exploded on a container ship in San Pedro harbor, along with another one in Red Hook, just across from Manhattan, and another one at the container yard in Seattle.

So I was kinda concerned when I read it as well.Then I looked at the bill itself.

Congressmen Jerry Nadler and Jim Oberstar have introduced the S.O.S. Act which would require 100 percent of the containers entering our ports, instead of the current 6 percent, to be screened long before they reach our shores. The bill mandates that:

* All containers be scanned using the best-available technology, including scanning for radiation and density, before they are loaded onto a ship destined for the United States;

* Scans be reviewed by American security personnel before the container is loaded; and

* Containers be sealed with a device that indicates tampering, and would notify U.S. officials of a breach before the container enters the Exclusive Economic Zone of the United States.

Come on Kevin – you know that’s not a serious security proposal, it’s a trial balloon. You can’t implement this proposal without shutting down global trade.

I’ll suggest some reading from the Georgia Tech Transportation and Logistics Security Group as a way of getting your feet wet in this issue.

Meanwhile, My Congresswoman, Jane Harman (who I like better every week) is working on a competing measure – the SAFE Port Act (pdf).

Dig in a bit and see what you think.