Sayings of V.S. Naipaul

From his profile and interview in The Observer, last Sunday:

"On becoming a writer: 'It is mysterious that the ambition should have come first - the wish to be a writer, to have that distinction, that fame - and that this ambition should have come long before I could think of anything to write about.'
On multiculturalism: 'A man can't say, 'I want the country, I want the laws and protection, but I want to live in my own way.' It's become a kind of racket, this multiculturalism.'
On Hindu nationalism in India: 'Dangerous or not, it's a necessary corrective to history and will continue to remain so.'
On the fatwa against Salman Rushdie: 'An extreme form of literary criticism.'"

V.S. Naipaul: Destroy Saudi Arabia and Iran

From The Hindu thanks to Prashant Kothari's blog, this little reported statement from Nobel-prize winning author V.S. Naipaul:

"London, Sept 12. (PTI): Raking up a controversy, Nobel prize winning author Sir Vidia Naipaul has said countries like Saudi Arabia and Iran which foment religious war must be destroyed. The 72-year-old India-born author, in an interview published in 'The Observer' today, however had a word of advise to the people: 'hate oppression, but fear the oppressed.' Naipaul said the thing he saw in the current terrorism was the exulting in other people's death."

PrashantKothari.com

I met Prashant Kothari a couple of years ago at the National Press Club. He had a successful business publishing corporate newsletters online. Now he has his own blog, and it is interesting. His company is String Technologies, which has an ad on the site, in case you need some work done...

Nikolai Getman Remembered

An obituary of the Soviet painter and former Gulag prisoner, by Robert Conquest, in The Wall Street Journal:

"Mr. Getman's death comes soon after that of Czeslaw Milosz, with whom I had warm, though not close, relations. He too, though stressing that his own experiences in Communist Poland were not at the Kolyma level, was very concerned that the Westerners he encountered should understand, should really understand, the extreme negativity of the Communist phenomenon. The implication was that the Western vision was still blurred. Mr. Getman has added what one would hope to be a final touch to our understanding."

Our First Tip

We just processed our first donation via the Amazon.com tip jar (down below the links in the left-hand column), and would like to say our "Thank You!" to our contributor.

Daniel Wiener on CBS and the Presidential Debates

From Wienerlog:

"The Drudge Report claims that Bush officials want CBS News correspondent Bob Schieffer removed as the moderator for the final (Oct. 13th) Presidential debate. If true, this would appear to be a clever move to keep the story about the CBS forged document scandal in the public eye, while simultaneously punishing CBS for it's biased and shoddy journalism. But characterizing it as merely a 'clever move' misses the underlying genius. It would be a BRILLIANT political move, simultaneously skewering CBS and the Kerry campaign..."

[link from RogerLSimon.com]

Bruce Feirstein on Dan Rather's Forgeries

From The New York Observer:

"Yes sir, Dan-O: The "essential truth" is that your credibility is now lower than a piece of armadillo road kill, flattened by a blogger driving an 18-wheeler out on I-20 somewhere west of Abilene.

"Or, to use one of your more colorful Dan-isms from the last Presidential election: The chances of CBS and Dan Rather coming out of this with their reputations intact are somewhere between slim and none--and Slim just left the state.

"And with all due respect here, sir: All this--for what? To prove that a Congressman's kid got special treatment in the National Guard? Hell, that's not criminal. It's practically the American Way. Look at the news business, publishing, movies, union jobs in Detroit--even most of our recent Presidential candidates."

[link via Romanesko]

Dan Rather's Forgeries = Journalism's Watergate

Says Eric Fettmann:

"LAST week, as the furor over Dan Rather's National Guard memos grew more and more intense, media critic Ken Auletta, appearing on PBS, criticized Fox News Channel for having 'treated this story as if it were Watergate. It's not Watergate.' Actually, in many respects, it is indeed broadcast journalism's Watergate."

[tip from powerlineblog.com]

Ernest Miller on CBS's Fraudulent Response

From Corante > The Importance of... > Incompetent or Unethical? The Story of CBS News' Response to Criticism Over the Killian Memos:

"I should also note that this isn't about Dan Rather. I couldn't care less about Dan Rather. This is about CBS News as an organization. Although Dan Rather has been the focus for attention for many, the majority of my criticisms are directed at CBS News as a whole.

"Whether you agree that the documents are forged, clearly credible and legitimate questions about their authenticity have been raised. CBS News has not responded to criticisms with transparency and responsibility we should expect from any news organization, let alone such a large and important one.

"The following is an analysis and timeline of CBS's response to their critics. It is abundantly clear that CBS's actions when questioned about the validity of their reporting are a breach of what should be fundamental journalistic practice. Either that, or CBS News is hopelessly incompetent.

If I've missed something or erred, please let me know."

Who Checks the Bloggers?

Power Line: "But who checks the bloggers?"

Roger L. Simon Calls Dan Rather A Liar

There, someone's finally said it, Roger L. Simon:

"But the question remains, had the anchorman done so, would he have had the intellectual capacity to have understood what he read. Maybe that's the secret to being a good liar. You can't comprehend what your critics are saying."

Memo to the RNC: Replace Bob Schieffer with Brit Hume as Presidential Debate Moderator

Hugh Hewitt says it best:

"Why would anyone believe anything from CBS or Team Kerry, including denials and committee reports? . . . At the j-schools there will be a brisk business in seminars for years to come: How Did It Happen! Save a lot of time: It happened because the fever swamp lives in the newsroom. Drain the swamp and people will begin to believe the big 3 again. In the meantime, they are watching Fox. You can believe Hume."

Which leads to the suggestion that the RNC demand Fox's Brit Hume moderate the Presidential Debates instead of disgraced CBS's Bob Schieffer. Fox right now is the most ethical news operation: CNN had "Tailwind," NBC had "Dateline", ABC had "Red Lion," and CBS has "Dan Rather". That leaves Fox as the lowest-scandal news network.

Allahpundit on Dan Rather

Allahpundit has an excellent analysis of the latest nonsensical story in the Dan Rather affair, which appeared in USA Today.

Power Line Questions CBS's Fraudulent "Apology"

From Power Line, in an item also called "Modified Limited Hangout" (file under Great Minds Think Alike):

"Yesterday you stated that CBS originally approached Burkett for the story, that Burkett did not seek you out. Who directed you to Burkett? Was it a member of the Kerry campaign? Why have you not identified the name of the person who directed you to Burkett?

"Did any member of the Kerry campaign have a hand in the story? Did the campaign direct you to any of the 'unimpeachable sources' you used for the story? What members of the Kerry campaign did CBS speak with about the story before it aired? Is it a sheer coincidence that the Kerry campaign unrolled its 'Operation Fortunate Son' attacking President Bush's Air National Guard service the same week that you broadcast the 60 Minutes story?

"The answers to these basic questions are within your knowledge. Will you please answer them publicly now? Why not?"

From Our Great Minds Think Alike Department (continued)

Today's editorial in The Wall Street Journal also sees Rather-Nixon parallels, calling CBS's latest statement a "Modified Limited Hangout":

"All of this raises the question of whether CBS was a vessel for, if not a willing participant in, a partisan dirty trick two months before a closely contested Presidential election. Last week Mr. Rather told the Washington Post that "if the documents are not what we were led to believe, I'd like to break that story." It was too late for that; Web writers and other news organizations had beaten him to it. But if CBS wants to restore the credibility it enjoyed back in the era of Edward R. Murrow, it will now get to the bottom of the story behind Mr. Rather's discredited story."

HughHewitt on Rather's Continuing Watergate Parallels

At HughHewitt.com:

"Gee, I may be old fashioned, but it seems to me that a third rate burglary is less threatening to the outcome of an election than fraud broadcast into millions of homes."

Dan Rather Owes Viewers a Confession

Not an investigation, as Dan Rather fraudulently promised, because Rather and CBS News already know exactly what happened. An "investigation" by CBS is likely to continue the cover-up, providing an excuse for CBS News to gag employees until after Election Day, "due to the investigation." This would have the effect of silencing sources, rather than providing full disclosure.

To put this matter to rest, all Rather and his accomplices really need to do is tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth--in a venue not controlled by CBS video editors.

For example, lets start with a live press conference, where Dan Rather answers questions, instead of asking them. It could be televised on PBS or C-Span, if CBS doesn't want to carry it.

Is CBS Part of the Kerry Campaign?

From Power Line, on links between Joe Lockhart, Burkett, and CBS:

"Okay, Joe, did Burkett tell you what they said? Okay, Mary, is CBS an adjunct of the Kerry campaign?"

Sorry He Got Caught...

Here's the transcript of Dan Rather's non-apology from tonight's CBS News, which followed a red-herring "interview" that seems scripted and fake, itself, from the Mudville Gazette:

RATHER: The failure of CBS News to do just that, to properly, fully, scrutinize the documents and their source, led to our airing the documents when we should not have done so. It was a mistake. CBS News deeply regrets it. Also I want to say personally and directly, I'm sorry.

But even this "apology" is a fraud, because CBS knowingly presented forged documents as the basis of a false story. Remember, while they were standing by their story last week--a delaying action designed to buy time to get all the principals on the same page for a cover story--they publicly declared that CBS had a system of "checks and balances" and "careful vetting." That was what separated their network news operation from "bloggers in pajamas." Remember also, CBS admitted that the producers asked experts to vouch for the authenticity of the documents.

The charade continues. Rather has not admitted his documents are forgeries and is still treating them as authentic, although not "authenticated." He did not report that they have been exposed as crude forgeries, easily detected when compared to original documents of the period. Rather didn't ask any tough questions of Burkett, either. He didn't ask for the original documents, or explain why CBS doesn't have them, or didn't seem to want them at any point. He didn't ask Burkett to reveal his sources. He didn't seem interested in pursuing the story at all, with good reason. He doesn't have to do any further investigation, for Rather knows exactly what happened, because he was at the center of the fraud.

The interview's supposed news content, that CBS came to Burkett rather than the other way around, makes no material difference. It is a red herring, designed to distract people from the real story: Dan Rather is perpetrator of a fraud, a peddler of forged documents, and is now orchestrating a cover-up. Like Watergate, there is probably "hush-money" involved. No "independent investigation" answering to Andrew Heyward--so far, one of the unindicted co-conspirators, to continue the Watergate analogy--is going to get at the truth.

This isn't an apology, it is an insult to the CBS audience. Especially all the viewers who believed that CBS News was an honest outfit, at least once upon a time.

From this interview, as Richard Nixon might say, Dan Rather has made one thing perfectly clear: The only thing Dan Rather is sorry about is getting caught.

Why Americans Hate Foreign Policy

P.J. O'Rourke says it is because Americans are all foreigners themselves. [hat tip, DiploMad]

Memo to the RNC: CBS Didn't Apologize...

From RNC Chairman Ed Gillespie Statement on CBS:

"We accept CBS's apology for a breach of the journalistic standards that provide the American people confidence in news organizations, but some disturbing questions remain unanswered."

Actually, Rather is sticking to his guns, and has not apologized for peddling forgeries, or misleading the public, so there isn't a real apology for the Republican National Committee to accept.

This kind of weak and bureaucratic response by the RNC is pretty good evidence that the bloggers who discovered Rather's forgeries were not working for the RNC, which would do much better to stay quiet than give Rather an "exit strategy" with his "limited modified hangout."

From Our Great Minds Think Alike Department...

HughHewitt has also just called Rather's statement a "limited, modified hangout."

Rather's "Modified Limited Hangout"

Under stress, Dan Rather appears to be morphing into Richard Nixon. For evidence, just take a look at Dan Rather's Statement on Ernest Miller's website:

Last week, amid increasing questions about the authenticity of documents used in support of a 60 MINUTES WEDNESDAY story about President Bush's time in the Texas Air National Guard, CBS News vowed to re-examine the documents in question--and their source--vigorously. And we promised that we would let the American public know what this examination turned up, whatever the outcome.

Now, after extensive additional interviews, I no longer have the confidence in these documents that would allow us to continue vouching for them journalistically. I find we have been misled on the key question of how our source for the documents came into possession of these papers. That, combined with some of the questions that have been raised in public and in the press, leads me to a point where--if I knew then what I know now--I would not have gone ahead with the story as it was aired, and I certainly would not have used the documents in question.

But we did use the documents. We made a mistake in judgment, and for that I am sorry. It was an error that was made, however, in good faith and in the spirit of trying to carry on a CBS News tradition of investigative reporting without fear or favoritism.

Please know that nothing is more important to us than people's trust in our ability and our commitment to report fairly and truthfully.

The tone is pure Nixon. "Mistakes were made." Sanctimonious self-righteousness combined with self-pity and the portrayal of himself as a victim, ending with an outrageous howler that the CBS fraud was perpetrated "in good faith" based on "our commitment to report fairly and truthfully." And Rather's mother was a saint, too, no doubt.

Tactically, it looks like Rather is using Nixonian damage control strategies taken directly from the Watergate playbook, as well. This means the above statement may be classified as a "Modified Limited Hangout." This was Nixon's next step after "Stonewall" during Watergate. Rather even seems to have his own "Palace Guard" (aka Haldeman & Ehrlichmann) in CBS News executives Andrew Heyward and Josh Howard, who will say or do anything to protect him, no matter how absurd or dishonest it may seem. The next step, if Rather follows Nixon's footsteps a little longer, will be to release a partial set of documents while claiming it is full disclosure.

CBS's "Smoking Gun"?

It is a truism from detective novels that every criminal leaves a piece of self-incriminating evidence. Reading Ernest Miller's summary, one comes across this quote from CBS spokesperson Kelli Edwards on September 8th:

'CBS verified the authenticity of the documents by talking to individuals who had seen the documents at the time they were written. These individuals were close associates of [Bush commander] Colonel Jerry Killian and confirm that the documents reflect his opinions at the time the documents were written.'

Note the phrases: "individuals who had seen the documents," "at the time they were written," and "reflect his opinions at the time the documents were written." These are evidence of the "accurate but fake" line taken by CBS and its apologists, that the documents were concocted at a later date to illustrate opinions that Killian supposedly held. CBS does not state the documents came from the author, does not give a date certain (say 1972) for the creation of the documents, and has the peculiar weasel-words about "reflecting opinions."

The attitude towards the White House reaction to the forged documents, expressed by producer Josh Howard in the New York Times today, is a proper response only to a premeditated a confidence trick. Why, if CBS did not have an ulterior motive, would executives point to the White House's acceptance of the documents as evidence of anything at all? Had the White House denounced the documents as the forgeries they are, CBS would not have accepted that statement. They admit to pre-recording an interview with a so-called "expert" to rebut such a claim. So, it would have proved nothing.

Likewise, that the White House responded to the forgeries faxed to them, proved nothing--other than that the press secretary doesn't have a licensed document examiner on staff. There is no way the President could know what a private individual had in his personal files. It is not up to the victim of a hoax to prove fraud.

Accounts of CBS's broadcast have referred to a "rush" to put the program on the air. But why the "rush"? One reason would be to put fraudulent documents on the air before the trick could be discovered. This is why CBS never really confirmed the authenticity of its own documents from an examination of the originals, since it never had any originals--as there were no originals. The documents could not be confirmed as genuine by any credible examiner, and CBS knew it, before, during and after the broadcast.

A "fake but accurate" defense fits into this scheme, as it treats the forgeries as a "reconstruction" or later documentation of a prior state of mind, so their authenticity is not relevant. And that only makes sense if they were concocted in the first place, to smear the White House. It also indicates that CBS News as a corporate entity was deeply involved, and that executives of the network approved the fraud prior to air.

The scheme might have worked, had CBS News not posted the fake documents on the internet, for no one might have checked them. That the crude forgeries didn't work, was due to the efforts of bloggers, who pointed out the fraud.

These forged memos, utilized by CBS as a "smoking gun" against President Bush, turned out to be a "smoking gun" all right--proving that CBS perpetrated deliberate fraud.

Mark Steyn on Dan Rather's Forgeries

From the Chicago Sun-Times:

"By now just about everybody on the planet also thinks they're junk, except for that dwindling number of misguided people who watch the ''CBS Evening News'' under the misapprehension that it's a news broadcast rather than a new unreality show in which a cocooned anchor, his floundering news division and some feeble executives are trapped on their own isle of delusion and can't figure out a way to vote themselves off it."

EDITORIAL: Until Dan Rather Apologizes, Bush Should Not Cooperate With CBS News

Simply as a matter of human decency, the White House might refuse to do business with CBS News until Dan Rather apologizes on the air for peddling his crude forgeries.

There is no reason to do business with con men or fraudsters. It would set a good example for the rest of the country, indeed the rest of the world, if the White House declares CBS News off-limits until this matter is resolved.

Once apologies are made, and measures taken to guarantee this sort of thing never happens again, normal relations could resume, with lessons learned on all sides.

Ernest Miller on Dan Rather's Forgeries

A fascinating, detailed recap of the major events, by a US Naval Academy and Yale Law School graduate, Ernest Miller, on his Corante blog The Importance of...:

"By this past Monday evening, however, the story had clearly become one involving serious questions about the future of news reporting and I decided to join the conversation on this blog. This story is important because the blatant flouting of basic and fundamental journalistic practices by one of the largest and prominent news organizations in the country is undermining the credibility of journalism as a whole. Jay Rosen has asked how the press can 'win' during this election season (Campaign Puzzler: How the Press Comes Out with a Win). Well, I think that right now, the press is falling farther and farther behind in points. If major news organizations think that their credibility is not tarnished by a rogue CBS, they are sadly mistaken.

"It is disappointing to me that the major media has been mostly silent in their condemnation of CBS's response to this scandal. Even granting, against reason, that there remains a serious debate about the authenticity of the documents, and that CBS's 'checks and balances' for vetting this story were sufficient, the response of CBS to its critics has been outrageous. Where are the outraged calls for more transparency on the part of CBS News from the editorial boards of the New York Times, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune or Wall Street Journal? Why haven't anchors of the other networks called for CBS to establish an internal, or better yet, an external investigation into the issue? Any profession that won't police its own when members egregiously violate the fundamental tenets of that profession will very quickly lose all credibility.

"More importantly, the press plays a vital and critical role in forcing transparency on government. How effectively will the press be able to play that role if it adopts the stonewalling tactics of the government when it is subject to criticism? If our watchdogs cannot even watch themselves, the Fourth Estate will become ever more ineffective.

"Many of my most important criticisms aren't about content, but about process. Many stories will lead to valid disagreements over nuance, omissions, and etc. However, there are fundamental aspects of process that virtually all can agree upon. CBS News has violated many of these. And, even where I criticize CBS News content, it is generally with the belief that a news organizations should be especially fair and even-handed in responding to criticism.

"I should also note that this isn't about Dan Rather. I couldn't care less about Dan Rather. This is about CBS News as an organization. Although Dan Rather has been the focus for attention for many, the majority of my criticisms are directed at CBS News as a whole.

"Whether you agree that the documents are forged, clearly credible and legitimate questions about their authenticity have been raised. CBS News has not responded to criticisms with transparency and responsibility we should expect from any news organization, let alone such a large and important one.

"The following is an analysis and timeline of CBS's response to their critics. It is abundantly clear that CBS's actions when questioned about the validity of their reporting are a breach of what should be fundamental journalistic practice. Either that, or CBS News is hopelessly incompetent."

Power Line on the Washington Post on Dan Rather's Forgeries

Power Line:

"What jumps out at me is that Dan Rather, Mary Mapes and the 60 Minutes staff behaved not as objective journalists, but as opposition researchers for the Kerry campaign. They had been trying for years to dig up dirt on President Bush so as to prevent his re-election, and were beside themselves with glee when Bill Burkett, or whoever it turns out to be, gave them the opportunity to use forged documents as a pretense to air their anti-Bush story."

What Blogs Have Wrought

From The Weekly Standard (tip: Powerlineblog.com).

Scott Johnson on Dan Rather on Fox News

From Johnny Dollar's Place:

A transcript of a Fox News program with Powerlineblog's Scott Johnson, who says: "And CBS now has gone from being perhaps the willing dupe of a hoaxer to a participant in a fraud."

Meet Alexander Fainberg, People's Poet of Uzbekistan

From Ferghana.ru [thanks to Registan.net for the link]:

"Alexander Fainberg, author of 12 books of poems, 4 scripts for full-length movies and 18 cartoons, translations of Uzbek poets into Russian, publications in Uzbek, Russian, American, and Israeli media became a People's Poet of Uzbekistan. This correspondent met with Fainberg, the patriarch of Tashkent poetry extremely popular with the Russian-reading general public in Uzbekistan for the last 25 years or so, on Saiilgokh Street, the so called Tashkent Broadway, in company of his friends - local journalists."

PBS Covers for Dan Rather

In a ridiculous segment, The Newshour last night featured Terence Smith, a former CBS employee, discussing Dan Rather's forgeries with Susan Tifft, a press aide for the 1980 Democratic National Convention and speechwriter for the Carter-Mondale campaign and Ken Auletta, a liberal writer for The New Yorker who claims that PBS is right-wing. The introductory taped "package" actually altered the typography and format of CBS's forged memos, displaying computer-generated documents different from the ones on the CBS website. So misleading, so transparently dishonest, one had to laugh--the producers perhaps realized that showing the actual documents, as they appeared on sites like Powerlineblog.com or LittleGreenFootballs would illustrate that they are obvious fakes.

The discussion was as ludicrous as the backgrounder. In response to Smith's softball questions, Auletta and Tifft soft-peddled the CBS fraud, clinging to a "Fake but Accurate" line. For example, Auletta's explanation: "Sometimes you race too fast. You don't pin your facts down."

But according to The Wall Street Journal, CBS was working on this story for several years, and had contacted multiple document experts.

Thus, Auletta's explantation is false. Yet, Smith didn't question it, even though as a CBS News veteran, he ought to know better. All he did was go to Tifft, the former paid Democratic party operative, who supported Auletta's line: "I think it's important to think about the atmosphere in which this occurred, which is obviously very partisan atmosphere, but as Ken said, there really has been a race and rush on this story."

So, instead of a balanced debate between two sides, The Newshour offered rationalizations and excuses from partisans on the side of Dan Rather and CBS. It was simply laughable, and can't be taken seriously. A fraud,itself--transparently not balanced, not objective, and not true.

To save his own reputation, and that of his program, maybe Jim Lehrer might invite one of the pajama-clad bloggers on the show to talk about how he discovered the fakes, instead of CBS apologists and political operatives? Or if that is a bridge too far, an articulate commentator who knows something about the internet side of the story, like Andrew Sullivan or Glenn Reynolds?

Until something like that happens, PBS's Newshour reputation is damaged goods, victim of self-inflicted wounds.

Dan Rather and "Credo Quia Absurdam"

How can people believe things that are clearly false?

The Dan Rather story led us to this article by Robert D. Sider on Tertullian. Although renowned for the phrase, apparently Tertullian didn't really say "credo quia absurdam" (I believe because it is absurd), rather "certum quia impossibile" (I am certain because it is impossible).

Either phrase is about the power of religious faith to overcome logic, as in the case of miracles.

That is what the CBS forgeries represent in the faithful mind of Dan Rather--the documents are miracles from on high to destroy the "Evil Bush." They have provided the 'smoking gun' of Bush's guilt in shirking National Guard duty. Like a relic of the Holy Grail, to doubt them is to challenge an entire faith. Thus, to preserve their own faith they must ignore the facts of this case. This religious impulse to believe the absurd is what lies at the heart of Rather-gate. Rather is a true believer. And in a form of religious fanaticism he places his faith in things which are clearly impossible. The greater the absurdity, the greater the faith. Thus, Dan Rather is demonstrating his fideism by sticking to his absurd story.

However, unlike Rather, Tertullian actually accepted the authority of reason--Logos:

"In the second and third centuries Christians of both East and West generally accepted a common mythos about God and the world. They believed that the world was rationally ordered, because it was created by God through his reason, his Logos. The same Logos spoke to man through rational terms in the Revelation embodied in the Bible and in Jesus. Even apart from Christ, men have caught glimpses of the truth, whether borrowed from the Bible or gathered from the order of nature. Unfortunately, the demonic, in one form or another, has entered to distort the vision of man, so that pagan philosophy never attained the wholeness and integrity of truth. Such integrity can be found only in Christ, the Logos; but because he is the Logos the integrity of truth implies the necessity of rational perception. Differences in apologetic aims, in individual style, and in personal temperament led to formulations of the relationships between faith and reason, and Christianity and philosophy which undoubtedly varied in tone and emphasis, but the common commitment on the part of all the major Christian thinkers of the second and third centuries, including Tertullian, to a belief in Christ, the Logos, eliminated fideism as a possible mode of Christian self-understanding."

Dan Rather's actions in this case reveal that he doesn't recognize the authority of Logos, only Mythos.

Rush Limbaugh: Rathergate is Media's Gettysburg

From RushLimbaugh.com:

"All right, now something interesting is happening with this CBS story, the Forgery Story, beyond what CBS is going to do today. Nobody really has any idea what they're going to say, but the Wall Street Journal, as I say, says that CBS is going to offer further evidence here of what they believe to be true. Uh, you just... There's a part of me hates to see this and another part of me that loves to see this. I mean, it's just an amazing thing to watch these giant institutions tumble. You might be able to say, ladies and gentlemen, that we are in the midst of re-fighting the Civil War again here in terms of the left versus the right and the media and this CBS may represent Gettysburg for the mainstream press. "

AllahPundit on Dan Rather

"If Edward R. Murrow wasn't already dead, he'd kill himself..."

Hugh Hewitt Calls for Congressional Hearings on the CBS-Dan Rather Forgery Scandal

In theWeekly Standard:


"...all we need are some timely Congressional hearings, best conducted by the Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, chaired by Michigan Rep. Fred Upton, or the Subcommittee on Communications of the Senate's Commerce Committee, chaired by Senator Conrad Burns of Montana. CBS president Les Moonves would be a wonderful witness, as would Rather, and while the subject of 'sources' would be a touchy one, either subcommittee could provide some information on the workings of a major broadcast network confronted with a juicy story that has been discovered to have been cooked.

"Hearings such as these would benefit the Bush campaign, just as the forgery scandal has, because it brings into sharp focus the ethics of the Bush opponents and the anti-Bush bias of the mainstream media. If a Deep Throat or two were to develop from within CBS, the revelations could be explosive, and the ratings for the cable shows wouldn't be bad either. The sacrifice of a few execs, producers, and, of course, Rather might be good for the industry all told. Certainly very, very few people have rushed to Rather's defense, and those few are just now finding convenient excuses to leave the front lines.

"The hearings would serve one additional important role beyond immediate accountability, a role far more crucial than any played by the Howard Stern-Janet Jackson hearings, or even those hearings which conducted the post-mortem on the election night network fiasco of calling Florida for Gore in 2000. Hearings now, immediately, would signal broadcasters and news executives everywhere that partisan maneuverings under the guise of news gathering--especially those that occur late in an election season--would be subject to close Congressional scrutiny..."

A Post From Little Green Footballs

To all our Jewish readers: best wishes for a very happy Rosh Hashanah. L'shanah tovah!

AndrewSullivan Says "Off With Their Heads!"

From www.AndrewSullivan.com:

"RATHER AND HEYWARD MUST GO: I have to say that the risible statement given by CBS News last night finally did it for me. Who do these people think they are? They have failed to find a single expert who will back the authenticity of the memos; their own experts say they warned CBS not to go with the story; Killian's secretary thinks they're fakes ... and yet Rather and Heyward say they stand by their story and will continue to investigate the provenance and dubiousness of the forgeries! This beggars belief. How do I put this to Rather: it doesn't matter if the underlying story is true. All that matters is that CBS's evidence is fake. Get it? End of story. For what it's worth: I believe Bush got into the Guard because of his dad's connections. I believe he probably didn't perform his duties adequately in his final two years. When I first read the CBS story, I thought the docs were 'devastating.' I'm not backing this president for re-election. But all that is completely beside the frigging point. Journalists are supposed to provide accurate evidence for their claims. CBS didn't. And its response to the critics is to stonewall and try and change the subject. The correct response - the one they'd teach you in kindergarten journalism class - is immediately to check the authenticity of the documents as best you can, and if the doubts persist, to apologize immediately and yank the story. Can you imagine what CBS News would do if a government official found to be peddling fake documents refused to acknowledge it? And kept repeating his story nonetheless? They'd be all over it. But, you see, they are above politicians. They are above criticism. And they are stratospheres above bloggers who caught them red-handed.

THE COUP DE GRACE: And then this astonishing statement from Rather to Howie Kurtz:

'If the documents are not what we were led to believe, I'd like to break that story. Any time I'm wrong, I want to be right out front and say, 'Folks, this is what went wrong and how it went wrong.''
Memo to Rather: you can't break that story, because someone else in pajamas already did. Check the frequency, Kenneth. You are so far from being out front on this, you are leagues behind in the dust. Have you heard of the Internet? You can find it on that weird machine in your office they call a computer. All this proves is the fathomless cocooning of Rather and Heyward. They still think this is the 1980s. They have no idea what media world they are living in. Like Howell Raines, they are so out of it, they don't even know they're finished. Above all, they are not acting as journalists. They are acting as political operators, determined to win a news cycle, to inflict as much damage on their opponents as possible, while stonewalling on their own glaring, obvious errors. So this is a test of the blogosphere. We have to keep at these guys day and night to force them to live up to the most basic ethical requirements of their profession. After all this stonewalling and arrogance, an apology and retraction will no longer suffice. These guys have to resign or be fired. "

Protein-Wisdom's Humorous Take on Dan Rather's Forgeries and CBS's Cover-Up

A friendly reminder to the folks at CBS and their apologists...:

"If they were done in Word, your defense is absurd...

"If the reporter is Rather,
then the news is pure blather....

"Rather lied...
CBS died ."

Power Line's Class Act

They've shown a lot of class in their responses to Dan Rather and CBS. Here's a sample fromPower Line:

"Every morning another batch of op-eds credits us, along with other bloggers like Charles Johnson and the Freepers, with bringing down the CBS News empire. I'm told that tonight they were showing screen shots of Power Line on the NBC Nightly News. That's fun and gratifying, of course, but we don't want you to think that it's going to our heads. I was on the Hugh Hewitt show tonight, and Hugh asked whether I was surprised at the hate we were getting from the establishment media. I said not at all; on the other hand, I was surprised at how much credit we were getting from so many sources. Too much credit: as I told Hugh, the real credit belongs to our readers, not us. We knew nothing about military protocol, type fonts of the '70s, when General Staudt retired, and so on. The power of the blogosphere (more properly, the internet) does not lie in a handful of bloggers with well-read sites. It resides in the hundreds of thousands, or millions, of smart, well-informed, engaged readers who, collectively, have amazing knowledge and expertise in just about any area you can think of. What is new is the ability to bring together these disparate sources of knowledge, analyze them, and disseminate them in real time. We help to do this, but on a big, fast-breaking story like this one, the real impetus comes from our readers--a point we make in every interview we give.

Along with the thanks, an apology. Over the last week, we have been absolutely inundated with emails. This was great, and we were able to use some of them to push the CBS story forward. But they overflowed our inbox, and at times stopped coming in until we could clear out more space. We tried to read them all, but I'm sure we missed some, and we couldn't begin to respond to more than a handful. Our site was actually down, briefly, yesterday because of the bottleneck in our email account. So please don't be offended if you've emailed us and we haven't responded; it just hasn't been humanly possible. At the same time, don't stop sending us your thoughts and information, as emails from our readers are where we get lots of our best stuff.

So, thanks again to the people who make the blogosphere the powerful force it has become: our readers."

Wall Street Journal v. The New York Times

From OpinionJournal - Best of the Web Today:

"All the News That's Fake but Accurate: Today's New York Times has an update on the scandal over Dan Rather's use of fraudulent documents in last week's hit piece on President Bush. Oddly, the Times piece lacks a byline, but it has what may be the greatest headline ever: 'Memos on Bush Are Fake but Accurate, Typist Says.' Fake but accurate! If this is the New York Times' new standard of journalism, does it apply to all stories, or only the ones that seek to make President Bush look bad?"

Rathergate.com

Here's a website devoted entirely to Dan Rather's forgery scandal: Rathergate.com.

Andrew Sullivan on Dan Rather's Forgeries (cont'd)

From www.AndrewSullivan.com - Daily Dish:

"RATHER IS GOING DOWN: This new story seems to me to show reckless indifference to the truth in the pursuit of political pay-dirt. Honestly, you can't make this stuff up. If a couple of years back, someone had predicted that a) Howell Raines would be brought down by a fabricating affirmative action hire; b) the BBC would lose its director-general because of shoddy anti-war propaganda tarted up as journalism; and c) that Dan Rather would flame out over forged documents designed to wreak revenge on the Bush family; then I would think it was Brent Bozell having a wet dream. But it's all true. Bernie Goldberg, pour yourself a drink. Eric Alterman, just go home and cry. "

Jim Lehrer and the Weakness of the Blogosphere

Jim Lehrer just reported the CBS forgery scandal--apparently taking the side of CBS. After quoting Laura Bush saying the documents are probably forgeries, he concluded by saying "the memos" did something or other. But they are NOT memos if they are forgeries. By calling them "memos" rather than "alleged memos", Lehrer sided with Rather--even though they are obvious forgeries; yet Lehrer did not report any evidence that showed that they were forgeries. Plus, he reported the fraudulent claims of the forged memos as fact. Shame, Shame Shame. Jim Lehrer should know better.

UPDATE: Here' the transcript, which I just made from the RealPlayer file on the Newshour Website:

On Monday, First Lady Laura Bush dismissed National Guard memos reported last week by CBS News. She said they probably are altered, and they probably are forgeries, as some experts maintain. The memos said Mr. Bush ignored orders to take a physical exam and keep his pilot statuts.

Note it is only Laura Bush's word and some unnamed experts against CBS News. Lehrer is clearly siding with Rather, coming back to the fraudulent contents of the forged documents, treating them as legitimate.

Pathetic.

This is the type of story that Terence Smith the "media correspondent" would normally cover. He's a former CBS News producer, and should know where the bodies are buried. Let's see how long it takes for him to host a segment...

Frankly, this all shows not the strength, but the weakness of the blogosphere. Keith Olbermann's MSNBC performance, documented by the Media Research Center (scroll down for link), showed that it is possible to ignore the facts and repeat ad hominem insults directed at bloggers, as host of a major news program on a cable network--owned in part by Microsoft, which should in principle be on the side of bloggers, simply because bloggers are more likely to make the purchasing decisions about computer software than CBS anchormen--rather than deal with the facts, that Dan Rather has been defending a crude and unconvincing forgery. Here's the Olbermann quote, from the MRC website: "So the Killian documents come out and are almost immediately questioned by a lawyer with Republican ties and are distributed to other news organizations without comment by the White House and they suddenly have one of their principal endorsers retract his endorsement. How many rats do you smell?"

Well, the only rat I smell is Keith Olbermann. But don't look for any negative consequences to his career for joining in a smear job against the blogosphere. He can see which way the wind is blowing in media land. It was Dan Rather, on CBS, who called characterized bloggers and their supporters as "partisan political operatives," on Monday's CBS Evening News, according to the MRC. And after five days, CBS has still not corrected the record. Of course, PBS has not done any independent reporting on this controversy, either.

So, when Jim Lehrer sides with Dan Rather--and nowadays Lehrer is perhaps the most trusted anchor in America, filling the shoes of Walter Cronkite--what does this mean? Even PBS, which by law must be fair, balanced, and objective in all matters of public controversy, in the most balanced program on PBS, cannot report the truth; namely that Dan Rather peddled forged documents on the evening news to smear President Bush. The major media are able to ignore the facts, and hunker down till it all blows over. That doesn't show the strength of the blogosphere, rather that the major media, including PBS, plan to marginalize "guys in pajamas" as right-wingers who can be ignored.

Will CBS and its supporters in the maintream media succeed? So far,they have. Even the Washington Post today, which basically admitted the facts of the case prove forgery, didn't criticize CBS. The next move will have to take place outside the blogosphere or the media, the issue taken to a higher level...

John Kerry Reaches Out to Business

By John Kerry, from The Wall Street Journal:

"As I travel across this country, I meet store owners, stock traders, factory foremen and optimistic entrepreneurs. Their experiences may be different, but they all agree that America can do better under an administration that is better for business. Business leaders like Warren Buffett, Lee Iacocca and Robert Rubin are joining my campaign because they believe that American businesses will do better if we change our CEO."

German Report Charges Syrians Provide Poison Gas to Sudan

It's in German, somehow appropriate for a story about mass killings with poison gas, this time in the Sudan. Syrien testet chemische Waffen an Sudanern. If the report is true, one might ask: Where did Syria get these Weapons of Mass Destruction? Iraq, perhaps?

Bloggers on TV Talking about Dan Rather's Forgeries

You can read transcripts of Powerline with Brit Hume and Instapundit with Paula Zahn ondoubletoothpicks.com. A very interesting explanation of what blogging is about, from two very big bloggers...

CBS Was Told Documents Were Fake Before Broadcast

From Jim Geraghty:

"Just when you think the story couldn't get any more devastating for CBS, it gets worse. A round of applause to ABC's Brian Ross, who ate his Wheaties today and got the most stunning story of this entire scandal, the revelation that CBS ignored experts who said the documents were fake before the initial broadcast."

AllahPundit on Dan Rather

AllahPundit says it is time for Dan Rather to resign.

Dan Rather's Defense

From the Media Research Center

John Kerry's Vietnam After-Action Report

Via Matt Drudge, from NewsCentral.tv. Note the reference to "spider holes".

Andrew Sullivan on Dan Rather

From The New Republic:

"What's riveting has been the reaction of CBS. Like Howell Raines and the directors of the BBC before him, Dan Rather seems to believe that journalism is some kind of caste profession, a calling that no amateur blogger can aspire to."

Uzbekistan Moves Uranium to Russia

Full story in Mosnews.

Canada Declares War on US (sort of)

From The Diplomad:

"One of our Diplomads attended a Canadian National Day reception, July 1, at a major hotel in a large city in the Far Abroad. It was a standard evening dip reception, to wit, carved ice swan, gummy canapes, warm drinks, and lots of inane banter among several hundred milling guests. Canadians are generally gracious hosts and traditionally hard to distinguish from their southern neighbors -- until they say "out" or "house," that is. But of late, and certainly at this event, they seem determined to ensure that there is no confusion, that the definition of Canada is "We're not the USA." At this reception, our Diplomad got cornered by a slightly tipsy Canadian aid worker (CIDA) who proceeded to give a weird version of US-Canadian relations which involved an apparently widely held Canadian view that Canada has defeated the United States in war, "We are the only the country to have defeated the United States in two declared (sic) wars." Our Diplomad, being a diplomat, held his tongue and didn't get into the details of these wars, such as noting that, yes, the Americans and British on several occasions fought battles in what is now Canada, and, yes, Americans lost some but won others, and in the end the Americans gained their independence (The Revolutionary War) and then successfully kept it (War of 1812.) Our noble Diplomad didn't launch into a description of Perry's victory on the Great Lakes over a "Canadian" invasion fleet or Old Hickory's victory over the "Canadian" army at New Orleans. Our Diplomad -- gracious, as are all our Diplomads -- limited his riposte to the ever polite, "Any time you want a rematch, let us know.""

New York Will Rise Again

Says Vartan Gregorian:

"NEW YORK--When I first arrived in New York City in 1956 (by way of Tabriz, Iran, where I was born, and via Beirut, Lebanon, on my way to Stanford University), the New York I encountered was awesome as well as mind-blowing--even if that term hadn't been invented yet. I wrote to my sister in Tabriz that this city was a gigantic magnet attracting everything and everyone, every idea, every bit of energy, every scrap of power. It still is.

"The past several days have seen many commemorations of the terror attacks of three years ago. These events focused on the grief, the calamity and the slaughter of innocents. This was entirely appropriate, for we should never forget what happened that day.

"But we shouldn't lose sight of the other side of 9/11, either: the tremendous strength, dynamism and resiliency of New York. This is a proud, self-confident, busy, determined and impatient place that simply cannot be cowed or bowed. Within hours of the attacks, there was little question in anyone's mind that soon the city would be back about its business."

Islam Has No Answers for Modern Iraq

From Zeyad, in Healing Iraq:

"Waiting for clerics and leaders of Islam to condemn violence might take forever. The reason is that there is no ONE Islam that all Muslims today adhere to. There is a multitude of sects, cults and groups that constitute what we call Islam, the followers of which can range from tens of millions to a few thousands. Even within the same sect there can be fundamental differences in interpretation of the Quran and the Hadith. Rival clerics from the same sect can hold highly contradicting opinions on a matter as simple as washing yourself before prayers.

"Muslim jurists over the last 14 centuries have gone into every small detail of life that one could imagine without ever attempting to address the fundamental or controversial differences. Hundreds of thick volumes have been written about what is najis (filthy) and what is not, which hand you should use to wipe yourself with after defecating and which one to use when eating, whether it is acceptable or not to kiss a woman when she is menstruating, whether to wash one's hands again after touching the robe of a non-muslim before prayers (there are actually two answers to that depending on whether your hand was wet or not), and so on. Muslims to this day ask these questions, seek answers for them, and fear the consequences of not following them properly. Such a sad waste of time and resources.

"In fact, one can lead a completely normal life without ever learning these irrelevant minor details, probably because they were originally intended for a society that existed centuries ago. One would certainly be regarded with scorn today if he took a few stones and some sand with him to the toilet. So, Islam is NOT a universal religion for all times no matter what Muslims say, neither is Christianity or Judaism by the way. Islam does not have the answers for many things which is why Muslim clerics over the last century were speechless about modern technology and scientific discoveries. Eighty years ago in Iraq it was considered blasphemy to say that rain was originally steam and some people were actually killed for doing so. Mullahs struggled hard to prevent people from sending their children to primary schools or to teach women to read and write. Every new and strange device was considered 'evil' and a work of the devil. Telegraphy, telephones, radios, cameras, televisions. In Saudi Arabia people went to the local telegraph office to ask them where they are hiding the Jinn that brings them news from the other side of the kingdom. They were incredulous to the fact that a message would travel in seconds a distance that took many days or months on camel back."

Dan Rather: Destroying CBS News to Save John Kerry

That's the thrust of this article by Stanley Kurtz in National Review:

"Why were we so wrong? Why did Dan Rather and CBS News, against all expectations, impeach their own credibility to defend the authenticity of memos that are almost certainly forgeries? The obvious answer is that they did it to save the faltering Kerry campaign from a final and decisive blow. If CBS were to admit that the documents were forgeries, it would have no grounds for protecting its sources. In fact, CBS would have a positive obligation to do everything in its power to expose the malefactors behind the forgeries. If the trail led back to the Kerry campaign, president Bush's reelection would be assured. Dan Rather has been at pains to derogate those who are interested in where the documents came from. This sounds suspiciously like Rather is concerned about what a revelation of his sources might mean. Certainly, if Rather personally received the forgeries from a Kerry operative, it would be a disaster for Rather. That alone might seem to be sufficient to explain CBS's refusal to admit its error. (It now appears that CBS News may well have received the documents from a partisan and highly questionable source.)

"And even if the trail leading back to the forgers does not pass through the Kerry camp, an admission by CBS that the documents are bogus would be a huge embarrassment for the senator's campaign, which has so aggressively seized upon the story to attack the president. It would also be a fiasco for Dan Rather and CBS, whose credulity on a story harmful to the president would be exposed, and pointedly contrasted to their treatment of the Swift-boat veterans.

"But surely it would have been better for Rather and CBS to cut their losses and admit their error. Yes, they would have taken a hit, but they would also have won kudos for honesty and professionalism. Americans are forgiving of those who admit error. By standing behind a story that is so obviously flawed, Rather and CBS News are setting themselves up to become laughing stocks. That is why the reasonable assumption I -- and many other folks -- made was that CBS would attempt to salvage its reputation by repudiating the memos. And that is why many now assume Dan Rather and CBS News have sacrificed their reputations in order to protect the Kerry campaign."

John LeBoutillier on the Presidential Debates

They are Kerry's last chance, according to John LeBoutillier:

"Kerry has to tread a fine line: respectful of the office of the Presidency but hard on the Bush record. And he has to attack that record concisely, coherently and quickly; if he drags it out in his normal boring manner, viewers are going to head to other shows and games. Kerry’s biggest problem? He is 'un-likeable.' He is Lurch who flip-flops, dissembles and connives. That image has to be changed by his debate performances. He has to have voters walk away from these debates saying something like this: 'Boy, Bush made some big mistakes and that Kerry...well, he is not as bad as I had heard he was.' If Kerry can do that - then this race is going to tighten up right away. And then the Passion Differential (the anti-Bush sentiment outweighs the pro-Bush feeling in intensity that will manifest itself in dispropportionate turnout on Election Day)."

Roger Simon on Pajamas and Bloggers

From RogerLSimon.com:

"Full Pajama Disclosure: I have noticed that some are casting aspersion on bloggers for working in their pajamas. I cannot tell a lie. I often do it. I also wrote screenplays for Warner Brothers, Universal and Twentieth Century Fox in my pajamas (do I have to give the money back?) and books for Simon & Schuster and Random House. I could go on... but I think you get the point. All together now:

'The pajama game
That's the game we're in
And we'll always be
In the pajama game
We love it!'"

ETYMOLOGICAL NOTE: According to the American Heritage online dictionary, the word "pajama" comes from the Hindi "pijma," for baggy pants, which in turn is based on the Middle Persian words "p" for leg plus "jmah" for garment.

Mark Steyn on the Anniversary of 9/11

From The Spectator:

"Three years after September 11, the Islamist death cult is the love whose name no one dare speak. And, if you can't even bring yourself to identify your enemy, are you likely to defeat him? Can you even know him? He seems to know us pretty well. He understands the pressures he can bring to bear on Spain, and the Philippines, and France, too. He's come to appreciate the self-imposed constraints under which his enemy fights-- the legalisms, the political correctness, the deference to ineffectual multilateralism. He's revolted by the infidels' decadence but he has to admit it's enormously helpful: the useful idiots of the pro-gay, pro-feminist Left are far more idiotic and far more useful to him than they ever were to Stalin. He's figured out that while pluralistic open democracy might be a debased system of government next to Sharia, it has its moments: he had no idea that quite so many Westerners so loathed their own governments and, if not their own, then certainly America's. And he never thought that, even in America, while one party is at war, the other party is at war with the very idea that there is a war. And even the party committed to war presides over a lethargic unreformed bureaucracy, large chunks of which are determined to obstruct it. So, despite the loss of the Afghan training camps and Saddam and the Taleban and three quarters of al-Qaeda's leadership, it hasn't been a bad three years: the enemy has learnt the limits of the West's resolve, and all he has to do is put a bit of thought into exploiting it in the years ahead. A nuclear Iran will certainly help. "

Steamroller and Violin

The other night we viewed a DVD of this, Andrei Tarkovsky's first film, completed as his student thesis project at Moscow's famous VGIK film school, shot at the Mosfilm Studios. Tarkovsky went on to become one of the great lights of the Russian art film, making Andrei Rublev, Solaris, The Mirror, and Stalker, among other pictures. This first effort is easier to understand than some of the later works, and a good introduction to his personal style. It is a 46-minute children's fable, about the friendship between a beleagured and insecure child musician and a heavy machinery operator paving the square in front of his apartment house, sort of like the French classic The Red Balloon. But it is also very different.

The themes of art and labor are Soviet, but the human drama, of personal fulfilment, bullying, testing, studying suffering, frustration, friendship, and the power of love, are universal. For anyone interested in the art of Tarkovsky, this early work is a real gem. It is full of symbolism, artistic cinematography--a raindrop falling into a puddle is almost like a human tear--and human moments. In a way, it presages his later themes, of a sensitive person caught in an insensitive world. We got our copy from Netflix. You can buy a copy at Amazon.com. And there is an excellent critical analysis online at Nostalghia.com. If you are interested in Russian films, especially Tarkovsky, you won't want to miss Steamroller and Violin.

Is Bush Soft on Terror?

The Guardian's Craig Unger says despite the hype, in fact, he is:

"A poll just after the Republican convention showed that 27% of the voters preferred Bush to Kerry when it came to national security. Increasingly, it is becoming clear that if Bush wins in November it will be because of the fear factor. Yet the truth is that Bush is actually soft on terror. When it comes to going after the men who were behind 9/11 and who continue to wage a jihad against the US, Bush has repeatedly turned a blind eye to the forces behind terrorism, shielded the people who funded al-Qaida, obstructed investigations and diverted resources from the battle against it."

Kamal Nawash on 9/11

Via Matt Drudge Kamal Nawah's interesting essay:

"This September 11 marks the third unforgettable anniversary of the worst mass murder in American history. After September 11, many in the Muslim world chose denial and hallucination rather than face up to the sad fact that Muslims perpetrated the 9-11 terrorist acts and that we have an enormous problem with extremism and support for terrorism. Many Muslims, including religious leaders, and �intellectuals� blamed 9-11 on a Jewish conspiracy and went as far as fabricating a tale that 4000 Jews did not show up for work in the World Trade Center on 9-11. Yet others blamed 9-11 on an American right wing conspiracy or the U.S. Government which allegedly wanted an excuse to invade Iraq and 'steal' Iraqi oil."

Glenn Reynolds Remembers 9/11

On GlennReynolds.com:

"September 11, 2001 wasn't the beginning of this war. In fact, fundamentalist Islamists had been making war on the United States for years, with the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole, the attacks on our embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993 (which was intended to topple both towers, but failed), all the way back, in some sense, to the seizure of the U.S. embassy in Tehran back when Jimmy Carter was president. For all those years, they were at war with us, but we largely ignored it. But September 11, 2001 was when we woke up, and realized what was going on. When people talk about the 1,000th casualty in Iraq, it's worth remembering that we had 3,000 casualties in a single day, in America, and that terrorists want to do much, much worse."

Mira Nair's Unknown 9/11 Film

Viewer's of Vanity Fair might be interested to track down a copy of Mira Nair's short docudrama about 9/11, one episode in an anthology film, which according to Tom Plate in the Straits Times, is not being shown in the US:

"Grieving Americans, shocked to discover that not everyone reacted to the World Trade Center massacre the same way, might want to see 11'09'01 September 11. It's an anthology, of sorts, from directors in 11 countries. The Egyptian contribution, by director Youssef Chahine, contains dialogue making the case for terrorist attacks against the US and Israel. India's Mira Nair tells the story of a Pakistani-American who died helping firefighters at the World Trade Center and who, posthumously, became the target of an anti-terrorist probe simply because, as his mother puts it, 'his name wasn't Jesus'- or David or Cary. Curtains go up on the controversial film in France on Sept 11. Americans who want to see it, at this point, will have to go there. It has yet to find a US distributor. Might this be a foretaste of US cultural protectionism? What an unwanted surprise ending that would prove. "

Here are some more details on the film, from ApunKaChoice.Com:

"Mira Nair's vignette dramatises the real life story of Salman Hamdani, an American Muslim medical student who went missing in New York City after the attack and later became a terrorist suspect. The all-American upbringing of the boy came to naught as his family saw neighbours and friends turn against them. Finally, it turned out that Salman had died helping people out of the World Trade Center tower that day. The members of the youth's family took part in the film.

"Nair was later quoted as saying that she wanted to make a film about the reality of life for South Asians in New York City after September 11. 'Life has changed irrevocably, and I think forever. From New York to Jenin to Gujarat, the Islamophobia that has taken over the world disturbs me immensely. As a filmmaker, I thought it was about time we spoke up,' the director of such popularly acclaimed films as 'Salaam Bombay' and 'Monsoon Wedding', told an ethnic Indian newspaper in the US."

Shahid Nahim reported that Nair's 9/11 docudrama was banned in the USA, in Pakistan's Daily Times:

"In the discussion that followed, Mira Nair revealed that the American film distribution association refused to distribute the film. According to them, the film is controversial and political. Hence the Columbia screening might be the only screening in the US. This effective banning of the film has come from Hollywood, which is notorious for making films about disasters and tragedies that have taken place all over the world. The film has been shown in Europe and other parts of the world and has been well received. It is a shame that the US public is unable to see the film � they need to see films of this kind more than any other nation. It is the US public that needs to learn how the rest of the world looks at them and their government. It is they who need to find out that there are other perspectives, other prisms through which events like 9/11 look very different indeed. 9/11, the film, does not present things as black and white or good and evil, unlike the US version of 9/11, where all good lies on one side and all evil on the other. "

Michael Wilmington Talks to Mira Nair

He interviewed the director of Vanity Fair for The Chicago Tribune:

"Movie director Mira Nair has a great, warming, infectious laugh and a mind that works like a steel trap. And, much like Becky Sharp, the seductive but smart, nice but naughty anti-heroine of Nair's latest movie, 'Vanity Fair,' she seemingly never lets life get her down. Nair, 46, the Indian-born, Harvard-educated, internationally admired director of 'Salaam Bombay!' and 'Monsoon Wedding,' might seem an odd match for 'Vanity Fair': the lavishly produced new movie adaptation of William Makepeace Thackeray's classic 19th Century British novel. Similarly, her film's star -- lively 'Legally Blonde' ingenue Reese Witherspoon -- might seem too Hollywood-ish a choice for 'Fair's' classically unscrupulous, seductive Becky, one of English literature's juiciest, most provocative females. Yet, as Nair points out, 'Vanity Fair' -- which she first read as a schoolgirl in India -- is a book she has read and loved for most of her life. And Witherspoon was Nair's first choice and, as it turns out, a memorable Becky -- winning us over equally or more than Miriam Hopkins in the trailblazing 1935 Hollywood Technicolor 'Becky Sharp' (directed by Rouben Mamoulian) or Natasha Little (star of the deservedly praised 1998 BBC TV-film, and a supporting player, as Lady Jane Sheepshanks, in Nair's all-star cast)."

How the Internet Saved the Book Business

Again via Artsjournal.com from The Guardian:

"They might not be ditching the traditional shop, but the suggestion that booksellers would crumble under the challenge of the internet has been utterly refuted. Instead of becoming a footnote in bookselling history, the industry has used the web to secure its future. And the resulting competition between the main players means that, right now at least, the second-hand book field really is a buyer's market."

(I know it's bad form to say "told you so," but just am unable to resist noting that in 1998 I published a magazine article analyzing charges that Amazon.com would put bookshops out of business, called "Turmoil in the Book World." It concluded the internet was good for the publishing industry, and that Amazon.com would stimulate book sales. Unfortunately, the full text is not available free online, so I can't link to it.)

The Disappearing Cultural Exchange

Via Artsjournal.com this linkfrom Backstage on the collapse of cultural diplomacy:

"And the bottom line: 'The annual number of academic and cultural exchanges has dropped from 45,000 in 1995 to 29,000 in 2001.' This means that far fewer American artists, including performing artists, are being given chances to ply their crafts on foreign soil. The study presumes that those figures have decreased even further in recent years."

Putin's Resolve

It's the beginning of the end for the terrorists, saysMansoor Ijaz in National Review Online

"Like him or not, Vladimir Putin's resolve to stare down Beslan's terrorists--about whom he understood nothing--will (if by accident) be seen one day as a turning point in the war against extremism, because the depravity of Beslan's architects has turned the silent majority in the Muslim world on its ear. Editors, political leaders, and mullahs from Jeddah to Istanbul to Jakarta are decrying the insanity of the Beslan murders. And they are beginning to realize that always blaming others for their woes won't help elevate their disaffected people or spread the word of their failed vision any faster or better.

"We Muslims (I am an American whose faith remains that of the humane and dignified Islam) have no legs to stand on anymore when those who proclaim our religion are willing to put a gun to a child's head, pull the trigger, and call it an act of martyrdom. Islam no longer carries a message of hope, only the indelible impressions of cruelty. Its purveyors are bankrupt of ideas that inspire, and have failed in an ideology that in its very heart today has become hypocritical. To top it all off, America's Muslims--whose freedom to craft and convey an opposition to the terrorist cancer is protected by the very people those terrorists seek to destroy, sit silent-- stone cold silent.

"Islam's 'vanguard,' as Zawahiri called it, has an opportunity to redefine the message and turn away from the extremists. America will win the war against extremism because America's values are righteous, and because God, whatever you conceive Him to be, is at our side. But Islam will surely lose its credibility as a great religion if its benefactors don't stand now and drive the final nail into the coffin of the terrorists who have hijacked a noble faith."

Word Wrap on 60 Minutes Forgery Scandal

For those of you not tired of the document details, Little Green Footballs has a very complete analysis of why the 60 Minutes story is a hoax.

Blogs v. 60 Minutes

The Blogger dashboard carried this link to an interesting story by Jay Currie:

"One day. That was all it took for the ranks of citizen journalists to swarm and then thoroughly discredit a story which ran in the New York Times, the Boston Globe and on a network news magazine. From the Kerry perspective a scandal involving forged documents is a disaster. Kerry had yesterday to get in front of the story and he missed that boat. Instead of being able to stay on message and trying to beat down the post convention pulse which has sent Bush several points ahead in various  opinion polls, Kerry is likely to face questions about who was responsible for the forgeries. While it would be astonishing if anyone inside the Kerry organization had a hand in them, it is a question that will be asked. Moreover, the spectacle of Kerry announcing that his campaign organization and the Democratic Party had nothing to do with issuing those documents will occupy several critical news cycles and focus attention on character -- exactly where Kerry does not want to be.

"From the perspective of the establishment media, this, too, is a disaster. CBS will have to explain: where did the documents come from? What were the bona fides of the source? Who was the source? Which expert looked at the documents? How closely? Those are the starter questions. The more basic question is how could a rabble of bloggers, in one day, provide hard core proof of forgery when major news organizations took those documents at face value? Most fundamental of all, why did the New York Times, the Boston Globe and CBS allow themselves to be used for such a transparent attempt to slander President Bush? Out in the blogosphere there are a swarm of people rooting for the answers."

Victor Davis Hanson on Beslan

He calls it the straw that broke the camel's back:

"The recent slaughters in Russia were the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back of excusing or explaining away radical Islamic terror. If the Estonians can break away from post-Soviet oppression and free themselves from Russian authoritarianism without slaughtering schoolchildren and blowing up airplanes, then the Chechens can as well -- but only if they wish to create democracy rather than an Islamic fascist state."

CYA

As the most intelligent person I know pointed out regarding the 60 Minutes Forgery Scandal, the documents must surely be forged -- since no one who really wanted to cover his backside would put the term "CYA" on a memo designed for that purpose. As any bureaucrat knows, the only way one can properly cover one's backside is by not announcing that is the purpose of the document...

Here's some backup from a posting in the comments section of Roger L. Simon's blog:

Posted by: Terrye at September 10, 2004 07:28 PM
------------------------------------------------------------------------

Rick B

No officer would ever use it on a memo. It would be dispositive proof of failure to perform or at minimum to report undue influence. Wouldn't look too hot in a court martial. "I knew it was wrong but I wrote this memo - see."

Thank you!

The "CYA" jumped out at me for exactly that reason.

I have to say this part of it is as shocking to me as anything, since presumably the staff members dealing with these memos are writers, at least some of them.

Seriously: I probably would only have noticed the problems with the type subliminally, but the "CYA" just smacked me between the eyes.

The entire point of a CYA memo is to CYA.
==============================================

Mark Helprin on America's Mistakes in Iraq

From the Wall Street Journal: "

"We have followed a confusion of war aims that seem to report after the fact what we have done rather than to direct what we do. We could, by threatening the existence of Middle Eastern regimes, which live to hold power, enforce our insistence that the Arab world eradicate the terrorists within its midst. Instead, we have embarked upon the messianic transformation of an entire region, indeed an entire civilization, in response to our inability to pacify even a single one of its countries. As long as our war aims stray from the disciplined, justifiable, and attainable objective of self-defense, we will be courting failure.

"Our strategy has been deeply inadequate especially in light of the fact that we have refused to build up our forces even as our aims have expanded to the point of absurdity. We might have based in northern Saudi Arabia within easy range of the key regimes that succor terrorism, free to coerce their cooperation by putting their survival in question. Our remounted infantry would have been refreshed, reinforced, properly supported, unaffected by insurgency, and ready to strike. The paradigm would have shifted from conquer, occupy, fail, and withdraw--to strike, return, and re-energize. At the same time, we would not have solicited challenges, as we do now, from anyone who sees that although we may be occupying Iraq, Iraq is also occupying us."

"60 Minutes is Toast"

Via Matt Drudge, here's the source for reporting on the 60 Minutes Forgery ScandalPower Line: The sixty-first minute.

Lileks on the 60 Minutes Forgery Scandal

Thanks to a link from Instapundit, from The Bleat:

"I can't add a thing to the forgery controversy, even in my capacity as a lily-gilder. The efforts of the Powerline guys and Charles Johnson speak for themselves, and you ought to read them before you make up your mind. Is there anyone out there who doesn't know what I mean? Possible. It's the old non-contiguous information stream issue again. I mentioned the story to someone today--a friend who has his ideas about politics, of course, but doesn't follow the braided strands of intrigue that thread through the blogosphere. He's an independent. Ventura voter. He'd heard about the latest round of National Guard stories, and he couldn't care less. I told him about the forgery rumors; he was amused. Did it change his opinion of CBS? Not really, because he didn't care for them one way or the other. Dan Rather's news was the Daily Show without the laughs."

Tim Blair on the Jakarta Bombing

Tim Blair has some updates from Australia on the bombing in Indonesia that targeted the Australian embassy.

Ed Koch: "Russia is America's Ally Against Terrorism"

From Newsmax:

"The Times editorial denounces the Russians for responding to Chechen efforts to secede, 'mainly with force and intransigence.' In the days of the Civil War and the South's efforts to secede from the Union, did The Times propose to President Lincoln that he 'reach for compromise' and let the South go? Lincoln's refusal to allow the secession, despite the knowledge that it would result in a tragic civil war, was nevertheless the right thing to do. Will Putin follow in Lincoln's footsteps? I hope so...The tragic events in Russia should be another wake-up call to the civilized world. As we grieve with the Russian people, we should remember that we are allies in a common war against international terrorism."

A "New Russian" Love Story

From MosNews:

"A 23-year-old former Miss Moscow contestant has avoided a prison sentence for ordering a contract hit by marrying her intended victim, Ananova web-site reports. After a bust up with boyfriend Igor Lantsov, a wealthy Moscow businessman, Anastasia Nasinovskaya contacted an old friend and offered $15,000, of Lantsov’s money, to make their separation permanent. The relationship reached breaking point in December of last year when Lantsov demanded Nasinovskaya return a brand new BMW.

“I spent a half a million dollars on her in the six months we lived together,” Lantsov told a police investigator, Izvestia reported. “It’s pure impudence: ordering a hit on me with my own money!”

"She offered Ivan Sentyurin $10,000 up front, with an extra $5,000 after he produced evidence of the contract killing. Sentyurin, however, went straight to the police who set up a ‘sting’ when the would-be hitman went to collect his second payment. In an apparent change of heart by Lantsov, however, the businessman hired a top lawyer to defend his ex and even proposed.

“Apparently his feelings were stronger than the insult of having a contract put on his life,” the police spokesman said. As a result of their wedding the court gave Nasinovskaya a five-year suspended sentence at the end of August, the Moskovsky Komsomolets tabloid wrote."

Blogging Hurricane Ivan

Thanks to Instapundit for the tip, here's a Hurricane Ivan Blog.

Russian Foreign Minister Blasts US, UK

For giving aid and shelter to Chechen separatists, according to MosNews:

"Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, said on Thursday that the United States and the UK were employing double standards in sheltering Chechen separatists. Speaking to the Vremya Novostei (Time of News) newspaper, he said that rendering asylum to 'persons involved in terrorism, and Russia has documentary witnesses of it, not only rouses our regret but really undermines the unity of the anti-terrorist coalition.' The minister expressed discontent with the facts that Chechen separatist spokesman Akhmed Zakayev lives in London, and their foreign envoy Ilyas Akhmadov has received asylum in the United States. Lavrov called for the executive authorities in those countries to 'take measures not to let those people propagandize terrorism.' In this connection, he recalled that Zakayev had blamed the Russian authorities for the school siege in Beslan."

What Putin Wants

BBC correspondent Paul Reynolds explains the Russian leader's concerns in Chechnya:

"His insistence that there can be no surrender to demands for independence for Chechnya is based on a number of factors which include:

* a fear of further chaos on Russia's borders in the region

* a feeling that Russia must not make any further territorial concessions anywhere

* a belief that the Chechens were offered and threw away the chance of responsible independence before.

"Mr Putin has also added into this complex mix the spectre of international (by which he means Islamic) terrorism and an accusation that unnamed foreign countries want to break bits off Russia. It must also not be forgotten that he has staked his own reputation on his policy and that therefore he is reluctant to change it."

"Now that we are the target ..."

From The Sydney Morning Herald:

"The bombing outside the Australian embassy in Jakarta delivered an unequivocal message. Australia is, for the first time, the clear and specific target of Indonesian-based terrorists. The Bali bombings of 2002, which killed 88 Australians, and the later attack on the Marriott Hotel in Jakarta were directed at 'Western interests' in general. However, the car bomb which exploded outside the gate of the heavily fortified embassy struck at the very symbol of Australia's interests and policies. Suspicion has immediately fallen on the regional extremist network, Jemaah Islamiah (JI), despite the huge security operation which netted more than 200 senior JI operatives after the Bali bombings. The attack suggests the Indonesia-based JI, or a similar splinter group, is still active and dangerous, creating real cause for alarm over the security of Australia's large expatriate community."

Last year, we visited some Australian diplomats in New Delhi, and every time our car stopped at the front gate of the residential compound, a guard would look under the vehicle with a mirror on a stick. Each time, it was a reminder of the Bali bombing tragedy, evidence that Americans are not the only terrorist targets...

Toby Gati on Vladimir Putin

Toby Gati, a former Clinton administration aide, was among those who met with the Russian president after the Beslan massacre. Gwen Ifill interviewed her on The NewsHour:

"GWEN IFILL: But not mistakes, to be clear, about the handling of the situation at the school in particular, and the way that Russian forces acted or didn't act?

TOBY GATI: No, he went out of his way to praise Russian forces and say they put their lives on the line to save the children. And you can see in the photographs that was actually true at times. He's very convinced that his policy on Chechnya is the right one, a Chechenization handing over security eventually that you can't negotiate with these people.

I think it's interesting, if he could listen to this broadcast he would be profoundly upset to hear people talking about rebels and hostage-takers.

GWEN IFILL: What's wrong with that?

TOBY GATI: The word they use is 'terrorist.' They don't regard these as people who have any cause other than -- it's not Chechen independence. He said, 'We tried to do that. I did everything I could.' And the years between the first and second Chechen war were chaotic. And he would not acknowledge that he should continue with negotiations with terrorists."

Big Trouble for John Kerry

Says the BBC:

"A year ago, John Kerry was dreaming of a presidential debate in which George Bush wilted under Mr Kerry's encyclopaedic knowledge of the world. But the Yale frat boys have given him a severe awakening. Like Al Gore, John Kerry appears to have badly underestimated George Bush's raw talent for the campaign fight. John Kerry was lulled into making Vietnam the centrepiece of his character, only to find himself running for cover under withering sniper fire from the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. Then along came the Republican Party, and with all the grace of an abattoir, sliced and diced his character at their Convention and spat him out 10 points behind in the polls."

Leon Aron on Russia's Plans

In March testimony to the Committee on International Relations, U.S. House of Representatives:

"In developing Russia’s strategic posture toward the United States, President Putin is likely to mediate between the national consensus and the “restorationists” agenda. In end, the resultant policies are likely to be closer to the former rather than the latter. The anti-American impulse is likely to be constrained both by the over-arching mutual strategic agenda and by the cost of neo-globalism and massive re-armament that such an impulse would dictate. While increasing Russian assertiveness on the territory of the former Soviet Union, Russia is not likely to undermine the U.S. strategic interests—provided such interests are clearly demarcated and communicated to Russia in no uncertain terms."

Russia Endorses Pre-emption

According to Mosnews, Russia will now act to pre-empt terrorists, in what sounds like a parallel to the "Bush doctrine."

America's Chechen Lobby

From The Guardian:

"Although the White House issued a condemnation of the Beslan hostage-takers, its official view remains that the Chechen conflict must be solved politically. According to ACPC member Charles Fairbanks of Johns Hopkins University, US pressure will now increase on Moscow to achieve a political, rather than military, solution - in other words to negotiate with terrorists, a policy the US resolutely rejects elsewhere. Allegations are even being made in Russia that the west itself is somehow behind the Chechen rebellion, and that the purpose of such support is to weaken Russia, and to drive her out of the Caucasus. The fact that the Chechens are believed to use as a base the Pankisi gorge in neighbouring Georgia - a country which aspires to join Nato, has an extremely pro-American government, and where the US already has a significant military presence - only encourages such speculation. Putin himself even seemed to lend credence to the idea in his interview with foreign journalists on Monday. Proof of any such western involvement would be difficult to obtain, but is it any wonder Russians are asking themselves such questions when the same people in Washington who demand the deployment of overwhelming military force against the US's so-called terrorist enemies also insist that Russia capitulate to hers?"

The Disappearing International Student

USA Today reports fewer international students are coming to study in America:

"U.S. graduate schools this year saw a 28% decline in applications from international students and an 18% drop in admissions, a finding that some experts say threatens higher education's ability to maintain its reputation for offering high-quality programs. The sharp declines, based on responses from 126 institutions, were reported in a study released Tuesday by the Council of Graduate Schools, a Washington-based nonprofit. About 88% of those schools reported a decline in international applications; 12% saw an increase. Several factors contribute to the drops, council president Debra Stewart says. Those include changes to the visa application process after 9/11, a perception that the USA has grown less welcoming of foreigners and increased competition from universities abroad. Secretary of State Colin Powell, speaking in May, acknowledged that 'procedural frustrations' could prevent more foreign students from enrolling in U.S. programs. 'We have to do a better job of attracting them here.'"

I can attest to the "procedural frustrations." Unless they are in a government program, it is almost impossible for students from Uzbekistan, for example, to get a student visa for study in the United States, even if they have the money to pay tuition, and have been accepted by an American school. Curiously, the odds are much better for getting an immigration visa through the green card lottery...

Mark Steyn on Why Bush Will Win

In The Telegraph:

"The Kerry campaign is a bore that's degenerating into a laughing stock. 'Bush-despising' is no doubt very comforting to McCrum's beleaguered literati but in the end it's little more than snobbery - fine for cocktail condescension but utterly inadequate for an election campaign. You can't beat something with nothing, and Kerry is about as spectacular a nothing as you could devise - a thin-skinned whiny vanity candidate who persists in deluding himself that Bush's advantage is all down to 'smears' and 'lies' and 'mean' 'attacks'. It's not. Bush's something is very simple: his view of the war on terror resonates with a majority of the American people; when he talks about 9/11 and the aftermath, they recognise themselves in his words; they trust his strategy on this issue. For an inarticulate man, he communicates a lot more effectively than Senator Nuancy Boy.

"Wallace Shawn, by contrast, is a writer, a man who makes his living by words and yet devalues his own currency. Is the Bush-Cheney tyranny truly a 'scary' time for him? Is he really 'scared'? Of course not. He's having a convivial drink with a fawning Brit interviewer; what could be more agreeable? 'Scary' is - to pluck at random - being held hostage in a school gym and the kid next to you is parched and asks for water and the terrorist stabs him in the belly in front of your eyes. 'Scary' cannot encompass both that situation and Wallace Shawn's vague distaste for Bush without losing all meaning."

Your Tax Dollars At Work

Laura Rozen tipped us off to this story in The Washington Times on how the CIA Counter Terrorism Center has been giving millions of dollars to Democrats:

"The CIA's Counterterrorist Center has spent more than $15 million in the past three years funding studies, reports and conferences produced by former Democratic administration officials and other critics of the Bush administration. The latest effort was a $300,000 grant by the CIA to the Atlantic Council for a study co-authored by Richard A. Clarke, the former counterterrorism official who wrote a best seller accusing the Bush administration of failing in the war on terrorism by invading Iraq."

A Hero of Beslan

In this article, Allison Kaplan Sommer tells the story of a heroic Beslan schoolteacher who tried to protect his students at the cost of his life--Yanis (Ivan) Kanidis, age 74. [link from Roger L. Simon]

Putin Talks to The Guardian's Moscow Correspondent

Jonathan Steele's account of his meeting with the Russian President:

"'No one has a moral right to tell us to talk to childkillers,' he added. 'Correct me if I'm wrong, but Margaret Thatcher, whom I've met more than once said: 'A man who comes out into the street to kill other people must himself be killed',' he told the Guardian. At times grim-faced, but always calm, Mr Putin's comments came in the midst of an extraordinary three-and-a-half-hour meeting with a group of foreign journalists and academics with long experience of Russia, invited for a special conference."

How We Cover Russian News

In a very interesting explanation of the difficulties of being a reporter or editor in Russia--the editor of Izvestia just resigned, apparently under pressure from the Kremlin for his aggressive Beslan massacre reporting--the Moscow Times has published a long article called The Changing Nature of Covering the News:

"In the 1990s, calls to ministries and other government bodies, if answered at all, usually resulted in a 'no comment' at best. Now, they all have web sites, some of which contain reams of useful information. The Economic Development and Trade Ministry quickly posts all of Minister German Gref's speeches and presentations, including those at Cabinet meetings. The Finance Ministry site contains all the annual federal budgets. Many ministries also have extensive telephone directories on their sites. The use of the Internet is new under Putin. A government resolution signed in February 2003 by Kasyanov, who was still prime minister then, requires all ministries and other government bodies to publish information not regarded as a state secret on their web sites. Government decisions can now be printed from the web. Before, reporters would have to send a request and wait for days in the hope that somebody would respond. Many ministries, particularly those that handle economic and social issues, have become much more open. They have press officers with some idea about the news and the people who make it."

What Russia Can Learn From Israel

Says The Moscow Times:

"Another lesson we can learn from Israel is that democracy can triumph in conflicts with authoritarian regimes -- even without cracking down on criticism of the government and the security services..."

Background to the Beslan Tragedy

From Winds of Change [linkfrom Instapundit]:

"First of all, claims that this has to do with the Russian military presence in Chechnya completely misunderstand the situation. The problem with Chechnya, more or less, is that the Russians tried to surrender after their failure to bring the rebellious republic back into the fold in the first Chechen war and it didn't work. The country was taken over by a mixture of international terrorist organizations, Wahhabi theocrats, drug cartels, and other criminal organizations that subsided more or less on generous funding from Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states. This funding helped the Wahhabis to finalize control over the institutional infrastructure of the de facto independent state and led for calls for the imposition of sha'riah even though most Chechens (and Caucasus Muslims in general) are Sufis. The al-Qaeda presence in Chechnya was headed up by bin Laden's protege Amir ibn al-Khattab, a Saudi national who had previously assisted Islamic fighters in the Tajik Civil War and the Armenia-Azerbaijan War over Nagorno-Karabakh. In 1999, Khattab and his 'Islamic International Brigade' used Chechnya as a base from which to invade the neighboring Russian republic of Dagestan (summarized here by GlobalSecurity) as part of a long-term al-Qaeda strategy to export the Chechen political culture to the rest of the Caucasus. That failed invasion of Dagestan marks the proper beginning of the current fighting in Chechnya."

Russia Tilts Towards Israel

After the Beslan massacre, Russia has signed an agreement to fight terrorism in cooperation with Israel, according to The Washington Times:

"JERUSALEM — Russia is turning for help against terrorism to a country with long experience, signing a memorandum with Israel yesterday pledging the two countries will work more closely in fighting the scourge. The increased sophistication of the terrorists in Chechnya and growing signs of an Arab role in last week's school attack in Beslan, Russia — where 120 victims were buried yesterday — appear to have overcome Moscow's concerns about offending its Arab allies by cooperating with Israel."