HOT5 Daily 11/7/2009

1. "THE HOPELESS BANALITY OF THE BLOGOSPHERE" Sharp critique of blogosphere reaction to the Ft. Hood shooting.

Representative Sample: without any definitive word from authorities, from his friends and associates, or from Hasan himself, both lefty and righty blogs have already “solved” the mystery of motive and any argument to the contrary is “racist,” or “pro-jihad,” or “hate speech,” or “political correctness.”

2. "Obama's loaves and fishes: fraud or miracles?" Fraud.

Representative Sample:  Obama is pretending that his stimulus package is creating jobs—it can't create jobs. At best it can only redistribute them from productive sectors of the economy to unproductive sectors. At worst, it redistributes fewer jobs than it destroys.

3. "Ralph Peters: 'Fort Hood's 9/11'" Ugh. Peters goes way over the top in my opinion.

Representative Sample: What cowards we are. Political correctness killed those patriotic Americans at Ft. Hood as surely as the Islamist gunman did. And the media treat it like a case of non-denominational shoplifting.

4. "Is it time to get the state out of marriage yet?" Long past time.

Representative Sample: Maybe it's time to take the hint, and concede that, so long as we let government impose one top-down definition for marriage, voters in even the most tolerant states are going to insist that the definition be a conventional one.

5. "Firmly Behind The Genocide Solution" The farce that is the "peace process."

Representative Sample: Peace prospects between Israel and the Palestinians are bleaker than ever. The main reason for this is something that is rarely reported in the mass media

To submit a blog post for HOT5 Daily, please e-mail me at unrright@NOSPAMgmail.com. Put HOT5 in the subject.

The Tim McVeigh False Analogy

There is a popular meme going around the left in the wake of the Ft. Hood shootings. I even heard it deployed on an NPR discussion as I was driving earlier. It goes something like this: When Tim McVeigh carried out his act of domestic terrorism we didn't start focusing suspicion on white Christian males, therefore it's unfair or even bigoted to train our suspicion on Muslims when a Muslim carries out a terrorist act. This is a false analogy on multiple levels. 

First, Tim McVeigh's primary motivation, from what we know, had little to do with Christianity, and a lot to do with him being an anti-government radical. We do in fact focus plenty of suspicion on people who appear to be extremist anti-government radicals. Why? Because they fit the profile of people who could be a domestic terror threat.

Second, it is indisputable that there is a significant minority of Islam that is radical and supports terrorism. There have been numerous acts of terrorism carried out in the name of Islam. There are even a significant number of Islamic clerics who support such actions and interpret the Koran accordingly. There are other religions, including Christianity, that contain violent extremists. But at the moment, the amount of terrorism perpetrated in the name of Islam, and justified by religious leaders, exceeds that of any other religion. 

It is unforunately often difficult to tell who is and is not an Islamic extremist. While it is wrong to smear all Muslims for the actions of an extremist minority, or the actions of a deranged individual who may have just misused his religion to self-justify his actions, in my opinion there is nothing bigoted or extreme about viewing Islam as a possible risk factor. That is why the FBI conducts surveillance of mosques in this country.

If there were Christian terror organizations comparable to Al Qaeda, the Taliban, and their associates, or Christian theocracies like Iran, where ministers ruled, a significant minority of Christian clergy who advocated & justified terrorism, Christian schools that regularly produced terrorists, and numerous terrorist acts perpetrated by white Christian males, white Christian males would indeed fall under suspicion.

The vast majority of Muslims in the U.S. are good citizens like any other. Outrage at Major Hasan's crimes shouldn't obscure the fact that there are millions of Muslim citizens who are not murdering people, and thousands who serve honorably in the military. Some have sacrificed their lives in the service of this country. It is sad that being a Muslim in the U.S. can cause suspicion, or be seen as a risk factor for terrorism. And I don't blame Muslims who have nothing to do with terrorism for being upset or angry at being seen as suspects. But that doesn't mean that everyone who views Islam as a risk factor for terrorism is some sort of bigot. Unfortunately reality indicates that it is a risk factor, and a risk factor not at all comparable to the risk factor of being a white Christian male.

Was Religion a Motivating Force at Fort Hood?

There is much speculation going on about the Ft. Hood shooting. The latest report says that soldiers heard the shooter, Major Hasan, yell "Allahu Akbar!" before he started firing. There are basically three possibilities, none of which has been ruled out.

1. Hasan was just a lone maniac who happened to be a Muslim. This would fall under the nuts do crazy things category, that is often the best explanation for murderous rampages.

2. Hasan's actions were motivated by his religious beliefs.  For example,  he might have felt that the U.S. wars in the Middle East were wars against Islam, or had other religious-based beliefs that motivated him to carry out the shooting. From what I have seen, there may be some evidence supporting this scenario.

3. And finally, Hasan might have had actual connections with radical Islamists. So far I've seen no evidence this was the case.

Since Hasan is alive and in custody, not killed in a shoot-out as originally reported, an investigation should be able to uncover the details and find which of these three scenarios applies.

HOT5 Daily 11/6/2009

1. "Follow McDonnell, Not Hoffman" Good advice.

Representative Sample: McDonnell ran a smart campaign which appealed to all types of voters and had that big tent feel. He focused on the issues facing residents: taxes, jobs and transportation. Virginians didn’t want to hear about polarizing social issues like abortion and gay marriage, so McDonnell didn’t inject them into his campaign. It paid off handsomely.

2. "Republican health care plan would SAVE money; Democrat plan will cost money. What to do?" I'm guessing ignore the Republican plan and attempt to ram thru the Democratic one.

Representative Sample:  So much for the narrative that Republicans don’t have a health care plan. Not only do they have a plan, but they have a plan that will save money rather than cost money

3. "Picking the New Good and Bad Wars" Makes some excellent points.

Representative Sample:In the good old days, Iraq was the "bad" war we had to abandon in order to fight and win the "good" Afghanistan war. I wrote some time ago that once the Iraq war was over (from either winning or losing it), that Afghanistan would become the new "bad" war.

4. "The U.S. Navy: America's Unrecognized Public Health Shield:" Defending our shores from disease.

Representative Sample: Not too many Navy people know their organization serves on the front line of America's disease defenses. Even fewer officers know--or even care--that the Navy occasionally beats the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention at disease detection, discovering, for example, the first domestic case of H1N1 Influenza.

5. "U.S. Builds Largest Biometric Database" Tell me again about that mythical "right" to privacy.

Representative Sample: The increase in prints is not due to an explosion in crime or terrorism, but more fingerprinting in the private sector. The FBI processes prints from teachers, bank employees and other non-criminals. "That is our growth business," says Debbie Chapman, who works in the data center.

To submit a blog post for HOT5 Daily, please e-mail me at unrright@NOSPAMgmail.com. Put HOT5 in the subject.

First Thoughts on the Ft. Hood Shootings

After reading the various accounts and speculation about this incident, I couldn't help thinking of the 2007 plot by six men to attack Fort Dix. There are no real similarities, and the Fort Dix plotters were arrested before they could carry out an attack. But at the time, there was considerable sneering at the notion that the plot could possibly be serious. Here's a prime example:

Ok. So, the plot was: six dudes from New Jersey buy some guns and storm Fort Dix. The Fort Dix that is full of lots and lots of Army reservists with way, way more guns. And, like, extensive military training and sh*t. Yes, thank god these terrorists have been caught and locked up before they could be killed within minutes of deciding to carry out the dumbest f*cking terrorist plot we’ve ever heard of.

The person who wrote that didn't have the slightest idea how vulnerable military bases might be to attack, or how much damage six terrorists could inflict. Unfortunately, today's incident demonstrates yet again -- as if anyone with a clue needed another reminder -- of just how much damage a single determined individual can cause, with nothing more than a couple of handguns: twelve dead, thirty-one wounded. From the latest reports, Major Nidal Malik Hasan, the shooter, wasn't some hardened, highly-trained terrorist-commando. He was a psychiatrist. It's something to keep in mind the next time someone tries to laugh off a disrupted terrorist plot. It doesn't take training and experience, or sophisticated weaponry to gun down a bunch of unarmed people, even on a military base.

Losing is Winning

That's the refrain from the hardline conservative base following the defeat of Doug Hoffman in NY-23.  The transcript from Rush Limbaugh's show yesterday was entitled, "Conservatism Didn't Lose in NY-23."  Michelle Malkin summed up the prevailing view on the right,

Hoffman may have lost narrowly, but NY-23 is a much broader victory for conservatives who believe the Republican Party should stand for core limited government principles ...  Moreover, NY-23 is a victory for conservatives who refuse to be marginalized in the public square by either the unhinged left or the establishment right.

There's only one slight problem with this attitude. It's a denial of reality. Back in the real world the GOP lost a formerly safe Republican seat, and another Democrat went to the House, adding to the already large Democratic majority. But conservatives sent the national party a message. Wow, what an accomplishment.

Here's something the conservative base simply refuses to understand. They are not the Republican party, and they don't get to decide who is and is not a Republican. We have a two party system with a pair of broad-based political parties. Each party contains a spectrum of views, and that includes the GOP. Trying to exclude moderates and even liberals from the party shrinks it and makes it less effective, not more. There is no addition through subtraction, as others have pointed out. By supporting third-party candidates and attempting to expel anyone they see as a RINO, the base is weakening the GOP and assisting Democrats.

I know this is difficult for some conservatives to grasp, but there are simply areas of the country where strongly conservative candidates, especially social conservatives, are just not welcome. They aren't going to win in certain districts. The only way for the GOP to win those districts, barring some highly unusual circumstances, is to run more moderate candidates that appeal to the voters in those areas. How does the base respond to this point? They argue that they don't want RINOs. RINOs weaken the GOP and give cover to Democratic policies. They'd rather have the open opposition of Democrats.

That attitude is a recipe for permanent minority status, and completely ignores the fact that moderate and even liberal Republicans often vote with the party line, and can be allies on issues important to the base, even if they defect on certain other policies. It is better to have more Republicans overall, even if some of them are moderate and liberal, rather than allow Democrats to control the government in order to remain pure to conservative principles. Having a large national party requires compromise and alliances. This is another element of reality that much of the base thinks they can deny. The GOP has never been a purely conservative party, where everyone has to meet a litmus test of issues in order to run for office.

I'll close by using myself as an example. I'm a pro-choice, pro-gay marriage Republican. Just those two issues automatically brand me as a RINO to much of the GOP base. But I'm not a RINO. I'm a rock-solid, reliable vote for GOP candidates from the national level, right down to local races -- because overall, the Republican party represents my attitude toward policies far better than the Democratic party. My voting record makes me every bit as strong of a Republican as Rush Limbaugh, Michelle Malkin, or any other conservative who thinks they should own the GOP. And there are plenty of others out there like me.

HOT5 Daily 11/5/2009

1. "Stapled Together" A response to the argument that allowing same sex marriage will "lead to an expansion of the size and scope of the state."

Representative Sample: the really breathtaking part here is the claim that same-sex marriages are “loosely stapled together by the state.” Stapled together? Really?

2. "Secret copyright treaty leaks. It's bad. Very bad." Let's hope this is incorrect. 

Representative Sample:  The internet chapter of the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, a secret copyright treaty whose text Obama's administration refused to disclose due to "national security" concerns, has leaked.

3. "China Declares Space War Inevitable" I agree with the Chinese about that.

Representative Sample: “As far as the revolution in military affairs is concerned, the competition between military forces is moving towards outer space… this is a historical inevitability and a development that cannot be turned back,” said air force commander Xu Qiliang in an interview with the official People’s Liberation Army Daily.

4. "who wants to build a warp drive anyway?" Speaking of space.

Representative Sample: when physicists Richard Obousy and Gerald Cleaver put together the energy requirements for a warp drive, they noted that a sufficiently advanced civilization could one day build it. And we’re going to use those requirements to find out whether a civilization like that could conceivably exist and what would happen to their solar system if they ever tried to create a device that warps space and time by locally boosting the ongoing expansion of the universe.

5. "This is How a Soldier Is Made" Links a very interesting photo essay.

Representative Sample: It's a link to a series of graphics.

To submit a blog post for HOT5 Daily, please e-mail me at unrright@NOSPAMgmail.com. Put HOT5 in the subject.