China's Suppression of Riot News Picked Up by NYT?

Mark down this day. The New York Times actually picked up a story that isn't flattering to the Chinese Communists. The Chinese government is busy burying the details surrounding the riots that broke out over the government seeking to build a power station in the town of Dongzhou. They're intimidating people into silence - and the Chinese know that if you cross the government, you'll never be heard from again because Chinese detention centers aren't happy fun places, but where political prisoners are held, tortured, or killed.

Residents of Dongzhou, a small town now cordoned off by heavy police roadblocks and patrols, said in scores of interviews on the telephone and with visitors that they had endured beatings, bribes and threats at the hands of security forces in the week and a half after their protest against the construction of a power plant was violently put down. Others said that the corpses of the dead had been withheld, apparently because they were so riddled with bullets that they would contradict the government's version of events. And residents have been warned that if they must explain the deaths of loved ones - many of whom were shot dead during a tense standoff with the police in which fireworks, blasting caps and crude gasoline bombs were thrown by the villagers - they should simply say their relatives were blown up by their own explosives.

China is holding the Olympic Games in 2008. Those games are supposed to be a coming out party for the modern China. Problem is that the modern China isn't different than the old China. They may have dressed things up around Beijing a bit to impress diplomats and the IOC, not to mention the athletes coming into the country to compete, but the old problems remain. Suppression of the media. Violent crackdowns against dissenters. Environmental disasters swept under the rug by officials who don't want the truth to get out.

The Peking Duck, Adrift in the Sea of Phlegm, and One Free Korea (which notes Congressional concern over the situation in China). The Paper Tiger wonders if this is a turning point. Gay and Right points out that no matter how much the Times or China's government proclaims that the country has embraced capitalism, it's still a Communist country where property rights are nonexistent and dissent is crushed, not tolerated.

A Small Step For Border Control

After avoiding the issue of border control for decades, we're finally seeing the first tentative steps. We're actually considering building a 600 mile-long fence along the Mexican border.

That howling you hear? That's Vicente Fox who's got to figure out how to get Mexicans across the border into the US so that they can earn enough money to continue propping up the Mexican economy.

That screeching you hear? That's the anti-Americans who think the US has just adopted the Zionist fencing techniques that Israel utilizes to maintain its national security against terrorists who seek to infiltrate into Israel to kill and maim as many Israelis as possible.

And, that golf clap you hear? That's Michelle Malkin who is cautiously applauding this belated step to take control over our porous borders. The Immigration Blog breaks down specific provisions, and finds some provisions wanting. Roadkill Journal says it's about time.

The Corner also notes the fence legislation.

The Dafur Mess Isn't Going Away

Per Instapundit. The situation in Dafur hasn't stabilized - in fact, it's getting worse as all the factions are fighting each other. The civilian populations are in the middle, and suffering for it. More than 270,000 people were killed in the violence thus far, and world attention - particularly at the UN - has never been focused on it, much preferring to attack the US involvment in Iraq to the hard work of stopping a genocide in Dafur.

And the UN is ineffectual because the Chinese do not want the UN to get involved since it would upset their economic interests in Sudanese oil contracts (where have we see economics drive the UN before? Oh yes, in Iraq where the Russians and French opposed action because it upset their oil deals).

Sunnis Hail Iraqi Elections

This doesn't quite smell of quagmire does it. Sunnis, who make up about a third of the Iraqi population, think that the elections were a success. And yet, we're reminded not to get ahead of ourselves - there could be months of negotiations ahead as the government forms.

The big Sunni turnout means the new government will probably consist of a broader coalition than the current one between Shi'ite Islamists and Kurds, raising the possibility that a more diverse leadership could ease sectarian tensions.

Fresh efforts to stabilize Iraq after more than two years of suicide bombings, shootings and kidnappings will be set against the background of complex negotiations to form a new government.

Judging by past talks, it could take months of heated discussions that inflame sectarian passions as frustrated Iraqis demand security, better services and jobs.

Oh, the horror.

Oh, the humanity.

Does anyone actually study history anymore? The US went through fits and starts at its inception as well. Articles of Confederation anyone? We don't have that document as our foundation document do we? No, it was replaced by something called the US Constitution. [You have heard of the US Constitution, haven't you?] And as quickly as the Constitution was adopted amendments to the Constitution were required to satisfy the fears and hopes of many - the Bill of Rights. The first 10 Amendments. The first of 27 Amendments to the Constitution.

Here's my first suggestion to anyone covering events in Iraq. Read the Federalist Papers. And the Anti-Federalist Papers. Those two groups of papers and pamplets consist of a detailed and spirited discussion over how the country should be governed, the reasoning behind how separation of powers came into existence, whether there should be a strong executive, the role of Congress and the judiciary, and a host of issues that we now take for granted.

Then read the US Constitution and all of the amendments that followed. You'll note that the Constitution has been amended quite a few times since 1791. In fact, the most recent amendment was approved in 1992. More than 200 years later, and we're still approving amendments for the Constitution. I'd say that we're still trying to get it right.

So, if the Iraqis are full of dissenters and factions and argue loudly over the direction of the country and how the government should operate, consider that when reading the media reports, which provide none of the context and all of the biased opinion.

As PubliusPundit says, Mission Accomplished. But for Leftists and Bush Administration opponents, there is no good outcome. Mohammed at Iraq the Model notes that Iraqis are waking up from their historic elections and have realized that they have a say:

We saw clearly that the vast majority of Iraqis now believe even more in the political process and in democratic practices and I believe this will undermine the ideology of those who use arms as a way of expression.

In the first 48 hours after the election we noticed that statements coming from politicians are getting more relaxed and the old tense tone began to fade as most of them now feel safe that they will have a representation in the next parliament. Even if this representation doesn’t meet the ambitions they had in some cases but it gave them a sense of security, for example Salih al-Mutlaq who was known for his inflammatory statements like “if we don’t get our representation we will consider other options including armed resistance or leaving Iraq…” now changed his tone after realizing that his list is going to win several seats in the parliament so now he’s saying that he will stay to “defend the cause of those who gave him their votes from his place in the parliament.

The possibility of a Shi'a dominated government doesn't appear likely - as there are enough secular groups that the Shi'a will have an important, but not overwhelming role. Juan Cole thinks that the Shi'ites are going to dominate the election, particularly in the South. Good thing that Cole reminds folks that the Shi'a are the overwhelming majority of people living in the South of Iraq. It would make sense that they are dominating the vote there. If they weren't, I'd be questioning the results. Oh wait, he didn't mention that. Instead, he's focusing on the Shi'a vote as though it's a problem. Captain Ed predicts a secular coalition.

John Kerry, on the eve of the elections, kidded about the impeachment of President Bush. Still tone deaf after all these years. Apparently the Iraqis know the significance of these elections far better than Kerry ever could.

Posted to: Wizbang's Carnival of Trackbacks, Stop the ACLU [updated regularly]: Basil's Blog, Michelle Malkin notes that Kofi Annan said that the elections went well in Iraq. No thanks to him. No kidding. Point Five has trackbacks. Six Meat Buffet puts the Kerry impeachment talk into its proper context - buffoonery as performance art.

Intelligence on Intelligence

Are the new revelations about intel operations that involve collecting information from certain phone calls that originate or terminate outside the US really some profound change in policy? Is it a critical violation of civil rights or harming the rights of Americans? Has this snooping actually resulted in any tangible results?

For starters, it would appear that Congress had some knowledge of this program, which accelerated in 2002 as a result of the capture of Abu Zubaydah. Time sensitivity meant that exploiting the data captured along with Zubaydah was of the essence. There were only days or hours in which to act.

And we have come to learn that the Zubaydah data uncovered the plot by Iyman Faris to destroy the Brooklyn Bridge. Faris was captured while still in the planning stages.

Have we really succumbed to giving up civil rights or is there so much nonsensical ravings on all sides that the truth is lost in the shuffle? And does this program have any relationship to data mining efforts taken after Able Danger was shut down - with the idea being that data recovered in various worldwide operations would be used to draw connections between disparate items that might have otherwise gone unnoticed.

This particular aspect of national security also works hand in hand with the Patriot Act, provisions of which were rejected by the Senate. While Instapundit thinks that the rejection shouldn't adversely affect national security, and that the laws affect by the Patriot Act really were used for operations other than counter-terrorism, I'm a bit more wary. There's no evidence that the Patriot Act did not do as it was intended (proving the negative, I know).

But all we need to know is actually buried deep in the NYT article:

What the agency calls a "special collection program" began soon after the Sept. 11 attacks, as it looked for new tools to attack terrorism. The program accelerated in early 2002 after the Central Intelligence Agency started capturing top Qaeda operatives overseas, including Abu Zubaydah, who was arrested in Pakistan in March 2002. The C.I.A. seized the terrorists' computers, cellphones and personal phone directories, said the officials familiar with the program. The N.S.A. surveillance was intended to exploit those numbers and addresses as quickly as possible, the officials said.

In addition to eavesdropping on those numbers and reading e-mail messages to and from the Qaeda figures, the N.S.A. began monitoring others linked to them, creating an expanding chain. While most of the numbers and addresses were overseas, hundreds were in the United States, the officials said.

If the Bush Administration takes steps to protect the US from attack, its excoriated from the Leftists who think that it's infringing on civil rights. The failure in the other direction is unimaginable to consider - another mass casualty attack. Yet, that's what the Leftists are actually forcing the Administration to consider.

Another argument is that the Bush Administration did this without Congress knowing. That's not the case either - as per Michelle Malkin:

Contrary to the impression the piece and headline leave of an administration acting in complete secrecy and with total impunity and disregard for civil liberties, the reporters reveal that Vice President Dick Cheney, then-NSA director Gen. Michael V. Hayden of the Air Force, and then-CIA director George Tenet called a meeting with Congressional leaders from both parties to brief them on the program.

The administration trusted that the briefing would remain confidential for the sake of national security. Obviously, they trusted too much. [emphasis mine]

Quite a few people are blogging this, including Protein Wisdom, Brainster's Blog, Stop the ACLU, Martin's Musings, The A-Team Blog, California Conservative, Truth Above All, Mad Mikey's Blog, La Shawn Barber, Ace of Spades, The Unalienable Right, In the Bullpen, Anti Idiotarian Rotweiller, The Mahablog.

And the kicker is that the Times story is somehow tied to a book scheduled to be released by one of the principals in the Times story. Eric Risen is one of the authors of the Times story, and he's about to release a book that covers some of the same ground. There was no mention of the book in the Times story - so one is left to wonder about the timing.

Peter Braunstein Captured In Memphis Tennessee

Braunstein was captured after being discovered on a college campus by someone working at the University of Memphis who then called law enforcement. When police approached him, he stabbed himself three times in the neck and he was taken to a local hospital in critical condition.

Braunstein was the focus of a nationwide manhunt after a sexual assault in New York City where he held a woman for nearly 12 hours and repeatedly raped her.

He is wanted in connection with a bizarre Halloween crime. He reportedly sexually assaulted a woman for 13 hours at gunpoint. He was able to bluff his was into her apartment by posing as a firefighter.

According to the television program, "America's Most Wanted," Braunstein was spotted donating blood at a blood bank in Memphis, Tennessee last month.

You can imagine the sigh of relief throughout New York City with Braunstein in custody.

Russian Power Plant Blast

An explosion at a Russian nuclear power plant complex killed one worker and badly hurt two others, but Russia's nuclear agency said Friday no reactors were affected.

The Rosenergoatom agency said radiation levels remained normal as the reactor in that part of the Leningrad nuclear plant was undergoing repairs and was not in operation. But Thursday's blast threw a spotlight on what environmentalists called uncontrolled operations at Russian nuclear sites.

The blast happened in a smelter at the plant in the closed nuclear town of Sosnovy Bor, 50 miles west of the northern city of St. Petersburg. The smelter is operated by Ekomet-S, a company reprocessing scrap metal.

"The enterprise ... functions illegally because there was no mandatory (state) environmental impact assessment on its construction," Dmitry Artamonov, head of the St. Petersburg branch of Greenpeace, told The Associated Press.

TWU To NYC - We're Gonna Strike

Only thing is that they're going to selectively strike. The TWU is sending out the new recruits of the formerly private bus lines to strike, instead of the TWU regulars who would be subject to the highest level of fines and penalties. Tens of thousands of people will be affected, particularly in Queens and Brooklyn. These are the sacrifical lambs.

Apparently 3% a year for each of the next three years isn't enough for the TWU. Most people would be happy with that amount. I know that Mrs. Lawhawk would appreciate a raise of 3% each year as her company doesn't ordinarily give annual raises.

Roger Toussant has muddied the waters with his announcements, and it shows that the union doesn't quite have its act together. There must be factions who want the union to settle, while other more militant groups want to strike. All the while, Toussant continues to harp on the $1 billion, which simply doesn't exist.

UPDATE:
The New York Times has more details on the strike:

The authority, which had offered two 3 percent raises over 27 months, raised its offer today to 3 percent in each of the next 3 years. It also agreed to lower its demand, to 1 percent from 2 percent, the proportion of earnings that it wants new employees to pay toward health-care premiums. But it refused to budge on its insistence that new workers reach age 62 before being able to collect full pensions, compared with age 55 for most current workers.

At 6:30 a.m. today, the union's executive board rejected that offer and agreed to set a new strike deadline of 12:01 a.m. Tuesday. The decision prolonged, for millions of riders, uncertainty about whether the nation's largest transit system will be shut down by a labor strike for the first time since 1980.

Consider that the MTA just had to put half of the $1 billion to maintain the solvency of the pension. That is a cost that is continuing to drag on MTA finances.

Sisyphus Shrugged thinks that some reporters are being played by MTA management when told of the salaries of various employees in the MTA system. Lots of bloggers are confused over exactly what is happening. That's because the TWU was oh so clear in what they were saying at the press conference that was mostly spent blasting the MTA for not bargaining in good faith. Yeah, I buy that one. I know about negotiating in good faith and putting reasonable offers on the table, and 8% raises each year for the next three years was wholly unreasonable. And the TWU should know that. I'd have had a lot more respect if they started with 5% a year, since that would have been a significant increase in wages, and still within a reasonable settlement range - putting a 3.5 to 4.5% agreement within reach. Instead, the TWU is seeking out the nuclear option.

The NYC official webpage has current information.

The TWU has enacted a limited strike that will affect private bus lines after 12 PM today. As of now, Jamaica Bus Lines and Triboro Coach are the lines that will be affected by this strike. However, other private bus lines may join the strike. Riders of Jamaica and Triboro Coach should make alternative travel arrangements. Riders of the City's other private bus lines should consider making alternate travel plans in the event that these lines join the strike. At this time, all NYC Transit buses and subways are running. At this time, traffic and roadway limitations are NOT being enacted - this includes HOV and commercial limitations. Alternate side of the street parking remains in effect today and tomorrow. Schools will open on time.
Friday, December 16, 2005

Technorati: transit strike, TWU, NYC,

Let the Counting Begin

And strangely enough, the Breitbart front page has the Iraqi elections as a below the fold story. It's the 9th story on the page, below the NYC transit strike and a Chinese police raid on a gay culture festival.

Media criticisms aside, the elections were hugely successful. The Iraqis have much to be proud of this morning. Television reports have indicated that anywhere from 10 to 11 million out of 15 million potential voters have actually cast ballots.

Millions of ballot papers were being counted and recounted on Friday as Iraqis celebrated a peaceful election that saw rebellious Sunni Arabs join in for the first time, pushing turnout close to 70 percent.

Cities were quiet on the final day of a security lockdown that has sealed borders, banned traffic and put tens of thousands of police and soldiers on the streets, backed up discreetly by U.S. troops. After preliminary counting in local centers, ballot forms were being shipped under guard to Baghdad.

Initial results may take days to emerge, and the final tally a couple of weeks, while talks on a coalition government that must bridge ethnic and sectarian divisions could last months.

Electoral Commissioner Farid Ayar told Reuters he was assuming between 10 and 11 million of 15 million eligible Iraqis voted on Thursday, putting turnout between 67 and 73 percent.

Final results may take several weeks as all the ballots are counted.

Meanwhile, peruse the video of the elections on Powerline. Even the Arab News is picking up the election story - and what it really means.

MSNBC on the other hand picks up a Washington Post article that is pessimistic at its core:

For President Bush, the strong turnout for Iraq's election yesterday may represent the best day since the fall of Baghdad 32 months ago because all major factions participated in the political process, according to U.S. and Middle East analysts. But the sobering reality, they added, is that the vote by itself did not resolve Iraq's lingering political disputes.

After weeks of an increasingly divisive debate at home that helped sink the president's approval rating to an all-time low, the Bush administration appeared buoyed by the throngs at the polls and the low violence. Flanked in the Oval Office by six young Iraqis, all with a purple-stained finger signifying they had voted, Bush called the election a "major milestone" on the road to democracy.

Has anyone checked out the US political scene lately? It's a sobering reality that there are lingering political disputes that haven't been settled in decades. Abortion rights, affirmative action, free speech and religion in public spaces are all issues that have been central to US national politics and there's no sign that there's going to be agreement on any of them anytime soon. So Ms. Wright takes items out of context in order to suit her political bent.

Or, perhaps we should look at our own US history from the period of 1776 through 1791, when we had a Declaration of Independence, the War of Independence, an Articles of Confederation that failed to unify the nation, a Constitution was drafted, and shortly followed by the Bill of Rights - amendments to the Constitution, which continues to be amended to this day. Issues that were relevant and debated in 1791 are still being debated today. The right to bear arms. Free speech - in the form of journalists and bloggers writing about political issues, and yet Wright thinks that lingering Iraqi disputes are reason to pou-pou the successful elections.

Michelle Malkin has a thorough roundup, and notices the silence of the Times editorial page. Aaron's cc has photos (and photoshops from the Iraqi elections and supporters).

Iraq the Model has his first hand accounts of yesterday's vote. Iraq Vote writes of his experience with his father voting in Virginia in Iraq's elections.

Yes, I voted today in the Westpark Best Western Hotel in McLean, Virginia. I waited until today for two reasons, first to be in communion with some 10 million Iraqis who voted inside Iraq and secondly to vote with my father who had traveled to Washington to cast his vote.

Indeed it was the best of moments to be standing with my father outside of the polling station. Here was I, a young Iraqi who started opposing Saddam by writing articles in his college newspaper and giving talks at local Boston events in the few years leading up to the liberation. And there was my father, an old Peshmerga who had opposed Saddam by his pen and his gun, in Tehran and in Kurdistan, from ad-hoc offices to snowy mountains. My father spent his entire adult life fighting the injustices of the Baghdad regimes. Today, two anti-Saddam generations of my family stood outside the polling station, thousands of miles away from Iraq and proudly showed their purple index fingers.

Hammorabi notes the historical moment and social implications.

However, Alaa at the Mesopotamian makes the salient point:

One of the most awesome and mystical phenomena in existence is how truth always finds a way to assert and vindicate itself despite all odds, fog and confusion. They said that no valid elections could be held “under occupation”; and when 8 millions went to the polls last time, they dismissed that with the pretext that the other 6 or 7 millions did not, that there was fraud, that the "Shiaas" and "Kurds" were taking advantages etc. etc.; and therefore the thing had no validity. What about it now? Now that the Sunnis had the slightest chance and a little respite from intimidation, we saw them march to the polling stations in their millions. How about that! If the Americans were rigging and faking things and organizing "shows", why would all these people risk their lives and turnout in this fashion, even as many of them may be harboring negative feelings and resentments? Would it not be more logical and appropriate to continue boycotting and shunning such infernal theatricals staged by the wicked Americans and their allies, such “infidel satanic wedding parties” as our eloquent friend Zarqawi called it recently? Does that not demonstrate in the most striking way that everybody in Iraq has come to realize that this is a genuine and real process in which it is worthwhile to risk one’s life to participate?

Technorati: iraq, elections.

Stop the ACLU says give tyranny the purple finger. The Glittering Eye posts comments from Iraqis who voted. And the Moderate Voice notes that the Iraqis love to vote and has a roundup of other blogging views. Compare and contrast the Iraqi joy of voting to voting in the US where we take such things for granted.

UPDATE:
Posted to Basil's Blog, TMH Bacon Bits, Wizbang offers a very special caption contest where you can give the finger to you know who..., and Sister Toldjah. The Shape of Days is overwhelmed by the history of the moment, but still manages to have something profound to say. Ace of Spades notes that the Democrats have no position on events in Iraq. However, even Ace should know that this is the same position that the Democrats have been in since 2003. They've been testing the waters ever since the first US casualties were reported.

Congressional Mixed Messages

On this day of great accomplishment by the Iraqi people, we're witnessing setbacks here in the US. Not due to losses by the US Military, but because of the acts of Congress. Between the McCain torture amendment pending approval, a potential filibuster of changes to the Patriot Act, combined with no action on illegal immigration, we in the US are going to be less safe going forward.

Whose fault is this? Is it because those in the Senate and Congress in general do not want to cross the media darling that is Sen. John McCain (R-AZ)? After all, he's a decorated war hero, who spent years in a Vietnamese prison and tortured repeatedly. He's got first hand experience in being tortured, and yet here he is potentially hamstringing the US into giving terrorists a variety of Constitutional rights - including Due Process, access to the courts, and strangely enough, Miranda Rights. And civilian courts to determine whether the military's actions have gone too far.

That's right folks. Our military may have to declare Miranda rights to terrorists before we capture them. That's what Andy McCarthy warns of. And he knows from what he speaks as he's one of the premier terrorist prosecutors in the US - and was instrumental in the prosecutions of the 1993 WTC bombers. MarkLevinFan notes what life for the terrorists might be like under the McCain language. In fact, he notes what McCarthy really thinks of McCain's bill: it's the al Qaeda Bill of Rights.

While most of the Senate appears to have acceeded to McCain on the torture bill, and potentially gutting the Patriot Act, some aren't letting this go quietly. Sen. John Kyl is vehemently opposed to the chicanery relating to the Patriot Act. It was dealt with in Conference Committee, and yet the Democrats want to scuttle even the watered down version. None in either party can point to a single verifiable example of where an American's rights were infringed or violated by the powers eludicated in the Patriot Act provisions. Yet, that doesn't stop the opponents from claiming that the Patriot Act violates someone's rights. John at Powerline thinks this is the first step to reestablishing a wall between intel and law enforcement.

Stop the ACLU has more on the torture ban. There's no pleasing the Leftists in this country until they've gutted every last bit of national security protections that we have - real or theoretical. And lest we think otherwise, it is quite possible that we've lost opportunities to obtain intel because of constraints imposed since the Abu Ghraib scandal broke.

UPDATE:
Instapundit has a slightly less apocalyptic response to the Patriot Act revisions. More here.

The Big Fix

CNN is reporting that President Bush has announced a plan to spend $3.1 billion on repairs and strengthening of New Orleans levee system.

Okay. The devil is in the details as any of my faithful readers know. How and why some of the levees failed is still under investigation. Sonar readings that indicated that some piles weren't driven to the proper depth were contradicted by the Corps pulling some of the piles and found that they were, in fact, driven to the proper depth. It calls into question whether the levees were not designed to withstand the forces that were intended by the designers. There's still the possibility that substandard materials and failures of oversight that contributed to the failures.

All this has an impact on repairing and strengthening the levees. What sorts of assumptions have to be made, including potential storm surges, hydrology changes to the wetlands, MRGO, and the bureaucratic dynamics both in Washington and Louisiana.

Expect grousing from the Louisiana delegation that this isn't a sufficient amount to fix and strengthen the levees. It probably isn't - if the Big Dig is any guide ($3 billion initial price tag, $14.6 billion as built). However, the early indication is that at least Whiplash Nagin is saying the right things:

Nagin thanked Americans for the money to rebuild New Orleans and told former residents of the city to come home.

"It's time for you to come back to the Big Easy," he said. "This action today says come home to New Orleans."

Nagin said the levee system will be stronger than ever.

"These levees will be as high as 17 feet in some areas. We've never had that," he said. "We will have the holy trinity of recovery -- levees, housing and incentives."

Officials said the levee system would be rebuilt to its previous level of protection before the hurricane season next year, and that the process of strengthening them further would take two years.

They better get cracking as the hurricane season is only a few months away.

Taking Sides in the Transit Strike

Many commenters and pundits are busy taking sides in the potentially destructive transit strike in New York City. They're either with the MTA or the union.

I think both of those sides are in the wrong, and are not worth siding with in the slightest bit. The only side I'm on are the commuters who rely on a safe and reliable transit system to get to work, school, or for enjoying many of the entertainment options throughout the city.

In the end, the commuters are the ones who are going to be screwed by the outcome, regardless of whether there is a strike or a settlement is reached (by deadline or not). Heck, commuters are going to be screwed if an agreement is reached at any point.

Here's why: commuters are going to foot the bill for whatever agreement that is reached. And forget about that $1 billion surplus. It doesn't exist. It never did. It was unexpected real estate taxes, and that money was all spoken for before the transit negotiations even took place. Most folks are under the misguided impression that the $1 billion will somehow make this negotiation easier and that the MTA should somehow be able to come up with the money. Wrong.

Folks appear to side with the union this time because they think that the $1 billion exists somewhere and that the union should have some kind of profit sharing. Time to set the record straight on that.

Half of that $1 billion is going to shore up the MTA pension fund, which is one of the key benefits for TWU workers. The rest is going to various capital programs, and only a small portion went to the reduced/limited fares from Thanksgiving through New Years. So, that money is all spoken for well before any agreement with the union.

No matter was TWU honcho Roger Touissant says, he can't make that $1 billion appear out of thin air, even though that's what the MTA essentially did. MTA chicanery has gotten the MTA into trouble before, and it's getting them in trouble here. Both in the public relations mess, and in the negotiations because the union knows that the MTA plays fast and loose with the numbers.

However, the union offers on the table are laughable. They initially wanted 8% per year for each of the next three years (working out to an increase of 25.9% after 3 years), and have countered offers by the MTA with a 6% per year for the next three years, plus the status quo on actions against union workers. The 6% salary rate increase is nearly double what most commuters have seen (or will see over the next three years). In fact, the 6% rate increase over the next three years works out to not 18% but 19.1% through compounding the annual increases.

The average salary increase is around 3.5% per year. Is the service that good that they should get more than what the commuters get? With the higher energy costs incurred by the MTA, the budget will need to require additional revenue from somewhere, and commuters will shoulder that burden as well. And that's on top of the generous benefits offered by the MTA for workers.

And in the end, any salary increases will be borne by the commuters through higher fares as the MTA has to make ends meet and balance their budgets.

So, which side are you on?

Where'd They Go?

Once again, we're hearing stories that Iraq's WMD were spirited away to Syria on the eve of the Coalition invasion of Iraq in 2003. This time, the claim is coming from one of Israel's generals who was in charge at the time of the invasion.

The Israeli officer, Lieutenant General Moshe Yaalon, asserted that Saddam spirited his chemical weapons out of the country on the eve of the war. "He transferred the chemical agents from Iraq to Syria," General Yaalon told The New York Sun over dinner in New York on Tuesday night. "No one went to Syria to find it."

From July 2002 to June 2005, when he retired, General Yaalon was chief of staff of the Israel Defense Force, the top job in the Israeli military, analogous to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the American military. He is now a military fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. He made similar, but more speculative, remarks in April 2004 that attracted little notice in America; at that time he was quoted as saying of the Iraqi weapons, "Perhaps they transferred them to another country, such as Syria."

It's been speculated for quite some time that the WMD were taken in truck convoys into the Beka'a Valley, where they remain hidden from the world. There have been various reports over the past several years that there were numerous large truck convoys that went between Iraq and Syria that could not be explained. In fact, Israeli Prime Minister made that observation back in 2002:

An article in the Fall 2005 Middle East Quarterly reports that in an appearance on Israel's Channel 2 on December 23, 2002, Israel's prime minister, Ariel Sharon stated, "Chemical and biological weapons which Saddam is endeavoring to conceal have been moved from Iraq to Syria." The allegation was denied by the Syrian government at the time as "completely untrue," and it attracted scant American press attention, coming as it did on the eve of the Christmas holiday.

It is quite possible that the WMD were taken out in these convoys, but the only way to know for sure is to go and investigate the claims by having boots on the ground in Syria - and that's not going to happen anytime soon. You just can't expect Syria to roll over, despite the increasing pressure as a result of the Harari assassination, the Mehlis Report, and continued attacks pro-Lebanese politicians and leaders by Syrian operatives.

UPDATE:
Pamela at Atlas Shrugs noticed the NY Sun story as well. And calls out the Leftists who continue to say no WMDs and other such blather.

The Battle For Ground Zero, Part 81

The 9/11 memorial is supposed to include a series of waterfalls that were supposed to be integral to the overall memorial, but if you haven't noticed the weather these days, it can get to be bitter cold in NYC. And the tests up in Canada have revealed that the waterfalls will likely need to be turned off in the winter. Gee, isn't that a surprise. In fact, it is a surprise to folks like Debra Burlingame, whose brother was among those murdered on 9/11 by the terrorists:

Debra Burlingame, a member of the memorial's foundation board, said she was "astounded" to learn of the waterfall's shortcomings.

"It seems to me this is something that should have been worked out before they selected the design," she said.

"It doesn't create confidence that we're this far along and only now determining that we picked a design for a memorial that will not function 30 percent of the time," said Burlingame, whose pilot husband was killed on one of the 9/11 planes.

[the Post got Debra's relationship to Charles F. Burlingame wrong - Charles was her brother, not husband.]

And the message of the day not to take things so literally was also picked up by the New York Times, based on this story about the memorial fountains that will reside on each of the tower footprints.

The great pool-filled memorial voids that are meant to mark the absence of the twin towers will be 31 percent smaller than the towers' actual footprints.

Each pool will be a 176-foot square, centered within the original 211-foot-10-inch-square footprint. The tower outlines will not be shown graphically on the plaza, so there will be no indication at ground level precisely where the twin towers stood; only an intimation.

It has been an open secret for almost two years that the pools would not faithfully represent the tower outlines. Official descriptions do not emphasize this fact but are also careful not to equate the pools and footprints exactly. The World Trade Center Memorial Foundation's Web site, for example, speaks of "two voids that reside in the original footprints" - not "two voids that define the original footprints."

Only now, however, is the degree of discrepancy growing clear. On Dec. 5, the foundation and the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation issued a request for proposals from construction managers. It indicated that the pools would be 180-foot squares, a measurement that includes a parapet where victims' names will be inscribed.

In other words, don't take everything so literally. You have to use your imagination to overcome the deficiencies in the memorial designs. Meanwhile, the real work is only starting to get underway as a number of companies, including Bovis Lend Lease and Slattery Skansa, are preparing bids for the memorial construction. And Governor Pataki looks like he's going to bypass Mayor Bloomberg by offering Silverstein the Liberty Bonds directly.

Eager to ensure that construction begins on the Freedom Tower next year, Gov. George E. Pataki bypassed the city yesterday and announced that the state would provide the developer Larry A. Silverstein with $1.67 billion in Liberty Bonds for the project, the most visible symbol of both the rebuilding effort at ground zero and the governor's legacy.

Mr. Silverstein has been at odds with Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's administration over his application for all of the remaining $3.35 billion in tax-exempt bonds. Though the two sides resolved some issues this week, city officials continued to question Mr. Silverstein's proposal for a 5 percent development fee, which could add $100 million to the cost of the tower.

UPDATE:
Greg.org has an entire section devoted to WTC reconstruction. It's especially harsh on Libeskind and Pataki, but especially Libeskind, who swills in bogus numerology - including in his 9/11 memorial in Padua, Italy. Now, I don't necessarily agree with all of Greg's postings, but on Libeskind and Pataki, he's right. They've botched the rebuilding in a big way.

UPDATE:
I've finally got some great news to report about the rebuilding. Sir Norman Foster is being commissioned to build the second tower to be built at Ground Zero, following the Freedom Center (7WTC is actually outside the original WTC complex). It will be a 65-story tower. I was a fan of his Kissing Towers concept for Ground Zero, and think that his Hearst Tower in Midtown is a great, if not iconic, building. You might not know who Foster is, but you know his work.

Morning Rounds

Captains Quarters, Pajamas Media, Instapundit, and many others are covering the Iraqi elections. Few reports of violence, and very heavy turnout has been reported, even in Sunni areas. Captain Ed reports that the low violence may be due to a negotiated ceasefire between native insurgent groups and the coalition forces. The hope is to get these groups to lay down their arms and consider the political process as a way to air their differences.

Bill Roggio is in Iraq, and provides his take. Also, check out the Iraqi bloggers, starting with Omar and Mohammed at Iraq the Model.

Meanwhile, Michael Totten has an enlightening visit to an iftar run by Hizbullah. An iftar is the first meal of the day just after sunset during the month of Ramadan. It's a big deal, and Hizbullah’s Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah was supposed to speak. Well, things didn't exactly go as expected, and the happy face that the Hizbullah media flack quickly wore off when behind the curtain it was revealed that Hizbullah hadn't changed at all. And this is what they have planned for Lebanon and anywhere else they set up shop.

UPDATE:
Michelle Malkin has running updates on the historic elections. As I noted last nite, this is a new dawn for the Iraqi people, who are electing a full four-year term Parliment. They're making the most of it, as turnout is extremely heavy and the elections have been extended by an hour.

UPDATE:
This is a pretty good quote to keep in mind:

"Remember my friends, that's not ink your dipping your finger into... it's freedom."

HT: Oh_dude

UPDATE:
Austin Bay notes the unending stream of pessimism from the NYT. The paper focuses on the threats of violence, dissent, and problems and can't see that these elections were a great success. Go figure.

UPDATE:
Six Meat Buffet notes that the elections are going badly - for the lefties. Turnout is high. Violence is low. Jeff Goldstein of Protein Wisdom also notes the silence of the Lefties. As does SoCalPundit.

UPDATE:
Flopping Aces has collected some great photos from around Iraq. And he notes what a difference four years makes.

UPDATE:
LGC - the Little Green Colloquium - takes the media to task for burying the historic events in Iraq in favor of ice storms and other agenda items.

A New Dawn

Iraq is once again about to engage in historic elections throughout the country. But instead of hearing how things are from back here in the US, let me clear the floor and let Mohammed from Iraq the Model describe events:

Tomorrow it’s going to be us who decide and I can feel the greatness of the responsibility because the result will draw the shape of our future and will determine how long it will take till we can announce victory in this war; our war against the past, against the past’s illusions and the past’s mistakes; with our hands we can make this war last shorter… with our own choices.

One year ago we wanted to defeat terror and the shadows of dictatorship and tell them that we are not willing to go backwards and that we’re ready to build a new Iraq where the people choose their representatives…
The choice didn’t matter then as much as voting itself did; all we wanted to do was to go and cast our votes regardless of the choices we made.

Yesterday we were sitting together with our friends talking and discussing our points of view. We found that our ambitions are way bigger than the mere idea of voting or practicing our right to elect, now we feel that our votes are a responsibility and a heavy one.

We are hesitant and worried about our choices and maybe the opinion polls results that we’ve seen-or at least from what I hear from people I meet-indicate that there’s a higher percentage than normal of people who haven’t made up their mind yet on who to vote for.

Me and my friends were sitting discussing “who’s best for Iraq?” and the reasons on which each one of us based his/her opinion. I was seeing a drastic change in the sense of the historic responsibility we shoulder.

Read it all. He's hearing sporadic gunfire and explosions, but nothing has been reported thus far. Have the terrorists waited until today to continue their campaign of horrors against the Iraqi people? Is that why they were laying low over the past few days? We'll find out over the next few hours. Early reports indicate that things are quiet, though rumors are rampant of all manner of malfeasance.

Alaa of the Messopotamian shares his reasoning on how to vote in the election, Iraq Vote notes that an Israeli of Iraqi origin is voting,

Others following the elections: Flopping Aces, Iraqipundit, Roger L. Simon, Pajamas Media has regular updates.

And don't forget The Purple Fingers of Freedom

What Would Gov. Corzine Do?

New Jersey is $6 billion in the hole going into next year. Gov-elect Jon Corzine has to balance the state budget by law, and among the key concerns is how to fund the Transportation Trust Fund, which will be out of money July 1, 2006.

First guess? He's going to raise the gas tax. Which he said he wouldn't do when he was busy buying the governorship from the other rich guy in the election (Forrester). Don Surber put it quite succinctly. Corzine's a liar (in stereo). DynamoBuzz also noticed Corzine's revisionism of current events.

Here's my best guess as to what Corzine is going to do to balance the budget. First of all, there will be no spending cuts of consequence. That would go against everything the Democrat stands for. Tax and fee increases? That's the most likely scenario.

First to be considered - an increase in the gas tax - and the only question is by how much. Right now, it's the lowest tarriff in the country, but that's going to change. I figure an increase by a dime will be a nice round figure.

Expect all kinds of other fees to rise as well. Real estate transfer taxes will rise (again). Personal income taxes may get an increase (again). Corporate income taxes will be increased (again). How will companies react to these new fees and tax increases? They'll go elsewhere, forcing the state to choose between raising taxes higher or cutting spending, but no one has tried tackling that beast and I don't expect Corzine to do so either.

Enlighten-NJ says that Corzine is going to be doing business as usual. He's not going to change the profligate spending, nor is he going to take on the unions to wring concessions on the pension and benefits costs to the state. Nope. Just expect more taxes and fees.

Opposition to the possible gas tax increases is already lining up. That's fine, but can someone explain how the Transportation Trust Fund will remain solvent without some kind of action? Sen. Dianne Allen seems to think that if you restructure how the TTF is used and take funds from the MVC (motor vehicles), they could make ends meet. That sounds great, except that the MVC funds are being used elsewhere to balance the budget, which as I noted earlier, isn't anywhere near being balanced.

Also commenting on the budget mess in New Jersey: Daily Pundit, Jewish Blogmeister, The Club for Growth says it isn't their fault - they voted for the other guy, Blue State Conservatives, [and updated regularly] Political Dogs

UPDATE 12/15/2005:
Enlighten NJ has a thoughtful and comprehensive posting on the gas tax, the fact that everyone knew that the tax would need to be raised, but no one would deal honestly with the issue - which really focuses on how the monies will be used.

Hey Ho, Ahmadinejad's Got To Go

Don't take my word for it. Listen to Ahmadinejad. This guy is delusional and a megalomaniac in the vein of Hitler or Stalin.

Commit genocide? No problem.
Mass murder? That's fine by him.
Ethnic Cleansing? The sooner the better.

But if it's Jews who claim that they were exterminated by Hitler, well then that's simply not true according to the Iranian leader. It's all a charade. But that's not the least of our worries about Ahmadinejad and his mullahs.

Ahmadinejad hopes the West keeps talking and stalling for time as his scientists ready a nuclear weapon for use against any of his enemies, including Israel, the US, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, or much of Europe.

Nuclear war during the Cold War was as close as the least stable guy with their finger on the button. Now, we're witnessing what may happen if the least stable guy in the room has their hand on the button with absolutely no limitations on its use. Ahmadinejad is unconstrained by notions that would otherwise cause a political leader to pause and stop to consider the use of the nuclear weapon. During the Cold War, the US and USSR came perilously close to engaging each other in a nuclear confrontation, such as during the Cuban Missile Crisis or during the 1973 Yom Kippur War, but in each instance, the crisis passed as each side realized they were adding to the fires and sought to back away.

Ahmadinejad has no interest in backing away. He wants the confrontation. He wants the violence. And it's for that reason that Ahmadinejad has got to go. And not just Ahmadinejad, but the mad mullahs that make up the totalitarian government that controls Iran's future. They're so convinced that the nucelar bomb will change their fortunes that they've staked pretty much everything on it.

The sad thing is that so far the mullahs have been right. They've bluffed their way into nearly obtaining the bomb without the interference of the IAEA, the EU, the UN, or the US. Despite the fact that US forces are in the region, we're not quite able to deal with the Iranian threat because of the Democratic back-benchers who are politically motivated to undermine the Administration at all costs, despite the threats posed by enemies of the US around the world.

The others aren't able to muster the political will to force Iran to stop, and instead consider one Munich Agreement after another. They'll have peace in their time, until the bomb goes off shattering that illusion.

Others blogging on Ahmadinejad and his insane clown rantings: Flopping Aces, Atlas Shrugs, Discarded Lies, Dissecting leftism, A Knights Blog, In The Bullpen, Media Backspin, Michelle Malkin, Regime Change Iran, and Dr. Sanity. Mudville Gazette notes that the US is not going to rule out a strike against Iran unless Iran conforms to international agreements and norms.

UPDATE:
Thinking Aloud says WTF and thinks that Ahmadinejad may be speaking for himself and not his country, he's well on his way to becoming the next Hitler. Smooth Stone comes up with a snazzy logo proclaiming that Israel is on the map to stay. Scaramouche has some interesting comments, and thinks that Ahmadinejad's out to confront folks. We just don't know the endgame.
Israpundit wants people to speak out against Ahmadinejad's ravings, and notices that Sweeden is about to cut diplomatic ties with Iran. NetWMD.com also wants people to speak out. Shuggy's Blog traces Ahmadinejad's comments back to European anti-Semitism. Also commenting is Sophistpundit.

Newsweek Covers The Harbin/Songhua River Disaster

Better late than never, Newsweek steps up to bat with a pretty thorough piece on the Songhua River chemical spill that contaminated the river that serves as the source of drinking water for the city of Harbin (population 3.8 million). In particular, the focus is on the government response, including the suppression of all news relating to the death of the environmental offical in charge who denied that the Songhua River was contaminated for nearly 2 weeks.

And the suppression was ordered from the highest levels of the Communist government.

Wang's death was conspicuously absent from domestic newspaper headlines—on orders from President Hu Jintao himself, say Chinese journalists. The press clampdown is just one gauge of the extent to which Hu's regime is scrambling to contain the damage—political, diplomatic and economic—from the chemical spill. Millions of ordinary Chinese downstream from Jilin were enraged by government dissembling and delays; Beijing also had to apologize to Russia for the 145-km-long toxic spill, which was due to reach the Siberian city of Khabarovsk this week. Meanwhile back in Jilin, Vice Mayor Wang was set up to take the fall for the ham-handed local effort to gloss over the crisis, say two Chinese sources close to officials involved. "The Jilin provincial government came to the con-clusion that Wang Wei should be held entirely responsible," says one. "He decided to commit suicide to prove he was innocent."

The current mess is a setback for Hu's efforts to beef up accountability and transparency in China. It has also revived prickly questions such as "whether or not ordinary citizens have the right to decide what levels of government to blame for neglecting official duties," says Prof. Mao Shoulong, an expert on government administration at People's University.

The death of Wang Wei—who was due to be questioned and could have incriminated other colleagues—has enhanced the perception of a cover-up. This makes it even more crucial for the regime to be seen as efficient and tough, but fair, in dispensing justice. "Anyone found guilty of dereliction of duty will be dealt with harshly," vowed Li Yizhong, China's industrial-safety czar and head of the State Council's investigatingteam. "Any move to cover up... [is in] defiance of the law."

Except that when the Chinese communists are implicated, in which case, no one will ever have a right to know...

The Battle For Ground Zero, Part 80

Tom Bernstein, who was one of the founders of the Freedom Center group that got the boot when they couldn't come to terms with the Pataki Administration's requirements for being sensitive to the families' concerns about anti-American content in the cultural center had a whopper of a statement at yesterday's meeting, entitled "What's Happening to the Arts at Ground Zero?," which was organized by the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council and the New School's Vera List Center for Art and Politics.

He said:

But Mr. Bernstein said that arts organizations with an exclusive 9/11 focus would not "stand the test of time." Such a theme would also represent a retreat from the original mandate for the site, which was to pair a tribute to the dead with educational experiences for the living, he said.

"It's a much, much narrower vision - a significant departure," he said.

Why would a cultural center with a narrow focus exclusively on 9/11 be a failure? Apparenlty it's simply Bernstein's belief that this is the case, and there's nothing to indicate any factual basis for that assertion. He seems to think that he had the liberty to recast the 9/11 experience any which way he pleases, which is precisely the reason he got the boot in the first place. The lessons learned from the 9/11 attacks are that there are groups around the world dedicated to attacking and destroying our way of life. They have struck before, and they will strike again.

Meanwhile, there's still a feeling among those attending the meeting that the issues could be revisited in the future. Oh goody.

Underlying the evening's discussion was, nonetheless, a sense of "it ain't over yet" - that the essentials could still be revisited. Mr. Yaro said he had at one point thought that a Norman Rockwell museum might be a safe bet, but then reconsidered. "It's very difficult to think of cultural activities that aren't going to be offensive to somebody," he said.

Don't Get On Betty's Bad Side

You might not like it. Especially if you're a member of the Cindy Sheehan far Left wing of the Democratic Party. In fact, Betty Dawisha puts it more succinctly than many supporters of the war ever could in polite company:

"Anybody who doesn't appreciate what America has done, and President Bush, let them go to hell!"

Ouch.

The Political Teen has the video.

Dam Break in Missouri

Gateway Pundit has more:

A wall of water is rushing down the Black River in Reynolds County south of the Upper Taum Sauk Lake Dam after the dam failed.

A fire dispatcher in Lesterville tells News 4 that crews released water from the reservoiraum Sa but apparently failed to open the dam. The dispatcher says that the pressure from the added water caused the dam to fail, sending a wall of water thundering down the Black River.

There are reports that the flash flooding has washed away several homes. The bridge at Highway N has been washed away. A tractor-trailer on Highway N was reportedly washed away. There unconfirmed reports that some residents are missing.

Iran Stuffing Ballots, Or Are They?

I'll report, and you decide. The NYT and other outlets are reporting that a tanker truck was stopped at the Iraqi border with Iran and searched. It was then discovered that the tanker was filled with thousands of ballots for the ongoing Iraqi elections.

Confederate Yankee (and crossposted to Newsbusters, is reporting that the Times may have been taken for a ride - that the Iraqi forces in charge of border control said that no such event took place. Per Reuters:

The head of Iraq's border guards denied police reports on Wednesday that a tanker truck stuffed with thousands of forged ballot papers had been seized crossing into Iraq from Iran before Thursday's elections. "This is all a lie," said Lieutenant General Ahmed al-Khafaji, the chief of the U.S.-trained force which has responsibility for all Iraq's borders. "I heard this yesterday and I checked all the border crossings right away. The borders are all closed anyway," he told Reuters.

Curious. It is still possible that the Iranians did try to get ballot stuffing into Iraq, but the question is why bother doing it the hard way. Getting the dead to vote early and often is so much easier. Just ask Chicago Democrats. Or New Jersey bureaucrats who never bothered to clear the voter rolls of thousands of dead voters.

UPDATE:
Count on Point Five to get to the bottom of the situation.

UPDATE:
This story is beginning to get wider attention. AJ Strata, All Things Beautiful, Stop the ACLU, and Right Wing Nuthouse all weigh in.

UPDATE 12/15/2005:
Michael Ledeen, who cannot be excused as a White House flack or an Iran apologist, thinks that there might be fire behind the smoke of the original story. Iran definitely wants to affect the outcome of the election, so the question becomes that if Iran did try to push phony ballots into Iraq, what should be the appropriate response. And that's a far tougher question to address.

Getting to the Bottom of the Levees

The Army Corps of Engineers has pulled some of the sheet piles from the 17th Street Canal, which was the site of the breach that caused one of the most significant flooding episodes in Katrina's aftermath.

The results are somewhat surprising considering what engineers had determined based on sonar findings:

Four sections of metal sheet pilings pulled Tuesday morning from both sides of the breach in the 17th Street Canal levee wall were all found to be more than 23 feet, 6 inches long, exactly as called for in design documents, Army Corps of Engineers officials said.

The pilings had been sunk to a depth of 17 feet below sea level, also meeting design specifications for the canal, said Col. Lewis Setliff III, commander of the corps' Task Force Guardian, which is which is in charge of the rebuilding the levees that were broken during Hurricane Katrina.

The depth of the pilings, which support floodwalls on the canal, had been questioned by independent engineers, who noted that sonar soundings taken elsewhere on the levees showed them going only about 10 feet below sea level. The engineers also had questioned whether even 17 feet below sea level would be deep enough to stop seepage below the canal bottom, which is blamed for causing the collapse of some walls.

It would seem that the failures are more complex than first thought, though the possibility that the failure was based on the design, and not the execution. The failures still do not exclude the possibility that the design itself was deficient, or that there were other sections of the sheet piling that weren't driven to the proper depth or were the wrong size. However, these samples seem to rule the latter two possiblities out. And as Paul of Wizbang notes, this moves the onus onto the Army Corps, because the possibility that the contractors screwed up is quickly being removed from the table. We're being left with a flawed design from the inception. However, there's still the possibility that the fill material used by the contractors wasn't up to spec, which means that the contractors could still be on the hook.

Meanwhile, Senate Bill 95 was defeated, which means that consolidation efforts will wait til the new session.

"I think the ideal thing would be to abolish all levee districts with one swoop and start over," the first-term Republican senator from Arabi told about 100 people attending the first membership meeting of Citizens for a Safer Jefferson. "If we don't have something that protects everyone, I don't think that's fair."

Although Boasso's original bill called for management by a regional board, it also would have required that millages dedicated to levee maintenance be spent in the districts where they were generated. But Boasso told the meeting that even that sacred cows may need to be slain if southeast Louisiana is to have adequate levee protection for the entire region.

Oh, and that vote that was supposed to take place in February? Well, there are now lawsuits to make sure that it goes on as scheduled, as opposed to having the politicians delay it for as long as possible.

Travel Advice

Without question, New York is the most expensive venue in the United States," said John A. Fox, a senior vice president of PKF Consulting. "In the rest of the country, $225 will get you a very good four- to five-star hotel room. But in New York, for $225, you'll get a small room in a low-quality three-star hotel that was not necessarily recently renovated."

And the view? "You'll get a brick wall."

That's assuming you can get a room. Hotel occupancy rates have risen to 85.4 percent, up from 81.4 last September, according to PKF. "New York is essentially sold-out until the end of the year," Mr. Fox said.

The NYT writer, Denny Lee, seems to forget the basics of travel bargain hunting. Look early and often. After claiming that he couldn't find a room at the Holiday Inn Express for less than $299, I found rates through the Holiday Inn website (www.ichotelsgroup.com) for $159 for the weekend of January 6 through January 8. That's the advance purchase price. Midweek strike your fancy? Try $260 for December 27-29. It really makes me wonder just what and how the author was searching for hotel prices. The $299 price seems to be their rack rate, and with the slightest bit of effort you can get rates far less than that. I just picked a couple of days at random, and even managed to get comparable rates for the July 4th weekend that were pretty good at the UN Crowne Plaza.

The key to getting a good rate on hotels? Looking for deals well in advance and a certain amount of flexibility. I usually plan my trips at least three months out. I lock in good rates, and check to see if I can improve on them as I get closer to the trip dates. Signing up for the various affinity clubs can help secure better rates as well. Looking at places like Orbitz, Hotwire, Travelocity, and Expedia helps - and the rates can and will differ between each other. The direct links to hotel websites may offer the best rates.

But the bottom line is that it seems that Lee's weak initial search served as the basis of an article to find unaffiliated hotels that were priced at under $250 per night. And that's a shame. New York can be an expensive place to visit, but if you do your homework, you can stay for less than you think.

There are quite a few people who don't want to risk staying at a hotel that is unaffiliated with a chain, so staying with a familiar brand name is key.

Technorati: travel deal, travel tips, nyc travel deal, nyc.

Don't Hold Your Breath

President Bush's comments taken out of context by media outlets? Say it isn't so. Michelle Malkin and Greyhawk at Mudville Gazette hope to set the record straight:

QUESTION: Since the inception of the Iraqi war, I'd like to know the approximate total of Iraqis who have been killed. And by Iraqis I include civilians, military, police, insurgents, translators.

THE PRESIDENT: How many Iraqi citizens have died in this war? I would say 30,000, more or less, have died as a result of the initial incursion and the ongoing violence against Iraqis. We've lost about 2,140 of our own troops in Iraq.

Can we parse this for a moment?

For starters, the President answered a different question than what was asked as he rephrased the question. Iraqi citizens means civilians, Iraqi military, Iraqi police, some translators, and potentially some insurgents. It excludes our own losses (which he answered separately), as well as the foreign jihadists. Further, the President didn't distinguish between who did the killing and when. He simply provided a fact that 30,000 citizens were killed. Whether that entire figure was civilian, military, police, insurgent, or some combination of the above was not broken out by the President.

Then, there's the conflation of civilians, military, police, and insurgents. The media, with Reuters as the prototypical outlet, left off all the other categories, and instead stated that 30,000 civilians died (coinicidentally in a report on elections in Iraq). That's not what the President said, even in the most liberal reading of the transcript. Civilians do not equal citizens.

Instead, the headlines key on 30,000 and civilians. The rest? Forgotten. And that's all that most folks will get out of what Bush said yesterday.

But remember. The media is on your side. They just don't mention which side that is.

UPDATE 12/14/2005:
Michelle Malkin reports that the headline at the SF Chronicle was changed after folks emailed demanding a correction. A correction was made, but without any corresponding explanation in or accompanying the article. Go figure.

Palestinian Elections Are Delayed - Again

The terrorists in charge can't prepare for the January 25 elections because the terrorists that would like to be in charge are causing trouble. It is almost to the point that the PA has to cancel elections *again* because Hamas and Hizbullah are targeting those in charge of running the elections:

In Tuesday's violence, masked gunmen stormed election offices in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, firing in the air, destroying computers and ordering workers out of the buildings - all with little or no interference by Palestinian police. There were no reports of injuries.

Amar Dweik, director of the election commission, said operations were halted until the Palestinian Authority can guarantee the safety of their workers.

There's a reason that the Palestinian police aren't interfering - they sympathize with the terrorists, and many of them are members of the terrorist groups like Hamas or Hizbullah, in addition to their paychecks from the Palestinian Authority.

Don't Get Fooled Again

Iran's 'President' Mahmoud Ahmadinejad once again questioned whether the Holocaust ever occurred, and took a militant stance on Israel. He's been at this for the past week. He earlier claimed that if the Holocaust occurred, it should be the Europeans who should set up a new Jewish state in Europe and excise Israel from the Middle East.

Nice guy.

And why is the media giving this guy the honorific of president? He's just the lead guy in a totalitarian dictatorship, whose intentions are clear for anyone who actually bothers to read what they say. They call for the genocide of the Jewish people - eliminating the state of Israel, have every intention of getting nuclear weapons to do just that, and to impose their will on the Middle East at the earliest possible opportunity.

Ahmadinejad has been unapologetic about taking Iran on a more openly defiant course, insisting on Iran’s right to develop its nuclear program and often using rhetoric reminiscent of the 1980s heyday of the Islamic Revolution.

But he has alienated even some conservative allies in Iran, who fear he is hurting the country’s image. Moderate Iranians have called on the ruling Islamic establishment to rein in the president.

Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has ultimate say on all matters, has backed Ahmadinejad’s calls for Israel’s elimination.

The controversy comes at a sensitive time for Iran, which is under heavy international pressure over its nuclear program. The United States is pressing the International Atomic Energy Agency to refer Iran to the U.N. Security Council for possible sanctions.

The IAEA hasn't taken up the issue, despite its receipt of a Nobel Prize for curbing nuclear proliferation. That's curious in and of itself. You would think that an organization dedicated to stopping nuclear proliferation would do everything possible to stop a member nation from obtaining nuclear weapons, yet it steadfastly refuses to act on Iran. Curious.

And hurting Iran's image? Was it all that good to begin with? Give me a break. The conservative mullahs are simply concerned that Ahmadinejad's comments will actually be believed by the West and steps will be taken to curtail Iran's nuclear program well before they could obtain the nuclear weapons that they covet. I don't trust the Iranians, and we should verify what they say.

UPDATE:
Israel believes that Iran is as close as 2 years from getting the bomb to as many as 10 years. That's quite a range. Intel agencies can't quite narrow that range down, which speaks volumes to how much we really know about rogue regimes and their intentions. Considering that Iran has publicly declared that they would like to see the Middle East without Israel in its midst, do you want to trust the Iranians with that kind of spread on their capabilities? In fact, there have been some reports that the Iranians are as little as a year away from having the ability to build a nuclear weapon, which were quickly followed by supposed leaks from Israeli military officials that were preparing plans to strike against Iranian nuclear facilities much as an earlier generation of Israelis destroyed the Osirak reactor in Iraq before it could go online in 1981.

IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Dan Halutz said Tuesday that Iran was approaching the point where it would have the technological know-how to build nuclear weapons.

According to Halutz, it is possible that Iran would be able to complete building a bomb as early as 2008 or as far as 2015.

And with all the criticism that the Iranians have gotten for their comments, has any tangible action been taken to rein in the Iranian threat by the IAEA, the EU, or the UN? Nope. Just lots of talk and platitudes - along with apparently a silent prayer and hope that the Iranians don't get the bomb on their watch.

UPDATE:
Pamela at Atlas Shrugged thinks that the Iranians are trying to goad the Israelis into attacking because they want a conflict. In fact, she thinks that the Iranians already have a bomb and are awaiting an attack to unleash it. I'm not convinced of that, but considering that the Iranians were assisted by the AH Khan nuclear network, anything is possible.

Cause Celebre

Until yesterday, the cause celebre flavor of the month was convicted mass murderer Stanley Tookie Williams, who was executed last nite by the State of California after 25 years on Death Row. Tookie murdered four people in cold blood (Albert Owens, Tsai-Shai Yang, Yen-I Yang, and Ye-Chen Lin). The media beat down doors to the Hollywood types who for reasons that defy logic and reasoning made him the poster child for all that is wrong with the death penalty. They claimed that he should receive clemency because he had changed his life around behind bars. Of course, the fact that he was in the most secure part of San Quentin prison because he was continually making trouble for inmates and corrections officers ever since he got to prison was overlooked by the Hollywood types.

The usual suspects lined up to get their 15 minutes, including Jesse Jackson, who couldn't even recall the names of any of the four victims who Tookie murdered. That was an enlightening moment of course. Honoring and assisting a mass murderer while ignoring the victims. Where have we seen that before?

Now, we have a report today that Clara Barton HS in NYC sought to invite convicted terrorist supporter Lynne Stewart to talk at an after-school program at the school. Why would an invitation even be extended by the student government in the first place? Do they not know what Stewart did or who she represented in the process of breaking federal law?

The decision to cancel a high-school lecture in Brooklyn by a civil-rights lawyer convicted of aiding terrorists has sparked a debate over free speech between the students who invited her and the administrators who said the invitation was inappropriate.

The issue arose at Clara Barton HS in Crown Heights last month, when the school's principal canceled the after-school lecture by Lynne Stewart two days before it was supposed to occur at the school's auditorium.

Stewart, 66, was convicted earlier this year of providing material support to terrorists by relaying messages to militant followers of Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman, a blind cleric serving a life prison sentence for his role in a 1993 plot to blow up five city landmarks.

The public school's student government president, Gardith Edouard, 17, said her classmates were outraged that administrators canceled the lecture.

"The students wanted to hear what she had to say," Edouard said.

Is it possible that the outrage is just slightly misdirected? The school is supposed to be a learning environment, and inviting a convicted terrorist supporter to speak doesn't exactly teach students anything. It gives a convicted felon a forum that they should otherwise not have. Stewart is unrepentant over her providing material support for terrorists by passing information to terrorist groups in Egypt. Terrorists whose sole goal is to attack US interests around the world.

In fact, I suspect that it was the parents of some students who sought to have Stewart speak, not the students themselves, who probably have never heard of Stewart in the first place.

If the students want to see outrage, how about talking to the families of the six people who were murdered by Rahman's followers in the 1993 WTC bombing? The six who were murdered: John DiGiovanni, Robert Kirkpatrick, Steven Knapp, William Macko, Wilfredo Mercado and Monica Rodriguez Smith, who was pregnant. More than 1,000 others were injured in the harrowing escape from the towers that quickly filled with choking smoke.

UPDATE:
Pamela at Atlas Shrugs has more.

15 Years?

Time flies when you're having fun. It's been 15 years since the Internet hit it bigtime. In that time, I've had the opportunity to become a billionaire several times over, get hundreds of requests to partake in deals from Nigeria that will add to your net worth, get pornography for free without ever having to go buy a Playboy ever again, never have to worry about my manhood because of the wonders of modern medicine, and never have to engage in the dating scene without first consulting an online dating service.

It all started with a graphic interface for the networks that we used back in college. They called it Mosaic. And it was glorious. I was doing research on Middle East politics and it made it so much easier to obtain source information than going through Gopher. You remember Gopher don't you? And I don't mean Ted Grandy from the Love Boat either.

I mean the original way to sort through the various networks connected to each other on college campuses. And that doesn't even scratch the surface of the original dating services - the relays. If you know what I'm talking about, you know what I mean. Too many people I know used the relays as one huge chat room/dating service - and it worked.

So, from those origins, we now have e-harmony.com, jdate.com, match.com, and hundreds of other services that did the same things as the relays, but you now have to plunk down your credit card to use them.

And CNN has it all wrong. The most significant step in the development in the Internet is the fact that people realized that the could do more than talk to each other - they could use it for commerce. So, I'd say that the development of Ebay and Amazon.com was the key development. Of course, that coincides with the moment in time when the Internet went from being cutting edge to being passe, but that's besides the point.

There was money to be made. Stock options to get. Venture capitalists to fleece. And Nigerians looking for easy money. Oh, those Nigerians. They took grifting and scamming to new levels. I have personally been contacted by the sons and relatives of dictators from various African nations too many times to count. Hundreds of emails. Billions in money transfers just waiting for my personal contact information to seal the deal and transfer my cut on each deal. Which, in a way, was like the stock options offered by thousands of Internet startup companies - the dot coms.

And in a flash, the stock options were torched in the market correction that saw so many dot coms go belly up. Heck, the sock puppet from Pets.com ended up working for a credit counselling service or other such nonsense. He was had for pennies on the dollar - and began making money for someone else. Go figure.

Now, we don't think twice about email, videoconferencing, VoIP, blackberries, or any other accoutrements of what the Internet has wrought. In fact, you wouldn't be here reading this if the Internet wasn't around. I'd probably be watching TV or a movie right now. And wondering who the heck the guy on the screen is and not knowing the joys of IMDB.com to search for movie trivia. Which reminds me.

Football's on [crummy game such as it is - is still better than anything else on tonite].

I guess I better go check my fantasy football stats online.

Hey, never said I'd give up my usage that easily.

Disaster Preparedness? Not Really

So, we have a report that shows California is unprepared for a potential tsunami strike with the accompanying surge. Is it any surprise that disaster preparedness is so far down the list of priorities in many states, and most localities?

We've seen this problem time and time again.

I've noted the problems here in New Jersey, New York's disaster preparedness plan for hurricanes is suspect, and Louisiana's failures are legion.

Many localities simply don't put disaster preparedness high on the priority list. It just doesn't bring home the bacon like a good bridge or highway. Designing a comprehensive disaster preparedness plan, including an evacuation guide isn't sexy, and most folks would rather spend their time figuring out what programs to fund - not preparing for worst-case scenarios.

So, many communities around the country are ill-prepared to deal with potential disasters. Which means it is up to individuals themselves to be prepared.

Pirro To AG's Race: Hillary To Run Unopposed?

So, after the disasterous four-month campaign that saw the wheels come off the Pirro campaign and no support from the state GOP, Gov. Pataki has managed to convince Pirro to run for Attorney General.

Which means who exactly is running against Hillary for the US Senate? Anyone? Bueller? Will the GOP in NY get a player to be named later, plus a conditional draft pick?

And there's the tiny little problem that Pirro herself is vetoing the trade. She's steadfastly denying the trade rumors according to spokespeople close to her campaign.

As I've previously noted, there's no good reason for her to withdraw - as long as the state GOP gets behind her and she gets her act together (and there's still plenty of time to do that as well). All these machinations do is show how futile and inept the NY State GOP is.

One of the biggest problems with all the talk about Pirro switching races is that there's no one being touted for the Senate race in her stead. That shows just how thin the GOP bench in NY is as does the fact that they've brought in a ringer from Mass. - William Weld - to run for governor.

A Cogent Observation

One has to wonder what is going through the minds of the human rights organizations and folks like Cindy Sheehan, Code Pink, and all the other leftist groups out there that find fault with everything that the US has ever done. You see, while they're all blathering about how the US done them wrong, China has gone on one of its repressive slaughters - killing at least 20 protestors who were upset over a local property rights issue.

Imagine a bunch of protestors in New London being killed protesting the building of a new condominum complex after the Kelo v. New London decision came down from the US Supreme Court.

Protestors in China face death when they step out against the government. Government controls the right to speech and assembly. We, in the US, don't have to fear the government in this fashion. People with unpopular or even bone-headed thoughts who want to show the rest of the world just how bone-headed they are, are free to do so without worrying that the government will kill them.

Cindy Sheehan and all the rest should count their lucky stars that they live in a country that is so forgiving of dissent. It could be far worse for them - they could live in China.

What Would the Palestinians Do?

When faced with the prospect of procuring greenhouses as part of the Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, the Palestinians proceeded to strip the greenhouses of anything of value and essentially destroyed them. The value of those greenhouses? A couple million dollars.

So, it's not surprising to know that the Palestinians are using settlements abandoned by Israel as terror training camps these days. It's about all the Palestinian leadership knows - creating, maintaining, and expanding terrorist infrastructure.

Officials said several of the 21 Jewish communities dismantled by Israel in September 2005 have become training grounds for insurgents from the ruling Fatah movement as well as the Islamic opposition. They said training included members of the new "Popular Army" sponsored by Fatah.

In November 2005, PA Interior Minister Nasser Yusef toured the training camps in the former Jewish community of Neve Dekalim. Neve Dekalim was the largest of the Jewish municipalities in the Gaza Strip. In all, about 9,000 Jews had lived in the Gaza Strip until their expulsion by Israel's military.

The Interior Ministry has drafted a plan for the use of the former Jewish communities, deemed a "closed military zone" by the PA. Officials acknowledged that organized crime as well as insurgency groups have clashed over control of the territory.

If they were only so successful in the economic or social realm.

UPDATE 12/13/2005:
Picked up by Atlas Shrugged who comments on the continuing payouts to terrorists by Abbas and the Palestinian Authority. Thanks Pamela!