I have a new piece up at Power Line this morning, on the death of major newspapers.  It's here.

MONDAY,  MARCH 9,  2009

PAKISTAN STONEWALLING - AT 10:46 P.M. ET:  From the Los Angeles Times:

Reporting from Washington -- U.S. efforts to identify and thwart the growing threat posed by Pakistani extremists who enjoy easy access to the United States -- and already have a significant presence here -- are being undermined by the government of Pakistan, according to current and former U.S. and Western counter-terrorism officials.

After the terrorist attack in Mumbai, India, in November, which killed more than 170 people, the FBI and other U.S. agencies went on high alert, searching without success for evidence of plotters in the United States. But they were essentially shut down in efforts to work the Pakistan side of the investigation, not only to find additional plotters but to learn more about the Al Qaeda-affiliated Pakistani militant group suspected of orchestrating the attacks, Lashkar-e-Taiba, and its global network of cells, the officials said.

COMMENT:  An important story.  British intelligence believes that Pakistani activists are the greatest terror threat to Britain.  It's logical to assume that these extremists also have America in their sights.  If we can't get the Pakistanis to cooperate, the chances of a successful terror attack here are enhanced.  Let's see what Obama can do about this.

March 9   Permalink

UNBELIEVABLE, BUT BELIEVABLE - AT 10:30 P.M. ET:  Read this one carefully, from Fox News:

The Department of Defense and the National Nuclear Security Administration had to wait more than a year to refurbish aging nuclear warheads — partly because they had forgotten how to make a crucial component, a government report states.

Regarding a classified material codenamed "Fogbank," a Government Accountability Office report released this month states that "NNSA had lost knowledge of how to manufacture the material because it had kept few records of the process when the material was made in the 1980s and almost all staff with expertise on production had retired or left the agency."

So the effort to refurbish and upgrade W76 warheads, which top the U.S. Navy's (and the British Royal Navy's) submarine-launched Trident missiles, had to be put on hold while experts scoured old records and finally figured out how to manufacture the stuff once again.

COMMENT:  There's a good lesson here.  We assume that expertise is handed down from generation to generation, but sometimes it isn't.  There have been authoritative reports that the United States Government is running on fumes in some technical, defense-related areas because people are retiring and no one is taking their place.  This problem should have the highest priority.

March 9, 2009  Permalink

THE FREEMAN BEAT - AT 7:49 P.M. ET:  The selection of Charles Freeman Jr. to be head of the National Intelligence Council continues to roil the waters.  We've been following the story.  Freeman is an apologist for both China and Saudi Arabia.  He has strange tastes in friends.  From the Washington Times:

Republicans on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence are vowing increased scrutiny of national intelligence estimates if Charles “Chas” W. Freeman Jr. oversees their production.

In a letter sent Monday to Dennis C. Blair, the director of national intelligence, seven Republican senators - led by the panel's vice chairman, Christopher S. Bond, Missouri Republican - said the appointment of Mr. Freeman as chairman of the National Intelligence Council (NIC), “sends the wrong message.”

COMMENT:  It's sad that only Republicans are raising objections.  Democrats, who are oh so sensitive about our "treatment" of Gitmo detainees, seem, with a few exceptions, to be unconcerned about Freeman's praise of the Tiananmen Square massacre or his vile comments about Israel.  Freeman is a former ambassador to Saudi Arabia, and his ties to that country's government should be put under a microscope.  The "kingdom" has a long history of taking good care of its friends.

March 9, 2009   Permalink

TALIBAN TALKS? - AT 7:18 P.M. ET:  Strangely enough, this is a joint dispatch from both Britain's Guardian and Telegraph:

BARACK Obama's call for "moderate" Taliban members to be brought in from the cold has met with scepticism from leading Afghan opposition figures, who warned that co-opting fighters would fail as long as Hamid Karzai's Government appeared weak and corrupt.

Ashraf Ghani, a former Afghan finance minister who plans to run for president in August, said: "I don't know of a single peace process that has been successfully negotiated from a position of weakness or stalemate."

COMMENT:  There's some wisdom there.  Obama's call for talks - his standard line - will run parallel to military action.  It's his war now.

March 9, 2009   Permalink

COMMON SENSE DEFENSE - AT 5:51 P.M. ET:  Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona and House GOP Whip Eric Cantor of Virginia have an excellent piece on the need for missile defense in The Politico.  They point out:

In the past two weeks, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee announced that he would “love” to cut missile defense funding. Newspaper headlines report that the Obama administration is planning to make significant cuts in the missile defense budget. These cuts could include funds that would be used to deploy our missile defense assets to Europe — which NATO has twice stated is necessary to deal with the threat from Iran.

That such a rollback of the system is being discussed is dangerous. That it is being discussed at the same time North Korea and Iran are carrying out aggressive, threatening activities is irresponsible and unacceptable.

Spot on.  The Republican opposition must watch carefully what is done to our national defense.  The left wing of the Democratic Party is contemptuous of it.  They want that money for their pet projects.  The two GOP leaders conclude:

Ballistic missile defense is the most moral and effective deterrent to the threat of ballistic missile attack. The American people deserve to be protected, and national security is too important to be politicized. Obama and congressional Democrats should work with Republicans to protect the American people and our allies against ballistic missile attack.

Rate the odds of that.  We're in for a fight on defense, but it's a fight our side can win - if we involve the American people and explain our correct, well-thought-out position.

March 9, 2009   Permalink

DOW CLOSE - AT 4:11 P.M. ET:  The Dow closed down 80 points, to 6547.

SERIOUSLY - AT 1:39 P.M. ET:

SILVER SPRING, Md. (AP) -- Montgomery County police say 16 people were arrested after a fight broke out during a concert held to promote nonviolence and to remember a Silver Spring teen killed last year.

The free Stop the Violence youth concert was held Saturday night on Ellsworth Street in downtown Silver Spring in memory of 14-year-old Montgomery Blair High School student Tai Lam, who was shot to death in November.

COMMENT:  You read that correctly.

March 9, 2009   Permalink

DOW NOW - AT 1:23 P.M. ET:  The Dow is down 60, to 6567, getting close to that psychological 6500 mark. 

OBAMAMANIA TAPERING OFF - AT 1:15 P.M. ET:  Rasmussen reports that approval of President Obama is at 56%, and has been there for three days running.  Disapproval is at 43%, also for three days running.  These are not spectacular figures.  A month ago the president stood at 60% approve, 38% disapprove.  The gap has gone from 22% to 13%. 

Messiahs generally do better.

March 9, 2009   Permalink 

POLAND DISSED - AT 8:25 A.M. ET:  As if to confirm the story just below, the president of Poland speaks out on missile defense, an an apparent plea to the United States.  AP reports:

Poland's president said Sunday he believes the U.S. will honor its agreement to build a missile defense base in his country, adding that scrapping the project to improve ties with Russia would be an unfriendly gesture toward Poland.

"A deal was signed and I think that regardless of which administration is in power in the United States agreements are going to be implemented," President Lech Kaczynski said on TVN24 television.

COMMENT:  Advice to the president of Poland:  Please note President Obama's rude treatment of Prime Minister Gordon Brown of the U.K. last week.  If I were you, I wouldn't be sure that this administration will honor its agreement with Poland.  The word "ally" doesn't appear to have much strength in the Obama White House. 

March 9, 2009   Permalink

OBAMA DOUBTED ABROAD - AT 8:07 A.M. ET:  The Australian reports something we're beginning to see clearly, that many foreign countries are becoming considerably less enthusiastic about Barack Obama, and these countries are allies of the United States.  Washington is opening ties with Iran.  It's also smiling broadly at Russia, and dangling a number of possible concessions.  As The Australian says:

The regional diplomatic effort, which will involve Mr Obama traveling to Turkey early next month -- Ankara has offered some qualified support for Iran's nuclear program -- makes good on his campaign promises.

But it worries Arab and Israeli leaders, who already question whether Mr Obama is making too many concessions to Iran, while eastern Europeans feel the same about the dramatic reversal in tone of the relations between Washington and Moscow.

COMMENT:  We hope that the Obama administration is simply testing the waters, as some analysts argue.  But we can't help noting that the changes reflect the leftist political instincts of the president and secretary of state, as well as Obama advisers like Samantha Power.

Time is not on our side, especially with Iran, whose nuclear program forges ahead.  Americans will start demanding some tangible results from the Obama foreign-policy team, sooner rather than later.

March 9, 2009   Permalink

EDUCATIONAL NOTE - AT 7:12 A.M. ET:  From the Washington Times:

Capitol Hill's top Democrats are making a full-throated effort to rebrand earmarks as good government, not a dirty word synonymous with pork-barrel hijinks.

With President Obama's vow to clamp down on earmarks putting pressure on lawmakers to change their ways, congressional leaders have set out to educate voters about why they think Congress should direct dollars to districts or states for specific pet projects.

COMMENT:  In other words, no change we can believe in.  Business as usual.  Now let's see if President Obama has the clout, or the stomach, to take on his own party.  Of course, he'll have to get some sleep first.

March 9, 2009   Permalink

RESTRAIN THIS JOURNALIST, IMMEDIATELY - AT 7:02 A.M. ET:  The AP is off to a borderline-hysterical start this week, going way over the top in discussing Mr. Obama's health-care plans:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Embarking on arguably his most complex political fight yet, President Barack Obama is using skills honed during his presidential campaign and lessons learned from past failures to try to overhaul the health care system.

It's a feat none before him has achieved. As such, it would pay monumental dividends for a popular new president looking for history-making accomplishments ahead of his likely 2012 re-election campaign.

''Nothing is harder in politics than doing something now that costs money in order to gain benefits 20 years from now,'' Obama acknowledged last week.

That's exactly what he's trying as he seeks to ensure health care for everyone in a country with the world's costliest system and an estimated 48 million uninsured people.

COMMENT:  Oh, the hero.  Oh, the godlike figure.  Oh, the messianic creature sent to us by a higher power to right our sins.  Can we be luckier?

Hey, guys, calm down.  The first journalistic question is this:  Does the health-care system actually need overhauling? 

Why is this question not being asked?  Maybe what's needed are some fixes rather than an overhaul.  And maybe it's not the health-care system we should focus on, but the health-insurance system.  And maybe, just maybe, we should fight to minimize government involvement, rather than maximize it. 

March 9, 2009   Permalink

BARACK AND WINNIE - AT 6:50 A.M. ET:  Superb historian Arthur Herman notes that British Prime Minister Gordon Brown gave President Obama a set of Sir Martin Gilbert's multi-volume biography of Winston Churchill.  But, Herman believes, Obama will never read it because he has contempt for Churchill and the British tradition:

...it's a shame that Obama will never read Sir Martin's work. If he did, he'd discover how one man can inspire a people with the notion that liberty is worth defending, not just in prosperity but in a nation's darkest days.

He might also learn why, not so long ago, Americans and Britons felt compelled to join forces to oppose a generation of would-be political messiahs who imagined they could make a better world by stifling that legacy of liberty.

COMMENT:  I like the part about the would-be political messiahs.  Hmm.

March 9, 2009   Permalink

SUNDAY,  MARCH 8,  2009

WARNING ON IRAN - AT 10:03 P.M. ET:  From AFP: 

Iran is trying to use the talks with Western powers on its nuclear ambitions to buy time to produce an atomic bomb, Israel's military intelligence chief said on Sunday.

"Iran has crossed the technological threshold. Reaching a military-grade nuclear capability is a question of synchronising its strategy with the production of a nuclear bomb," Major General Amos Yadlin told cabinet ministers.

"Iran continues to stockpile hundreds of kilogrammes of low-level enriched uranium and hopes to use the dialogue with the West to buy the time it requires in order to move towards an ability to manufacture a nuclear bomb," a senior official quoted Yadlin as saying.

COMMENT:  You will notice the deep concern by the Obama administration.  Talk will solve everything.

March 8, 2009   Permalink

MAYBE HILLARY NEEDS TO GO BACK THERE - AT 9:57 P.M. ET: 

PYONGYANG/BEIJING, March 9 (AP) - (Kyodo)—North Korea warned Monday that any move to intercept what it calls a satellite launch and what other countries suspect may be a missile test-firing would result in a counterstrike against the countries trying to stop it.

"We will retaliate (over) any act of intercepting our satellite for peaceful purposes with prompt counterstrikes by the most powerful military means," the official Korean Central News Agency quoted a spokesman of the General Staff of the Korean People's Army as saying.

If countries such as the United States, Japan or South Korea try to intercept the launch, the North Korean military will carry out "a just retaliatory strike operation not only against all the interceptor means involved but against the strongholds" of the countries, it said.

COMMENT:  It's important for Hillary Clinton to go right back to Asia, where she traveled recently, and do some major apologizing and groveling.  She's gotten so good at it - really expert - that some genuflecting would probably do considerable good.  Boy, that BUSH really messed things up, didn't he?

March 8, 2009   Permalink

I'M LEAVING - AT 7:46 P.M. ET:  Actual headline in London's Telegraph:

Prince Charles: 100 months to save the world

COMMENT:  Let's face it:  He wants the world to last long enough for him to be king, at least for a day.

March 8, 2009   Permalink

REALLY? - AT 7:41 P.M. ET:  Actual Associated Press headline today:

White House Budget Director Says Economy Is 'Weak'

COMMENT:  Well, now we know.  It wasn't a rumor.

March 8, 2009   Permalink

NOW WE KNOW - AT 10:31 A.M. ET:  Just in, hot news from Britain's Telegraph, finally explaining to a yearning public why President Obama was so rude to Prime Minister Gordon Brown:

Barack Obama's offhand approach to Gordon Brown's Washington visit last week came about because the president was facing exhaustion over America's economic crisis and is unable to focus on foreign affairs, the Sunday Telegraph has been told.

Sources close to the White House say Mr Obama and his staff have been "overwhelmed" by the economic meltdown and have voiced concerns that the new president is not getting enough rest.

COMMENT:  Oh, the poor dear.  We must get him beddy-bye.

Strange, but overwhelming pressure didn't affect Franklin Roosevelt's greeting to Winston Churchill during World War II, or George W. Bush's treatment of Tony Blair in the aftermath of 9/11.  But do you know why?  Those presidents had firmer mattresses.  That's it.  That's the key.  Write the White House.

Geez.

March 8, 2009   Permalink

CAN WE TALK? - AT 10:04 A.M. ET:  From Reuters and Israeli sources:

Iran has test fired a new long-range missile, the state Press TV reported on Sunday.

Iran often stages war games or tests weapons to show its determination to counter any attack by foes including Israel and the United States, which accuse the Islamic Republic of seeking to develop nuclear bombs. Tehran denies the charge.

"Iran test fires new long range missile," Press TV, Iran's English-language television station, said in a scrolling headline without giving details.

COMMENT:  Do not worry.  Nothing to see here, nothing to see.  Once Barack Obama "engages" the Iranians, we'll learn that the mullahs are just peace-loving, misunderstood churchmen (or mosquemen) with only good will on their minds.  If it weren't for BUSH (!!) we would have known it already.

There are people who believe that. 

March 8, 2009   Permalink

HYPOCRISY 101 - AT 9:31 A.M. ET:  From The Washington Post:

When President Obama promised Wednesday to attack defense spending that he considers wasteful and inefficient, he opened a fight with key lawmakers from his own party.

It was Democrats who stuffed an estimated $524 million in defense earmarks that the Pentagon did not request into the 2008 appropriations bill, about $220 million more than Republicans did, according to an independent estimate. Of the 44 senators who implored Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates in January to build more F-22 Raptors -- a fighter conceived during the Cold War that senior Pentagon officials say is not suited to probable 21st-century conflicts -- most were Democrats.

COMMENT:  This is an ongoing scandal.  Even the late Barry Goldwater - "Mr. Defense" - railed against corruption in defense spending.  We too often buy weapons that have political, rather than military backing.  It will be difficult to dislodge this cash cow. 

We support President Obama in fighting Pentagon waste.  At the same time, we'll watch his defense plans with both eyes.  Being against waste does not automatically mean he'll make the right defense judgments when pushed against the wall by the left wing of his party.

March 8, 2009   Permalink

COMMON SENSE - AT 8:49 A.M. ET:  Frank Miele is a transplanted Easterner who now enjoys the wide-open spaces of Montana.  He writes some of the best commentary on the web.  Consider:

Rush Limbaugh has been criticized for saying he hopes the president fails in his efforts to reshape the economy, most recently in this newspaper by columnist Ellen Goodman, who called Limbaugh "a talk radio host who'd rather be (far) right than have his country rescued."

This kind of twisted commentary is what makes one pessimistic about the future of the country. How exactly did Ellen Goodman miss the news that Rush Limbaugh is a conservative and Barack Obama is a liberal (oops, I almost said socialist)? Is there really any logical reason why Limbaugh WOULD support Obama? Does anyone remember liberals like Al Franken and Nancy Pelosi supporting President Bush when he was trying to ensure victory in Iraq?...

...But when liberals are in power, criticism of the government is virtually a crime against the state.

COMMENT:  Miele is entirely correct.  My great fear is that some "liberals," and they really aren't liberal, would like to punish the heresy in very serious ways.  Examine what some "liberals" have done on a number of college campuses, where speech codes restrict what students can say.  Our kids are learning that these restrictions are perfectly okay, and they will take that lesson to the larger society.

Read the rest of Miele's column.  It's superb.

March 8,  2009   Permalink