Smart Man

Coach K to remain at Duke. The soap opera that is known as the Lakers is no place for a good man like him. The really bad thing is that the Lakers/Duke/Krzyzewski should NOT have let this out of the bag. Now whoever takes the Lakers' job will seem to be the second choice. Not good, not good. Thinking about it, it will probably mean that the Lakers won't get a tier 1 coach and end up with some assistant coach taking on an interim job for a year.

What a mess.

Follow Up: Apparently I'm wrong. Rudy T is the "clear-cut No. 2 choice". (Boy, talk about backhanded compliments) I think that Rudy T is an excellent choice, if he'll take it.

Follow Up To the Follow Up: I wonder. . .I wonder if Rudy T is really the Lakers first choice. Since the Boy Wonder didn't select Rudy T, I wonder if the Lakers made it seem like they tried to get Kobe's man (K), but failed. .. thus leaving the franchise no alternative but to get Rudy T.

Nader Nixed by Dems

Repression? Payback for 2000? Whatever it is, the Dems are doing what they can to make sure Nader is off the ballet. You decide:

Nader's campaign had submitted more than 22,000 signatures to Arizona election officials June 9 — far more than the 14,694 valid signatures required by state law to compete against President Bush and Kerry.

Two Democratic voters had filed a lawsuit last week, backed by the Arizona Democratic Party, questioning the validity of Nader's nominating petitions and other documents. The Democrats argued that more than 70 percent of the signatures were invalid.

As a Maricopa County Superior Court judge prepared to hear arguments in the case, Nader campaign attorney Richard Mahrle conceded there were "technical errors" in the ballot petition and said Nader would not contest the lawsuit.

So, on a technicality Nadar is not going to be on the 2004 ballet in Arizona. And why?

Democratic National Committee spokesman Jano Cabrera said Friday that the national party supports efforts by state parties to validate Nader signatures, but it is not providing resources to help state parties in that effort.

"We feel that no matter how small a percentage of the vote he is drawing, he is drawing that support from John Kerry. A vote for Nader is a vote for Bush," Cabrera said.

No, I would have thought that a vote for Nader is a vote for Nader. I guess what they're saying is that your vote doesn't count unless it's for us.

The Degradation of American Dialog

Well, it's racheting up and it's mind boggling (phrase d'jour). Over the last couple of years, I've seen the liberal left increasingly use demagoguery, propaganda and outright lies in order to discredit President Bush and win this fall's election. A survey:

MoveOn.org hosted a contest for political commercials that included an entry that equated President Bush with Hitler. Hitler? Last I checked, I don't remember the government marching Arab Americans into concentration camps with ovens.

An artist paints President Bush as a devourer of children.

The pinnicle is, of course, Moore's agitprop movie, Farenheit 9/11. Joe Katzman at Winds of Change runs him down.

What, have we so lost our minds? Are we so wrapped up in our own ideologies that we will resort to namecalling (albeit artsy namecalling) to advance our points of view? What happened to reasoned dialog? It's sad. And what's even sadder is that we are falling for it. And you know what, it happens on both sides. That's the TV generations for ya.

We are Not a Third World Nation

And yet some of our own legislators want us to believe that we can't even run our own elections fairly. This is just mind boggling, these lawmakers have undermined the American political process by presuming that we need U.N. monitoring.

U.N. monitoring? I don't agree that the U.N. should be involved, there is just too much temptation for the U.N. to drive their influence into the American political process. The U.N. would love to have the opportunity to influence how America is run.

Ridiculous. Why don't those lawmakers just ask for a peacekeeping force now?

The Poles Find Sarin in Iraq

Specifically, they bought several rockets and warheads filled with cyclosarin in their sector of Iraq.

"We were mortified by the information that terrorists were looking for these warheads and offered $5,000 apiece," Dukaczewski said. "An attack with such weapons would be hard to imagine. All of our activity was accelerated at appropriating these warheads."

Dukaczewski refused to give any further details about the terrorists or the sellers of the munitions, saying only that his troops thwarted terrorists by purchasing the 17 rockets for a Soviet-era launcher and two mortar rounds containing the nerve agent for an undisclosed sum June 23.

WMD. They're there, it's not like the Iraqis were going to just turn them over. The questions are: Have any warheads leaked out of Iraq? Will we see them this summer? Israel? Athens? New York? Boston? Washington?

normblog: The 'compassion' of the Left

Instapundit points us to normblog, who quotes leftie columnist, Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, in the Evening Standard:

I am ashamed to admit that there have been times when I wanted more chaos, more shocks, more disorder to teach our side a lesson. On Monday I found myself again hoping that this handover proves a failure because it has been orchestrated by the Americans.

Also check out the quote from a radio interview:

Chiles: So where do you stand on the whole business [Iraq] now? You'd rather we just never bothered in the first place?

Alibhai-Brown: Well, you know, it's really difficult; I was thinking this morning - I mean the kind of moral trauma. I've been against the war and part of you begins to... you know, it's horrible how your mind works. You think 'Good!', you wake up thinking 'Good, there's all this mess'. And then you have to question your own self, saying what kind of a human being are you, that you want this mess? So, I think I'm terrified of what's happening. I don't think we can pull out now.

Crap. Pure crap. Can you guess at my anger whenever I read crap like this? I'd sure like to wish "more chaos, more shocks and more disorder" into Ms. Alibhai-Brown's life, but that would be stooping to her level. I'd just rather see a stable Iraq, just to spite her and her ilk. Iraq not only has to fight it's own internal power struggles, but it also has to fight those who hate America.

Freedom Brings Responsibility

Tim finds an article on a democracy march in Hong Kong and comments:

Notably, I don't see reports of sympathetic demonstrations on behalf of Hong Kong in other democracies around the world.

Just as I don't see a whole lot assistance in the establishment of a democracy in Iraq by those in Europe who less than 65 years ago were, themselves, subjects of a megalomaniacal dictatorial, murderous tyrant.

According to organizers, 350,000 marchers turned out for a demonstration in Hong Kong Thursday to voice their aspirations for greater political freedom.

Why are so many who enjoy the blessings of liberty so cavalier about those who don't share those blessings?

Indeed. Make no mistake, the war to liberate Iraq will and has cost America more than it is worth: the blood of American sons and daughters, the treasure spent, the political capital expended.

Was it for oil? Ridiculous. If American aims were cheap oil, it would have simply gone ahead and bought into the food for oil program. I won't say that the Iraqi War was a purely alturistic move, for there are American interests involved: one less state sponsor for terrorism, one big wedge of democracy smack dab in the middle of Islamic fundamentalism (Iran, Saudi Arabia, Syria and Jordan), one big message to states worldwide (Khadaffi, I think, got the hint).

A democratic Iraq can accomplish (and it isn't a done deal yet) is the creation of a foundation upon which a more stable Middle East could emerge. It isn't cheap, it won't be quick, but it must happen.