Malkin rips Chris Mathews a new one -- and deservedly so.

Cliff's Notes on International Affairs

Victor Davis Hanson has a very good rundown on a lot of topics in this interview. I recommend reading it.

Inteligence

A new inteligence report is out, and lets just say that Bush haters will be disapointed. Among other things, it says there was no evidence of political pressure to trump up inteligence.

Impromptus

Some random thoughts:

Remember Brian Nichols -- the guy who shot and killed all those people in Atlanta? I was just remembering how one member of the chattering class said that this tragedy was just all the more reason to outlaw handguns. But the handgun that Nichols used was lifted from a police officer. Do those who want to outlaw handguns suggesting that police should not have handguns either?

Here's some info from a lobby for the consumption tax. I think I'm for it, though this site is admittedly one-sided. Economic wonks (I'm thinking right now of Bruce Bartlet) say that these kind of value added/consumption taxes adversely effect the economy less than our income tax does. This is one instance where Europe may actually have something to teach us Americans.

Should we give parents a financial incentive to become better parents? I thought this post was interesting.

Constitutional Loop Hole

I know I titled a post "last thoughts on Shiavo," and I really did intend to end on that note. There are, however, side issues that are raised by the Shiavo case the I want to comment on.

One of those issues is that of a runaway judiciary. Judges are using there unchecked power to flout the written laws and inject their own personal politics. This really shouldn't be a partisan issue, though it seems its turning out that way.

This politicization of the judiciary is really a fairly new development. Antonin Scalia has pointed out that even though he was known to be a fairly conservative guy, he was approved for the supreme court unanimously. That has all changed, as the current filibuster on judiciary nominations shows. Why has it changed? Because the people have figured out that judges are not disspationate arbiters of the law, but lifetime appointed politicians.

Normally I'm upset with the the liberals on these counts. Substantive due process and the right to privacy are judge-fabricated rights/procedures not found in the constitution. Today, though, I'm upset with conservative judges like Judge Greer (for some reason today is a day of introspection).

Greer as well as other (reportedly conservative) judges have flouted the law passed to give Terri Shiavo standing in federal court and de novo review. The law was clearly constructed to give Terri a new hearing in federal court with a complete review of the evidence. Perhaps the results would have been the same, and this step would merely prolong Terri's life a few more months. Nevertheless, this is what Congress stipulated in the bill, and this is what should have happened.

Essentially, if judges continue on this path, the constitution and rule of law will be destroyed. Finding provisions in the constitution where there are none, and disregarding laws contrary to a judges personal predilections will eventually make laws void. If laws are subject to the whims of judges, then, in effect, there are no laws.

Marketing Social Security

The Bush administration has made a mistake in the marketing of Social Security reform. Early on in the debate, the administration said that personal retirement accounts would not fix the solvency problem. Assuming that these accounts had the same returns as Social Security, that would be true; but everyone knows (based on the Thrifts Savings Plan, and past market performance) personal accounts would actually have a much higher rate of return than Social Security.

In the almost inevitable case that personal accounts have higher returns than Social Security -- the benefits cut due to Social Securities solvency problem (unless we want to drastically raise taxes) would be more than offset by these personal accounts higher returns. Thus the president should say, "we have two options to save Social Security. My plan: personal accounts, which would help fix solvency; or the only other alternative -- a combination of higher taxes and lower benefits." Faced with a choice between taxes hikes/benefit cuts on the one hand, or personal accounts on the other, I believe the electorate will easily choose the latter.

In Good Shape

Remember how Iraq was supposed to be Bush's Vietnam? Remember how Islam was incompatible with Democracy? Remember how these fundamentalist Islamo-facist insurgents were suposed to be superhuman, everyone of them fighting to the death, and remember how the American military was not going to be able to beat them?

Well, I'm not sure what's going on concidering all of the above, but it appears we the Iraqi insurgency is losing its steam. How is this posible?

Iraqi resistance begins to crack after elections

Jason Burke, chief reporter
Sunday March 27, 2005
The Observer

The Iraqi resistance has peaked and is 'turning in on itself', according to recent intelligence reports from Baghdad received by Middle Eastern intelligence agencies.
The reports are the most optimistic for several months and reflect
analysts' sense that recent elections in Iraq marked a 'quantum shift'. They will boost the government in the run-up to the expected general election in May

Is Congress Overstepping Its Bounds?

Much has been said about congress "overstepping its bounds" in the Shiavo case. I'm not persuaded. Perhaps, as some have argued, it's a bad idea to make laws from specific cases. But as far as overstepping ones bounds, isn't congress supposed to write laws? Isn't this completely within their bounds?

Some have argued that Republicans believe congress should stay out of the American peoples' personal lives, and that in the Shiavo case Republicans are being hypocritical. But that's really more of a Libertarian principle. Republicans have always sided with life; As the President says lets "err on the side of life." (I actually prefer he say "if we are to err, we should err on the side of life." Since I don't think we're erring at all, I think Republicans have it right in this case. I hope that's not too pedantic of me). Still what laws do we have that don't affect our personal lives? Inevitably, laws affect the personal lives of some people. How far those laws go, and what areas of our lives they affect are all questions to be debated. The "stay out of our personal lives" mantra, however, is a meaningless argument.

Others say Republicans have betrayed their federalist principles -- that is, by taking a case that was in state jurisdiction, and giving it standing in federal court they've slighted states' rights. This argument has more merit, though I don't find it particularly persuasive. "Protecting life" is higher than federalism in the conservative principle hierarchy. Certainly the due process (specifically on the federal level) that's afforded a convicted murder should also be afforded an innocent helpless woman.

Probably the most insulting argument is that we conservatives, who supposedly believe in the "sanctity of marriage," are now undermining ourselves as we come out against Michael Shiavo's right to choose for his incapacitated wife. If preventing your wife from getting proper diagnosis, and starving her to death is part of the "sanctity of marriage" (which I don't think it is) then, no I don't believe in it. Is beating your wife ok because of the sanctity of marriage?

Fake Documents, Round Two

Rathergate, it seems, was not embarrassing enough to left leaning media, since it appears they learned nothing from it. Now in the crosshairs of media watchdogs (like Powerline) is ABC news. ABC published the highly suspect "GOP talking points" memo. The problem; no one knows the source of the memo. Here is John Hinderaker's (of Powerline) write-up:

To sum up, then: (1) The memo itself conveys no information about its source. (2) It is very poorly done, containing a number of typographical errors, failing to get the number of the Senate bill correct, and using points cribbed word-for-word from an advocacy group's website. (3) The politically controversial statements are out of place in a talking points memo, and seem, on the contrary, ideally framed to create talking points for the Democrats. (4) Somewhat bizarrely, after the contents of the memo had been reported, someone corrected those typographical errors--but only those errors that had been pointed out by ABC. (5) No one has reported seeing any Republican distributing the suspect memo; the only people confirmed to have passed out the memo were Democratic staffers.

Final Thoughts on Shiavo

I've had a few thoughts on Terri Shiavo since I last posted about her. They're not entirely original, but still worth your time.

For instance, "who benefits from Terri's death?" Her husband says that Terri did not want to be a burden on others, presumably in connection to just such a circumstance, and he says she did not want to be kept alive by machines. Ok, maybe she said that (although Michael Shiavo's interests seem to be at odds with Terri's).

But assuming Terri didn't want to be "a burden." still, as people we don't get that choice. If a quadriplegic man, decided he was a burden (lets face it, in some respect he probably would be) still, we would try and prevent him from committing suicide. What about being kept alive by machines? Some quadriplegics have to have machines to keep them living and breathing. Would we be ok with such a person choosing to turn off his breathing machine if he so desires? I think not.

What seems to be the sticking point for most is this PVS (persistent vegetative state) business. In other words, even though she looks like she's aware of what going on, in fact she isn't. Well of course this diagnosis is, at the very least, questionable.

But lets work from this premise. If Terri has no cognition, then she also has no idea whether of not her wishes are being carried out. Thus it's no inconvenience to Terri that she's being kept alive against her will, particularly because she currently has no will.

The remaining players are Michael Schiavo and The Shindler family (Terri's parents). Terri's family has a deep attachment to Terri and wants her to live. Michael has only expressed that Terri's death is synonymous with Terri's will. But as we just established Terri has no will. Thus there is no objection to allowing Terri to live.

That is unless there is another reason. Michael also has a perceived interest in Terri's death for the sake of his own closure. He's moved on to a new woman, and by her, has two children. But why is he so insistent upon Terri's death? Can't divorce give Michael Shiavo the closure he needs, turning custody to Terri's parents? It seems as thought that would be the best solution. Both Michael's and Terri's parents' needs would be met.

If Terri does have a will, and wants to die, then of course, she shouldn't be allowed to because existence of a will and this PVS sticking point are mutually exclusive.