(no subject)

N.Y. Times article of note: New to Job, Gates Argued for Closing Guantánamo

Looks like the new Sec Def as well as Sec. Rice were both arguing for closing the prison. Cheney's people and, surprise surprise, Alberto Gonzales were the main opposition. So, just maybe, once the Attorney General is removed from the board that damned prison may be cloesd. Its fate may well be central to the appointment battle over the next Attorney General.

Ah Gates, this and the fact that he fired a General of Walter Reed makes me think that the adults might be making a come back in the Republican party.

Two great demagogues that go great together

"[Jack Thompson] goes on to mention September 11, accusing the New York City-based publisher of "spewing its pop culture sewage to the world's children" from near the former site of the World Trade Center. Calling depraved US pop culture a recruiting tool for extremists, Thompson asks, "What is America's rebuttal to the Islamic Fascist recruitment call? This counterclaim is the rebuttal, not just to these terrorists but to Take-Two."
Gamespot - Thompson countersues Take-Two

Looks like Thompson may have been reading Dinesh D'Souza's The Enemy at Home. Admittedly he seems to be blaming game makers and not liberals for 9/11, but the basic framework seems to be the same.

I mostly link this because there's a National Review Online conservative take down of D'Souza that people might enjoy. The short version of that is that even most hard right intellectuals seem to think Islamists (let alone Islamic terrorists) are way worse than liberals. Aww, thanks guys. :P

I don't tend to worry much about the sort of cross-fundamentalist alliance D'Souza calls for. Sure, such alliances are possible. Right-wing catholics and evangelicals tend to get along pretty well these days in America. Similarly some right wing evangelicals support hard-line Israelis (although hard line Israeli isn't a religious grouping). But look at Mitt Romney. He's having trouble on the right because he's a Mormon. There's still debates about whether Mormons are Christians. So while I find the trashing of D'Souza reassuring, I'm not that surprised.

Also, go Dems!

The House passed a bill with a September 2008 deadline for withdrawal from Iraq. The Senate part will be tougher because it's a razor thin majority.

Bush has threatened to veto. He's probably not bluffing. The question is, how strong of a conference bill can we pass? I'm guessing that the House version will have to be watered down and/or porked up more, but still can probably be too strong for the President to sign.

The Republicans in Congress aren't breaking yet, so there's a limit to how much we can ram down the administrations throat. I'm also not sure if we can pull the equivalent of a continuing resolution. That's probably not worth it over a supplement battle.

Instead, the second bill will probably still have some tough provisions that Bush thinks he can sign and then safely ignore. Not sure what that will be, a lot will depend on the negotiators we use. This is a multi-round fight but I think we're setting up a stronger position for the next round.

Main downside, no provisions on Iran. For those of you that haven't seen it, they've captured 15 British sailors. It sounds like the Brits are going to be able to resolve that one, but this is the sort of incident that could escalate.