Meet your new thread, same as the old thread.

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
Goyim and Dalai

So, what do those upset by the Resolution on Armenia think about this one? How come we're insulting China like this?

1) This relates to present-day conduct in China, not something that's 100 years ago.

2) We're not using Chinese airbases to access Iraq.

(I thought it was clear that no one was saying Turkey was right regarding Armenians, only that a symbolic comdemnation that has waited nearly 100 years perhaps could be postponed a few more)

Besides, this will get Bush total consciousness on his deathbed.

[LessinSF]

Originally posted by Greedy,Greedy,Greedy
Goyim and Dalai

So, what do those upset by the Resolution on Armenia think about this one? How come we're insulting China like this?

Realpolitik - we don't run 50% of our materiel and supplies to Iraq through Lhasa.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

• Reaganomics Finally Trickles Down To Area Man
  
  HAZELWOOD, MO—Twenty-six years after Ronald Reagan first set his controversial fiscal policies into motion, the deceased president's massive tax cuts for the ultrarich at last trickled all the way down to deliver their bounty, in the form of a $10 bonus, to Hazelwood, MO car-wash attendant Frank Kellener.
  
  "Back when Reagan was in charge, I didn't think much of him," Kellener, 57, said, holding up two five-dollar bills nearly three decades in the making. "But who would have thought that in 2007 I'd have this extra $10 in my pocket? He may not have lived to see it, but I'm sure President Reagan is up in heaven smiling down on me right now."
  
  Leading economists say Kellener's unexpected windfall provides the first irrefutable proof of the effectiveness of Reagan's so-called supply-side economics, and shows that the former president had "incredible, far-reaching foresight."
  
  "When the tax burden on the upper income brackets is lifted, the rich and not-rich alike all benefit," said Arthur Laffer, who was a former member of Reagan's Economic Policy Advisory Board. "Eventually."
  
  The $10 began its long journey into Kellener's wallet in 1983, when a beefed-up national defense budget of $210 billion enabled the military to purchase advanced warhead-delivery systems from aerospace manufacturer Lockheed. Buoyed by a multimillion-dollar bonus, then-CEO Martin Lawler bought a house on a 5,000-acre plot in Montana. When a forest fire destroyed his home in 1986, Lawler took the federal relief check and invested it in a savings and loan run by a Virginia man named Michael Webber. After Webber's firm collapsed in 1989, and he was indicted on fraud and conspiracy charges, he retained the services of high- powered law firm Rabin & Levy for his defense. After six years and $7 million in legal fees, Webber received only a $250,000 fine, and the defense team went out to celebrate at a Washington, D.C.-area restaurant called Di Forenza. During dinner, lawyer Peter Smith overheard several investment bankers at an adjoining table discussing a hot Internet start-up that was about to go public. Smith took a portion of his earnings from the Webber case and bought several hundred shares in Gadgets.com, quadrupling his investment before selling them four months later. Gadgets.com's two founders used the sudden influx of investment capital to outfit their office with modern Danish furniture, in a sale brokered by the New York gallery Modern Now! in 1998. After the ensuing dot-com bust, Modern Now! was forced out of business, and Sotheby's auction house was put in charge of liquidating its inventory. The commission from that auction enabled auctioneer Mary Schafer to retire to the Ozark region of Missouri in 2006. Last month, while passing through Hazelwood, she took her Audi to Marlin Car Wash, where Kellener was one of the employees who tended to her car. She was so satisfied with the job that she left a $50 tip, which the manager divided among the people working that day.
  
  "This money didn't just affect one life," Laffer said. "It affected five."
  
  Prior to joining Marlin Car Wash in 2005, Kellener worked for nearly two decades at a local Ford assembly plant that is now defunct. Before that, he was employed by the FAA as an air traffic controller until his union went on strike and Reagan fired him, along with nearly 13,000 others. This is the largest tip he has received in his professional life.
  
  "I thought Reaganomics was nothing more than a mirage that allowed President Reagan to reward his wealthy support base," Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-MA) said. "But two generations later I am seeing Reaganomics in action, and I like what I see. It just took a little longer than I thought it was supposed to."
  
  The tip has not gone unnoticed by the economic team in the current administration.
  
  "Had Mr. Kellener received that money in 1981, like the Democrats wanted, it would only be worth $4.24 today because of inflation," Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson, Jr. said during an official announcement of the economic policy's success at a press conference Monday. "Instead, Kellener has a solid $10 to spend right here and now. The system works, and our current president intends to keep making it work."
  
  Kellener, who has cared for his schizophrenic sister ever since her federally funded mental institution was closed in 1984, said that he plans to donate the full $10 to the Republican presidential candidate who best embodies Reagan's legacy.

link

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by Gattigap
Protection of State Department officials traditionally has been a function of the Marines, as I understand it.

I get your point that we're not asking Blackwater to retake Fallujah, but that doesn't really counter Ty's point that we wouldn't have to hire these dudes in the first place if we weren't so overstretched with our traditional forces, and if the Administration weren't so enamored generally speaking with the idea of privatizing big chunks of what Marines and soldiers have done for decades.

Everyone in this discussion is at least partly right.

Marines guard embassies, and provide some limited personal security services. The State Dept. (like some other govt. agencies) also has an internal security department (staffed with lots of ex-military guys) who typically handle personal protection for diplomats and personnel when needed.

Sebby is right that the Army typically doesn't do personal proection/bodyguard work [that is a specialized field] -- and isn't often used for convoy security for other government agencies. But that is not because they COULD NOT do the convoy jobs (in theory), it is that they have other missions. The counter-example is that SOF teams are sometimes used to provide personal security to very high level officials -- including (for a long time) Karzai in Afghanistan.

But Ty is also right in a sense that Blackwater and these other contractors are needed because we "don't have enough soldiers." It is not that we don't have enough soldiers to protect the convoys (although we don't) -- but
that we don't have enough soldiers to impose and maintain peace and security. If it wasn't an active low-intensity conflict, this wouldn't be an issue.

Tangent #1:

We'll never know now, but a build-up of overwhelming force from the start could have made a huge difference. Some of that failing is due to Rumsfeld's unfortunate obsession with light, lean forces and the political need for speed. Part is that failing is also due to the simple fact that our force structure was so different in 2003 than in 1991. After 10+ years of bipartisan post-Cold War draw-downs in search of the "peace dividend", we just don't have the same numbers to throw around that we did in the first Gulf War.

Tangent #2:

Doesn't mean it wasn't a g-ddamned stupid decision to invade in the first place, which I've become more convinced of as time went on.

S_A_M

[Secret_Agent_Man]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Could you find us a security-related firm that has a Democrat at the helm? When a ex-mil guy starts a military like company, it's probably not going to have a bunch of peaceful liberals.

Exactly, I'm not all that far to the left on the American political spectrum, but I was about the closest thing they had to a Communist radical when I was at Fort Bragg.

S_A_M

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Secret_Agent_Man
We'll never know now, but a build-up of overwhelming force from the start could have made a huge difference. Some of that failing is due to Rumsfeld's unfortunate obsession with light, lean forces and the political need for speed. Part is that failing is also due to the simple fact that our force structure was so different in 2003 than in 1991. After 10+ years of bipartisan post-Cold War draw-downs in search of the "peace dividend", we just don't have the same numbers to throw around that we did in the first Gulf War.

We also had more numbers in the first Gulf War because President G. H. W. Bush put together a true international coalition that had significant numbers of troops from many other countries. Had the White House listened to what some in the Pentagon (e.g., Gen. Shinseki) were saying about force requirements, they might reasonably have come to the conclusion that they couldn't make the war work unless they had a significant numbers of troops from other countries, both to have a presence to maintain order and because an international force would have seemed less like occupiers. As I see it, the White House opposition to this stemmed partly from a view that the U.S. would be stronger if other countries believed it could do this sort of thing unilaterally, and partly because the President does not like to have to collaborate with anyone. As to the first, the irony is that the result has been to weaken us by underscoring the limits of our power.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Here are the best things I've seen on both sides:

Alex Massie (links omitted):

• Amidst suggestions that Nancy Pelosi will in fact put the Armenian Genocide resolution in her pocket, it's been quite something to see so many self-styled liberals shake their heads and mutter that, you know, while we feel for the poor Armenians - and please, don't for a moment doubt the seriousness of our compassion - that feeling does extend to doing anything other than cave to Turkey' desire to muddy historical waters that are plenty clear enough (and have been for 90 years) to most reasonable observers. Still, it must be reassuring to be told, We'd like to help, we really would, but it's just too difficult.
  
  For some reason the Washington Post has run a number of pieces taking this brave stand. Something should be done for the Armenians but nothing should be done that might mean anything, even on a symbolic level.
  
  Daniel Larison knows much more about Ottoman history than I do and he dismantles Richard Cohen's rather rotten column in his usual, exemplary style.
  
  One thing I'd add, however, is that it is remarkably rich for Cohen to say that the slaughter of the Armenians, while terrible, falls short of genocide even as he notes that the term was coined by Raphael Lemkin who, Cohen says, "clearly had in mind what the Nazis were doing to the Jews". What happened to the Armenians was not, therefore, genocide it was just "plenty bad".
  
  But of course Lemkin himself deliberately cited the suffering of the Armenians when he first wrote about genocide. He didn't seem to share Mr Cohen's belief that there is only one kind of genocide.
  
  Then there's Fred Hiatt, the WaPo's editorial page editor who thinks the resolution should be spiked because, well, modern Armenia isn't properly democratic. Or something like that. [Hat-Tip: Matt Zeitlin] Hiatt laments that the Armenian diaspora should have concentrated on having the genocide recognised rather than ensuring that Armenian civil society was constructed upon sounder foundations. And, yes, clearly it would be good if there were an Armenian George Soros to preach for - and fund - institutions for an open society. Hiatt thinks, however, that Armenia should forget the past and emulate the Baltic states. Well, fine, but as Anne Applebaum correctly reminds him, the Balts are pretty keen on re-examining and restoring their histories too.
  
  But just because Armenia isn't perfect - well, let's just say that seems an odd reason to suppose that persuading Turkey to recognise the genocide is a quixotic cause that would only be contemplated, let alone chased, by people with no sense of priority or perspective.
  
  As a half-Scots, half-Armenian friend emails me to point out:
  
  Imagine an alternate universe in which a 15 year-old Israel was surrounded on three sides by an Iranian state that not only questioned the Holocaust, but had been responsible for it. It's an imperfect analogy, but not a ridiculous one. Even the WaPo wouldn't blame Jewish Americans in that scenario for having skewed priorities.
  
  Indeed.
  
  Perhaps everyone would have had a more comfortable time if the matter had never been raised at all and perhaps many of those members of Congress still on board with the resolution are motivated by parochial concerns and maybe there will be some uncomfortable consequences that stem from doing the right thing. So be it. When the government of the United States is asked to recognise a genocide it seems to me that you have to have some strong reasons - and a pretty strong stomach - to side with those who would deny the genocide's existence. That's true even when the victims are form a small country of little strategic or other significance.

James Fallows (emphasis in original):

• Before leaving China, I hadn't heard about the House of Representatives' vote on a resolution condemning Turkey for the Armenian genocide of the World War I era.
  
  Now that I've heard about it, I find that it leads naturally to this question:
  
  Is America insane??????
  
  To be more precise: have the Congressional Democratic leaders lost their minds in not finding a way to bottle up this destructive and self-righteously posturing measure?
  
  Maybe they think that the U.S. has so many friends in the Islamic world, especially in countries bordering Iraq, that it should go out of its way to make new enemies?
  
  Or -- and this is truly appalling possibility -- perhaps they think that America’s moral standing is so high at the moment that we will be admired and thanked worldwide for delivering condemnations of sins committed in the waning days of the Ottoman Empire?
  
  Why not go all the way? How about a resolution condemning China for the millions who suffered in the Cultural Revolution and the tens of millions starved during the Great Leap Forward – right as we’re seeking China’s help on Burma, North Korea, the environment, etc? I mean, for each Armenian the Ottoman Turks slaughtered, at least ten Chinese citizens perished at the hands of the regime whose successors still rule the country. And the government's official stance of denial is just about as strong. So, why not just tell them they were evil? The timing would be especially nice during China's current Party Congress.
  
  I'm sure we could get a unanimous vote for a resolution condemning North Korea for any of a hundred grievous offenses; that would be a good complement to the recent nuclear deal. Why not one denouncing Russia for the Czarist pogroms, to accompany efforts to reason with/rein in Putin? Maybe another condemning England for its subjugation and slaughter of the Scots, to say nothing of the Irish – while also asking Gordon Brown to stay the course in Iraq? What about Australia for its historic treatment of the Aborigines? Or the current nations of West Africa for their role in the slave trade?
  
  The Armenian genocide was real; many Turks pretend it wasn’t. They are wrong, and we should stand for what's right. But it’s hard to think of a more willfully self-indulgent step than lecturing Turkey's current government and people 90 years late.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield
Lou Dobbs .

Every time I hear his name or see him on TV it is hard not to retch. Arrogant and stupid, my favorite combination. He talks like immigration is the biggest crisis to ever hit the US.

[SlaveNoMore]

Spanky
Every time I hear his name or see him on TV it is hard not to retch. Arrogant and stupid, my favorite combination. He talks like immigration is the biggest crisis to ever hit the US.

It's one of them, but IMHO he misses all the reasons why.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore
It's one of them....

The immigrants bring smallpox, kill the buffalo, and force red-blooded Americans to live on reservations in flyover states. Things have been going to shit since 1620.



Or 1492.

[Greedy,Greedy,Greedy]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
Here are the best things I've seen on both sides:

Alex Massie (links omitted):
[list]
Long quotes - check the links

This misses the big issue: the Armenian genocide occurred during the birthpangs of Kamalist philosophy and society, and reflects the attitudes of the Kamalist government to non-Turkic minorities today.

The Armenian Genocide was a fairly successful one, in that the number of Armenians remaining in Turkey is quite small (there are more in the Boston area than in all of Turkish Armenia); but the reason the issue threatens the Turkish government is because now that they've pretty much taken care of their Armenians and Jews, and partially taken care of their Greeks, they still have the Kurds and a few others left.

Look at their response: "OK, America, if you feel so strongly about Armenians, let's show you what we can do to the Kurds, including in your precious Iraq."

[Tyrone Slothrop]

How on Earth can this be OK?

• Two executives from Village Voice Media — a company that owns a number of alternative weeklies including The Village Voice, The LA Weekly and The Phoenix Times — were arrested Thursday night in Phoenix on charges that a story published earlier in the day in The Phoenix New Times revealed grand jury secrets.
  
  Michael Lacey, the executive editor, and Jim Larkin, chief executive, where arrested at their homes after they wrote a story that revealed that the Village Voice Media company, its executives, its reporters and even the names of the readers of its website had been subpoenaed by a special prosecutor. The special prosecutor had been appointed to look into allegations that the newspaper had violated the law in publishing the home address of Maricopa Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s home address on its website more than three years ago.
  
  The weekly and its leadership has been in a long running battle with Mr. Arpaio, after the weekly published a series of stories about his real estate dealings.
  
  “They did not have a warrant, but they told me that I was being arrested for unlawful disclosure of grand jury information,” Mr. Larkin said by phone from his home early this morning, after he was released from jail. Mr. Lacey remained in jail early this morning. Captain Paul Chagolla, a spokesman for the sheriff did not return a call for comment.
  
  Steve Suskin, legal counsel for Village Voice Media, said that the arrests on misdemeanor charges of the newspaper executives represent an escalation in the conflict between The Phoenix New Times and Sheriff Arpaio, who has received national attention for his reputation for running tough jails.
  
  “It is an extraordinary sequence of events,” Mr. Suskin said. “The arrests were not totally unexpected, but they represent an act of revenge and a vindictive response on the part of an out of control sheriff.”
  
  Grand jury proceedings are secret. In the story about the ongoing case, Mr. Larkin and Mr. Lacey suggested that the publication of the subpoenas might be viewed as illegal.
  
  “It is, we fear, the authorities’ belief that what you are about to read here is against the law to publish,” they wrote. “But there are moments when civil disobedience is merely the last option. We pray that our judgment is free of arrogance.
  
  The subpoena asks for information not only about the newspaper’s reporting, but also the information on readers who may have seen material deemed confidential published on the newspaper’s website, including the internet domain names and browsers used, and any other information about online readers of the publication since Jan. 1, 2004.

It's a crime to reveal a subpoena? That's insane, isn't it?

[Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop


It's a crime to reveal a subpoena? That's insane, isn't it?

Not necessarily. I don't know the speciifcs of the law, but I can see that revealing that you were subpoenad to provide information about X could hamper an investigation about X. For example, Barry might have started pouring his flaxseed oil into the toilet if it were known others were being called to testify about it.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
Not necessarily. I don't know the speciifcs of the law, but I can see that revealing that you were subpoenad to provide information about X could hamper an investigation about X. For example, Barry might have started pouring his flaxseed oil into the toilet if it were known others were being called to testify about it.

OK. Can it be a crime to reveal that you, yourself, are a target of an investigation?

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by Tyrone Slothrop
OK. Can it be a crime to reveal that you, yourself, are a target of an investigation?

No. Usually one wouldn't, however, for obvious reasons.