Right Wing Nut House

Back in the 1980’s I looked upon Congressman Jack Kemp as something of a hero. He had an infectious enthusiasm for ideas that was very attractive to a young conservative looking for ways to translate Ronald Reagan’s electoral success into true conservative governance. He may be the only Congressman in history who could make a speech about tax and budget policies interesting.

Blessed with a soaring optimism and sunny disposition, he could be called the ideological grandfather of “The Ownership Society” that President Bush is trying to enact. He proposed what at the time were radical ideas involving “Enterprise Zones” in the inner cities where investment would be encouraged by lowering taxes and eliminating regulations. As Secretary for Housing and Urban Development he pushed for public housing residents to own their units and set up co-ops to govern those housing projects.

In 1993, he started Empower America with William Bennett that seeks to promote capitalism and freedom while reforming tax policy and social security. And in 1996, he was the Vice Presidential candidate when Bob Dole made his run for the White House.

Couple that impressive resume with his experience as a Hall of Fame pro football quarterback and you have someone that was easy to look up to and admire.

And that’s why the news brought to us via Michelle Malkin is so depressing:

Jack Kemp, the businessman, was recently negotiating a highly questionable billion-dollar oil deal with Venezuela’s Chavez. Kemp stood to make up to $50 million in commissions….

Kemp made high-profile “courtesy” visits and wined and dined with Hugo Chavez and his ministers in 2002. Weeks later, a contract dated Jan. 17, 2003, was circulated between Free Market Petroleum, where Kemp is chairman, and the Chavez government. That Kemp, the GOP’s 1996 vice presidential nominee, even would consider doing business with the Chavez government raises troubling ethical and political questions…..

Kemp has used his political capital to open doors for Chavez. In May of 2003, he tried to charm the staff of The Wall Street Journal editorial page into abandoning its opposition to Chavez’s undemocratic behavior.

I had also missed this little tidbit of information that Michelle relates:

Jack Kemp has been getting quite a bit of attention lately for his relationship with Samir Vincent, a secret agent of Saddam Hussein who was recently convicted in the United Nations oil-for-food scandal.

When you discover your hero has feet of clay it’s almost like being told again that there’s no Santa Claus. There’s disappointment, a sense of personal betrayal, and a great, heavy sadness that weighs upon the mind. You ask yourself how you could have been taken in by someone who clearly has betrayed some of the most cherished beliefs about supporting freedom he held those many years ago.

And then you realize it’s not so much your hero has feet of clay it’s that he’s a human being. And humans, being the complex creatures that we are, sometimes fall short of the high expectations we set for them. It doesn’t make them evil, it simply reveals them for what they really are; a flawed representation of the image you projected onto him.

Folk artist Suzanne Vega wrote a song about this phenomena entitled “When Heroes Go Down”

When heroes go down
They go down fast
So don’t expect any time to
Equivocate the past

I heard you say
You look out for the feet of clay
That someone will be falling next
Without the chance
For last respects
You feel the disappointment

We’ll always have heroes. And as surely as there is no Santa Claus, some will end up making us wish we’d never heard of them.

Cross-Posted at Blogger News Network

According to this fellow, we’ll be at war with China in a few years:

The proposed anti-secession law, read out for the first time before the ceremonial National People’s Congress, does not specify what actions might invite a Chinese attack.

“If possibilities for a peaceful reunification should be completely exhausted, the state shall employ nonpeaceful means and other necessary measures to protect China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity,” Wang Zhaoguo, deputy chairman of the congress’ Standing Committee, told the nearly 3,000 members gathered in the Great Hall of the People.

Beijing claims Taiwan, which split from China since 1949, as part of its territory. The communist mainland repeatedly has threatened to invade if Taiwan tries to make its independence permanent, and the new law does not impose any new conditions or make new threats. But it lays out for the first time legal requirements for military action.

(HT: Instapundit)

China has very quietly and without much notice made itself into an economic powerhouse. It will continue to grow as long as the communist party keeps its mitts off the economy, something that by no means is certain to happen. The reason is simple.

In order for China to keep growing, it’s going to need to reform. And the young technocrats running the communist party in China today are as fearful of political reform as the octogenarians who slaughtered thousands of innocents in Tienamien Square in 1989. Communism by its nature brooks no opposition. How can it when it sets itself up as the only authentic voice of the people? If it loses that it loses its legitimacy. Hence, the Chinese are soon to reach a crossroads where one path will necessarily lead to more freedom and the other leads to a crackdown.

Something like 800 million people are not enjoying the benefits of Chinese economic growth. That’s a pretty big cauldron to be bubbling below the surface. There has to be an outlet and the Chinese are betting on nationalistic fervor.

The author of this post, Mr. Dunn, believes that the 2008 Olympics to be held in Beijing may offer a perfect cover for Chinese aggression against Taiwan while whipping up nationalistic feeling at the same time:

The only question is when China will go. I think it will be on the eve of the 2008 Peking summer Olympics. China will have the security issue to cover mobilization and movement of military units. And everybody will assume China is using the attention as a coming out party to highlight their advances and their place in the sun. I think swallowing China under the nose of US and Japanese protection will be even better to demonstrate their power. Why else go on a crash building program for naval units?

Inside Taiwan, the move for independence may be gaining momentum. Like the American colonies of 200 years ago, Taipei is beginning to recognize that they’ve developed a culture and way of life separate and distinct from their cousins across the Straits. Any move by Beijing to annex the tiny island would meet fierce resistance. And that, of course, is where the United States comes in.

Our “one China” policy has allowed the US to walk a tightrope between satisfying our obligations to protect Taipei while not riling Beijing and forcing their hand over the indpendence issue. While we oppose independence for Taiwan, American policy is to sell the tiny country defensive weapons while at the same time giving it assurances that a Chinese military move to reunite with the mainland would be met with force. For more than 30 years, this policy worked well as Beijing was to weak to stand up to the US militarily. But now China has embarked on a crash naval building program that would seem to have one purpose: To give them the capability for amphibious landings necessary to conquer the little island nation.

Would such an invasion trigger a war? Most certainly yes. Not only our treaty obligations would require it but a successful Chinese takeover of Taiwan would massively impact the strategic situation in the entire far east. There’s no telling what an aggressive China would mean for Japan and our relations with Korea and other nations in Asia would be drastically affected. A Chinese takeover of Taiwan then must be prevented; even at the risk of war with another nuclear power.

Mr. Dunn has some suggestions:

The best way to avoid this (nuclear exchange with China) is to make Taiwan strong enough to hold the line while US and Japanese forces rush to repel a Chinese invasion. If China knows this, they may hold off in the hope that the future will change the strategic situation in their favor.

The second best way to avoid the escalation problem is to win quickly, if the Chinese delude themselves into thinking the US and/or Japan will not defend Taiwan and that the Taiwanese cannot resist. Cripple the first wave; crush the paratroopers and infantry that come across the beach; interdict the follow-up waves with naval and air power; and hit the ports of embarkation. Do all this and make sure Taiwan can throw the Chinese back into the sea so the war ends quickly

Taiwan is in trouble. If China is really seeking to resolve it’s problem with Taipei, it may prove to be the most dangerous move since Kruschev sent missiles to Cuba in 1963.

UPDATE:

Glen Anderson has updated his post with this:

Many readers are skeptical of Dunn’s analysis, but reader Jim Satterfield isn’t:

Think on this possible scenario. The Chinese consider it a very minor possibility that we would do anything to defend Taiwan. But just to cover their bases they won’t move until we represent a small enough portion of their foreign trade to where they think they can take the hit by appealing to nationalism. First they will launch a massive distraction by nationalizing every American company in China and simultaneously flooding the world currency markets with their dollar reserves while stopping the acquisition of dollars. The resultant economic crash in the U.S. will pretty much guarantee that there won’t be any military action taken except if America was to be attacked directly. Tyrants full of themselves and desirous of retaking what they view as their wayward territory won’t necessarily stop long enough to think through the long term economic repercussions even to themselves.

I believe this scenario much less likely than a Chinese reaction to a move towards independence by Taipei. Picking up the pieces after a war with the US would be easier if China didn’t burn their bridges as they would with nationalization of American businesses and initiating economic armageddon by dumping their dollars.

A Sino-American war would represent a failure of their policy. Their goal is to achieve unity with Taipei without resorting to force of arms. But, their naval buildup may signal that they’re ready to challenge US-Japanese hegemony in the far east. Having the capability to invade will also change the strategic balance.

Any way you look at it, we’re in for a some rough times with China over the next decade.

Looks like Italian communist journalist Guiliana Sgrena’s lies and distortions about the tragic incident that occurred at the American checkpoint in Iraq have had their desired effect. Prime Minister Berlusconi is announcing that Italian troops will leave Iraq in September:

Italy is to begin withdrawing its troops from Iraq in September 2005, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has said.

He told Rai state television the pullout would take place “in agreement with our allies”.

Italy has 3,000 troops in Iraq - the fourth largest foreign contingent.

Italian politics is notoriously unstable. In order to maintain his position, Berlusconi has done a masterful job of balancing his support for the United States in Iraq with addressing domestic concerns of his center-left coalition.

Sgrena comes along and basically upsets the apple cart:

“I spoke to Tony Blair about it, and public opinion in our countries is expecting this decision,” he told Rai.

He said the exact numbers would depend on the Iraqi government’s ability to deal with security.

The BBC’s Tamsin Smith in Rome says it is the first time Mr Berlusconi has suggested a timetable for withdrawal.

Local elections coming up next month may have had something to do with the announcement of the decision. Captain Ed thinks it may be something a little more sinister:

One wonders if this wasn’t a negotiated commitment between Italy and Giuliana Sgrena’s kidnappers. It certainly looks that way, or else it appears to be a reaction to American demands to stop paying ransoms to terrorists.

Not sure I agree that Berlusconi would acquiesce to a terrorist demand that pushes around the Italian military. But he may have added up the domestic political costs of maintaining forces in Iraq while realizing in any future hostage situation, he would be under enormous pressure from the US not to deal with the terrorists.

The left will have a hoot with this news, which begs the question…

Which side are they on?

If the writers for the show are making this up as they go along, they’re doing a damned fine job. All of the terrorist activity to date-the train wreck to steal the override device, the kidnapping of Heller, and the nuke meltdowns-has been a prelude to the terrorists real goal:

Kill the President.

The plot is exquisite in it’s elegance and subtlety. The terrorists also seem to have a frightening familiarity with the American psyche. In short, they’ve played us, CTU and indeed the entire security apparatus of the United States government perfectly.

My complaint last week about the President being in the air for the entire show now appears to be something that terrorist mastermind Marwan counted on. In a conversation with the President, Heller implied that the reason the President hadn’t landed was a matter of security. Marwan’s planning must have included this because the final part of the plot involves a rouge Air Force officer. Can’t wait to see how this plays out but my guess would be either an attack on Air Force One using a hijacked fighter escort or an attempt at the air base.

Stay tuned.

SUMMARY

Michelle arrives at CTU and immediately makes her presence felt. First, she carves poor Audrey into little pieces for questioning her on a matter of procedure. Then it’s Tony’s turn as their long awaited and much anticipated confrontation ends up with Tony’s already bruised and battered ego nearly destroyed by Michelle’s taunt about his lack of sobriety. Finally, Sarah feels the icy blast of Michelle’s wrath when, in the middle of the worst internal security crisis in the history of the United States, she demands that Michelle make sure that the deal she had with Erin about expunging her personnel record and the bump in pay grade go through. Michelle gives her a look that would freeze the Hounds of Hades and promptly fires her.

Adios, Sarah…for a while. Anyone whose last line as they exit is “You’ll be sorry…I promise you will” is going to be back, I guarantee it.

Meanwhile, Jack rescues Paul from the clutches of the McGlennon-Forster goons and, because of the EMP bomb knocking out any car with an electronic ignition within 8 miles, they have to try and make their escape on foot. Conlon discovers that Jack and Paul have esacped and calls in a squad of commando/mercenaries to finish them off.

The two rivals for Audrey’s love take refuge in a sporting goods store owned by two Arab-American brothers. (I deal with the PC aspects of this issue in my post below). After the brothers volunteer their services, Jack outlines his plan; start a firefight with an enemy of greatly superior numbers and firepower and hope to hell that CTU is expecting him to do that so that they can rescue him.

In point of fact, Tony is expecting Jack to do that…but Michelle overrules him condemning Jack and Paul to a long couple of minutes before CTU ground teams can arrive.

And Audrey? In a heart to heart with her father, she makes clear that Jack is in trouble. Talking about Jack’s novel interrogation methods when questioning Paul a few hours ago, Audrey reveals that she’s in something of a quandry as to who Jack Bauer really is:

Audrey: Somehow, he seemed like a different person.

Heller: We need people like that Audrey…

Audrey: (Beginning to cry) Jack is an extraordinary man.

Heller: But you’re not sure you feel the same way you did before, is that it?

Audrey: Something like that…

Doesn’t look good for Jack.

And Tony doesn’t make matters any better for his erstwhile friend. Judging by this exchange, maybe Tony should keep his mouth shut:

Tony: You think he’ll go back to wearing a suite?

Audrey: After the hell he’s gone through today do you think he’ll want to come back to that?

Tony: Some people are more comfortable in hell.

Thanks a lot Tony…just what she needed to hear.

After being told of Tony’s heroics earlier in the day by Audrey (who also informs the ice queen that Tony still has feelings for her), Michelle tries to be a little friendlier in their subsequent meetings but Tony’s having none of it. Hard to tell where this is going, but an interesting possibility would be a reconciliation followed by Tony’s untimely demise. Serve her right, anyway.

Back at the sporting goods store, Jack, Paul, and the two good Arabs are putting up a good fight but are forced to fall back to their last line of defense, the storage room. After Jack’s most horrific killing to date (he stabs a mercenary through the back of the neck) Conlon corners Jack. But before he can kill him, CTU arrives and takes care of Conlon…mostly. As Jack is talking to the leader of the CTU swat team, Paul notices that Conlon isn’t dead just in time to save Jack’s life and take a bullett for him in the process. As Paul’s life ebbs away, Jack probably remembers his promise to Audrey from last week:

Audrey: Take care of Paul. He’s not like you Jack. Please promise me you’ll look after him?

Jack: Yeah…I will.

One more nail in Jack’s coffin.

BODY COUNT

Big night for the grim reaper. Jack took out 3 McGlennon-Forster security flunkies and 6 commandos. Paul and the good Arabs accounted for 5 more. Still no word on casualties from the meltdown although Audrey told Heller it’s not as bad as they feared.

Jack: 27 dead

Show: 115

LOOSE END

There’s no such thing as “residual” EMP effects. The pulse is like a wave. Once it passes, there’s no way any more damage can be sustained. This fallacy was used as a plot device to keep Jack in trouble a little bit longer.

There’s an old Arab proverb that says “Example is better than precept.” I really wish Fox Television would have taken that to heart last night because the way the network worked “the good muslims” into the story line of “24″ was so jarring, so unnatural that the only conclusion one can draw from it is that the network must think we’re all a bunch of goober chewing, redneck, red state yahoos who need to be hit over the head with an allegorical two-by-four in order to get the message.

The fact that there are tens of thousands of Americans of Arab descent serving honorably in the United States military as well as millions more who are law abiding citizens that love this country as much as you and I should be enough to convince everyone except the galoots, the yawpers, and the mentally deficient that there’s a vast difference between the guy who owns the convenience store down the street and Abu Musab al Zarqawi and his merry band of beheaders.

Which begs the question; if the only people who need to be reminded of this are immune to any and all pleas for ratiionality, what’s the point?

The point is to placate a pressure group. And Fox has shamelessly caved in to pressure exerted by muslim organizations, in particilar the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR).

Last December when the plot line first emerged for this season’s “24,” CAIR objected saying that portraying muslims in such a negative way would feed prejudices and lead to bigotry and perhaps even violence.

But is it necessary? Since 9/11 the Justice Department has investigated 546 “incidents” involving not just Arabs, but others who appear to be of middle eastern origin. Out of all those incidents, federal charges have been brought against just 13 individuals. They’ve also assisted local prosecutors with another 121 cases.

Not exactly a crime spree directed against American muslims.

Despite this, Fox changed the story line and added characters that would portray muslims in a more positive light. The result was the stilted, heavy handed, and preachy scenes tonight in a gunshop owned by two Arab American brothers who, after first trying to kill Jack and Paul thinking they were looters, ended up joining the fight against the McGlennon-Forster mercenaries.

Some of the dialouge could have been lifted from a CAIR press release:

Good Arab #1: You don’t understand…for years we’ve been blamed for the attacks of these terrorists. We grew up in this neighborhood. This country’s our home.

Good Arab #2: If you find the people who caused today’s bloodshed, then we’ll help you.

And then later:

Good Arab #1: We’re going to stand up and be part of the solution.

Good Arab#2: If our father were here now, he’d be standing next to you, just as we are.

Leaving aside the fact that 3 of CAIR’s board members have been charged with aiding terrorists and that money raised by CAIR has found it’s way into the coffers of Hamas and Hizballah, the idea of a television network bending to this kind of pressure sets a bad precedent.

Whether Arabs are portrayed positively or negatively doesn’t change the fact that there are thousands of Arab muslims bent on killing as many Americans as they can get their hands on. They’ve been trained for it. They’ve dedicated their lives to that end. No amount of pressure by CAIR on TV networks is going to change that singular fact.

So instead of whining about how Arabs are portrayed in the American media, perhaps CAIR and other Arab and muslim organizations could take a page from their own handbook and “stand up and be part of the solution.” As it stands now, they seem more concerned about playing “the victim card” rather than working to expose those in our midst who would do us harm.

As you may or may not already be aware, members of the Watcher’s Council hold a vote every week on what they consider to be the most link-worthy pieces of writing around… per the Watcher’s instructions, I am submitting one of my own posts for consideration in the upcoming nominations process.
Here is the most recent winning council post, here is the most recent winning non-council post, here is the list of results for the latest vote, and here is the initial posting of all the nominees that were voted on.

Your truly recieved absoutely zero votes last week on my submission. How embarrassing!

If you’d like to submit a post for the Watcher’s Vote, you can do so here.

This is either a false alarm or extremely troubling:

WASHINGTON (AP) - Sensors at two military mail facilities in the Washington area detected signs of anthrax on two pieces of mail Monday, but Pentagon officials said the mail had already been irradiated, rendering any anthrax inert.

Officials weren’t sure if this was an attack. Additional tests and other sensors at the two facilities, one of them at the Pentagon and the other nearby, found no presence of the bacteria, which can be used as a biological weapon. There were no initial reports of illness.

The Pentagon’s mail delivery site, which is separate from the main Pentagon building, was evacuated and shut down Monday after sensors triggered an alarm around 10:30 a.m. EST, spokesman Glenn Flood said. It was expected to remain closed until at least Tuesday while the investigation continued.

(HT: Little Green Footballs)

What makes this especially troubling is the recent news of Abu Musab al Zarqawi’s plans to attack here in the United States.
And they never did catch the individual responsible for the anthrax attacks in the immediate aftermath of the September 11 attacks.

Anthrax false alarms have become a fact of life since September 11. Suspicious packages or letters containing “some kind of powder” are found on a regular basis. Looking through a google search of “anthrax false alarms” however, I couldn’t find a story (338 of them) that contained a reference to an actual bio-hazard alarm going off. And in a Pentagon mail room, you’d think the hazard alarm would be state of the art and designed to go off only when there was a real threat.

Since the letters were already irradiated there’s probably no problem at that facility. That doesn’t preclude the possibility of others being exposed either at other Post Office facilities or even neighbors of the individual who sent the deadly letter or package in the first place.

Definitely a story that bears watching.

Cross Posted at Blogger News Network

I wonder how you say “How do ya like them apples” in Lebanese?

BEIRUT - An emboldened Lebanese opposition mobilized more than 800,000 people Monday to demand an end to Syrian military domination of Lebanon, hurling a potent challenge to the Syrian-backed government here.

Beirut city official Mounib Nassereddine said the estimate of 800,000 did did not include demonstrators who were still arriving from all parts of the country ahead of the rally.

Thousands of Lebanese had made their way throughout the morning to the capital by car, bus and boat, heading for Martyrs Square and the grave of former prime minister Rafiq Hariri, assassinated exactly one month ago in a bomb blast.

Lebanese television aired spectacular pictures of a massive throng in the square, showing thousands of demonstrators waving the red, white and green Lebanese flag in bright sunshine against the deep blue of the Mediterranean in the background.

Some later estimates put the crowd’s numbers at 1.3 million.

I like this picture too. Pretty damned good for being organized on such short (2 days) notice:

Far from being intimidated by the massive outpouring that Baby Assad and his Hizballah toadies managed to force into into the streets a few days ago (reports say that perhaps as many as half of the 500,000 demonstrators were actually bussed in from the Syrian border) the pro-democracy demonstrators seem to have been energized by it.

Plus, Lebanese President Emile Lahoud may have miscalculated when, after the gun-toting thugs from Hizballah had orchestrated their demonstration, he felt emboldened enough to ask Prime Minister Omar Karameh (who he had fired 10 days ago) to try and form another government. The effort failed when the opposition rebuffed the offer and demanded that the Syrians immediately withdraw from Lebanon and a “government of national unity” made up of Sunni’s, Druze, Christians, and Shia’s be formed.

If I were Lahoud, I’d start listening to the millions in the streets rather than his master in Damascus who finds that he’s slowly losing control of events and running out of time to boot.

UPDATES, PICTURES, AND COMMENTARY AND HOTTIES!:

Chrenkoff
Michelle Malkin
Little Green Footballs
Captains Quarters
Wizbang
Protein Wisdom
Ace of Spadesand here too!

UPDATE II

Athena at the excellent blog Terrorism Unveiled is not only blogging the demonstration, she was kind enough to translate the first line of my post…”How do you say ‘How do you like them apples?’ in Lebanese?”

Roughly translated: Keef toheb hada tufaah? Take that Hizballah!

UPDATE III

More fantastic Photo’s (more hotties and other great shots!)

I’ve been sitting in front of my Wordpress Admin screen trying to think of something clever and witty to say about the latest flip-flop in Guiliana Sgrena’s account of her run-in with Americans in Iraq and drawn an absolute blank.

While it’s true a certain kind of Abbott and Costello comedy can be found in her tiresomely changing story (”Who’s on first” today?) it’s also true that once you realize that outside of a few blogs here in the United States, her lies and inconsistencies are receiving virtually no play in the European press. It’s as if a collective state of amnesia involving short-term memory loss has gripped the press so that this self-important, propagandizing lickspittle can say anything she likes, secure in the knowledge that her words will be faithfully transmitted via the leftist rags who’ve annointed Ms. Sgrena as their Anti-American Champion du jour.

Here’s Sgrena in an interview on March 12:

The Italian journalist Giuliana Sgrena, who was wounded by American fire last Friday soon after being released by kidnappers in Baghdad, has said that she does not think that the Americans were trying to kill her. “I never said that they wanted to kill me,” she said on a television talk show, “but the mechanics of what happened were those of an attack.”

And here’s Sgrena in an interview on March 13:

A joint American-Italian investigation is due to report within a month on the shooting, but Sgrena refuses to accept that it might have been simply a blunder. “This was an ambush. No sign was given for us to stop. We were going at a normal speed and we were fired at,” she insists.

At various times her story has included an armoured car, a tank, a patrol, a checkpoint, the car going slowly, the car going at normal speed, the car going so fast it almost went out of control, a light, no light, and on and on and…

It’s depressing. And Sgrena has given notice beforehand that she will not accept as truth any investigation by the Italian or American authorities:

What happened was just terrible. Our questions need to be addressed. And not only by the Italian government, but by Mr Bush himself. Sure, we won’t come to the truth, but let’s hope that at least this time around, they do everything in their power to have a plausible account.

Why she wants her “questions addressed” by “Mr. Bush himself” can only be construed as a propaganda ploy…and perhaps an unshakable belief in her own self-importance.

This hubris may in fact have led to her kidnapping in the first place. A Dutch journalist who flew to Bagdhad with Sgrena told her this:

‘Be careful not to get kidnapped,’ I told the female Italian journalist sitting next to me in the small plane that was headed for Baghdad. ‘Oh no,’ she said. ‘That won’t happen. We are siding with the oppressed Iraqi people. No Iraqi would kidnap us.’

‘You don’t understand the situation. We are anti-imperialists, anti-capitalists, communists,’ they said. The Iraqis only kidnap American sympathizers, the enemies of the Americans have nothing to fear.

Was it hubris? Or just stupidity:

She has covered fighting in Algeria and Afghanistan, and on her seventh trip to Iraq this winter she had “of course” thought she might become the target of kidnappers. “I took precautions. I never fixed appointments in advance. I never stopped a long time in one place,” she says in a voice made weak by her difficulty catching breath. But she disobeyed those rules on February 4 with disastrous consequences.

It seems pretty obvious now that she has the attention of the entire world, Guiliana Sgrena is going to milk her notoriety for all that it’s worth. It remains to be seen whether her lies and distortions will have the intended effect of damaging Prime Minister Berlusconi politically and roiling Italian-American relations to the point where Italy feels it necessary to reduce its committment in assisting the US in Iraq.

Now I know how a 12 point buck feels on the first day of deer hunting season in Wisconsin:

We have shown at the FEC a willingness to extend the media exemption to some internet-based news services. But this media exception inquiry will go to the question of: “What is a periodical publication?” and “What is a legitimate press function?” It will also get into: “What is news?”…”What is commentary?”…”What is editorial content?”

(Remarks by FEC Chairman Scott Thomas at the Politics Online Conference at GW University)

You see, it’s all a matter of definition.

If your website is dedicated to telling everyone what you had for dinner or what cute thing your child did that day, with an occasional foray into commenting about politics, you have absolutely nothing to worry about from the FEC as far as new regulations go. And if your site talks about politics and issues but is more informational in nature concentrating on educating the public, then your site also will probably not fall under any regulations promulgated by the FEC.

But if you’re an advocate for a particular candidate, or party, or cause then watch out…the FEC has YOU in the crosshairs.

I am not a journalist. I make no pretense to being fair, or balanced, or even sane at times, hence the name of this site. I make no bones about the fact that I am a Republican and a conservative.

Iam an advocate. I am a polemicist. I’m a ranting, raving, rabid, rabble rousing raconteur of rude, ribald , rip-roaring and rage-inducing invective. My goal is to provoke. My modus operandi is satire and ridicule.

If you don’t like it, lump it.

In another age, at another time, I would probably have been a pamphleteer putting broadsides up on the walls surrounding the public square and signing my name “Publius” or “Maximus” or some such Latin psuedoniminous nonsense.

And I would have been perfectly free to do so.

Today, the public square is the internet and my broadsides take the form of postings on this website. THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WHAT PEOPLE DID 200 YEARS AGO AND WHAT I AM DOING TODAY.

Why then if we’re living under the same constitution that Tom Paine and Sam Adams lived under when they were posting their broadsides must I be concerned that the Federal Election Commission, a regulatory arm of the federal government of the United States of America, will regulate my “broadisde” and hence, my speech.

The government at the time of Tom Paine didn’t tell him how big or how small the broadside he was posting could be. They didn’t regulate what kind of ink should be used in the printing of it or what kind of paper he should use. The very thought of such regulations were beyond the imaginings of government at the time.

And now the FEC feels that the wild west of the internet must be tamed. Here’s more of Chairman Thompson’s remarks regarding “advocacy” blogs like this one:

Seriously, that starts to drift between the blogger serving as a commercial vendor, and the blogger, on the other hand, becoming a [emphasis] political committee that must register and report its receipts and disbursements for federal election activity. That sounds pretty scary, I know, but the definition of political committee is:

“…a group that raises more than $1000 dollars in contributions for the purpose of influencing federal elections…or that spends more than $1,000 dollars in expenditures for the purpose of influencing a federal election.”

It’s a pretty broad definition. Now, mercifully the Supreme Court has uh, said that a group’s “major purpose” must be influencing elections before the FEC can regulate it as a political committee. Uh, so…most bloggers, I presume, will be able to avoid political committee status. But I have to say, it’s not a particularly clean area of law, and we may have to spend some energy looking at that ugly issue.

I will also make no bones about one of my goals for starting this blog; that is, to make money. What Chairman Thomas is talking about directly affects me in that, if during a covered period I were to receive more than $1000 in political ads (or perhaps even $1000 in ads of any kind), I would fall under the reporting requirements for the purposes of FEC regulation.

Failing to report carries criminal sanctions. So unless I wanted to pay a fine I would probably have to hire a lawyer who knows something about campaign finance law to do the paperwork so that I could continue to exercise my freedom of speech.

MADNESS!

Glen Anderson, who spoke at the same Conference immediately after Chairman Thompson and who by no means could be considered an advocate is himself worried:

Scott Thomas, chairman of the FEC, spoke before me. He opened with some rather uncharitable remarks regarding fellow commissioner Brad Smith’s comments on FEC regulation of blogs, but followed up with a discussion of FEC intent that, although it was supposed to be reassuring, actually left me thinking that the FEC was thinking more seriously about regulating blogs than I had previously believed. I wasn’t reassured at all, and the complexity of the reasoning he outlined just illustrated how much discretion — and how little real guidance — the FEC has on these kinds of questions.

And one of my heroes and mentors, Pat Hynes who started the “Crushkerry” webstite (now Anklebiting Pundits) says in effect that they will have to pry his mouse from his cold, dead fingers before he acquiesces to such regulation:

Bloggers Left and Right have joined forces to prevent anything like that from happening. As I stated before, they might as well throw me in jail right now, because I will not follow the rules.

Every time anyone from the FEC or the pro-reform crowd opens their mouths to reassure bloggers, they end up making it clear that they’ve got some of us in their regulatory crosshairs.

Let’s hope they’re extremely poor shots.

NOTE: Wizbang has a video of Chairman Thompson’s remarks. Keep checking there for video and transcripts of the remarks of Glen Anderson and others at that conference.

Updates and Commentary at:

Captians Quarters
Darlene’s Place
Vodkapundit (Lashawn Barber)

Cross-Posted at Blogger News Network

UPDATE:

The Captain links to two excellent MSM columns defending the free speech rights of bloggers. He’s quoted in World Magazine talking about the same issue I raised in my post above:

“If we had to start accounting for our time and defending ourselves every time we got accused of coordination-say by simply excerpting from a candidate’s position paper in order to make a point-we’d incur legal fees that would intimidate most people into shutting down.”

The problem as I see it is that since 95% of blogs will be exempt from any regs promulgated by the FEC, it may be difficult when push comes to shove to defeat any momentum for reform that’s building on the other side.

What we need is help in Congress. These Commissioners are creatures of politics, I believe they can be swayed if enough members of Congress speak out against any regulation of advocacy blogs. Letters and phone calls are fine. What we need are some of the big-tiime bloggers to step up and meet face to face with Members of Congress who are on our side and can do us the most good. A few floor speeches with subsequent coverage in the MSM could go a long way towards dampening any enthusiasm the FEC may have for regulating advocacy blogs.