National Review articles from February 2005

National Review archives from February 2005

Energy through 2030.
February 14, 2005... Energy plays a key role in economic prosperity, and lately it has commanded significant public attention. It's our business, and so we continually assess trends and issues that are likely to affect energy in the future. Key elements of our...

A taxing debate.(letters to the editor)(Letter to the Editor)
February 14, 2005... Ramesh Ponnuru's "The Perils of Tax Reform" (Dec. 13) argues that the administration is wise to ignore calls for bolder tax reform. I vigorously disagree. A May 1997 study completed by Dale Jorgenson, formerly chairman of the economics...

Toughening up on immigration.(letters to the editor)(Letter to the Editor)
February 14, 2005... Regarding "GOP, You Are Warned" (Dec. 31), I couldn't agree more with David Frum that a Bush policy that appears to be soft on illegal aliens and border security would alienate a significant portion of his Republican base. Yet while border...

Tsunami lessons.
February 14, 2005... As the toll from the tsunami continues to mount, it has become clear that this catastrophe was also a political turning point. No governments may have fallen, but some deeply held political myths and beliefs have not been able to withstand the...

Barbara Boxer now is the foremost representative of a powerful home-state interest group.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * Barbara Boxer now is the foremost representative of a powerful home-state interest group: the Sour Grapes Growers of California.

Ted Kennedy, at the National Press Club, presented what he thought should be the Democratic response to President Bush's re-election.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * Ted Kennedy, at the National Press Club, presented what he thought should be the Democratic response to President Bush's re-election. He wants us to withdraw from Iraq, and to stop "bullying" other countries "to salute us." He thinks we...

Roe v. Wade has just reached the age of 32, which is of course considerably more years than many innocent lives have, thanks to it, enjoyed.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * Roe v. Wade has just reached the age of 32, which is of course considerably more years than many innocent lives have, thanks to it, enjoyed. Even supporters of the abortion license found it a melancholy anniversary. Writers and activists in...

The president said that the Federal Marriage Amendment does not have the votes in the Senate to pass.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * The president said that the Federal Marriage Amendment does not have the votes in the Senate to pass. Moreover, it will not have those votes until courts strike down the Defense of Marriage Act, an existing law that many senators think is...

Sen. Boxer was the only member of the Senate to vote against certifying George Bush as the election's winner.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * Sen. Boxer was the only member of the Senate to vote against certifying George Bush as the election's winner. Two weeks later, she was railing against the war in Iraq, and accusing Condoleezza Rice of lying about Saddam's WMDs, telling the...

The Bush administration wants to reform Medicaid so that federal spending is capped and states have more control over the program.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * The Bush administration wants to reform Medicaid so that federal spending is capped and states have more control over the program. The nation's governors, and the lobbying groups that speak for them, have a different idea: They want the...

Michael Powell was a vocal proponent of deregulation as head of the Federal Communications Commission.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * Michael Powell was a vocal proponent of deregulation as head of the Federal Communications Commission. But policy lagged behind the rhetoric, largely because fellow Republican commissioner Kevin Martin voted with the Democrats--and with...

The Kansas Supreme Court has broken new ground in school-finance law.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * The Kansas Supreme Court has broken new ground in school-finance law. Normally courts claim the authority to rewrite their states' education-funding policies based on constitutional guarantees of "equal protection." The Kansas Court relied...

Army Spc. Charles Graner got ten years for his role in the prison abuse at Abu Ghraib.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * Army Spc. Charles Graner got ten years for his role in the prison abuse at Abu Ghraib. His defense rested on the argument that he was acting under orders when he sexually humiliated and beat Iraqi prisoners. He tried to produce witnesses to...

All quiet on the Gaza front: There's been a brief and welcome lull in the terror campaigns of Hamas, the Al-Aksa brigade, and such-like.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * All quiet on the Gaza front: There's been a brief and welcome lull in the terror campaigns of Hamas, the Al-Aksa brigade, and such-like. More than that, Yasser Arafat's successor, Mahmud Abbas, has deployed some hundreds of his security...

The staff of the Jerusalem Post has performed the valuable task of singling out international news organizations that retain Palestinian Authority employees masquerading as journalists.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * The staff of the Jerusalem Post has performed the valuable task of singling out international news organizations that retain Palestinian Authority employees masquerading as journalists. Among them are the Associated Press, one of whose...

Zhao Ziyang died in Peking at age 85.(The Week)(Obituary)
February 14, 2005... * Zhao Ziyang died in Peking at age 85. After serving as prime minister of China, 1980-87, and as general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, 1987-89, Zhao became an unperson after the crushing of the 1989 protest movement. He spent the...

During his rule of Uganda, the dictator Idi Amin wrecked the nation's economy, drove out tens of thousands of her citizens, and murdered hundreds of thousands more.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * During his rule of Uganda, the dictator Idi Amin wrecked the nation's economy, drove out tens of thousands of her citizens, and murdered hundreds of thousands more. Yet state documents recently released to Britain's National Archives show...

As you may have noticed, we have discontinued the feature "For the Record.".(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * As you may have noticed, we have discontinued the feature "For the Record." It ran for decades, but its purpose was slowly eroded by the information revolution, and particularly by the rise of the Internet as a news source. It had become...

Twit alert.(The Week)(Prince Harry wears Nazi costume)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * TWIT ALERT. Prince Harry, third in line for the British throne, attended a "Native and Colonial"-themed costume party (that alone would merit a chapter in Vile Bodies) sporting Afrika Korps garb and a swastika armband. How Rommel would have...

A friend on the Continent sends us a publication from France, called L'Anti-Americain.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * A friend on the Continent sends us a publication from France, called L'Anti-Americain. He says, "You'll find it at all the best kiosks in Paris." At the top of the paper's front page is a motto: "We are all anti-Americans!" Lower down on...

Hossam Armanious was a Coptic Christian immigrant from Egypt who lived in Jersey City.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * Hossam Armanious was a Coptic Christian immigrant from Egypt who lived in Jersey City. Early in the New Year, he, his wife, and two daughters were found murdered in their home. Fellow Copts believe they were slain for their religion. The...

Harvard President Lawrence Summers wondered aloud, at a recent academic conference, whether there might not be innate differences between the scientific capacities of men and women.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * Harvard President Lawrence Summers wondered aloud, at a recent academic conference, whether there might not be innate differences between the scientific capacities of men and women. "I just couldn't breathe," said Nancy Hopkins, a professor...

Elsewhere in this issue, John Derbyshire attacks the theorists of "intelligent design.".(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * Elsewhere in this issue, John Derbyshire attacks the theorists of "intelligent design." What they are doing, he says, is not science. That may be so. But it is also true that a lot of the resistance to evolutionary theory is a result of...

The bullet, dodged.(Brief Article)(Poem)
February 14, 2005... THE BULLET, DODGED Imagine President John Kerry Steering the Ship of State as scary Insurgents throw beheading parties, Unnerving what's left of his hearties-- Teresa. From the White House, chatter Reprises...

Who is CBS considering to fill its empty anchor chair?(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * Who is CBS considering to fill its empty anchor chair? Katie Couric, the tufted titmouse of liberalism, that's who. It needn't be so. CBS could turn to conservative MSM stalwarts like . . . or . . . or . . . oh, forget it.

Absorbent and yellow and porous is he ... but gay?(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * Absorbent and yellow and porous is he . . . but gay? It seems to be one of the imperatives of our culture that every kiddies'TV cartoon character must sooner or later come under suspicion of sexual eccentricity. (Remember Tinky Winky?) The...

Sometimes a political cartoon defies even the lowest expectations of civility in public discourse, and so it is with one of the latest from The Boondocks by Aaron McGruder.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * Sometimes a political cartoon defies even the lowest expectations of civility in public discourse, and so it is with one of the latest from The Boondocks by Aaron McGruder. The cartoon relates a news broadcast on affirmative action in which...

Kipling's line about "makin'mock o'uniforms that guard you while you sleep" was given ugly illustration at Seattle Central Community College on Inauguration Day.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * Kipling's line about "makin'mock o'uniforms that guard you while you sleep" was given ugly illustration at Seattle Central Community College on Inauguration Day. To signal their disgust at the swearing-in of President George W. Bush, a gang...

We note the thirtieth anniversary of the bombing of Fraunces Tavern in New York City.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * We note the thirtieth anniversary of the bombing of Fraunces Tavern in New York City. Four died in that atrocity and more than 60 were injured. The bombing was the work of FALN, a Puerto Rican terrorist group with ties to Cuban intelligence....

Mid-January was blessed with two grand American spectaculars, standing at opposite ends of the spectrum of civic gravity.(The Week)(Donald Trump's wedding)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * Mid-January was blessed with two grand American spectaculars, standing at opposite ends of the spectrum of civic gravity. On the one hand were the solemnities of the Inauguration; on the other, a Trump wedding. In the grand American tradition...

"And what is it that will make it possible to spend 20 billion dollars of your money to put some clown on the moon?".(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 14, 2005... * "And what is it that will make it possible to spend 20 billion dollars of your money to put some clown on the moon?" So asked the great Tom Lehrer, pre-Neil Armstrong. "Well, it was good old American know-how, that's what. As provided by good...

Rose Mary Woods spent most of her adult life working for the man she most admired.(The Week)(Brief Article)(Obituary)
February 14, 2005... * Rose Mary Woods spent most of her adult life working for the man she most admired. She met Richard Nixon in 1947, when he was a freshman congressman. When he moved to the Senate in 1951, she joined his staff. She served him, in lean years and...

In Monopoly, the rich man is a mustachioed gent in striped pants and topper, who makes thousands of dollars buying real estate.(The Week)(Brief Article)(Obituary)
February 14, 2005... * In Monopoly, the rich man is a mustachioed gent in striped pants and topper, who makes thousands of dollars buying real estate. Walter Wriston, chairman and CEO of Citibank, made billions for his company by discovering brand-new resources and...

Freedom's address.(The Inaugural Speech)
February 14, 2005... PRESIDENT BUSH's foreign policy has been, roughly, neoconservative in its aggressively idealistic expression and realist in its practical application. At no time has the dichotomy been more evident than during his inaugural speech and its...

Try, try again.(Washington State)(gubernatorial election)
February 14, 2005... WE have generally decried the recent trend toward attempts to settle elections after the fact in the courts. But the voting controversy in Washington State is a special case. As Byron York reports elsewhere in this issue, it is impossible to...

Fear not.(Social Security)
February 14, 2005... THE conventional wisdom has it that President Bush's Social Security reform is dead before it has even been proposed. Democrats are nearly united against personal accounts. Republicans are scattered. Some Republicans want personal accounts, but...

Trading up.(The Week)(financing Social Security reform)
February 14, 2005... WOULD you pay $2,000 today, to save $10,000 in 15 years' time? That question lies at the heart of the debate about financing Social Security reform. President Bush's plan to create personal investment accounts for every worker has run into...

Notes & asides.(remembering Johnny Carson)(Obituary)
February 14, 2005... * Johnny Carson, R.I.P. If Johnny Carson could have managed it, no doubt his death would have been a private affair. Who would have been invited to his memorial service? We don't know. That is the measure of his integrity as a private man....

A certain trumpet: Bush's second inaugural speech--and its critics.(The Presidency)
February 14, 2005... PRESIDENT BUSH'S second inaugural address, whatever else you think of it, was interesting. We are debating what it meant, and we will be debating the questions it raised for some time. President Clinton's second inaugural address, in contrast,...

Ready or not: dangers of the second Bush term.(The Presidency II)
February 14, 2005... THIS is the presidency of living dangerously. George W. Bush has dared more, done more, and risked more than any president since Ronald Reagan's first term. Now in this second term, when most presidents take it easier, Bush is upping the ante...

Summers storm: a feminist show trial at Harvard.(Higher Education)(Lawrence Summers)
February 14, 2005... IN the course of an informal, off-the-record talk before a group of academics, Lawrence Summers, president of Harvard University, unwittingly touched the third rail of university politics: He speculated that innate differences between the sexes...

Who's to blame? The tsunami's aftermath.(The World)(preventing malaria in Sri Lanka)
February 14, 2005... Galle, Sri Lanka THE last time I was here in Galle, England had just played a great cricket match against the Sri Lankans, the local economy was bustling, and the great threat--from the Tamil Tiger rebels--was losing its force. But today,...

But is it science? The war over 'intelligent design'.(Essay)
February 14, 2005... THIS year contains two notable scientific anniversaries. The one most widely mentioned is the centenary of Albert Einstein's three trailblazing papers in the German scientific journal Annalen der Physik on the nature of matter, energy, and...

Heeeeere's ... Remembering a late-night legend.(People)(Obituary)
February 14, 2005... IN a box, somewhere in my house, I have a picture of me and Johnny Carson on the set of the old Tonight show. We're standing affably side-by-side, me grinning like an idiot, him with lips pursed in a patient half-smile. We look like a rich...

A movie for all time: tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow, Groundhog Day scores.(Cover Essay)(Critical Essay)
February 14, 2005... HERE's a line you'll either recognize or you won't: "This is one time where television really fails to capture the true excitement of a large squirrel predicting the weather." If you don't recognize this little gem, you've either never seen...

Down for the recount: no one can know who won Washington State's gubernatorial race.(Politics)
February 14, 2005... 'Rossi Re-Vote." That's how they answer the phones these days at the headquarters of Dino Rossi, the Republican who, after one election-night count, one machine recount, one excruciating manual recount, and more than a few electoral...

The impatient caucus: have we forgotten that winning a war takes time?(At War)
February 14, 2005... READING the pages of foreign-policy journals, between the long tracts on Bush's "failures" and those on neo-conservative "arrogance," one encounters mostly predictions of defeat in Iraq, laced with calls for phased withdrawal...

High caliber advocacy: how the NRA won the fight over gun rights.(Public Policy)
February 14, 2005... 'WHEN I was growing up in Tennessee, we had a saying for something that was so outrageous nobody could believe it: 'That dog don't hunt,'" says Chris Cox, the chief lobbyist of the National Rifle Association. The old phrase came back to him a...

The long view.(allegedly humourous fictional memo to journalists)(Fictional Work)
February 14, 2005... MEMORANDUM TO: All news staff worldwide FROM: Management RE: Guidelines for the next four years As I hope was clear from my conference call this morning, many of us here on the eleventh floor are concerned with what seems to...

Help!!!!(Comic)
February 14, 2005... NOW THERE'S PROGRESS' CHINA IS DRAFTING A LAW WHICH WOULD PROHIBIT SEX-SELECTION ABORTIONS! HOW IRONIC! IF A WOMAN FROM CHINA WANTS TO ABORT HER CHILD BECAUSE SHE PREFERS TO HAVE A BOY, SHE'LL HAVE TO TRAVEL AMERICA! YEAH, IT' STILL...

FOR DNC chairman.(Brief Article)(Poem)
February 14, 2005... FOR DNC CHAIRMAN On February 12th when Dems Assemble to replace McAuliffe with a better chair To run a better race; Grant us, O Lord, the pick will be The noisome Dr. Dean, Whose Hyde-to-Jekyll...

One man's platoons.(Right Turns: Unconventional Lessons from a Controversial Life)(Book Review)
February 14, 2005... Right Turns: Unconventional Lessons from a Controversial Life, by Michael Medved (Crown Forum, 448 pp., $26.95) IF you want to understand how thoroughly the American elite moved from the right to the left in the 20th century, consider this:...

The people, in a way.(The People Themselves: Popular Constitutionalism and Judicial Review)(Book Review)
February 14, 2005... The People Themselves: Popular Constitutionalism and Judicial Review, by Larry D. Kramer (Oxford, 376 pp., $29.95) FOR students of the Supreme Court, a crucial question is how to approach what the late Yale law professor Alexander Bickel...

What they're saying about Miles Gone By.(Book Review)
February 14, 2005... From beginning to end Miles Gone By is Buckley at his best. The way he is able to lift stories of his own experience to the level of major insights is masterful. He is a 21st-century bearer of the mantle of the Polite Essay, as worn in times...

When he's right ...(Shelf Life)(Love, Poverty, and War: Journeys and Essays )(Book Review)
February 14, 2005... CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS is the kind of writer who makes you miss your bus stop when you're engrossed in him, who makes you want to grab friends by the arm and read them passages that have made you shiver between the shoulder blades (this last was...

Singing his own song.(Music)(Lee Hoiby)(Biography)
February 14, 2005... NOT long before Christmas, an important operatic event took place in New York. It was not at the Metropolitan Opera, or even City Opera. It was at the Manhattan School of Music--and the opera was Lee Hoiby's A Month in the Country. Hoiby is an...

New Bedford.(Brief Article)(Poem)
February 14, 2005... NEW BEDFORD Down cobbled streets that still seem slippery With whale oil to deserted wharves and docks In this backwater port on Buzzards Bay, Blustery with white caps, sporadic gulls Screaming their hunger in the...

Count me out.(The Straggler)(filling in the national census)
February 14, 2005... I TOOK against the census form right away. It arrived with the lunchtime mail on a day when I was even more behind than usual with writing assignments. THE AMERICAN COMMUNITY SURVEY, it declared itself at the head of Page 1 of 24, every page...

Saving the democrats.(on the right)
February 14, 2005... NEW YORK, JANUARY 7 THE world, especially American Democrats, ponders the question: Where might the party go in the immediate years ahead? The political reality seeps into the mind, that liberalism's next step is not obvious. Dogmatic...

Michael Ross dead?(on the right)
February 14, 2005... NEW YORK, JANUARY 11 CATHOLICS who attend Mass in Fairfield County, Connecticut, on Sunday, January 16, will know that in doing so they are being dutiful, it being Church law that the sabbath should be observed. But this Sunday, the...

What is Bush saying?(on the right)
February 14, 2005... NEW YORK, JANUARY 21 THE inaugural address was in several respects confusing. The arresting feature of it was of course the exuberant idealism. But one wonders whether signals were crossed in its production, and a lead here is some of the...

Outing Ataturk.(Letter to the Editor)
February 28, 2005... In "Gay Old Times?" (Dec. 27) Victor Davis Hanson writes that Alexander the Great "might even have often enjoyed male outlets in the manner of Frederick the Great or Kemal Ataturk." I respectfully ask what Mr. Hanson's source is for this...

False idols.(Letter to the Editor)
February 28, 2005... A few words concerning Jay Nordlinger's excellent piece on "Che [Guevara] chic" (Dec. 31): Communist icons inevitably are found out. We need to look no further than the deaths of some 5,000 Polish officers, murdered by Communist firing squads...

We heard that there was an irregularity in the Iraqi election.(The Week)
February 28, 2005... * We heard that there was an irregularity in the Iraqi election: another 412 votes discovered for Washington "governor" Christine Gregoire.

It seemed the 2004 elections would provide a "teachable moment" for the Democratic party.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 28, 2005... * It seemed the 2004 elections would provide a "teachable moment" for the Democratic party. Apparently not. Howard Dean will be selected the new chairman of the Democratic National Committee, in defiance of every possible lesson from the...

Sen. Evan Bayh of Indiana is a moderate Democrat.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 28, 2005... * Sen. Evan Bayh of Indiana is a moderate Democrat. He voted for the Iraq war, and has remained a vocal defender of it. He has voted to ban partial-birth abortion, which caused the National Organization for Women to warn Al Gore against picking...

Hillary Clinton won plaudits for saying that abortion is a tragedy and that all Americans should agree to take steps to reduce its incidence, such as funding sex education and contraception.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 28, 2005... * Hillary Clinton won plaudits for saying that abortion is a tragedy and that all Americans should agree to take steps to reduce its incidence, such as funding sex education and contraception. The speech made the political splash she wanted,...

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice wowed the Europeans on her first trip abroad.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 28, 2005... * Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice wowed the Europeans on her first trip abroad. Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder looked positively smitten, and anyone who has ever been around Rice will understand why. Her charm offensive, however, came with a...

Joe Lieberman may be wrong about a number of things, but when it comes to the War on Terror he has proven himself stalwart.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 28, 2005... * Joe Lieberman may be wrong about a number of things, but when it comes to the War on Terror he has proven himself stalwart. Back in August we noted that the senator--alone among speakers at the Democratic convention--congratulated the U.S....

The blind men and the high school.(Advertisement)
February 28, 2005... It is on everyone's lips: the next big thing in education reform is a serious focus on high school. That's what President Bush wants to do, what the Gates Foundation wants to do, and what a vast array of experts and education groups want to do....

The border between Vietnam and Cambodia remains a perilous spot for Sen. John Kerry.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 28, 2005... * The border between Vietnam and Cambodia remains a perilous spot for Sen. John Kerry. He first claimed to have spent Christmas 1968 there, an experience that he presented as profoundly disillusioning and that was "seared" in his memory. "I...

According to the government's survey of payrolls, the unemployment rate has fallen to 5.2 percent, the lowest level since September 11.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 28, 2005... * According to the government's survey of payrolls, the unemployment rate has fallen to 5.2 percent, the lowest level since September 11. In the last 20 months, 2.7 million jobs have been created. During President Bush's first term, the economy...

The Cole disaster.(Juan Cole)
February 28, 2005... ONE of the glories of the blogosphere is that it has enticed some of the titans of academia into the open. Until now, we've had to rely on the mainstream media to inform us of the goings-on in the scholarly groves. Unfortunately, given the...

In a welcome change from his first few years in office, President Bush plans to impose some restraint on domestic spending.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 28, 2005... * In a welcome change from his first few years in office, President Bush plans to impose some restraint on domestic spending. He says that 150 programs will be cut or eliminated. In particular, Bush wants deep cuts in subsidies to farmers and...

The Democratic candidate for governor of Washington state, Christine Gregoire, seemed to lose narrowly on November 2, and then lost a recount as well.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 28, 2005... * The Democratic candidate for governor of Washington state, Christine Gregoire, seemed to lose narrowly on November 2, and then lost a recount as well. Democrats insisted on a manual recount, and, after the state's most Democratic county...

How sweet it is.(Brief Article)(Poem)
February 28, 2005... HOW SWEET IT IS The crazies triumphed: Dr. Dean's In for McAuliffe. Manic teens-- Huns at a website--ululate For Howard; who, when in a state (The doc deploys a world-class spleen) Can spook a ghoul on...

Indiana has a Republican governor for the first time in 16 years--and a conservative Republican, with a Republican legislature behind him, at that.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 28, 2005... * Indiana has a Republican governor for the first time in 16 years--and a conservative Republican, with a Republican legislature behind him, at that. And Gov. Mitch Daniels wants to introduce the voters to Republican governance with... an...

A New York state judge ordered New York City to accord legal standing to same-sex "marriages".(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 28, 2005... * A New York state judge ordered New York City to accord legal standing to same-sex "marriages." Mayor Michael Bloomberg greeted the decision by saying that while he supports the concept of same-sex marriage, he thought that the judge had...

Terrorists in Iraq claimed to have kidnapped a U.S. soldier after a firefight in which several of his comrades were killed.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 28, 2005... * Terrorists in Iraq claimed to have kidnapped a U.S. soldier after a firefight in which several of his comrades were killed. To bolster this claim, the terrorists posted a picture of the unfortunate serviceman on their website. Strangely, the...

Who is the bravest man in the world? Ali Fadel is certainly in the running.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 28, 2005... * Who is the bravest man in the world? Ali Fadel is certainly in the running. The new mayor of Baghdad--his predecessor, Ali al-Haidari, was assassinated by terrorists--wants to memorialize George W. Bush. "We will build a statue [of] Bush. He...

Lt. Gen. James Mattis of the Marine Corps commanded Task Force 58, which secured early turf in Afghanistan in 2001, and the 1st Marine Division, which marched to Baghdad in 2003.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 28, 2005... * Lt. Gen. James Mattis of the Marine Corps commanded Task Force 58, which secured early turf in Afghanistan in 2001, and the 1st Marine Division, which marched to Baghdad in 2003. Stateside, he told a panel at a conference of a military...

Jimmy Carter--the man who gave his stamp of approval to the sham election of Palestinian dictator Yasser Arafat in 1996 and to the questionable victory of Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez in 2004--decided not to put in an appearance during the recent Iraqi elections.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 28, 2005... * Jimmy Carter--the man who gave his stamp of approval to the sham election of Palestinian dictator Yasser Arafat in 1996 and to the questionable victory of Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez in 2004--decided not to put in an appearance during...

The pundits are saying that Tony Blair will call for a general election as early as May 5, on the grounds that the polls show him easily defeating the Conservative Michael Howard.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 28, 2005... * The pundits are saying that Tony Blair will call for a general election as early as May 5, on the grounds that the polls show him easily defeating the Conservative Michael Howard. To be on the safe side, though, the Labour party has been...

The liberation of Auschwitz just 60 years ago prompted the United Nations General Assembly to hold a special session concerning the Holocaust.(The Week)(Brief Article)
February 28, 2005... * The liberation of Auschwitz just 60 years ago prompted the United Nations General Assembly to hold a special session concerning the Holocaust. The specious people there seemed to be trying to make amends for the strenuous anti-Israeli and...