Libertarian Leanings

The House in Windsor

Susan and I often stop for visits in Windsor. Separately we grew up there. Separately we graduated from high school. From there we went off to lead separate lives. Our reintroduction to each other came some thirty-five years after we'd each left town, each married, each had three children, each divorced. The similarities seem remarkable to us, although the facts of our lives are most likely the same as for thousands of others. Nowadays it seems there is little we do separately.

This weekend we drove down from our place in New Hampshire to Connecticut to visit family who remain in the area and to reconnect with Windsor. We had our Sunday morning breakfast at Nick's and then took a long walk that took us past the house where I grew up. The new owner looked up from where he was sitting on the front steps and smiled as we walked by. Do you think I should introduce myself? Yes, she said.

Windsor is a town with an ever changing demographic. It's the first town north of Hartford which puts it right in the path of urban flight. Over the years, the local rag has made every effort to put a racial slant on the situation with stories of "white flight", of minorities left trapped in the urban ghetto, but the fact is it's just flight. Ed exemplifies. I introduced Susan and me, and told him that his was the house I grew up in. I asked him how he liked living there, and he told us he loved it, and apologizing that his wife was not home at the moment and that the house was not as tidy as it might be, he asked us if we'd like to come in and see it.

Ed has the hint of a Spanish accent in his speech. I didn't ask from where or how long ago. It was faint but it was there, and the chance that we might miss it disappeared when we went inside. Where the house once presented a subdued impression of neutral color and straight line classical décor, today it is flamboyant with vibrant color and a suggestion of baroque in its atmosphere. It's different. It's Ed. It reflects Ed and his wife and his family. But what surprised me was how the differences were almost overwhelmed by how much the same it is. It was home. It is home.

For my part I was able to give Ed a little of the history of the place. It was built in the twenties, and I was able to tell him who had built it, and where his house had once stood. I was able to tell him that my parents had moved into the place right after World War II. I told him which bedroom belonged to which of us as we grew up there. In what was once my bedroom I took the blame for carving my name with a fishing knife down the edge of the closet door where it still can be seen above the latch plate.

It was a short visit, but one marked by genuine warmth. He took us through the whole house. We thanked him, said our goodbyes, and continued on our walk. How gracious it was of him to invite us in. It was something to once again walk through the rooms where growing up happened. But what was most satisfying was to see that the old house will be the anchor for another couple of generations of Windsor people, who will come back to reconnect from time to time, just as Susan and I do.

Mohammed of Iraq the Model has a great post on "Knowing the enemy".

The new enemy differs from all the previous ones in that he doesn’t have or even claim to have any constructive ideology. He doesn’t bring us anything other than the seeds of death and destruction “either you surrender to me or I kill you”. As for an alternative ideology, it doesn’t exist. Moreover the willingness to initiate a dialogue was never expressed or shown to be a possibility.

Mohammed concludes:

I don’t know what exactly is on the mind of the American administration and what exactly their intentions are, but I know that it’s absolutely wrong in this stage and with the existing threats to go back to the old policy, and I know that the coalition has the capabilities and the strength to defeat the enemy.

This war demands great determination, patience and faith on the parts of the governments and the people. For me, an Iraqi citizen, the American administration has never failed me, not yet. I hope that they keep the course, otherwise the loss will be that of the whole humanity and I doubt if it can ever be overcome.

He's right, you know. This is a message more Americans ought to take to heart. Read the whole thing.

Esoteric Diatribe has published an email from another Vietnam Veteran who abhors the thought of a Kerry presidency:

How many sacrificing, honorable warriors were left alone, isolated and embittered with their grievous wounds, rejected by an ungrateful nation, because of the manipulative, purposeful deceptions of a scheming, ambitious politician.

You can go here to read the whole thing.

Meanwhile back in Afghanistan...

Tony Blair insists that Afghanistan is not a "forgotten country". He said this in reponse to statements from members of a Commons Select Committee on Foreign Affairs who presented a grim picture of conditions in that country upon their return from a fact finding mission.

They said Nato had failed to keep its promise of restoring democracy, and that warlords were still in charge of vast areas of land, with private militias numbering up to 10,000.

Mr Blair conceded that there were problems but insisted that it was a mistake to say that no progress has been made.

"There are five and a half million kids in school including over two million girls who were banned from school. The economy has grown by 30 per cent this year and is expected to grow by 20 per cent. The most telling statistic is that two and a half million refugees have returned to Afghanistan," he said.

Donald Anderson, chairman of the select committee, issued a statement challenging his own committee members. "The Independent report is more newspaper spin than any considered view of the committee as a whole," he said. "There are quotes in the story from individual committee members but the committee has not even begun to discuss what to put in its report."

Afghan President Hamid Karzai is expected in Washington next month for discussions with President Bush on combat efforts against the "Taliban-led insurgents" who threaten upcoming elections and reconstruction in the country.

So Kevin, tells how you really feel!

John Weidner at www.randomjottings.net links to a revealing post by Keving Drum. How does he feel about the prospect of failure in Iraq?

As near as I can tell, though, a lot of them have basically given up and are already setting the stage for Phase 2: figuring out a way to blame liberals and the press for the fiasco in Iraq even though George Bush and his team have been in charge of every single detail of it and have gotten every single dollar they've asked for. I can't wait.

He can't wait!

Foreign leaders for Kerry

According to the Wall Street Journal (subscription required) Hans Blix has identified himself as one of those foreign leaders who support a Kerry presidency.

Hans Blix has never made a secret of his opposition to the war in Iraq, but recently the former chief U.N. weapons inspector and Swedish diplomat has dropped all pretense of, well, diplomacy. His frequent public statements are confirming that the Bush Administration was right to suspect that he was so opposed to the war that he'd have given Saddam Hussein the benefit of every doubt and more in order to prevent it.

In an interview published Monday in the Italian newspaper La Stampa, Mr. Blix had the following to say:

Mr. Blix: "I place my trust in the multilateralism of Democratic candidate John Kerry. And in any event, I think that the whole world should vote on 2 November because so much depends on the outcome of that vote."

This makes clear that Kerry support from abroad is clearly among those who opposed invasion of Iraq, many of whom are not only anti-war, but also anti-American. Again I have to wonder how this will play in minds of our enemies.

Pessimistic Reactions

The Minute Man shares his pessimism with us in this post on the President's speech last night.

Bush seemed confident, and what he presented certainly sounded like a plan. Is it achievable? Time will tell, but at this point I will settle for the appearance of competence.

He follows his modest hope for the "appearance of competence" with a rundown of predictably "disappointing to annoying" pundit reaction from just anybody he can find who longs for a Kerry presidency. He concludes:

Events are in the saddle, and the horse is rudderless. Or lacks training wheels.

And in the comments to his post a gentlemen who goes by WillieStyle adds:

All jokes aside, I pray he pulls this off. If things end up bad over there it';ll be really bad for all of us.

I've never wanted to be wrong so much in my life.

Sorry to be the one to spoil all the fun, but he's going to pull it off. Actually, I should say that we will pull it off, because more people than GWB have a stake. Americans want this to happen. Iraqis want this to happen. The troops, and their families, and those who support the troops by saying so in emails and care packages to them will make it happen. Folks, like those who contributed toys to Chief Wiggles for Iraqi children, or money to Spirit of America for radio equipment to provide an alternative voice in Iraq will make it happen. And still others who provide support just by speaking out and saying they support the President, support the mission, support the troops, believe that Iraqis are going to come through for themselves and for us - they will make it happen.

We will pull it off. I can see only one sure recipe for failure, and that is a John Kerry presidency. We have in President Bush, a man who has risked his presidency to do what he believes needs to be done to make the world a safer and a better place. He is a man who has the courage to go against world opinion to do what he believes is right. In John Kerry we have a man who is willing to risk American security for the chance to be president. He is a man who is willing to say whatever it is he thinks will make him president. By the time November rolls around enough people are going to recognize this and make the right choice. We will pull it off.

News Flash! Imus and Scheiffer think terrrorists could attack!

I listened to Imus in the Morning on the way to work today, and was stunned by the sheer idiocy of his interview with Bob Scheiffer. It was more of the usual whining and pathetically stupid Monday morning quarterbacking about the "hopeless" situation in Iraq. Here we have another pair of geniuses talking about the war in Iraq as if it was intended to be a church bake sale. "This just in - yesterday's bake sale became the worst of the century when a mortar hit the brownies!" Well, here's a clue! It's a war! How about if we compare it to how other wars have gone, instead of trying to pretend it was supposed to be an 14-day cruise to the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World! A little bias is to be expected. Imus endorsed John Kerry. An endorsement made solely to feed his own overblown ego, I might add. He sees himself as king maker, God help us!

But to get back to the topic at hand, in the course of their discussion of the dreadful state of affairs in Iraq where the terrorists can "take a suicide bomber off the shelf" and set him in motion against the troops, they concluded that there's a difference between the war in Iraq and the war in Vietnam. Are you ready? The difference is that the Viet Cong were no threat to bring the battle to U.S. soil, but the terrorists are! Brilliant! Brilliant! Except they forgot that terrorists already brought the battle to U.S. soil. Not once did they mention 9/11. It was all in the context of terrorist retaliation for our incursion into peaceful Iraq. As if we went into Iraq for the hell of it!

For those of us who view the prospect of a Kerry presidency as being as close to disaster as we'd ever like to get, there is a silver lining. The idiocy of John Kerry's pronouncements is matched by those of his most loyal supporters.

A Veteran's opposition to a Kerry presidency

Today's Chicago Tribune has an article by Neal Thompson, a Vietnam Veteran who is very much opposed to a Kerry presidency. He includes what has become a pretty common complaint among veterans, that Kerry slandered American troops on his return from Vietnam. But Mr. Thompson's complaint goes beyond the Vietnam issue. It's the issue of opportunism verses integrity.

John Kennedy, whom Kerry idolizes, wrote "Profiles in Courage" in 1955.

The book is a tribute to public officials who, in Kennedy's view, had the courage and integrity to act in the public interest knowing they would forfeit their office for so doing, people like Sen. Edmund G. Ross, whose vote against impeachment saved Andrew Johnson's presidency at the cost of his own political career.

Within a few short years, Kennedy, in his own mind, would face just such a test, and he would fail miserably.

According to aide Kenny O'Donnell, Kennedy had concluded by spring 1963 that American involvement in Vietnam was pointless and had to end, telling Sen. Mike Mansfield that he "agreed with Mansfield's thinking on the need for a complete military withdrawal from Vietnam. But I can't do it until 1965--after I'm re-elected."

And Kerry's hero JFK was not alone in putting politics ahead of statesmanship.

Presidents Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon followed suit.

As Johnson's recently released White House tapes and other historical materials reveal, domestic politics both drove and limited his conduct of the war. He needed just enough commitment to avoid losing but not so much as to alarm the electorate, lest the Republicans gain in Congress or limit his Great Society programs.

Nixon represents the flip side. He genuinely believed that an independent, non-communist South Vietnam was important but removed troops by the hundreds of thousands whenever the next election cycle demanded further reductions. Clark Clifford, a former secretary of defense, described it all in his autobiography as "a cauldron in which good and able men of high integrity, acting out of solid and well-reasoned motives, went terribly wrong."

"We made an honest mistake," he said.

Nonsense.

There were no "good and able men of high integrity," there were "no solid and well-reasoned motives" and there were no "mistakes."

What we had instead were conscious, carefully considered choices made by dishonest, ambitious men who put their interests first at every crucial juncture. And from everything I've seen, John Kerry is just such a man.

So while I might not be happy with much of what I see today, Kerry is not a man I will trust in the White House. I've seen his kind before and, knowing history, I am determined not to repeat it.

Via Betsy's Page

Kerry's promise

John Kerry's promise to pull all of our troops out of Iraq before the end of his first term strikes me as beyond stupid. Apparently Mr. Kerry is unconcerned that he may be perceived as inviting attack. Either that, or he has forgotten all about Madrid. Whether or not there was actually some cause and effect, the sequence of events remains. The terrorists attacked on the eve of Spain's national election murdering hundreds. The pro-war party in power, apparently ahead in the opinion polls up to that point, was defeated. Is Mr. Kerry so confident the same kind of attack can't happen in America? Isn't it possible that there is some idiot terrorist somewhere who thinks he can pull it off?

His pronouncements continue to boggle the mind. But they may also provide a hint as to the identity of those mysterious foreign leaders who look him in the eye and say "you gotta win this thing". Did Mr. Kerry happen to run into Muqtada al-Sadr in a New York restaurant?