Shinseki Good Choice for VA

The Chicago Sun-Times explained why in its lede:

The very man rejected by the Bush administration for warning that Iraq would be no cakewalk is President-elect Barack Obama's choice to be Veterans Affairs secretary.

Eric Shinseki, 66, was Army chief of staff when months before the Iraq war was launched, he warned that several hundred thousand troops would be needed -- more than the Bush administration planned.

He also warned that ethnic rivalries would break out and that American troops would face a long, difficult clean-up afterward. Bush administration officials repudiated Shinseki's remarks.

But on Sunday, Obama said, "He was right."

My guess this appointment might indicate that Shinseki may be in line for the Defense Secretary job, when Gates steps down...

My Bas Relief of Anton Chekhov as a Young Man

Based on Levitan's portrait:

From 20081207

Yet One More Reason Hillary Should Not Be Secretary of State

Today's story in the NY Times about Bill Clinton's recent $200,000 speech for a suspicious Malaysian businessman embroiled in controversy and legal problems:

Mr. Clinton promoted the Petra Group’s new deal on Friday, telling the audience, “One of the biggest rubber shoes and boots manufacturers, Timberland, is replacing the soles of its shoes it makes with this man’s green rubber technology.”

Mr. Clinton often praises companies that pay him to speak. In 2001, he received $125,000 from an Illinois management consulting company called International Profit Associates. It was later revealed that the Illinois attorney general was investigating accusations of deceptive marketing tactics by the company.

After a start-up Web search site named Accoona donated $700,000 worth of stock to his foundation, Mr. Clinton praised the company at a corporate event in December 2004.

“I hope you all get rich,” he told Accoona executives, “but, remember, you are doing something good for humanity as well.”

Another Reason Hillary Should Not Be Confirmed as Secretary of State

From the AP, this story of what looks like a corrupt practice:

The Clintons plan a New York City fundraiser this month, which will give donors a final chance to buy some face time with the future secretary of state.

Aides said the New York senator will try to avoid doing anything that suggests she is leveraging her new post for fundraising advantage. But the appearance of a conflict of interest is always possible when people give campaign money to politicians.

"If nothing else, there's the embarrassment element," said Brad Smith, a former Federal Election Commission chairman. "A secretary of state trying to raise campaign money is kind of ugly."

Obama's team sent an e-mail Friday, signed by Vice President-elect Joe Biden, asking supporters to help Obama fulfill a pledge to whittle Clinton's campaign debt."

This story reminds one of the continuing scandal surrounding Hillary fundraiser Norman Hsu reported in November by the San Jose Mercury News:

A state appeals court Tuesday upheld a three-year prison term for disgraced political donor Norman Hsu, whose hefty campaign contributions to prominent politicians amid a life on the lam at one point thrust his name into last year's presidential primary campaign.

In a unanimous ruling, the San Francisco-based 1st District Court of Appeal rejected Hsu's bid to overturn his fraud conviction and sentence, which dated back to a 1992 San Mateo County criminal case involving a $1 million investment scam. A San Mateo County judge sentenced Hsu to the three-year prison term in January, prompting the appeal.

Hsu's troubles came to light after news reports revealed he was a fugitive on the San Mateo County charges, skipping bail in 1992 after pleading no contest to the fraud allegations. Hsu had been a major fundraiser for prominent Democrats, including Sen. Hillary Clinton, and his plight attracted nationwide attention. Many of the politicians who received contributions from Hsu returned the money or gave it to charity after the revelations.

Is Afghanistan Lost?

Just found this announcement for an upcoming Harvard University seminar in my inbox

Is Afghanistan Lost?
A panel discussion on Afghanistan: Development, Human Rights and Security

Date: December 8, 2008
Time: 1:30-3:00pm
Location:
Malkin Penthouse, 4th Floor
Littauer Building
Harvard Kennedy School
79 John F. Kennedy St.
Cambridge, MA. 02138

Moderator:

Samantha Power, Anna Lindh Professor of Practice of Global Leadership
and Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School

Panelists:

Steve Coll, President, New America Foundation, author of Ghost Wars:
The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the
Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001, which won a Pulitzer Prize in
2005 and The Bin Ladens: An Arabian Family in the American Century

Mark Garlasco, Senior Military Analyst, Human Rights Watch

Maleeha Lodhi, Fellow, Harvard Kennedy School Institute of Politics,
former Pakistani Ambassador to the U.S.

Barnett Rubin, Director of Studies, Center for International Conflict,
New York University, author of The Fragmentation of Afghanistan: State
Formation and Collapse in the International System and The Search for
Peace in Afghanistan: From Buffer State to Failed State

Sponsored by the Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Carr Center for
Human Rights Policy, the University Committee on Human Rights, Harvard
Law School Human Rights Program, and the Initiative on contemporary
state and society in the Islamic world.

More from Dawn:

PARIS, Dec 4: France has invited a dozen states to a conference on Afghanistan on Dec 14 to enlist the support of neighbouring countries in a stepped-up effort for peace, officials said on Thursday.

“Apart from Afghanistan and its immediate neighbours (Pakistan, Iran, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan), India and China have been invited as countries from the region,” said a French foreign ministry spokesman.

The United Nations special representative for Afghanistan, Kai Eide, has been invited to the informal ministerial meeting along with representatives of the United States, Britain and Russia, he said.

EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana was also due to attend the Paris talks, six months after a donors’ conference in France, which currently holds the EU presidency, raised $20 billion for reconstruction in Afghanistan.

French officials see Pakistan, alleged to be the staging ground for Taliban attacks, as key to stabilising Afghanistan, which remains mired in poverty and violence more than six years after US-led forces drove the extremist militia out of Kabul."

Caroline Kennedy for US Senate

ABC News has reported speculation that NY Governor Patterson may appoint Caroline Kennedy to Hillary Clinton's Senate Seat. Sounds good to me (this blog recommended her for VP). Full disclosure: Caroline danced with a schoolmate of mine at a mixer about 35 years ago...he said she was very nice. (ht Huffington Post)

This just in...

Google just let me know about this item on Courthouse News Service from October:

CIA Info On Uzbek Massacre Demanded

WASHINGTON (CN) - Conservative culture critic Laurence Jarvik sued the CIA in a federal FOIA complaint demanding information on Uzbekistan's massacre of protesters on May 13, 2005, and events before and after the slaughter.

After wrangling over fee waivers, Jarvik says he agreed to pay the fees, but the CIA refuses to cough up any documents. Jarvik, known as a critic of the Public Broadcasting System, is represented by Matthew Simmons of Bethesda, Md.

EU Human Rights Court Upholds French Secularism

According to this report from the Irish Times(ht Althouse):

Europe's human rights court today threw out a complaint by two French Muslim girls who were expelled from their school for refusing to remove their headscarves during sports lessons.

France, which takes secularism in state schools very seriously, passed a law in 2004 banning pupils from wearing conspicuous signs of their religion at school after a decade of bitter debate about Muslim girls wearing headscarves in class.

"The court observed that the purpose of the restriction on the applicants' right to manifest their religious convictions was to adhere to the requirements of secularism in state schools," the European Court of Human Rights said.

The two girls were 11 and 12 when they were expelled in 1999. After French courts ruled against them, they complained to the European court that their school had violated their freedom of religion and their right to an education.

The court, based in the eastern French city of Strasbourg, rejected both complaints by a unanimous ruling of seven judges.

N

Putin Offers Olive Branch to Obama

During his annual call-in TV show:

OLEG BELAN: Good afternoon, Mr Putin. Nenets Autonomous Area. I am Oleg Belan and I am a deputy of the regional assembly.

Do you think our relations with the United States will change after the election of Barack Obama as President? Will they become more pragmatic and constructive? Thank you.

VLADIMIR PUTIN: The question should be directed first and foremost to the new US Administration. Usually, when there is a change of power in any country, especially such a superpower as the United States, such changes do take place. We very much hope that the changes will be positive.

We see these positive signals. What are they? Look at the meeting of NATO foreign ministers: both Ukraine and Georgia have been denied a Membership Action Plan. We already hear at the level of experts, the people who are close to the President elect and the people around him, his aides, that there should be no hurry, that relations with Russia should not be jeopardised. We already hear that the practicability of deploying the third position of missile defence in Poland and a radar in the Czech Republic should be considered once again.

We hear that the relations with Russia should be built with respect for our interests. If these are not just words, and if they are translated into practical policies, then of course we will react in kind and our American partners will immediately feel it.

Obama: Permission Granted--India May Bomb Pakistan

According to the Washington Times, President-Elect Obama has given the green light to India (unlike President Bush): "President-elect Barack Obama declared Monday that India 'would be within its rights if it took retaliatory action against militants hiding inside Pakistan.'"

Lucette Lagnado on Chabad in Mumbai

From today's Wall Street Journal:.

I still remember the rabbi's first sermon, about the Valley of Dry Bones -- that amazing biblical passage where the dead come to life again. I thought of the hopelessness I had felt on 9/11, the collective hopelessness, but then, listening to the story of how even a bunch of bones had been brought back to life, I too felt a sense of possibility again. And safety.

I thought of that sense of safety and comfort as I watched the horrific events unfold in Mumbai, and specifically at the Chabad House.

I am absolutely certain that Rabbi Gavriel Holtzberg and his pregnant wife Rivka, massacred by the terrorists, had also set up a safe-haven. Theirs was a retreat for Jews living in and around Mumbai or even those who were merely passing through.

I would venture that's one of the secrets behind the Chabad movement's extraordinary growth -- that they build little sanctuaries for lost Jews, alienated Jews, secular Jews, Jews who have no interest in traditional religion.

Chabad has redefined religion in part by getting away from the notion of large, formal temples to establishing places of worship that are small, intimate and, above all, deeply comforting; they have made religion personal.

And so, even as some other branches of Judaism and other religions have withered, they have ventured to the far corners of the earth: Siberia, Alaska, Kiev, Odessa, Ho Chi Minh City. But no matter where the Chabad house the philosophy is always the same -- to bring even the most alienated Jews back into the fold.

You go to a Chabad house and you can count on being invited to Friday night dinner by the rabbi and his wife. The model emphasizes old-fashioned notions of community and home -- the sense that religion is not a once-a-year affair but a way of life.

Memo to Obama: To Solve Financial Crisis, Declare a Jubilee Year

Debt relief for developing economies was all the rage in the 20th century. The IMF and World Bank forgave oodles of debt, with the support of Margaret Thatcher among others. Now, an item on Sudden Debt suggests that the USA practice IMF debt forgiveness on herself. I'll go one step farther...IMHO, it is time for a Jubilee Year::

The biblical requirement is that the Jubilee year was to be treated like a Sabbatical year, with the land lying fallow, but also required the compulsory return of all property to its original owners or their heirs, except the houses of laymen within walled cities, in addition to the manumission of all Israelite indentured servants.[7] The biblical regulations state that the Jubilee was only to come into force after the Israelites had gained control of Canaan,[8] presumably because it would otherwise require the Israelites to return the land to the Canaanites within 50 years; similar nationalistic concerns about the impact of the Jubilee on land ownership have been raised by Zionist settlers.[9] From a legal point of view, the Jubilee law effectively banned sale of land as fee simple, and instead land could only be leased for no more than 50 years; the biblical regulations go on to specify that the price of land had to be proportional to how many years remained before the Jubilee, with land being cheaper the closer it is to the Jubilee.[10]

Since the 49th year was already a sabbatical year, the land was required to be left fallow during it, but if the 50th year also had to be kept fallow, as the Jubilee, then no new crops would be available for two years, and only the summer fruits would be available for the following year, creating a much greater risk of starvation overall;[11] Judah haNasi contended that the jubilee year was identical with the sabbatical 49th year.[12] However, the majority of classical rabbis believed that the biblical phrase hallow the fiftieth year,[13] together with the biblical promise that there would be three years worth of fruit in the sixth year,[14] implies that the jubilee year was the 50th year.[15] The opinion of the Geonim, and generally of later authorities, was that prior to the Babylonian captivity the Jubilee was the intercalation of the 50th year, but after the captivity ended the Jubilee was essentially ignored, except for the blast of the shofar, and coincided with the sabbatical 49th year;[16] the justification given for this lapse of adherence to the Jubilee was that the Jubilee was only to be observed when the Jews controlled all of Canaan, including the territories of Reuben and Gad and the eastern half-tribe of Manasseh.

Basically it means cancelling debts. To those holding mortgage-backed securities...tough luck.

Chabad Tribute to Slain Mumbai Rabbi

At Chabad.org, Jonathan Mark writes:

Someone wondered: What effect would the Mumbai attack by Islamic terrorists have upon Chabad's presence in dangerous places?

I never met Rabbi Gavriel Noach Holtzberg or Rebbetzin Rivkah Holtzberg, martyrs of the Mumbai massacre, but I met more than a thousand of their spiritual brothers and sisters, the shluchim and shluchot, the Rebbe's emissaries, and here's what they always told me when the situation was darkest.

Chabad doesn't quit. They stood their ground in Czarist Russia, and they didn't quit after the Holocaust, and they didn't abandon Crown Heights after the 1991 riot. Chabad doesn't quit even in Islamic countries that might blow up any minute, such as Morocco, where Chabad teachers still operate in a city called "Gazablanca."

The Chabad idea of activism is to enlist for a lifetime job in Siberia, or Beijing, or Mexico, or MumbaiThey were working in the spiritual and anti-Semitic ruins of East Berlin when religion was criminalized, before the wall fell, and they were working in the Jewish ruins of Dnepropetrovsk before that Ukrainian city was open to the West and their activity could have meant a trip to the gulag. Chabad is still in the Congo amidst Africa's "world war," and they're still working in inner city neighborhoods where experts say "there are no Jews there anymore," except there are.

They didn't sign up to be American "clergy" whose idea of activism is announcing how their partisan politics are – surprise! – identical to Torah values. No, the Chabad idea of activism was to enlist for a lifetime job in Siberia, or Beijing, or Mexico, or Mumbai, a life in the trenches, on the front lines—the first wave in G‑d's infantry.

Even as I write this, Chabad is planning to re-open the Chabad House at 5 Hormusji Street, the now-famous Nariman building in Mumbai.

Jews don't run. Chabad doesn't run. Tonight, in India, Rabbi Tzvi Rivkin and Rebbetzin Noa will be open for Friday night davening and hosting people for Shabbos meals on Brunton Cross Road in Bangalore; Rabbi Baruch Shanhev and Rebbetzin Rachel Tova will be open for davening and Shabbos meals on Club House Road in Manali; Rabbi Guy Efraim and Rebbetzin Maya will be open for davening and Shabbos meals in Anjuna Village; and tonight, you can bet on it, there will be Shabbos in Mumbai.

Jews lit candles in the Warsaw Ghetto until they ran out of wicks, and tonight Jewish women in Mumbai will be lighting Shabbos candles not a second after 5:42 p.m., India time. That's what Jews do. That's what Chabad does.

Maybe some Jews will be understandably less inclined to backpack in India, or to do business in India, but plenty of Jews will still pass through Mumbai and Chabad will be there when they do.

There's a war on — a spiritual war as much as a shooting war — and Chabad knows it. The Lubavitcher Rebbe is their Churchill, even from the Other World. Good men and women will die, but Chabad will never surrender. They call their youth group Tzivos Hashem, the Army of God. The Holtzbergs were in it when they were young. Their two-year-old baby, Moishele, will be in it soon enough.

When the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, died in 1994, all the experts wondered how soon would Chabad fold.

Good men and women will die, but Chabad will never surrenderThis is what Chabad did. A Chabad carpenter sawed wood from the Rebbe's lectern to build a casket; a Chabad burial society gently poured water over the Rebbe's body and wrapped him in a shroud; straw was placed on the floor and the Rebbe's body was placed on it; and then they drove to the cemetery and laid the Rebbe in the ground. That night they davened Maariv. The next morning they showed up for Shachris. Then, over the next 15 years, they sent out several hundred shluchim and shluchot – including the Holtzbergs — representing the Rebbe.

Chabad did what they had to do when the Rebbe died and they'll do the same now.

Man Bites Dog: David Horowitz Defends Barack Obama

From FrontPage:

Conservatives need to get a grip. My email box is full of right wing trash talk (sorry, I'm peeved this morning) about Obama's fake birth certificate, his alleged covert Islamism and Hillary's scandals. Worse, we were running a frontpage story on this last wild goose until I canned it.

Since not everybody is following me at this point, let's take them one at a time. First, the birth certificate. Is Obama a legitimate president of the United States? Well, let me put it to you this way: 64 million Americans voted to elect Barack Obama. Do you want to disenfranchise them? Do you think it's possible to disenfranchise 64 million Americans and keep the country? And please don't write me about the Constitution. The first principle of the Constitution is that the people are sovereign. What the people say, goes. If you think about it, I think you will agree that a two-year billion dollar election through all 50 states is as authoritative a verdict on anything as we are likely to get. Barack Obama is our president. Get used to it.

And what could conservatives be thinking when they push this issue as though it were important (as The American Thinker did last week)? Do we want to go challenging the legitimacy of an election that involved 120 million voters? Have we become deranged leftists like Al Gore who would attack the one binding thread that makes us a nation despite our differences? The mystique of elections is the American covenant. Respect it. Barack Obama is the president of the United States. Get used to it.

I'm not even going to go into the Hussein idiocy. Obama spent 20 years in Reverend Wright's Trinity Church. There is much that was wrong with that, but being a Muslim isn't one of them.

And the Hillary thing. Get real. Please. Obama was elected in large part by a leftist crusade for hope and CHANGE. Now, as president-elect he has just formed the most conservative foreign policy team since John F. Kennedy, one well to the right of Bill Clinton. Where is your gratitude for that? What is more relevant in his Hillary Clinton pick -- her prickly past or the fact that except for Joe Lieberman, she is the Democrat most identified with support for the Iraq War?

Perhaps I should repeat that. Hillary Clinton is the Democrat MOST IDENTIFIED WITH REMOVING SADDAM HUSSEIN BY FORCE. She lost a presidency over it. So whatever low opinion you may have about Hillary, on foreign policy she is the very best choice for that position that conservatives could expect to get. Even better, because the ONLY issue that really divided Hillary and Obama was the Iraq War. So this is President Obama's way of saying, ok now that I'm in office I'm going to put my anti-war commitments aside and put the defense of the country first. And in case you didn't get that, I'm going to keep George Bush's Secretary of Defense in place, and I'm going to appoint a conservative Marine general as my National Security Advisor.

Maybe some conservatives out there have forgotten, but Clinton's Secretary of Defense Les Aspin was an anti-Vietnam activist. So were his two National Security Advisers, Tony Lake and Sandy Berger. In fact they met Clinton in the anti-war movement. Conservatives should be cheering right now, not chasing red herrings.

Moshe Yalon: Forget Oslo to Forge Israeli-Palestinian Peace

From Azure.co.il (ht LGF):

The strategy outlined in this paper is not particularly uplifting. I doubt that it will thrill the public or win prestigious international awards. It requires, after all, diligence and a good deal of patience. Its enactment would mean giving up expectations of reaching an immediate “solution” to the Israeli-Palestinian problem, and instead adopting a more pragmatic attitude that focuses, at least in the short term, on “managing” the conflict. Yet this new strategy is no less ambitious than the former one. It, too, strives to end Israel’s control over the Palestinians and to establish a new, safer, and more stable order west of the Jordan River. Unlike the Oslo paradigm, however, it begins by laying the foundations for the establishment of this new order, and only then proceeds to build from the bottom up. The policy proposed here rests on the understanding—which has so far eluded Israeli statesmen—that in our geopolitical arena, “the realities on the ground shape agreements, not the other way around,” as Guy Bechor, an Israeli expert in Middle Eastern affairs, once said.

This article has focused only on the constructive aspect of the approach I am recommending. The other, more demanding and no less important aspect is dealing with radical Islamic terrorism. It is important to remember that the regime established by Hamas in Gaza threatens not only the Jewish state, but the Palestinian Authority as well. Hamas’s rule in Gaza has been leading Israel and the Palestinians down a dangerous road of escalating violence with unforeseeable results. Abu Mazen and his deputies lack the strength to neutralize or contain the threat. As a result, Israel must shoulder this burden. Unfortunately, Israel’s leadership over the past few years has not demonstrated sufficient determination in tackling this problem, and has fallen into a series of devastating errors: the unilateral disengagement from the Gaza Strip, for instance, which laid waste to prosperous Jewish settlements and showed the world Israel retreating under fire; the postponement (time and again) of a large-scale military operation against the terrorist infrastructure in the Gaza Strip, which has allowed Hamas’ guerilla fighters to barricade and arm themselves in preparation for the inevitable clash; and the willingness on the part of Israel’s leaders to pay an exorbitant price for the release of kidnapped soldiers (and sometimes only their dead bodies), which sent a message to even the most moderate Palestinians that the armed struggle can achieve results unattainable by conciliation and cooperation.

No dialogue can succeed and no reforms will be possible so long as the Palestinians—and Arabs in general—believe that the Jewish state can be subdued by force. The American historian Daniel Pipes has correctly noted that it is not despair that encourages extremism among the Palestinians, but rather the hope and belief that the Zionist state can be defeated. If Israel hesitates to use overwhelming military force against the swelling abscess of terrorism in Gaza, its enemies may get the impression that its stamina is eroding and that it can be pushed into a corner. Such a perception of Israel poses a greater threat than any rocket attack and must be immediately rectified. For more than a hundred years, Jews living on this land have had to prove time and again that they are not afraid to fight. Sadly, it does not seem likely that they will be able to put down their weapons anytime soon. This reality was eloquently expressed by Moshe Beilinson in an article published in June 1936 in the Histadrut’s newspaper Davar, at the onset of the bloody 1936-1939 Arab Revolt. In response to the oft-repeated question, “How much longer?” Beilinson answered: “Until the most fervent warrior in the enemy camp realizes that there is no means by which to break Israel’s power in its land, because it has necessity and living truth on its side. Until they know that there is no other way but to make peace with Israel. This is the purpose of our struggle.”

The Israelis need not abandon their hopes for true peace with the Palestinians. The reorganization of Palestinian society in accordance with the principles outlined in this paper could feasibly serve as the foundation for a future settlement that would realize some of the hopes that were pinned on the Oslo process. Nevertheless, such a settlement will invariably involve painful concessions. However, in order for it to become a reality, two conditions must be met: first, unequivocal Palestinian recognition of Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state; and second, the establishment of Palestinian self-rule on a solid economic, political, and security basis.

Unfortunately, the road leading to this destination is still very long. But sometimes, the longer road is in truth the shorter one. And it is clear that we will not arrive there if we continue to ride the rickety train that left Oslo and passed through Taba and Annapolis. The present diplomatic path, which forces Israel to make far-reaching concessions and take genuine risks in return for empty Palestinian declarations, is headed for war, not peace. At most, it can create an illusion of reconciliation and progress that will dissipate at the first sound of gunshots and bombs. In order to avoid repeating mistakes, both sides must get off the train to nowhere and board the one on the right track.

Bradley Burston on Jihadi Nazis

From Haaretz:

For the whole of my adult life, it irked me when my fellow Jews would routinely and without compunction, accuse anti-Zionists of being anti-Semitic, and conflate anti-Israeli sentiment with the Nazis.

I felt that the latter eroded the memory and the magnitude of the Holocaust, and that the former was a slightly more elegant way of telling people with whom one took issue, to shut the hell up.

Only this week did I realize my error.

It turns out, that when Jews suspected that the Jihadi hated the Jew the way the Nazi hated the Jew, they were right.

After all this time, I am embarrassed to admit that only when the monsters entered Chabad House in Mumbai, did I understand.

Monsters, not solely for what they did there, but, if the reports are to be believed, for the fact that they were able to do what they did after having actually gotten to know the young couple who founded the center, after asking them for shelter in Chabad House, after telling them that they were Malaysian students eager to learn about Judaism.

Monsters, for having befriended these sweet people in order to better learn how to execute them. Monsters, for having targeted a young couple who had devoted their lives to helping others better live theirs, despite having had a baby who died of a genetic disease and a second child ill and under treatment far away in Israel.

The monsters in Chabad House were not Nazis because they were Muslims. It was specifically because they so faithfully emulated the Nazis, that they, in fact, betrayed Islam.

The hatred of the Jihadi for the Jew is such that - as in the case of the Nazis - the killing of Jews - anywhere they may be found - is an obligation on par with whatever other enemy, target, cause, mission, goal or creed they may be pursuing at the moment.

Their hatred of the Jew is such that - as in the case of the Nazis - all tragedy that befalls the Jews was brought on by the Jews themselves.

Their hatred of the Jew is such that even if a Jew rejects the concept of a state of Israel and is wholeheartedly opposed to Zionism, if he wears the clothing of a believing Jew - as in the case of victim Aryeh Leibish Teitelboim - he will be bound and tortured and put to death.

It is no longer a question of geography or personal experiemce. On September 11. the jihadis told us that the attacks came, in part, in response to the atrocities of the Jews. In the next breath, they told the Muslim world that the Jews were also behind the attacks...

Christopher Hitchens on the Mumbai Massacre

From Slate:

I hope I am not alone in finding the statements about Bombay from our politicians to be anemic and insipid, and the media coverage of the disastrous and criminal attack too parochially focused on the fate of visiting or resident Americans. India is emerging in many ways as our most important ally. It is a strong regional counterweight to Russia and China. Not to romanticize it overmuch, it is a huge and officially secular federal democracy that is based, like the United States, on ethnic and confessional pluralism. Its political and economic and literary echelons speak English better than most of us do. Its parliament in New Delhi—the unbelievably diverse and dignified Lok Sabha—was viciously attacked by Islamist gangsters and nearly destroyed in December 2001, a date which ought to have made more Americans pay more attention rather than less. Since then, Bombay has been assaulted multiple times and the Indian Embassy in Afghanistan blown up with the fairly obvious cross-border collusion of the same Pakistani forces who are helping in the rebirth of the Taliban.

It would be good to hear from the president and the president-elect that we regard attacks on the fabric and society of India with very particular seriousness, as assaults on a close friend that was battling al-Qaida long before we were. In response, it should be emphasized, our military and financial and nuclear and counterinsurgency cooperation with New Delhi will not be given a lower profile but a very much higher one. The people of India need to hear this from us, as do the enemies of India, who are our sworn enemies, too.

The inevitable question arises: Did our nominal ally Pakistan have a hand in this atrocity? In one sense, to ask the question is to answer it. Whether we refer to al-Qaida "proper," or to any of the armed Kashmiri formations that have lately been mentioned, we find some pre-existing connection to Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency, or ISI. Another conceivable suspect, the former Bombay crime lord Dawood Ibrahim, wanted by the Indian authorities on suspicion of blowing up the Bombay stock exchange and killing 300 civilians in 1993, has long been a fugitive from justice living safely in Pakistan's main port of Karachi. Not a bad place from which to organize an amphibious assault team that acted as if it had been trained by serious military professionals.

Bernard Henry-Levy on the Pakistan Problem

From today's Wall Street Journal:

Since its creation 15 years ago, the Lashkar-e-Taiba has been linked to the ISI, the formidable Inter-Services Intelligence agency that operates like a state within a state in Pakistan. Obviously, this link is not widely publicized. However, from the kidnapping and murder of Daniel Pearl to the July 2005 attack on the Ayodhya Hindu temple in Uttar Pradesh, there is abundant evidence that the jihadist wing of the ISI has assisted the Lashkar-e-Taiba in the planning and financing of various operations.

Worse yet, the Lashkar-e-Taiba is, as I discovered while researching and reporting my book on Daniel Pearl, a group of which A.Q. Khan, the inventor of Pakistan's atomic bomb, was a longtime friend. Mr. Khan, one may recall, spent a good 15 years trafficking in nuclear secrets with Lybia, North Korea, Iran and, perhaps, al Qaeda, before confessing his guilt in early 2004. Later pardoned by Gen. Pervez Musharraf, Mr. Khan remains perfectly free to travel within Pakistan, as he was just admitted this Monday, under the protection of the ISI, to the most elite hospital in Karachi.

No, this is not a dream -- it is reality. Pakistan is home to a man both father of his country's nuclear program and known sympathizer of an Islamist group whose latest demonstration has netted at least 188 dead and several hundred wounded.

The Lashkar-e-Taiba is, ultimately, one of the constitutive elements of what is conventionally called al Qaeda. For too long we've told ourselves that al Qaeda no longer exists except as a brand; that it is only a pure signifier, "franchised" by local organizations independent of one another. Yet there indeed exists in our world what Osama bin Laden called the "International Islamic Front for Jihad against Jews and Crusaders," which is like a constellation of atoms aggregated around a central nucleus. These atoms find themselves, for the most part, clustered in this new zone of tempests that forms the whole of Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan.

Mumbai Terrorists Targeted India-Pakistan Peace Deal

Writes Tarek Fatah in the Calgary Herald:

While the ISI-PPP tussle for control of the country's intelligence network was going on behind the scenes, on Tuesday, the president of Pakistan, Asif Zardari, threw a bombshell that caught the Pakistan military establishment off guard. Speaking to an Indian TV audience, Zardari announced a strategic shift in Pakistan's nuclear policy. He startled a cheering Indian audience, saying Pakistan had adopted a "no-first-strike" nuclear-war policy. This apparently did not go down well within Pakistan's military establishment that has ruled the country for decades using the "Indian bogey" to starve the nation of much-needed development investment in order to put the huge military machine on a permanent war footing with no war in sight. Immediately, the military commentators denounced Zardari.

Zardari also borrowed a quote from his late wife, who once said there's a "little bit of India in every Pakistani and a little bit of Pakistan" in every Indian. "I do not know whether it is the Indian or the Pakistani in me that is talking to you today," Zardari said.

While most Pakistanis welcomed the new air of peace and friendship, the country's religious right was upset.

Just a month ago, the founder of one of Pakistan's most feared armed Islamist groups had accused Zardari of being too dovish toward India, and criticized him for referring to militants in Indian-held Kashmir as "terrorists." Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, founder of Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT),a major militant group fighting in Indian Kashmir, described Zardari's comments as "a clear violation and digression from the consistent policy of Pakistan."Then Wednesday, the so-called "Deccan Mujahedeen" struck against India with the clear aim of triggering a Hindu backlash against the country's minority Muslims, with the obvious danger to Pakistan-India relations.

Most security commentators agree the Deccan Mujahedeen is merely a tag of convenience and that behind this well-planned terror attack lies the secret hands of the LeT. The same LeT that had warned Zardari to desist from warming up to India.

Only time will tell whether these Islamists succeed or whether the good people of India--Hindus and Muslims --can see through this provocation and embrace the hand of friendship extended by Zardari.

In the meantime, Muslims around the world will also have to decide whether to enter the 21st century and distance themselves from the doctrine of armed jihad, or go back to the 12th century and embrace these haters of joy and peace.

Obama's First Big Mistake

Obama said he didn't want "groupthink" when he introduced Hillary Clinton as his choice for Secretary of State, but given the apparently unanimous chorus of cheers from the media, that's exactly what Hillary's selection has yielded. I haven't seen too much criticism in the papers--even from commentators who know how bad a choice this may turn out to be. IMHO, this ranks with Bill Clinton's decision to make gays in the military his top priority during the first 100 days, or Bush's "Mission Accomplished' stunt. It's a hubristic move by a winner who thinks he holds all the cards. I hope Obama is reading some Greek and Shakespearean tragedies as well as Doris Kearns Goodwin...uneasy lies the head that wears the crown.

First, it looks as if Obama was forced to pick Hillary. Weeks of selective leaks to the media, followed by his "negotiations" with Bill Clinton, followed by his promise to pay Hillary's outstanding campaign debts--does anyone even remember Hillary's campaign claim that she would pay for her campaign out of her own pocket (fattened by some 100 million in post-administration income to the Clintons)?--all combine to create an image of weakness, not strength. Even Rush Limbaugh wondered if Obama would be a "figurehead." He's right about that.

Second, Hillary is not someone the American people want picking up a phone at 3 am. We had an election, and she lost. Personally, I agree with Limbaugh that McCain could have beaten Hillary. Now she's going to be the face of the Obama administration in dealing with international crisis? I just don't get it. She has drive, but not intelligence or judgement. Her husband was impeached due to her handling of the Lewinsky scandal. He may have beaten conviction, but a majority of the Senate voted him guilty. The Clinton presidency was terribly damaged by her hardball tactics. Indeed, the failed attempt to get Bin Laden was clouded by suspicions that Bill was just trying to change the subject from Lewinsky...leaving America unprepared for the global jihad that grew into 9/11.

Third, now everyone around the world will wonder, like Limbaugh: Who's really in charge? Can I make a deal with Bill and go around Obama? Does the USA have an Obama administration or a 3rd Clinton term?

Fourth, in the end, Hillary is a doormat--Bill humiliated her, and she hung around; Obama beat her, and she begged for scraps from the table. Weak, weak, weak...despite the bullying and bluster. Everything she has, she owes to some powerful man.

Fifth, there's always the Machiavellian issue, mentioned by former Obama foreign policy advisor Samantha Power, who called Hillary a "monster." Power was fired, but it may be the only thing she's said that I agree with.

If the Republicans had any backbone, they'd do to her what the Senate did to John Tower in the Reagan administration--and torpedo this nomination in a very obvious way. Unfortunately, the Republicans don't look like they are up to the job...and if they can't stand up to Hillary, they can't stand up to Bin Laden.

UPDATE: Christopher Hitchens says Hillary is not fit to serve as Secretary of State.