ninme

Flying home tonight. It’s a bit warmer there than here, I’ve noticed.

While I’m at 30,000 feet, some reading to keep you all from going into deep withdrawal and violent DT:

NRO - Our Wars Over the War, by Victor Davis Hanson

Ever since September 11, there has been an alternative narrative about this war embraced by the Left. In this mythology, the attack on September 11 had in some vague way something to do with American culpability.

Either we were unfairly tilting toward Israel, or had been unkind to Muslims. Perhaps, as Sen. Patty Murray intoned, we needed to match the good works of bin Laden to capture the hearts and minds of Muslim peoples.

The fable continues that the United States itself was united after the attack even during its preparations to retaliate in Afghanistan. But then George Bush took his eye off the ball. He let bin Laden escape, and worst of all, unilaterally and preemptively, went into secular Iraq — an unnecessary war for oil, hegemony, Israel, or Halliburton, something in Ted Kennedy’s words “cooked up in Texas.”

In any case, there was no connection between al Qaeda and Saddam, and thus terrorists only arrived in Iraq after we did.

That tale goes on. The Iraqi fiasco is now a hopeless quagmire. The terrorists are paying us back for it in places like London and Madrid.

Read the whole thing. I was tempted to quote highlights rather than the alluring beginning, but decided I’d just end up pasting half the end of it and no one would feel the need to read the first half. So read the rest. Then:

NRO - Murder’s Row Rules, by Michael Ledeen

Iranian dissidents appealed to the United Nations to support calls for freedom for Akbar Ganji, the brave writer who is being tortured in Tehran for the sin of exposing the murderous activities of the theocratic regime of the Islamic republic. The top dog at the U.N., Kofi Annan, declined to take a stand, claiming he did not know enough to have an opinion. The U.N.’s lapdog at the U.S. Senate, Indiana’s Richard Lugar, similarly declined comment, thereby relegating himself to the honor roll of appeasers of terrorists, murderers, and torturers. With the exception of the New York Sun, no major newspaper has supported Ganji, nor, for that matter, the broader cause of Iranian freedom.

Happily, President Bush unhesitatingly denounced Iran’s mullahcracy for its barbaric treatment of Ganji, and his forthright support of freedom has been echoed by Senators Sam Brownback, Rick Santorum, and Joe Biden. Even the European Union felt compelled to support Ganji in an usually blunt demand for his release. Others may well follow, as they should…

And yet the protests continue, to the near-total indifference of the media of the so-called civilized world (the most notable exception being John Batchelor, whose late-night radio broadcasts have been a rare source of information on Iran). In the township of Mehabad in Kurdistan province, thousands of people demonstrated on July 11 against the murder of a Kurdish activist named Shovaneh Ghaderi. The demonstrators chanted “Death to the Islamic Republic,” and “Death to Khamenei.” The demonstrators were clubbed and beaten, at least one was killed, and significant numbers were arrested. On the 12th there was a work stoppage, nominally to protest the economic misery of the city, despite the torrent of petrodollars pouring into the mullahs’ coffers.

Don’t worry, I’ll be back tomorrow! Light blogging, perhaps, but blogging nonetheless. Bubblehead understands.

Wait, one more thing (gettin’ in the mood) (I’ve realized I’ll have to reread a bit of the last book to remember what happened):

Opinion Journal - History According to Harry: Appeasement fails with warlocks too. BY JONATHAN V. LAST

In the fifth book, “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix,” something interesting happened. The author, J.K. Rowling, abandoned the mystery genre and gave her readers something more challenging: a historical allegory. Through sleight-of-hand, Ms. Rowling took a children’s book and transformed it into a parable about 1930s England. We’ve heard a lot recently about London and the Blitz. Ms. Rowling’s unfolding saga may illuminate that dark historical moment, not only the ordeals that led up to it but also–who knows?–the triumphs that followed.

The parallels between this volume and Britain’s prewar dithering are so great that the book is perhaps best read as a light companion to “Alone,” the second volume of William Manchester’s biography of Winston Churchill.

Again, I’ll have to reread bits of that. It’s very fuzzy in my head, and I’m sure I missed the Churchillian parallels.

I usually shy away from attributing meaning to something that the author/artist may not have meant. If he says it isn’t there, or hasn’t said it is, then it’s not mine to hijack. But this is quite interesting. And practically proven. And it’s not as bad as what they did to Georgia O’Keefe.