dangerous liberty

Please go read the Winds of Change summary of the Berger affair: The Real Follies of the Berger Affair. (hat tip, Instapundit)

This is comprehensive and I have to agree whole-heartedly with Jonah Goldberg: If I accept for the sake of argument that Berger ‘inadvertantly’ left with Codeword secret files multiple times and Berger is known for his sloppiness (according to Bill Clinton), what does that say about the seriousness with which Democratic administrations might take National Security? Berger was National Security Advisor, for petessake!

This incident is one reason a Kerry adminstration should be avoided - because what ‘experienced’ hands will be staffing a Kerry admin?

Why, former Clintonoids!

Dan Darling, over at Winds of Change, actually READS The Senate Intelligence Committee Report - and debriefs the rest of us. I’ve been through about half of it, and it jibes with my own understanding, which is ant-like compared to Dan.

READ HIS ENTRY. Then read the report for yourself. I’ll comment more when I’ve read it all myself.

UPDATE: Dan’s conclusion:

The bottom line

Everything Powell said at the UN regarding Iraqi ties to al-Qaeda (which is pretty much the same as what President Bush, Vice President Cheney, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, and others said going into the war) appears to have reflected the consensus of the broader intelligence community.

Joe Wilson’s claims (along with, I suspect, his reputation within Democratic circles) have more or less gone down in flames, as have claims that intelligence analysts were pressured into making certain conclusions. The claim on p. 328 that “Wali Khan” (i.e. Wali Khan Amin Shah, one of Ramzi Yousef’s two lieutenants in the proto-9/11 Oplan Bojinka plot) and Jamal al-Fadhl (whose name is blacked out in the last sentence in that paragraph) identified Abu Hajir al-Iraqi (aka Mamdouh Mahmoud Salim, a high-ranking al-Qaeda leader who was arrested in the wake of the 1998 embassy bombings and later stabbed a NYC prison guard with a comb in his left eye in an attempted prison break in 2000) as the chief liaison between Iraq and al-Qaeda is sure to keep Mylroie enthusiasts around for quite some time at any rate.

In general, this document is a lot better than that Staff Statement No. 15 that was churned out by the 9/11 commission. One other thing to be mentioned, incidentally, is that this report specifically undercuts some of the 9/11 Commission’s key findings with respect to Iraq and al-Qaeda. It cites post-1999 contacts between Iraq and al-Qaeda, which the 9/11 commission claims to possess no information on. Perhaps someone should hand the commission members a copy of the Senate Intelligence Committee report?

Also, this demolishes 2 of Richard Clarke’s key claims with respect to Iraq: that there was no Iraqi involvement in terrorism post-1993, and that there is no evidence whatsoever of Iraqi support for al-Qaeda. Both of these claims, to put it quite simply, can now be shown to be factually untrue.

As I said, no doubt apologies will pending from all those concerned.

He also links to Michael Ledeen’s column on the same.

Arthur Chrenkoff continues his excellent series on Good news from Iraq. Be sure to check the sidebar with links to other versions.

John Kerry and Michael Badnarik have both said our mission in Iraq is a failure, but when one reads Chrenkoff’s excellent exposition on the good news, the difficulties the US faces look less like failure and more like, well, difficulties.

It is a shame these partisans cannot bring themselves to look at the enormous progress and conclude, perhaps, that ‘failure’ is a conclusion of one with blinders on.

Some gems from Chrenkoff’s entry:

(more…)

Bureaucracies!

It is good to see the Times mention the fact, the one we know from the 911 commission testimony, that there is not ONE SINGLE PERSON testifying under oath of political pressure to ’sex up’ intelligence data in order to sell the Iraq War.

Johann Hari - The strange, unexplored overlap between homosexuality and fascism

Just read it.

Who gets to define it? Thanks to the lidless eye, I have been led to a series of blog entries which center around the notion of “the common good”, spawned by a recent Hillary Clinton speech to wealthy supporters:

“Many of you are well enough off that … the tax cuts may have helped you,” Sen. Clinton said. “We’re saying that for America to get back on track, we’re probably going to cut that short and not give it to you. We’re going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good.”

Kevin Drum discusses recent Sullivan comments (here and here) and notes an invocation of “the ‘common good’ … is apparently all it takes to drive some conservatives nuts these days.” His post is then followed by an avalanche of comments which the esteemed H. Dreck cherry picks over at Asymmetrical Information, following up with an insightful post about elitism and political alignments. This is good:

It is human nature to behave ridiculously in groups. I’ve always said you can make an ass out of anyone by putting them in traffic or a long line. And when you combine them in a structured bureaucracy with power over others - look out. Most of the evil in the world has come from that - even as the individuals themselves go on with the best possible intentions.

I urge the reader (I think there is one, at least) to check these links and read the comments.

I’ve not made it all the way through, but I’ve failed yet to see one liberty leaning voice note what seems to be an obvious answer to my question: When individuals are given the maximum freedom to live as they please and improve their situation, according to their own values (be they attaining spiritual enlightenment by rejecting material comfort or amassing a huge fortune or just living well and having stuff), then the “common good” is addressed, because individuals make up collectives. A policy mindset which seeks free individuals to pursue their dreams to the degree they wish to chase and reach them, will undoubtedly benefit society, since society is made up of those individuals.

One commenter Dreck highlights says

The essence of Liberalism:

Society contributing in order to further the common good.

The essence of Conservatism:

“Go f[**]k yourself”

This is so irritating. Who makes up society? Cows? Dogs? Or individual people? Moreover, if you take money from someone by force, is it really a ‘contribution’? This whole idea that ‘we’ (as a society) ‘give’ to the poor through taxation and welfare spending seems to ignore the meanings of the words ‘give’ and ‘we’. Is it not a fact that government must first take from ‘us’ in the first place?

And what if I dissent from Hillary Clinton’s idea of what is best for everyone? Do any liberals see how absurd and untenable this notion is? No person or committee of persons can determine what is best for ’society’.

The “common good” is really an aggregate of individual values and varies according the whims and tastes of each person and what they consider ‘good’ for them.

This doesn’t mean ‘we’ shouldn’t have compassion for the poor, nor should we not give of our time and money to ease poverty. When I look at the illegitimacy rates growing over the last 40 odd years of the War on Poverty and the crime and incarceration which statistically follow children in one parent families to adulthood and imprison them in the squalor of housing projects and the spiritual bankruptcy of dependency and ignorance, I have to wonder just what kind of ‘compassion’ liberals are talking about. Seems they have a different defintion than what one finds in the dictionary.

Update: Poliblog addresses my question and links to Prof Bainbridge’s comments as well, both worth reading.

Another: Jason of PoliPundit weighs in as well.