I think we'll see him testifying a bit in the new year.

Most of the relevant lines were drawn at the peace conference in Paris in 1919 (all of the ones in the Middle East in particular). The U.S. was a key participant that conference.

As for the relevance of your maps, sorry, I missed the earlier discussions. But apparently the sarcasm should have been directed at Ty, because, according to your rendering of the conversation, you made a rather obvious point.

That is an excellent point I had not thought of. As part of the fourteen points, Wilson did push for the creation of nation states (nations whose boundaries followed ethnolinguistic lines) which is why Europe took a big step in that direction after WWI (even though the European powers resisted it). However, even though Wilson did not specify it, it seems he was just talking about Europe. I know assurances were made to the Arabs about an Arab nation state being made after the war, and T.E. Lawrence attended the Paris Peace Conference with Hussein to try and see that the Arabs were given this nation state. But of course they were ignored and Arabia was divided up by the European powers. I am not aware if Wilson resisted this. And even if he did resist it, he didn't do a very good job.

When I made the assertion, I thought it was an obvious point and was very surprised that Ty disputed it. We argued for pages and pages. However, I shouldn't really have been surprised because I often make assertions that I think are obvious that Ty disputes. Example: CAFTA made trade freer in the Caribbean and Latin America (and opponents to CAFTA were serving protectionists interests regardless of their claims to the contrary), the redistricting initiative proposed by the Governator would have improved the political situation in California etc. etc.

This is a pretty good book on the subject. The authors definitely fault Wilson for not standing up to his rhetoric. A lot of different groups (the Arabs and the Irish, in particular) placed a lot of hope on the idea of self-determination that was one of the 14 points. In the Middle East in particular, most of them were disappointed.

The authors also suggest that whatever Wilson's somewhat naive hopes were, the reality of the European powers' colonial interests was too much to overcome. The English, in particular, wanted a mandate over the area around Basra specifically because of oil.

I don't think I would argue with either of those two statements. Apparently when two ships pass in the night, it takes a long time. Or something.

Yeah, this one made me proud.

Does a few months of sleep deprivation count as "torture"?

Does the fact that we kept an FBI informant imprisoned suggest that denying prisoners counsel, or any semblance of due process, just might inhibit our ability to assess those who really are, and are not, threats?

Is this what people want America to stand for?

Come on. Everyone knows that the Iraqis don't understand any other way--without a strong hand to guide them, how will they ever find their way to democracy?

And if a few Americans (or Brits or whatever) have their "rights" temporarily limited, well, they should have expected it for getting mixed up with those people over there. Really, what were they thinking, wokring with Iraqi gun traders?

(a) It does seem particularly stupid
(b) No.
(c) Yes.
(d) No. I would prefer we be more competent.

S_A_M

Bush Administration censors former official for having the wrong views.

If S_A_M's right that it's not torture, I think the people in the White House who did this should be deprived of sleep for a few months.

We argued for pages and pages about something. You kept defending Ellen Taucher's (and other conservative Democrats ) vote against CAFTA. You spent a lot of time writing about why CAFTA was bad and didn't really promote free trade. If you said CAFTA on balance, was a good thing, there would have been no argument.

You critisized the Governors proposition for redistricting. I kept trying to say that if it is flawed it is superior to the status quo, but you refused to accept that logic. If you had acknowledged that on balance, it was a good thing then there would have been no argument.


I supported both CAFTA and the governors proposition on redistricting. Did you not take positions different from that, and if you didn't what were we arguing about?

Under what definition does three months of sleep deprivation not constitute torture?

Would denying food and water be torture?

You really think intentionally depriving someone of sleep for extended periods of time is not torture?

You forget -- the same people who redefined "torture" to exclude anything done by the US military have redefined "treason" to include anything critical of the Bush Admin. Thus, they were preventing treason.

You don't support treason, do you Ty?

I think I actually just heard a chorus of angels.



NB: They used country music to deprive him of sleep. That has to be torture.

I think my bottom line on CAFTA was that I didn't know enough about the details. Note that this post here makes a different statement than the one above that I said I could agree with ("CAFTA made trade freer in the Caribbean and Latin America (and opponents to CAFTA were serving protectionists interests regardless of their claims to the contrary)").

If I recall correctly, I said that I had my own approach to redistricting that was even better, and I worried about the wisdom of California adopting that sort of redistricting without obtaining like concessions from (e.g.) Texas.

I see that while most of our politicians are settling into the warmth of the holidays, Our Man Newt is out on the trail doing his best to bring back the crazy.

• Gingrich cited last month's ejection of six Muslim scholars from a plane in Minneapolis for suspicious behavior, which included reports they prayed before the flight and had sat in the same seats as the Sept. 11 hijackers.
  
  "Those six people should have been arrested and prosecuted for pretending to be terrorists," Gingrich said. "And the crew of the U.S. airplane should have been invited to the White House and congratulated for being correct in the protection of citizens."

...and if they float, they should be burned as witches.

I guess this is just my pre-9/11 mindset talking, but I think these dudes were assholes, but I think it might be more productive to focus on real terrorists than on pretend terrorists. On the other hand, how can you argue with logic like this?

• "If you give me any signal in the age of terrorism that you're a terrorist, I'd say the burden of proof was on you," Gingrich said.

Well okay then.

Having dark skin is a "signal", right?

I just want to know before I fly to the Carribean to lie in the sun.

I know of two separate art projects that have been called dangerous by various officials around here. (One reported here, the other was rejected for a group show called "have a seat" because it had a replica bomb in a backpack left on a chair. The artist is a Londoner who was in London at the time of the Underground bombings last year. She was told to expect a call from Homeland Security by the guy who rejected her submission to the show. Ours is a vigilant populace.

Just recently you told me that I was in error when I said you did not support CAFTA. That was when I said it was ripe that you would critisize Bush for his lack of committment to free trade when you didn't support CAFTA. So where do you stand? Did you support CAFTA? Or to really boil down the issue, if you were in Congress would you have voted for it?



Did you are did not not support the Governor's proposition?

(Of course I remember you had a version you thought was better but on planet earth your version was not an option. But that was irrelvent to the discussion. The question that everyone faces when they have a chance to vote on something is do they believe a vote of yes would improve the situation. If you waited for a perfect bills and propositions you would never vote for anything. Voting against something, even though you think it would improve the status quo, because it is not perfect is just plain stupid. In politics, when something is up for a vote you can either support it or not. These are not ethereal policy questions, we are talking about a bill that went before the American congress and a proposition that went before the California voters. The options are yes or no - it is really not that complicated)

Sometime silence is golden...
 

Is it just me, or sometimes shouldn't the government just shut the hell up. If we are happy with the elections in Iran shouldn't we just keep it to ourselves. How does it help the guys that won when the US says we support them?

Ahmadinejad 'thwarted' in Iranian elections: US

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad looks to have been thwarted from keeping his ultra-conservative allies in control of key offices despite efforts to "cook the books" in weekend elections, the State Department said.

The elections for municipal councils and a powerful religious assembly saw Ahmadinejad loyalists suffer setbacks at the hands of more moderate candidates in a number of key races, including for seats on the Tehran city council.



"It would seem that they are not the results that President Ahmadinejad would have hoped for," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said when asked to comment on the vote.

"I think, despite the regime's efforts to cook the books in terms of an outcome, they seem to have been thwarted in that regard," he said.

While noting the high voter turnout in Friday's election, McCormack said there had been "some fundamental flaws" in the polls, "in which there were numerous candidates that were excluded from even running."

"So the people didn't have that choice to make," he said.

The United States has declared Ahmadinejad's regime to be one of its principle international adversaries for its alleged plan to develop nuclear weapons and his frequent statements that Israel should be "wiped off the map".

Washington also accuses Tehran of supporting Islamic militants responsible for unrest in Iraq, Lebanon and the Palestinian territories.

The voting for Iran's municipal councils and the Assembly of Experts -- the body which chooses the country's supreme leader -- was seen as the first popularity test for Ahmadinejad since he swept to power in 2005.

In one key race, centrist ex-president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani overwhelmingly won a seat on the Assembly of Experts, thrashing a cleric seen as Ahmadinejad's spiritual mentor.

Sometime silence is golden...
 

Based only on what you quote, I don't see any statement that the US actually likes anyone who was elected, except relative to Ahmadinejad's allies. And noting Ahmadinejad lost face is actually kind of important.

Sometime silence is golden...
 

So you disapprove of the "nyah nyah nyah nyah" foreign policy school of thought? I too have trouble with it.

As some of you may know there is an immigration check point between LA and San Diego on Interstate Five. I always thought that this check point was unconstitutional, in addition to being a huge pain in the derriere. One time I approached the check point in an old cream color Ford LTD that was missing a hubcap. Although it was winter, I was sporting a dark tan, and had rather long hair and a goatee.

I was late, in a bad mood, and after spending an eternity in line, I finally got my turn with the immigration officer who when I drove up, asked me in Spanish what was in my trunk. I told him I didn't think it was really any of his business, but if he really wanted to know, I had a family of seven back there.

I was directed to a special inspection area and spent the next hour and half having my car fully inspected. How long does it take to figure out you are not hiding a live body somewhere in your car?

I understand the constitutional reasoning for allowing full searches at the border, but I have never understood how they can defend a border inspection station a hundred and fifty miles into the country. Is there an implicit permission to have your car searched for illegal aliens every time you get on the public roads? What is up with that station from hell? If I find the thing objectionable and offensive, and I am a Caucasian republican with little sympathy for the ACLU, why aren't other people bothered by it?

1. Residency for an MD program; and

2. Associate in a law firm.

Only if you weren't allowed to bill the client.

I don't know. You'll recall that we discussed the details. I suggested that there was a problem with the bill, you told me I was wrong, and I said that I really didn't know.

I don't recall what he proposed exactly, but I do recall having a problem with a large Democratic state introducing reforms without getting large Republican states to do the same.

et fix "without"

I'm not sure that there is an asshole here other than Newt.

The imams may be a little assholish for blowing out of proportion the airline's treatment of them, but that doesn't mean that they deserved the treatment.

And anyone, crew member or otherwise, that hears something as obviously stupid and made up as "they sat in the same seats at the hijackers" and doesn't laugh, should not be involved in any conversations about airline security.

Isn't it rather settled law that you can have sobreity checkpoints, as long as you either stop everyone or choose randomly or something? Is this covered by the same reasoning? Or is that because of some public safety considerations that don't apply here (dont think so)?

But, not being a republican with little sympathy with the ACLU, I too am bothered by it, although I have no hope that the courts would step in.

I've been sleep deprived since I started practicing law - do I have a claim?

Uh huh. Yep, every person of darker-than-Casper skin is probably going to get in trouble. Nevermind that one of the imams stated that he'd already previously travelled 60,000 miles on US Airways without incident. http://www.startribune.com/462/story/864312.html Go figure. Maybe on those other trips he didn't act like a scary freak.

And Adder, there was not a single instance of "strange behavior." It was a series of behaviors, which, whether intended as threatening, a test run, merely to fuck with people's heads or just a poor sense of how to behave, that led to their ejection. Katherine Kersten summed it up well, though I acknowledge that none of what she writes has been proved in a court of law, if that's going to be someone's ridiculous standard. http://www.startribune.com/191/story/859326.html

STP.

And what about kids who torture parents this way? Can we sue them? I realize they didn't ask to be born, but still, surely a little compassion for those who gave them life in the form of big dollars is warranted.

pre 9/11, you couldn't say you had a gun even if it were a joke. Those guys had so many red-flags waiving that it seems a long shot it was all a coincidence. I've been flying out of the city with the greatest Muslim population in the States for a really long time. I have never seen anyone reciting prayers loudly in the airport anywhere, let alone at a gate.

You don't think they were looking to create a story? Really?

Atta was a registered D, yes?

Sue your kids. I'm sure they aren't judgment-proof.

Wait, maybe I have you mixed up with b'n'b.

Sometime silence is golden...
 

["It would seem that they are not the results that President Ahmadinejad would have hoped for," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said when asked to comment on the vote.

"I think, despite the regime's efforts to cook the books in terms of an outcome, they seem to have been thwarted in that regard," he said. ]

The above comments seem to imply that the US is happy with the outcome because Ahmadinejad is not. Why comment at all on who should be happy?

I love it when you get all hot and bothered and quote the star tribune.

I'm just saying that I think ole' Newt would consider a darker shade of pale a "signal", and suddenly you start connecting the dots....

I don't know anything about the sobriety check point issue. This occurred when I was in Law School and I was told by some fellow law students at the time that normally you can't just search every car on the street for illegal aliens, but the ninth circuit made some weird ruling about this check point being a quasi border check point.

So you don't have any rights not to be searched when entering the country, but you do once you are inside the country. However, the court ruled that crossing this check point was like entering the country (even though it is a hundred and fifty miles inside California) Of course that was hearsay that I never checked on.

In any case, I have always hated that check point and thought it shouldn't be there. When you are approaching the check point there are these yellow diamond signs with fleeing families portrayed on them to warn you to slow down because Mexican families might be crossing the road and you don't want to hit them. Of course if the check point was not there, there would be no reason for people to pull over, get out of their cars and cross the interstate (necessitating little children to dodge cars traveling at 75 miles per hour) to get over to the beach where the could sneak by the check point. Since the people are driving north and the beach is on the West side, they have to cross both directions of the interstate to get to the beach.

What purpose does it serve to put these families at risk? Every time I saw those signs I would just think to myself, what idiot came up with this idea? Didn't anyone think that when they were putting put up the signs that maybe it might be better just to take down the check point?

http://www.travelblogs.com/geoff/pro...ico_border.jpg

http://www.travelblogs.com/geoff/pro...ico_border.jpg

Guess He Still Hasn't Found What He's Looking For
 

From the mouth of that whiny little snotrag (whose band has always always sucked), on walking out of his meeting with American lawmakers without cash for his charities:

This guy's got a fucking nerve. I like Sally Struthers better. She asks nicer.

Right. You know, it's quite weaselly of you to imply something then try to skate away from it because you didn't technically say it. :-P

And the Star Tribune is relevant only because, um, well, that's where it happened, you know? Seemed a reasonable place to start.

And you haven't even seen me warm and slightly stirred yet. I am keeping a lid on it.

Piss off. You can't drop an STP after your primary has been MIA for this long.