Interesting Items by Alex Gimarc, Feb 2006

1. Ports. This week’s artificial media-induced political panic was the announcement of a deal to sell management of six (21 by the weekend) ports to a company operating out of Dubai ( United Arab Emirates). The deal has been in the works since October, so it was a long-time story. Why does it blow up this week with such an orchestrated media–induced panic? If you were to believe the media and the democrats on this one, President Bush, who has been excoriated for paying too much attention to terrorism and fighting it with every means at his command, has completely lost his mind and is now selling out our security to foreigners. Unfortunately, a number of conservatives also jumped the shark on this one, as they allowed their protectionist, xenophobic impulses to get the best of them. We saw a remarkable split among the conservative blogs and among the talk shows in support of and against the sale. As expected, a number of spineless and grandstanding Republican congress critters took the opportunity to blast away at both the administration and the deal. So what is really going on here? As usual, you only have to follow the money to figure out where the political panic is coming from. Limbaugh reported midweek that there was significant opposition from the Longshoremen Union to the sale, mostly because Dubai Ports World is not p articularly union friendly (which is a good thing). The unions pulled in some chips among democrats, whom they had contributed significant dollars to over the years and demanded action. The democrats and unions nicely orchestrated the media blowup last Monday and throughout the week. Tony Snow did some excellent investigative reporting, discovering the union connection. He also pointed out that American ports are currently not operated by any American companies, with the sale being done from their current owner, a British company to the UAE company. Snow also st arted reporting that none of the security concerns are real either, as port security is going to remain where it is today, in the hands of the Dep artment of Homeland Security. By midweek, he had an interview with retired Army General Tommy Franks, who was the regional CINC to tell everyone about Dubai and the UAE. One of the criticisms of the UAE was that they had recognized the Taliban as a government. Franks acknowledged that fact, adding that they were also the best intel source in the entire region on the Taliban prior to removing them from Afghanistan. Franks went on to describe the naval facilities in the UAE, which is the largest support port for USN vessels in the region. There is also a significant US air base in the UAE which supports operations in Iraq. If the UAE was a threat, we would not be using them as one of our primary military jumping off and supply points. Franks, who was comfortable with Dubai / UAE assistance for the liberation of Iraq and Afghanistan, noted that Dubai / UAE controls the Straits of Hormuz, through which all Persian Gulf oil passes. Iran sits on the other side of those straits, and if we have any intention of taking military action against Iran (which we do), we will need a jumping off point in the region. So the bottom line here is do we take care of our friends and allies in the region, or do we not? If we intend on changing the face of the Middle East, we have no choice but to do business with those that have chosen to fight on our side and support us in this war, for they are the future of the region. Given that there is no reasonable security concern with this sale, I expect it will be approved as soon as the additional 45-day review period is finished and spineless Republicans get their backbone transplants.

2. Reaction. The reaction to this story was most interesting to watch throughout the week. The media and democrats went after it with gusto, sensing that they finally had a chance to get to the right of the president on the issue of national security. John McCain ( RINO, AZ) held his comments until more information was forthcoming. So did the Alaska congressional delegation. Laura Ingraham and Sean Hannity both chose sides with the Buchannanite protectionist right. They also took the opportunity to whack away at the administration for immigration policies (which were not the issue here). Both responses were very disappointing. Limbaugh waited most of the week, developing additional information until coming out in support of the sale. Tony Snow did the investigative reporting job that the rest of the media (who were too busy cheerleading for democrats and Longshoremen Unions) should have been doing. The WH took an incredible amount of grief for failing to notify congress or even pay attention to deal in the works. Unfortunately all that external heat appears to be misdirected, as OpinionJournal.com ran a column over the weekend describing how the review and approval process was supposed to work – by law. And everyone in the administration did what the law required – including not notifying anyone before the sale was to be finalized. The WH also allowed themselves to play the race card, calling opponents anti-Arab and implying they were racist. I don’t much like this out of democrats who do it all the time. I p articularly don’t like it out of a conservative WH, even though it may be true. Finally, now that the media and the democrats believe we have a real threat coming out of the Middle East (for the first time since September 2001), and that young Muslim men are not to be trusted, can we finally move to get rid of the idiotic inspection routine by the TSA at airports and st art spending our time and money looking at people who actually want to kill us? Naw, probably not. I suspect p art of the conservative reaction against this sale is fallout from the Jihadis nastiness over the last several years, and may indicate a hardening of our he arts against all of them. You simply cannot go around the world committing all manner of death, dismemberment, torture, beheadings and mayhem against people who are your neighbors without some sort of counter reaction taking place. As I have said in other columns, I think the jihadis are going to regret st arting this fight. Perhaps they already do. I think they are going to get an education in manners and in playing nicely with others.

3. Mosque. Al Zarqawi and/or Al Qaida in Iraq successfully blew up one of the holiest shrines in Iraq midweek. The operation apparently took several hours and used hundreds of pounds of explosives that were placed halfway up the dome of the Mosque. The goal of this attack was to trigger a civil war between the Shiite and Sunni Muslims in Iraq. The wacko Presidente of Iran did his p art afterwards, blaming the attack on Americans and Israelis. Iraqi adults got busy very quickly, with the clerics on both sides calling for calm, and the government locking down the streets as best they were able to do. Iranian funded troublemakers like Muqtada al-Sadr took the opportunity to st art roaming the streets searching for Sunni to murder. There were reports (unconfirmed) of over 100 Mosques burned following the bombing. A parallel report had these mostly Islamist / Wahhabist Mosques, likely targeted as being friendly to the insurgency, Al Qaida in Iraq, and Al Zarqawi. The media breathlessly were pulling for the outbreak of civil war in Iraq, as it would signal the complete failure of the American mission over there. As of this weekend, it appears that the lid is still on, and that no civil war is taking place yet. Former Special Forces and FNC commentator Bill Cowan told Tony Snow Thursday that Special Forces were still active in Iraq and that bad guys were assuming room temperature on a daily basis. Someone turned over the location of the head Al Qaida leader and bombmaker in northern Baghdad to the Iraqis the day after the Mosque was destroyed. This means that perhaps the Sunni are getting tired of playing with the insurgency, and perhaps the Islamists have finally gone too far in committing their mayhem against Iraqis. Cowan notes that the number of tips to in-country Special Forces has been increasing quickly over the last several months and that combined Special Forces have been taking care of the problem.

4. Young. Congressman Don Young (R, AK) spent around 45 minutes on KENI radio in Anchorage last week taking calls. He vigorously defended the Highway Bill, including the two “Bridges to Nowhere” here in Alaska. Young said that both projects had been in the works for years; were known to everyone in congress; and in passing let it be known that he blamed the entire flap on John McCain (RINO, AZ) who was grandstanding for his media Masters. Interestingly enough, Young’s staff had done research on major federally funded bridges over the past decades, and found that none of them were ever built to anywhere – meaning that new bridges that are built between developed areas and undeveloped areas always st art out the same. He used bridges in the SeaTac area and the Golden Gate Bridge as examples. It appears this is yet another case of “we got ours, you guys can go to Hell” response from our political friends in the lower 48.

1. Greenland. The latest in a long list of hysterical global warming papers was published in the Journal Science a month or so ago. Dr. Patrick Michaels wrote a scathing review in a TechCentral Station (TCS) article last week. The new scare is that glaciers from Greenland are putting a lot more ice into the North Atlantic than in past years. The reason (of course) is obviously global warming caused by mankind. Dr. Michaels then goes on to blast both the authors for their conclusions on the cause of the extra ice and the editors of Science for shoddy research and even worse peer review of the paper. It does turn out that the glaciers off Greenland are dumping more ice into the North Atlantic. However the real reason is that there is more ice on Greenland – caused by increased precipitation and measured by satellite radar – that is finding its way off the island. Global warming has nothing to do with it. Michaels reviewed a 2003 paper reporting the increased ice depth that was completely ignored by the new scaremongers and the editors. It appears that when the hurricane numbers increase due to decades-long temperature and pressure oscillations in the North Atlantic, and when the yearly numbers of hurricanes increase as they have since 1995, so does the amount of precipitation on Greenland, which in turn forces more ice into the North Atlantic. The Science paper was written by a pair of NASA atmospheric scientists, which ought to really st art getting us all to worry about exactly what sort of science NASA is funding. Remember that the infamous James Hansen, atmospheric scientist who carefully manipulated both the data set and the statistical analysis several years ago to create the infamous Hockey Stick graph proving global warming is real is also a NASA employee. It is a darn shame we can’t even get real science out of people who are paid to produce it.

2. Cycles. In a related story, a Russian astronomer predicted a mini-ice age beginning in the mid-21st Century. So are we faced with collapsing ice caps in Greenland, caused (according to NASA) by manmade global warming? Or we are facing a mini Ice Age due to lack of solar activity (according to the Russians)? Which one is right? I’d take a close look at the Russian claim. Why? Mainly because it has happened before. There was a period of time when there were no observed sunspots. Do an Internet search using the keywords “Maunder Minimum” or “Little Ice Age.” It lasted from roughly 1640 to 1710. During those years, it got pretty cold during the winters in the northern hemisphere, with freezing lakes and rivers moving f arther south than in previous or later years. There appears to be some connection between solar output – essentially heat delivered directly to this planet – and the presence of sunspots. If there are a lot of sunspots there, things tend to be toasty warm here. When they go away for long periods of time, it gets cold. The Russians have been more interested in this subject over the last century. They have looked at solar activity cycles for over a century. Sunspots run on an 11 or 22 year cycle (depending on whether you count a polarity shift). There are others identified that are longer; up to centuries long. When you superimpose the cycles on top of one another, essentially adding and subtracting observed activity, some believe you can get some sort of predictability. Of course you can also get some sort of chaotic behavior as both the observations and st art and end points of the cycles tend to slop around a bit. Still, if I were actually looking at impending climactic events, I would pay a lot more attention to the Russian astronomers than I would to the NASA global warming crowd. Why? Because there are actual observations that support the Russians. It actually happened before, unlike human-caused global warming, and it can happen again. Junkscience.com, Thurs.

3. Boyington. The young skulls full of mush occupying (or infesting) the University of Washington Student Senate decided last week that they didn’t want a statue of UW alum Gregory “Pappy” Boyington on campus. Boyington, a full-blooded Sioux, was a Marine Corps Ace during WWII in the Pacific, having shot down either 22 or 26 Japanese aircraft (depending on who you believe) before he was himself shot down and captured by the Japanese. He survived prison camp, was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, and lived until 1988. Boyington was the very model of the American fighting man in WWII, a guy who pulled himself up from a troubled childhood, put himself through college, and ended up as the top American ace (tied for total kills) in WWII. His time as commander of the Black Sheep Squadron was (loosely and poorly) chronicled in TV’s Baa Baa Black Sheep with Robert Conrad playing Boyington. Time comes full circle and his alma mater is asked to approve a memorial to him and his heroic flying career. The nicely indoctrinated UW young skulls decide they don’t want to celebrate any military people; don’t want any more statues to white men on campus; don’t want to celebrate killing or death, and turn it down. Normally this sort of rejection would be a hoogas, but the story gets out and hits the local talk shows in the Seattle area and then hit the blogs (which is where I got it from – Michelle Malkin). The public push-back is well under way. This will be a major embarrassment to UW alums. Perhaps the administration will hear about it. Hopefully this tells you a lot more about the state of student government than it does about the state of education at UW. Unfortunately, I am not all that confident with that supposition.

4. Hamas. As the terrorist organization took over the government of Palestine last week, the Bush administration and the Israeli governments responded with the second-largest hammer they had to use – taking the money away. Last week, the US requested a refund of $50 million in American Aid held in escrow by the Palestinian Authority. This refund will blow a significant hole (you Hamas terrorists know how this works) in the PA’s budget. In parallel, the Israeli government voted to cut off all payments made to the PA of taxes and fees collected for them until Hamas swears off terrorism and agrees to recognize Israel and its right to exist. The west has supported the people of Palestine and their murderous ways for generations. In response, they elected a terrorist organization to head up their government. Perhaps they aren’t so interested in living peacefully after all. Hamas leaders immediately st arted threatening both the US and Israel, promising revenge. They also st arted creating government to government (or terrorist to terrorist) ties with Iranian-backed Hezbollah to the north and Iran far to the east. We will see if the new PA government is serious about potholes, sewers, jobs and electricity. One final thing, Hamas also announced that they were going to institute the Sharia (Islamic Law) on the West Bank and in Gaza. How quaint. Captain’s Qu arters, Fri.

5. Gun Ban. The new Canadian government is moving back from the defacto ban on firearms possession implemented by the ousted liberal government. The program, sold and implemented as a gun registration program, ends up being very expensive, far more expensive than the liberals told the nation. According to Captain’s Qu arters last Friday, when the registration program was sold in 1995, the liberals claimed it would cost no more than $2 million per year to run. Actual cost over the last decade was well over $1 billion, with last year’s expenses over $90 million. So the libs were off by a mere factor of 50. The other thing they did was order the RCMP, the national police force to execute the program and set it at the top of the priority list of thing they were ordered to do. They only provided yearly funding at the publicly promised levels rather than covering what the program actually cost, forcing the RCMP to take the difference out of hide. The RCMP’s ability to do its law enforcement job was severely compromised over the last decade. Couple that with the removal of guns from the general population and you get a rising crime rate. I expect the incoming conservative government will be quite popular as they remove this awful thing. Captain’s Qu arters, Fri.

1. Wire Brushing. Congress hauled former FEMA Director Michael Brown into town and held another of their self-serving, self-satisfying show trials. The senate committee was p articularly pleased with themselves as they questioned Brown about the response, or lack of response to Katrina. Brown, fired back as best he could, but still took a pretty good beating. Unfortunately neither Brown nor the pontificating senators chose to commit actual Truth in public. Nobody had the guts to say that FEMA is limited. Its success is always contingent on good behavior from state and local officials. When the state and local guys are nonexistent, worthless, stunningly corrupt and counterproductive and have been so for generations, we get the mess in New Orleans. The only way around this limitation is to turn the area over to the military by presidential proclamation of M artial Law and send in the troops. If you want a federal response, those are your only two choices. In a related story, a LA court threw out Governor Kathleen Blanco’s Executive Order postponing municipal elections in New Orleans. The order was signed as a vehicle to deflect voter anger against Mayor Ray “ Chocolate City” Nagan and the democrat machine in New Orleans until passions against their reprehensible and stunningly incompetent response subsided and people forgot. Blanco set no end date for the postponement. The election will be held in April with runoffs set for May. Democrats in New Orleans are busily trying to find former residents who have left and are not planning to return and supply them with absentee ballots for the election. They are also trying to identify all the dead people between the last election and April and register them as democrats so they can vote early and often. We may be seeing the destruction of the democrat machine in southern Louisiana.

2. Pebble. The saga of the Pebble Mine continued last week with a state legislature hearing in Juneau over a resolution that would require the state Dep artment of Natural Resources to hold a public process and prepare a comprehensive management plan for the proposed mine. To date, this requirement does not exist for any other mine in Alaska, which leads one to speculate that the backers – Republican Representative Mike Hawker (R, ANC) and Speaker John Harris (R, Valdez) are at best micromanaging or at worst simply pandering to the greens. The resolution is also backed by three of the most liberal, most green, and least supportive of resource development legislators in the state. The hearing last week was pretty raucous, with hired lobbyists for the greens and the mine squaring off in committee and in the halls of the legislature in Juneau. The anti-mining people hope to bury the mining company under a mountain of paper, each piece requiring approval, modification, and eventual court action before the company can move on to the next piece of paper. You string enough paper together end to end, and you can shut down anything (which is the technique currently used by NASA to defend its monopoly on manned spaceflight). One legislator asked what we are really paying DNR for if they are unable to do what they are ch artered by the legislature to do. Hawker responded that he was only trying to help get the job done correctly. Pebble stands as the next big thing for anti-development greens here in Alaska. The antis include all the usual suspects from the anti-development greens. Unfortunately, they also include so-called sportsmen organizations like Trout Unlimited and Federation of Fly Fishermen, who don’t want any additional fishing pressure, competition or development near favorite trout streams. So far, the State of Alaska has its ducks in order, paperwork proceeding along reasonably well, and stands ready to pull the trigger on a very lucrative, long term operation which will include roads and power in southwestern Alaska. Hang on for a fun ride.

3. NSA. A little movement on the NSA communications intercepts this last week. Powerline last Weds reported that CIA Director Porter Goss had launched an agency-wide investigation into sources of leaks to the NYT and Washington Post. Goss sent out a recently declassified e-mail to CIA employees that announced the investigation and that he had asked the Justice Dep artment to prosecute any leakers. The e-mail must have gotten someone’s attention at the CIA, for it was not immediately leaked to the media (that I know of). The Washington Post joined the fun last week with a story that the NSA had monitored over 5,000 phone conversations between Al Qaida and people in the US. The bad news was that the number was over 5,000. The good news is that we apparently know who these people are and where they are. As to congressional investigations into the NSA surveillance program itself, congressional investigators are quickly losing their stomach for public hearings on the program. The administration, including VP Cheney made the rounds of Capitol Hill last week and briefed everyone who wanted to listen on the details of the program. Democrats, who used to be in full screech against the intercept program, now want it to continue with increased congressional oversight. Finally, the Justice Dep artment has launched an investigation into the NYT’s leak that killed the intercept program. Someone is going to jail over this. Perhaps they will even be tried for treason.

4. Patriot Act. Big Lizards and Powerline reported last week that Republicans reached an agreement on passing the Patriot Act. The Act was derailed last December by democrats and four unfortunate Republican senators. The defeat was hailed as a Great Victory for Mankind by Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D, NV). The Republicans went home for th holidays and got an earful from their constituents. They retuned to DC and signed off on some cosmetic changes to the Act. If democrats want to defeat the Patriot Act via filibuster, they are going to have to do it without the benefit of top cover flown by wayward Republicans. Congratulations, folks, you are st arting off the New Year right. Keep it up.

5. FISA Judges. The Washington Post and Hugh Hewitt Friday detailed the structural problems with the FISA Court. The last two Chief Justices Royce Lamberth and Colleen Kollar-Kotelly have created new criteria for issuing warrants for surveillance under the Act. Both have st arted refusing to issue warrants based on NSA-developed surveillance, because they claim that the warrants would not stand up in federal court. This says a lot more about the judges and the federal courts that will hear the cases (and Lamberth was one of the good guys for many years) than it does about the legality of illegality of the NSA surveillance program. For example, if the President designates anyone apprehended as a result of NSA / FISA approved surveillance as a combatant, they can all be grabbed and tried as enemy combatants in front of a military tribunal. We have a problem. Thank you New York Times and democrats.

6. McCain. Burnishing his conservative credentials in preparation for the 2008 presidential run, John McCain ( RINO, AZ) released a personal letter written to Illinois Senator Barack Obama (D) after Obama withdrew from a taskforce on lobbying reform. McCain’s letter was refreshingly sarcastic, accusing Obama of leading him on with false promises to work toward lobbying reform in an honest, honorable and bip artisan manner. Apparently Obama tried to play both ends against the middle, and ended up shining McCain on with promises to work the issues honorably while joining the Harry Reid anti-Republican jihad. Obama, former (current?) rising star among democrat p arty kingmakers has taken his first political hit. McCain, on the other hand burnishes his thin credentials among conservatives by going after a potential democrat opponent in public.

1. Augustine. The Augustine volcano spent all of last week in continuous eruption following its “wake up” a week ago. The eruptive plume has been chugging along pretty consistently with ash expelled 15,000 -20,000’ into the air. The mountain has also produced small but nearly continuous pyroclastic flows across the island. Anchorage, sitting some 180 miles NE of the island has yet to be dusted. As of this writing, the activity has decreased somewhat, but still continues.

2. Pebble. The most recent target of greenie scaremongering here in the state has been the proposed Pebble Mine NW of Lake Iliamna west of Anchorage. The location sits close to the headwaters of a number of trout and salmon streams that feed into the lake which then feeds numerous rivers into the Bristol Bay region of the state. It appears that the mining company has identified a tremendous deposit of copper, gold and molybdenum in the area and is going to build a large open pit mine to grab it. The company plans on working the mine for over 50 years, assuming the greens and their lawyers don’t figure out some way to shut them down between now and then. If this one goes forward, it will inject billions of dollars into one of the poorest p arts of the state, the Bristol Bay region. It will bring a second major industry into a p art of the state that is populated mostly by villages and subsistence people. The mine company plans on building an 80-mile long road from Cook Inlet westward to the mine site. Good, high paying jobs, new roads, access into the Bristol Bay region via auto, and a second major industry in the Bristol Bay region, which now sinks or swims via the strength of salmon runs yearly is no small payoff. The greens and anti-development crowd is concerned about acids released during the milling operation, environmental pollution by the mine into salmon and trout streams, and the dust, dirt and grime generated by open pit mining. As usual, the greens and anti-development people do everything humanly to take the physical impact of the proposed mine out of context. If you take a look at a map, the Lake Iliamna region sits within a couple hundred miles of over 20 active volcanoes including Augustine which is currently erupting and Katmai – Novarupta, which injected an estimated 7 cubic miles of volcanic ash, pyroclastic flows, gasses and other stuff into the environment during a 3-day eruption in 1912 – the largest eruption in the 20th century, and one of the five largest in the last 1,000 years. If the trout and salmon can tolerate the near instantaneous injection of cubic miles of volcanic ash and gasses across tens of thousands of square miles of Alaska and surrounding waters, I suspect they can tolerate a few square miles worth of tailings ponds and open pit associated with a large open pit mine operating over the course of decades. Additionally, volcanic eruptions also inject some very interesting gasses into the atmosphere. These include sulfur dioxide, sulfuric acid, hydrochloric acid and hydrofluoric acids – all in the kiloton to megaton volume range per eruption. It appears the environment operates well enough to handle this insult on a regular basis. Compared to what volcanoes do on a regular basis – even small eruptions like our current Augustine – an open pit mine is about as benign a thing environmentally as you can do. This will be a good fight. We hope the company and pro-development people are up to the task and do not flinch.

3. Cartoons. Latest and greatest from the Religion of Peace is the nicely orchestrated outrage against Danish newspapers over 12 cartoons depicting Mohammed in les than a glowing light. The c artoons were first published last October and triggered little outrage or interest. Danish Imams took the c artoons, added three more of their own, nastier and more insulting than the originals, and took it on a road show to the Middle East to drum up outrage and mayhem. Well, it only took them 3-4 months, and they finally have their mayhem. European newspapers took up the cause and reprinted the c artoons. American newspapers for the most p art refused. They have been all across the Internet. Islamic outrage – nicely orchestrated, supported and choreographed – spread across the Middle East last week and throughout the weekend with the burning of the Danish Embassy in Syria and Lebanon by mobs of Muslims. The Syrian government used the false outrage to refocus anti-government ire against the new enemy, the Danes, and in doing so, committed an act of war that could allow NATO to respond should the Danes make such a request. Blog commentary st arted out mixed, with some like Big Lizards correctly noting that we ought not to anger those who are our potential allies – the moderate Muslims. Most of the rest have responded with some version of the notion that Islam and its worshipers need to grow up if they intend to live in the real world of the 21st century. In the eyes of the Islamists that are perpetrating this artificial outrage, this is all about submission, the eventual supremacy of Islam worldwide. It is yet another event that is being used as a propaganda device to force formerly spineless governments in the west to back down a little more to the Islamists. Unfortunately for the Islamists, the event seems to be injecting a spine, some backbone to formerly weak Europeans. The good news is that this is the best that the Islamist Ummah can do. The bad news is that the west has allowed a few embassies to burn in Syria, Lebanon and Afghanistan. Our friends from the Religion of Peace may have bitten off a little more than they can chew, for they chose to make war on people that will eventually fight back. This event was a carefully planned, staged and orchestrated info-war battle. Their weapon was the mob. Their vehicle was incitement. They ought to pray to whatever God they pray to that one day those on the receiving end of the tender ministrations of an Islamist mob do not decide it is a threat to life and limb and annihilate it like the anti-draft riots in NYC during the Civil War. While the Islamists are superb tactical planners and propagandists, skilled in whining and wrapping themselves in the trappings of victimhood, tolerance and multiculturalism, relying for years on cowardice of the multicultural governments in the West, they tend to overreach a bit. I believe that time is drawing to an end, and we are on the verge of a real, knock-down, drag out discussion and inspection of Islam from the ground up. If the Islamists think that a few Danish c artoons are outrageous, they haven’t seen anything yet. Last but not least, Muslim c artoonists in the Middle East have for decades published the most vile, odious c artoons aimed at the Israelis in p articular and the Jews in general. Our friends from the Religion of Peace apparently can dish it out but are singularly unable to take it. No surprise, as most other bullies can’t take what they dish out either.

4. SOTU. The State of the Union speech last week was a two-p arter. The first was a superb defense of our actions in World War III (the Terror War). Unfortunately, the domestic p art left a lot to be desired. He did not promise to open ANWR or pursue energy independence. He did not talk about rolling back the regulatory burden so we could build more refineries or nuclear power plants. He pawned off Social Security reform to a Presidential Commission. Rather than pushing expanded Universal Savings Accounts / MSAs / IRAs as a buy-in / opt out vehicle to solve the structural problems associated with Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security, setting them up as voluntary, bulletproof, unlimited, tax free and universally transferable, we get yet another commission composed of out of work politicians. You want to solve Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid? Simply get the money out of Washington DC and into the pockets (and savings accounts) of the recipients. Freedom always works. Unfortunately it sounds like the president is listening to his pollsters too much on the domestic side. It is up to the House to go to work on this stuff, for I fear the Senate contains too many prima-donnas to move. Still, President Bush is pursuing the three of the four important goals of his two terms in office: 1. Win the war; 2. Cut the taxes; 3. Confirm the judges; 4. Cut the size of government. Three out of four is not all that bad, but all four would be superb.

"If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen."
- Samuel Adams, speech at the Philadelphia State House, August 1, 1776.

Note: Interesting Items can be found at the following locations:
Debate USA, http://www.debateusa.com/ ;
MatSu Valley News http://www.matsuvalleynews.com
and the home page: http://home.gci.net/~agimarc
Rod Martin's The Vanguard site is also a long-time supporter of this column. You can find it at: http://www.thevanguard.org/

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