Pentagon Prestidigitation

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Via the always excellent Best of Both Worlds comes this long article in the NYT (sub may be req).

You can read it in full here at RePressed
At another point, an analyst made a suggestion: “In one of your speeches you ought to say, ‘Everybody stop for a minute and imagine an Iraq ruled by Zarqawi.’ And then you just go down the list and say, ‘All right, we’ve got oil, money, sovereignty, access to the geographic center of gravity of the Middle East, blah, blah, blah.’ If you can just paint a mental picture for Joe America to say, ‘Oh my God, I can’t imagine a world like that.’ ”

Even as they assured Mr. Rumsfeld that they stood ready to help in this public relations offensive, the analysts sought guidance on what they should cite as the next “milestone” that would, as one analyst put it, “keep the American people focused on the idea that we’re moving forward to a positive end.” They placed particular emphasis on the growing confrontation with Iran.


I Give Up! #893

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Down's pupil accused of 'racism'
The parents of a Down's teenager accused of a racist assault have called for changes in how the law deals with people with special needs. Jamie Bauld, 19, who has a mental age of five, was charged with assaulting an Asian pupil at Motherwell College last September...

The Baulds, from Cumbernauld, said they were first made aware of the incident on 4 September when someone from the college called to say Jamie had pushed another pupil, but the matter had been resolved and it was nothing to worry about. But a few weeks later they received another call saying the police had become involved and an advert had been placed in the local newspaper calling for witnesses to a "racist assault" at the college. The police visited the house to charge Jamie, but Mr Bauld said his son did not even understand what racism was.


Poll: Obama comes in 2nd on most issues

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America's presidential contest | Who leads on the issues?
Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama get another chance to explain their policies on the big issues in a televised debate from Philadelphia on tonight. Who is better placed to beat John McCain in the election? In a head-to-head contest on the big issues, according to The Economist's weekly poll, voters appear to be aligned most closely with Mr McCain on law and order, taxes and trade. Mrs Clinton comes top on the budget and health care. Mr Obama comes second on most issues, impressing only on fuel prices.


Bloody foreigners #782

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Migrant crime wave a myth - police study
A wide-ranging police study has concluded that the surge in immigrants from eastern Europe to Britain has not fuelled a rise in crime, the Guardian has learned. The findings will be presented to the home secretary, Jacqui Smith, tomorrow when she meets chief constables to discuss the issue. Several of them had complained that they needed more money to deal with increases in migrant populations in their areas. However, the study prepared for the Association of Chief Police Officers challenges claims that up to 1 million people from EU accession countries have caused a rise in criminality. The report finds that, despite newspaper headlines linking new migrants to crime, offending rates among mainly Polish, Romanian and Bulgarian communities are in line with the rate of offending in the general population.

Update: On the other hand:

How the gullible liberal media swallowed the spin on migrant crime

AND The facts behind crime and migration

AND Immigrants Bring more Crime



Berlusconi. The Entertainer

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The clownish politician EU countries deserve
How, ask non-Italians, could anyone vote for such a clown? Silvio Berlusconi is comfortably ahead in the polls, yet his capers would disqualify him in most countries. He compares himself to Jesus, says that Rightists get more sex, and is building himself a Caligulan mausoleum, in which he will eventually be laid to rest surrounded by his retainers and clients.

He once told a German MEP that he would be perfect for the role of a concentration camp capo. Now, he delights audiences by describing how he hides under the bed when his wife is in a strop. But here's the thing. In Italy, as in every other EU state, democracy has been vitiated. The key decisions are made, not by parliamentarians or councillors, but by judges, civil servants and Eurocrats. Brussels passes 80 per cent of legislation in Italy, as in every EU member country. National elections have become a folkloric activity: an enjoyable ritual without meaningful consequence.


Get planting that allotment

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Biggest grain exporters halt foreign sales
The global food crisis intensified on Tuesday as Kazakhstan, one of the world’s biggest wheat exporters halted foreign sales and rice prices shot to a record high after Indonesia stopped its farmers from selling the grain abroad.

In another sign of turmoil, a big food company in Japan, Nihon Shokuhin Kako, said high corn prices had forced it to buy cheaper genetically modified corn for the first time, breaking a social, though not legal, taboo and signalling that opposition to GM foods could weaken in the face of record food prices.

Meanwhile, fresh wheat export curbs in Kazakhstan, the world’s fifth largest exporter, and the rice bans in Indonesia, threaten to trigger bans in other food exporting countries, which will now face much higher demand from importing countries.
And get yourself a shotgun!



After the Ride

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The Myth of Ronald Reagan Lured the Working Class Into Economic Destruction: Obama Gets It, But the Jilted Middle Class Doesn't
I can't save workers from voting against their own economic interests when they vote to defend values that no one is going to take away from them. And I understand that Clinton and McCain are playing on the pride of such displaced members of the middle class. No one wants to be told that they have been duped for nearly 30 years by the wealthy backers of the Republicrats. Rural and small town Pennsylvanians want to feel proud about America and themselves -- and the uproar from the McCain and Clinton camps once again presses the hot button of dignity, while privately believing in (whatever Clinton is saying on the campaign trail today) policies that will continue to erode the earnings and standard of living of the very people that they claim to be championing.