The Noble Pundit

Nuclear Blackmail?

So North Korea is now trying to use nuclear blackmail as a tool in their fight to gain concessions from the West. So what does it really mean?

Not much I hope.

We already know that NK has a few nuclear devices from way back when. We know that the nation is being run by a homicidal/suicidal nutcase. Does their threat to build more weapons really change the equation in the region?

It shouldn't. Part of the reason why NK is going to the brink with this is because they are about to implode. NK needs concessions and aid from us. Without Western help, the government in Pyongyang will fall.

But Pyongyang has nothing to offer, except for an "offer of peace." Threatening a war is their only tactics that they have left - and a nuclear war would seem to be the more extreme threat. They are banking on a terroistic fear taking over in the region that will force Washington to cave in. NK is counting on us collapsing under pressure from Tokyo and Seoul.

The regime in Pyongyang is entering the endgame phase and they know it. The risk will continue to rise as we go forward in our negotiations with NK. We cannot allow their attempts at blackmail to succeed. The risk of future escalation is too great.

Free Europe?

So just how free is Europe? Our allies often chide us for not living up to our ideals, but when it comes down to it, how do they stack up?

According to this article in the Independent, not too well.

Remember the story of the Danish pizzeria owner who protested the Axis of Weasels by refusing to serve Germans and the French? Turns out he has now been charged with discrimination which could cost him up to 5000 kroner.

Is it right for the government to dictate who a private business can and must serve? If a business owner chooses to deny service to a particular person, they are willingly forgoing the income that that person would provide. They choose to suffer the consequences of their actions.

And it’s not as if the owner in question was denying French and German patrons a vital service. He denied them his pizza. He didn’t threaten them with starvation, he just said that he wouldn’t feed them in a place with many food options.

If the Danish government wants to ensure that the French and Germans have access to pizza on this island, then they need to open a state owned pizzeria. They should have no right to step in and tell this man that he must serve people when it goes against his beliefs.

So just how free is Europe?

Environmentalists Tell Africans To Starve

When is principle more important than human life? When the human life at risk isn't your own.

Environmentalists are opposed to genetically modified food in principle. They put forth arguments that GM food will take over the world crowding out natural (and therefore more safe and pure) strains of food.

I haven't done any research on the effects of GM crops, but from personal observations, it seems that these new crops are every bit as safe to grow as natural ones. I don't see them spreading across America like a cancer. Might there be long term health effects? Possibly, I don't know. But I do know that the long term effects mean nothing if you starve to death for lack of food in the short term.

And that is what the environmentalists are essentially proposing for Africans. The environmental lobby wants African nations to reject GM food aid until "more research" has been conducted. And in the meantime, Africans starve for lack of food.

As an example, Zambia has banned GM food, yet they have two million people on the brink of starvation. Villagers have stolen banned GM food so that they might survive. Yet some among us continue to encourage the government to starve the people, rather than to let in GM food.

The environmentalists are failing to recognize the difference in needs between themselves and Africans. Viewed through the filter of Maslow's Heirarchy of Needs, the Africans are at the bottom trying to satisfy their basic needs, while the environmentalists are trying to satisfy their needs for self-actualization. If you're starving, making the world better isn't real high on your list of priorities.

There are times when it is acceptable to risk human life for a principle. That's the theory behind a just war.

But is it acceptable to risk human life to oppose a food that may create problems 50 years from now? I don't think so when the alternative is death by starvation.

The environmentalists need to quit encouraging the African governments to starve millions of innocent people. Is it really right to oppose GM food by promoting someone else's death?

Are Muslims Capable of Surviving Freedom?

I stumbled across this article in WORLD magazine (require registration) in which the author basically says that Islam and freedom are incompatible.

I kept re-reading the article trying to figure out what didn't sit quite right with me, and then I found it. It is this:

This is why, historically, Christianity is associated with political freedom. Those who can govern themselves morally do not need a strong central governmental power to maintain social order. Conversely, Islam, for all its high moral teachings, enforces them with coercive external power. For that, it needs a strong authoritarian government. Whether this government is religious, as in the theocracy of Iran, or secular, as in the Arabic fascism of the Baath Party, the habits of mind and the political repression are the same.

Is Christianity really historically associated with political freedom? In recent history, yes. In the grand history of the world, no. Medieval Christian Europe was not free. America was settled by people trying to escape persecution in Christian countries - and they were Christian themselves. Christianity doesn't have any great claim to political freedom. It's only relatively recently that we can even begin to make that claim.

But does Islam automatically lead to theocracies and dictatorships? Islam's heavy reliance on external morality control certainly increases the probability of a less free form of government, but they don't necessarily have to go hand in hand.

Just because someone is Muslim doesn't mean that they don't have an internal moral compass. 99.9% of the people in the world have one and our basic beliefs are all that different. I'm sure that every Muslim out there knows that murder and theft are wrong even without having the executioner standing over them (suicide bombings and terrorism aren't viewed as murder in large parts of the Muslim world, unfortunate and wrong, but it is reality). Muslims know right and wrong. Those are human traits, not religious ones.

Maybe I'm naive, but I think that the people of Iraq, given an opportunity to transition into independent thought, will be able to handle freedom just fine. The looting and vandalism I believe was an aberration, a testing of limits if you will. We arrested a couple of people for violating the law. The Iraqi people saw that there were consequences for their action, so they modified their behavior. And after they see fair trials and just, not cruel, punishments being sentenced they will buy into a system of freedom even more.

Nowhere are we trying to impose a system tailored for the Muslim world. We are trying to instill a fair and just system. The Iraqis haven't been running to welcome the system, not because they don't want it but because it is completely foreign to them.

But it will appeal to their human nature, their desire for freedom, and their innate sense of right and wrong.

Freedom can survive and, I believe, can even thrive in a Muslim land. It appeals to the basic urges in all of us. It's just going to take a while for the Iraqi's to believe that it is real. Give them time. We can't declare them incapable of freedom after such a short time. It wouldn't be right.

Does Bush Read The Noble Pundit?

Two days ago, I posted this essay in which I proposed canceling the TotalElfFina contract in favor of Royal Dutch. Now today I read this article in the Times Online in which we are apparently considering turning the entire Iraqi oil industry over to a former official of - get this - Royal Dutch Petroleum!

Now I know that Bush probably doesn't read this nor does any official of the Administration. It just feels good to be ahead of the curve for once. Now if I could only quit looking over my shoulder at the on-rushing tidal wave............

I'll feel even better about this once it gets officially announced - if it's true. In the meantime I've got to go stretch, I think I pulled a muscle patting myself on the back.

So What?

Matt Drudge is breathlessly reporting that the Democrats are going to hold a debate at a theater on the University of South Carolina campus named after the secessionist Augustus Longstreet. He has since updated and all but retracted the story. But his correction doesn't change the general tone of disapproval in the story. And my problem here isn't with the Democrats, but with Drudge and the political correctness police in society today.

As I view the situation, the Dems wanted to hold a debate in South Carolina (why not Georgia or Virginia - more important states electorially I don't know). They decided to hold the debate at the University, I'm guessing as a way of proving that they are all for promoting free speech and diversity of thought. So far so good.

The University would have examined their facilities and then determined that this theater, the Longstreet Theater, was the venue best suited to such an event. The naming of the theater probably never came up, as it shouldn't have. The University had decided at some point in the past that they wanted to honor Longstreet and did so.

The point is, the Democratic Party of today had nothing to do with the naming or selection of the theater as the place for the debate. The were looking for an adequate venue on a college campus and they found it. What's wrong with that?

Now Drudge in his story is implying that the Democrats are being hypocritical. I'm sure that argument would be along the lines of "Democrats 'fought' for equality and desegregation. It would be wrong for them to implicitly support those institutions by honoring the name of Longstreet by debating in a place named for him."

Longstreet is a historical figure and, at least according the people of South Carolina, an important one. Important enough that they named a building for him. But that was the people in South Carolina that named the building; not John Kerry; not Al Sharpton; not Carol Moseley-Braun. That fact that the State Democratic Party of South Carolina chose an "inappropriate" venue should not in any way reflect on those running for office.

Speaking at the Longstreet Theater would not imply a support for slavery. It wouldn't imply a support for secession from the Union. Those were the battles of seven score ago. To try to create a link between the two issues (speaking and slavery) is just wrong.

(My parents will hate this next part - sorry Dad.)

I'm Southern. I was born and raised in Florida. Both of my parents are from up north, but a pride in being Southern has taken hold in me. It is part of who I am.

And whether I like it or not, the legacy of the Confederacy is part of my history. Large parts of the story of the South disturb me. I don't like the history of slavery or segregation. I'm appalled by the Klan and Jim Crow.

But there are other parts of the Southern tradition that I love. The grace and dignity of men like Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson. The desire for decentralized government (though I didn't like their reasoning for it).

The history of the South, like that of any nation or region, has its high points and its lows. Failed nations like the Confederacy usually fail because the foundations are weak and as a consequence there are more lows to write about in histories than highs.

To use history as a lesson for the unreformed (see France) is acceptable. There are times, when the same mistake is being repeated again and again and again, that it is necessary to openly remind people of the consequences of repetitive stupidity (appeasement anyone?).

But the South has made great strides in reforming from our ways of 150 years ago, 50 years ago, or even 5 years ago. Are we perfect? No. But is there a problem with slavery and secessionist movements? No.

The South has moved beyond that. It's not right that some people keep dragging out the slavery excuse every time they don't like something Southern.

I'm ticked at Drudge for not being honest with who he's mad at and for what reasons. He's mad at the Democrats for being Democrats. Fair enough. Drudge is politically motivated most of the time. I have no problem with that.

But if he is upset with the people of South Carolina for having named a theater after Longstreet, he needs to say so. I don’t think Drudge likes the legacy of Longstreet. That's fine. It's obvious that he really doesn't want a building named after a man like Longstreet. That's fine too.

But neither one of those problems is a problem of the Democratic Party. To say it is is disingenuous.

If you want to attack the Democrats, go right ahead; just don't drag out my history as a convenient evil for cheap potshots.

Bad Move By American Airlines

American Airlines has named a new CEO in the wake of Donald Carty's resignation. The new CEO Gerard Arpey has one trait that is really scary - and it's the one that American chose to highlight at the end of their press release.

Gerard Arpey is a pilot.

Pilots, for whatever reason, make terrible airline CEOs. There have only been a few, but three in particular: Eddie Rickenbacker, Frank Borman and Ed Acker really stand out.

Rickenbacker was the most successful of the three men. He was the only one that didn't bankrupt his airline (but the he was the only one to operate under the CAB and the regulated industry). For all his shortcomings, Rickenbacker did understand basic airline economics "put bums in seats." Some of those bums took exception and created clubs like WHEAL (We Hate Eastern AirLines), but overall Rickenbacker was fairly successful as a CEO.

Frank Borman, also an Eastern Airlines CEO, was nowhere near as lucky. He presided over all but the final shutdown of the airline, partially caused by the mechanics distrust of a former pilot. Borman had a decent relationship with the pilots, but the other unions basically hated him. That distrust lead to the mechanics not being willing to believe anything Borman said. Eventually that forced Borman to sell the airline to Texas Air and Frank Lorenzo.

Ed Acker was another great failure as a pilot CEO. He ran at one time or another Pan Am, United Airlines and Braniff Airlines and did nothing to help the labor situations at any of those airlines. He cultivated the pilots while alienating the other labor groups. Eventually, all three of those airlines had to use Chapter 11 (or 7) to attempt to recover from the messes that Acker left behind.

The stories of all three men are much more complicated than what little bit I mentioned here, but the fact stands. As pilot CEOs they were terrible with labor relations.

American is changing CEOs because of labor problems. And the new CEO is a pilot. Doesn't seem like the best idea in the world if we are to learn from history.

If history is to be our guide, American has just ensured their eventual trip through Chapter 11.

Death and Dying

Last night Donald Sensing at One Hand Clapping posted an excellent story about death and dying. I've been wanting to comment on it, but really haven't been able to come up with coherent thoughts to express - read the article, then come back here.

So what to think? My view is probably still a little skewed as I'm still young enough to fear both death and dying. I know that some older folks are "ready" to die, but that idea is just simply foreign to me right now. I have too much that I want to do with my life. Maybe in 50 years when I've accomplished more I'll feel the same as them, but not now.

But, if I have to go, make it quick. I don't want to spend my life hooked up to machines with people coming in to pity me. I don't want to end up in an Alzheimer’s home, where people come by to visit "when they can." To prolong biological life by merely existing and providing carbon dioxide for a tree somewhere - that's just not for me. If I have to exist without life - pull the plug. I fear death, but not what's on the other side.

I can only hope to be as lucky as James in Mr. Sensing's essay. Not for the way he died, but for the way he lived. If I can make to 84 and still be driving myself around to help others - well that would just about the perfect script for the later years of a life. You only get one shot at life. Like James did, you have to make the most of it.

Hopefully that made a little bit of sense - like I said, it's been hard for me to construct a coherent thought on the subject to express how I truly feel. Now that I've let you in on my greatest fears outside of needles, I'll go back to finding a politician to rip on.

Is Kerry Too "Touché?"

Oh, oh. Looks like John Kerry is a little touchy (or should it be touché) about a Bush advisor saying that he "looks French."

Now I haven't really studied any pictures of Kerry, but at a quick glance, I could see him with a beret, sitting in a café, discussing who was more accurate: Lenin or Marx? But then again, I could say the same about Rumsfeld, too (though he'd probably be talking what great guys they both were).

Kerry's reaction to this massive sign of disrespect was actually pretty measured and maybe even reasonable. His wife's reaction was another story though.

I realize that she was just defending her husband against a political attack, but there was no need to drag the monkeys into it. Plus, if he aspires to be President, she needs to realize that there will be much more virulent attacks than calling her husband French. If she's going to lose it this much on a small comment, what will she do when Chirac accuses her husband of being, horror of horrors, "a typical jingoistic American President." A violent reaction could set back Franco-American relations several hours from where they are now.

Kerry exposed his political tone-deafness prior to the war with his spectacularly ill-timed remarks about a "regime change" in Washington. His wife has now proven that her skin is about as thick as torn tissue paper. Together they create a combination we need to keep as far away from the White House as possible in the interest of world relations.

Trafficking In Bad Taste

This is good to see. As we attempt to establish law and order in Baghdad, showing the Iraqis that we are willing to arrest our own for looting will set an excellent example of our willingness to be even-handed.

There is only one part that I really don't agree with the government on here. I agree that we shouldn't allow the importation of Iraqi artwork (at least not from Saddam's palaces - in the interest of good taste and all). We should also restrict the movement of high value items like gold plated weapons and the importation of large weapons (no T-55s in the duffel bag, please).

But we should allow soldiers to bring back small arms. Pistols, knifes, ceremonial swords (not gold plated) and the like should all be allowed. What constitutes a "small arm?" I don't know. An AK-47 would be borderline - I'd be ok if they allowed soldiers to bring them back; I'd be ok if they forbade them. Anti-tank guns, AAA guns, tanks, APCs - those should all be forbidden. But not small weapons.

Small weapons can be a soldier's link to the memories of the battle they just endured. Those weapons are as much a part of the victorious soldier's life as they of the defeated soldier.

That little quibble aside, I'm very glad to see that we are making a real effort to curb the trafficking in stolen items. We just need to make sure that we differentiate between theft and the collection of memories. The Fox News engineer stole (and is guilty of bad taste if he's stealing art from Uday); a soldier in the field picking up a 9 mm isn't. But I'm sure that someone higher up than me has already thought of that.

Martyrdom - Democrat Style

The Democratic Party, in its zeal to find a sacrificial candidate, has had many people attempt to make themselves viable candidates. The volunteers have been less than politically outstanding as evidenced by their incredible ability to self-destruct. First it was John Kerry, now Howard Dean has sacrificed himself to the God of Stupid Comments.

Asked if the Iraqi people are better off now than they were under Saddam, Dean said, "We don't know that yet. We don't know that yet, Wolf....."

Message to the Presidential candidates: If you can't see the inherent good in the liberation of Iraq - don't run. Challenge the need to go in; challenge the way we are running the peace. Those are legitimate points of contention (even if I will probably think you're wrong and/or nuts).

But don't ever answer a simple yes or no question about good and evil with a "don't know."

And if you can't answer Wolf's question with a "yes" you had better explain really, really well why Jacques Chirac is your proposed running mate. Because if you think that Iraqis dying by the thousands under Saddam is better than them arguing about what kind of government they want, well then you're just not Presidential material. A President has to have some moral clarity; if you can't admit that Saddam's regime was an absolute evil, you don't deserve to be in command of your car, much less the global superpower.

So now two candidates have really disqualified themselves, even though they will still raise money and pretend to play the game. Who's next? Bob Graham? I'm from Florida and I haven't really heard anything from him or about him - not a real candidate. Al Sharpton? I'd be more electable than him - and I can't run until the next election cycle! John Edwards? The guy from North Carolina? He looks like he's a good soundbite guy, but I haven't really heard anything from him.

If this is the best that the Dems have to offer, it could be a long, boring campaign. Someone needs to give Bush a challenge. Otherwise it would take all the fun out of it.

"Sound Bites"

Couple of quickies before I get to bed:

Legends:

Why do have this great need as a society to disprove some of our most enduring legends? Take this article from the Telegraph. Apparently we aren’t satisfied with the legend that says Rome was founded by Romulus. Now some historians are trying to literally personify the goddess Roma to discredit the original legend.

Probably neither legend is exactly true and certainly neither can be proven one way or the other. Why not just let it be? The legend of Romulus has always been satisfactory in the past (it is the subject of one of the most collectible ancient Roman coins). It’s never hurt anyone and it can’t be completely discredited. Why must we tear down all of our heroes, institutions and legends? Life without mythology, religious or legendary, isn’t really all too exciting. Let some things be a pleasant mystery.

Stupid Pilot Tricks:

Speaking of heroes, is there a kid out there that doesn’t look at pilot at least once in their life and say “I wish I could do that.” For those of us lucky enough to have actually piloted an airplane, there is an appreciation of just how special a pilot’s job really is. And then to see one throw their special career away, it really makes me wonder if some people have any capacity to think. There, because of the grace of God, goes he.

Tony Blair:

Tony Blair continues to impress me. During the Clinton years, I really didn’t like Blair too terribly much, but after 9/11 he really proved himself to be leader up to the challenge of the time. I really don’t think that any British leader since Churchill (Thatcher excluded) would have been able to exhibit the leadership that Tony Blair has since November of last year.

Now, asking critics to hold their judgment to see how the rebuilding of Iraq goes. Blair believes that our true legacy in Iraq won’t be the prosecution of the war, but the establishment of a just and fair peace. I got to say, I agree with him here, too.

It’s hard to believe that this is the same man that used to pal around with Slick Willy.

Punish France?

France is whining about the effects of the grass-roots boycott that Americans have undertaken against them. Apparently, it is doing much more economic damage than they thought it would. And now, there are calls from parts of the Administration to punish France for its stubbornness leading up the war.

I have no problem with the boycott of French products. I do think that we need to be careful about openly punishing the French on a governmental level though.

With the boycott, since it is not government sanctioned, the French government can't impose reciprocal trade sanctions against us. But if we officially sanction them, we do open ourselves to retaliatory actions.

So how do we get around retaliation while still punishing the French for being the French? I think it is actually pretty simple. We only need to invalidate one single one-sided contract - TotalElfFina's.

It is generally accepted everywhere, except Paris maybe, that the contract between Saddam and TEF was really one-sided in its benefit to TEF. We just simply need to declare the contract void for not having provided adequate consideration to the Iraqi people - the true owners of the liquid gold TEF wants to pump. Of all the contracts Saddam had made, this is the most blatantly one sided out there. Politically there is no risk in invalidating it.

The risk is in what we do after that. The oil fields still need to be developed. We can't very well turn around and award the contract to ChevronTexaco or ExxonMobil or even British Petroleum. To do so would open us up to accusations of stealing the best deals. Truth wouldn't matter - the appearance would be damning enough to kill a large chunk of the goodwill we built up in fighting the war the right way.

So what to do? Well, we can't give the contract to a coalition company and we want to keep it from the weasels. There is one company that comes to mind that would be a good choice. Give the contract to Shell/Royal Dutch Petroleum.

This would allow us to reward friends who put themselves at great political risk early on in the diplomatic fight. Remember, the Dutch were the first to completely circumvent NATO to provide Turkey with Patriot missile batteries to help with the defense of that nation. That was a risky move for the Dutch government.

And rewarding them with one of their companies getting the oil field development contract isn't out of line with what they did for us.

It would be a pretty slick deal. The French would lose their most precious contract in Iraq. One of our stalwart friends would get it and we wouldn’t suffer the wrath of negative public opinion. Most people don't care about changing one European firm for another. The only downside risk comes if France decides to accelerate the annexation of Holland as part of the EUnificiation plan.

Punish France? Absolutely. We just need to make sure we do it right. For all of Chirac's "sophistication" he is proving to be a pretty naive opponent.

The European Dis-Union

Sometimes I wonder if I'm being a bit too harsh on the Eurocrats and their dream of a unified Europe. I'm very much against the idea of the EU, not because of what it creates, but for what it destroys. I believe that it will be the end of many nations as we know them. I also believe that the EU is nothing more than an attempt to copy and "improve on" the institutions of the US. It seems rather arrogant of the Eurocrats to think that they can improve on the system that we've been tweaking and perfecting for over 210 years.

So as I'm surfing the web tonight, I come across this article in the New Zealand Herald which seems to provide an independent third party verification of my belief that the EU is unworkable politically.

There is a quote in the article from the Danish Prime Minister, who says:

"You can talk as much as you like about a common foreign and security policy," Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen said. "But the fact is that when the moment comes along, a series of countries - the big ones - do not want to give up self-determination."

I wonder if Chriac will tell Mr. Rasmussen to shut up. The basic problem with the EU, and the cause of the current rift in the organization, is now out in the open. The EU is essentially an attempt to annex the smaller European nations into the bigger ones. Small nations like Denmark, Holland, and Luxembourg would lose everything - they would cease to exist - while the big players like France and Germany would be enhanced by being able to "speak" for the new European citizens. The big nations get bigger, the small disappear. Is it any wonder that there is a split in the EU between the large nations and the small ones?

And all of this with the goal of establishing a political counterweight to the US. The primary proponents of the EU truly believe that they can create a federalist government, in the image of, but better than, the US government. They believe that because European civilization goes back thousands of years that they will have some special insight that will make their federalist experiment more successful than ours.

But they have forgotten why the US is so successful. It isn't the government that makes us successful, it is the American people that make America successful. Are we better or smarter than Europeans? No. The playing field is pretty level in all reality. So what advantages does an American have over a European that makes us more successful?

We really have three major advantages: true freedom of the press, laissez-faire capitalism, and a common language.

Is our press really more free than the European press? Well, our major news outlets are private. We don't have an equivalent of the BBC or the French state media. The closest we come is NPR Public Radio. We can get our news in any form we want: filtered, unfiltered, conservative, liberal, whatever. We can choose between Fox and CNN, instead of BBC 1 or BBC 2. We can read the NY Times or the Wall Street Journal. Our choice isn't limited to Le Monde or La Figaro. Think about the coverage of the war in the US. We were simultaneously in a quagmire and a cakewalk (the truth turned out to be in the middle), depending on what news source you chose to read. But you had both sides available to you. In France, they apparently still think we're stuck in a quagmire outside of Umm Qasr. The French press is so tightly interlaced with the government that they weren't able to accurately report on the progress of the war. Is that true freedom of the press?

If there is any one trait that truly gives us an advantage, it is laissez-faire capitalism. Capitalism isn't the perfect system, it does allow for unfair suffering, but at the same time no one has developed a better system. Communism failed. And the European socialist experiment will fail as surely as the Soviet Socialist experiment did. Why? A government can't support unemployment of 10-15%. It will bankrupt them. Capitalism also encourages innovation in Americans. We have been creating most of the truly important advances of the last 30-40 years. Why? Because we let people reap the rewards of their efforts, as opposed to the socialists who attempt to redistribute those rewards to the "less fortunate."

Someone once said that representative governments fail when people realize that the can vote themselves government handouts. Our government has survived so well for this long because capitalism allows for better rewards than the government dole. Socialism, however, attempts to make everyone more or less equal in economic stature, which makes the dole seem like a pretty good alternative.

Short term, however, it will appear that our common language is our greatest strength. In America, a person in California can read and understand what a New Yorker has done, without the need for translation and all of the potential problems inherent in translations. But someone in Warsaw will need a translation to learn about what someone in Madrid has done. At the governmental level this isn't a big deal. But at the laborer level, where wealth is truly created, this will be a big problem. The inefficiencies of multiple languages will forever retard the growth potential of the EU.

All of this will only serve to weaken the EU federal government. Our federal government works so well not because of its structure or design (although those certainly help), but because of the American people.

Until the Germans and Brits are willing to call themselves French and vice versa, the Federalist EU is doomed to be an impotent failure. You can copy the system, but not the people that make the system.

Looking Back To Pre-Iraq

The last few days I’ve been finding entertainment in going back and rereading some of the anti-warriors statements in view of what actually happened in Iraq. Some of them, like this interview with George Galloway, British MP, in the Palestinian Chronicle are downright hilarious now. Let’s rehash and see how George did:

War is not inevitable. Wars are never inevitable, even when wars have begun they can be stopped. The enemy wants us to believe that it is inevitable because it hopes thereby to stun us with horror and paralyze us. So we have to continue to say that war is more likely than not but it is not inevitable and it can be stopped but it only can be stopped very quickly and with a huge movement of protests around the world and that’s what I was calling for today.

Bad call George. The “huge movement of protests around the world” did nothing to deter the war. Why? You assumed that all policy decisions are based on public opinion polls. But they’re not. Some decisions are based on principle. It’s a concept called leadership. A million Frenchmen protesting will do nothing to change a US policy based on conviction and principle.

The British foreign office is not with the war, the British foreign office which was cheating the Arabs when the Americans were still cowboys chasing the red Indians and exterminating them. The British foreign office knows the Arabs very well and it is strongly against the war because it knows that [Secretary General of the Arab League] Amr Moussa is right that the gates of Hell will be opened by this, and nobody knows what will emerge from those gates.

“The Americans were still cowboys chasing the red Indians……?” George, George, George. Hasn’t anyone ever told you that as a loony leftist you have to be politically correct? Calling Displaced And Disenfranchised Native Americans “red Indians” smacks of a smug elitism that your elitist colleagues are trying to stamp out. And what about those gates of Hell? They were opened. What happened? Looks to me like Satan came out to take Saddam, just like was predicted by the Gods of South Park. It’s too bad they took Baghdad Bob with them. He had such a future here as a political analyst for CNN.

But my opposition to imperialism is greater than my opposition to the character of the Iraqi regime. You have to make these choices in life. Imperialism is the biggest criminal in the world. America is the biggest rogue state in the world. Britain is an auxiliary of a criminal rogue state. So there is no choice but to stand beside the people of Iraq.

Would that be the imperialism of the Iraqi regime that attempted to annex Kuwait? Oh, yeah, American imperialism. Yep, we’re just out there creating an Empire, you know: colonizing, conquering, pillaging, subjugating, cleansing, destroying, spreading food, water and the UN, all the evil traits of the great imperialist nations of the past. And for some reason, I’m guessing your “standing beside the people of Iraq” was so long as you could stand beside them in Westminster – heck I’ll bet you were so brave that you may have even been willing to stand beside them in Brixton (provided you had ample security).

We have a saying in English, that in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king. And Saddam Hussein has one eye.

Well at least you’re smart enough to know that you’re blind. Otherwise you might have seen the evil that was Saddam’s Iraq.

We survive because we are not afraid and because there is some democratic space in our countries that wasn’t given to us; it had to be taken. Had to be fought for. All the freedoms we have had to be fought for, and they could be taken away.

You know, this almost makes sense, except that you fail to realize that you didn’t fight for that space. The men in the cemeteries of Normandy fought for it, but not you. And it is absolutely true, all the freedoms that we have fought for as a civilization could all be taken away. Just ask the people of Iraq. They can tell all about how the government you support has denied them any of the freedoms you recognize as being so fragile.

The Iraqis have resisted all these years the bombing and the siege without surrendering.

The Arabs and Muslims are potentially great, I just gave you three examples. And you know in Cuba, each and every day, the teacher asks the school children in every school, what do you want to when you grow up? And the children answer: I want to be like Che.

The Arabs have to have a mentality that says “I want to be like Hizbullah, I want to be like the Intifada, I want to be like the resisting Iraqis.” And if they can, nothing can stop them. Nothing.

Yep. They resisted twelve years of sporadic bombing, UN sanctions, and weapons inspections. They then “resisted” the US military for all of three weeks – and almost a third of that was because we had to stop and build highway rest stops so that we could go to the bathroom. But you’re absolutely right – the Iraqi’s never surrendered. Like Hizbullah and like the Intifada, they melted away into nothing. In the grand scheme of things they too are now insignificant. And you’re right nothing can stop them – there really isn’t anything to stop and nobody cares to waste the time stopping them anyway.

Let the Iraqi regime be like Che. He’s dead. We, on the other hand, have the task of helping the Iraqi people ahead of us. You be like Che, we have work to do.

Iraq To Be Based On Islamic Law?

Everywhere I look now in the news, I see articles describing how some Iraqis are calling for Islamic law to rule in the newly liberated Iraq. Without fail, every article makes it seem as though “Islamic law” will be this great and terrible evil visited upon the Iraqi people. The implication being that if we allow the establishment of Islamic law our efforts to liberate the nation will be wasted as we will trade a thugocracy for a satanic theocracy. I don’t agree with that implication.

But before I can discuss why I think it is wrong, we need to examine the foundations that the implication is built upon. The term Islamic law is used in the media to describe the extremist forms of Koranic interpretation. The term has been used so many times to describe decapitations, public amputations, torture, rape, executions, intolerance and a whole host of other inhumane evils that it has become a loaded term. People now have trouble separating the term from extremist actions. Islamic law does not necessarily need to indicate that it is only practiced by dictators and clerics.

What is law? Law is a set of codified principles. It sets forth what society sees as right and wrong and establishes punishments in the case of someone violating one of the society’s mores. Can the definition of society be manipulated by power hungry people? Sure. But regardless of who establishes the law and for what reason, it will always be a reflection of some principle.

The United States was founded on Christian principles. Our laws are based on the Christian views of right and wrong. But our Christian underpinnings have also served as one of our great strengths. Our attempts to meet the Christian ideals of fairness, justice, and compassion have driven us to be better as a people. Have we succeeded? Not always. Are we better for having tried? Most certainly.

Ignoring the Wahhabi interpretation of Islam, how different are the underlying principles from those of Christianity? They really aren’t all that different. The Koran, the Torah, and the Bible are all similar in that they were originally written as handbooks for life. The books exist and are enduring because they speak to the basic instinctual humanity in all of us. All speak of the sanctity of life, the need to do good deeds in life; they speak of tolerance and of love for fellow man. The messages are the same, only the stories that convey those messages are different.

A new Iraq based on Islamic principles of law is not incompatible with our own desires to see a more tolerant and open government in Baghdad. There will always be a minority fringe that wants to set up an Iranian style interpretation of Islamic law in Iraq - just as we have a minority fringe that wants to establish a fundamentalist Christian state in the US. Our goal should be to help the Iraqi people set up a secular government based on true Islamic principles, not the hijacked extremist ones. If we are successful in doing so, the Iraqi people themselves will marginalize the extremists, much like what has happened in Turkey - a secular government based on Islamic principle where even an Islamic Party can live within the rules of fair government.

We need to bring together the clerics and the initial leaders of the new Iraq and help them to build a new country based on their principles. Like it or not, the clerics will be key in helping to establish the new Iraq as they can hold vast sway over large numbers of Iraqi citizens - just like the preachers and pastors of pre-Revolutionary America. They can help to ensure that the new Iraq has real meaning to the people.

An Islamic Iraq needs not be a fear of ours, only an Iraq based on an extremist interpretation of Islamic law. Let Islam establish the guiding principles of the nation. It is our job to help the people of Iraq to establish a new government, not to dictate it to them.

US Sanctions Killed Millions Of Iraqis!

And as our colonial occupation continues, the evidence continues to pour out about how brutal and oppressive our sanctions regime really was. This article proves that the only "regime change" needed was in our sanctions!

One of the grandest of these palaces was built in 1994, when ordinary Iraqis were suffering under a suffocating United Nations (news - web sites) sanctions regime. Malnutrition rates for Iraqi children soared, but Saddam's building spree continued apace. Adding insult to injury, this palace, it seems, was never used. Chinese rosewood cabinets inlaid with mother-of-pearl hold elegant china teacups and crystal wineglasses--all still wrapped in their original plastic. Still, the palace chef was under orders to prepare three meals a day--just in case the president ever decided to drop by.

The oppression we imposed on Iraq is unacceptable. He had to use mother-of-pearl on his Chinese rosewood cabinets? Don't we understand that any third world dictator or pimp worth his salt has gold inlay? And on top of that, our evil sanctions forced him to never be able to visit this particular palace, thereby forcing him to waste all that food. Didn’t we understand that by forcing him to have each palace prepare three meals a day for him we were starving ordinary Iraqis?

How could we subject Saddam and his family to this torture? It was almost inhuman. I mean the only way it could get worse would be to find out that they were forced to decorate these palaces with velvet porn paintings (soft porn?):

Pictures (one of them velvet) of naked women with bouffant hairdos and poised like 1950s centerfolds adorn the walls.

Oh.

Well it's not like they'll ever find any evidence of Saddam claiming a false love for the people of Iraq.

Without the slightest hint of irony, an engraving inside Saddam's Republican Palace in Baghdad reads, "This palace is for the people of Iraq."

Forget it.

Self-Destruction Knows No Bounds

Don't ever think that the Palestinians have cornered the market on self-destructive tendencies. We have some among us here in America that are more spectacular in their intellectual combustion. Today, Harold Meyerson proves my point in The American Prospect with this little gem of an article: The Most Dangerous President Ever.

I like to occasionally pretend to be open-minded and willing to listen to the other side of an argument. And most of the time I'm rewarded by learning something new. It doesn't always change my position, but I'm usually better off for having listened.

Then there are arguments like this that deserve only contempt. Let's look at some of Mr. Meyerson's arguments one at a time:

Speaking first of Ronald Reagan:

The United States would be a far better place had he not been elected.

Now I know I was pretty young at the time of the Reagan Revolution's beginnings, but I really don't think the alternative, four more years of Jimmy, was a better choice. I shudder to think of what my life would be like with four more years of stagflation and unchecked terrorism and Camp Davids. So right off the bat, I'm already getting annoyed with stupid comments like that.

Next up:

What Bush seems determined to extirpate are the basic forms of common security in America. His particular targets seem disproportionately the handiwork of years ending in "5." From 1965, there's Medicare, which he seeks to subordinate to the pay-as-you-can calculus of HMOs; from 1945, there's the United Nations and the whole structure of postwar alliances, which he seeks to subordinate to an imperial America freed from international laws and treaties; from 1935, there's Social Security, which he still seeks to privatize, and the Wagner Act, whose pro-labor tilt he seeks to obliterate in his tax policy.

I'm going to ignore the Medicare and Social Security comments. I'm too young to have any hope of ever seeing a penny from either program. They are both rip-offs to me. But is Mr. Meyerson really complaining about America retaining its sovereignty? Not surrendering our Constitution is not the same as submitting the UN to "imperial America." That's just Bush upholding his Oath of Office and defending the Constitution against "all foes, foreign or domestic." And what's wrong with getting rid of "pro-labor tilt?" I'm poor. I have also suffered because of organized labor. I once had a job with an airline as a part time ramper. Spent three years there part time. Still had seven to go before I could even think of becoming full time. And that was assuming they didn't outsource my job before the 10 years was up. Labor started making noise about organizing us and the company accelerated the outsourcing program. I left as the battle was really heating up. But labor didn't do anything for me. Neither did the company. I had to do it myself to better my condition. I don't want a pro-anything tilt. I want a level playing field and a fair shake. That's all.

Moving right along:

And so, by strategy, inclination and conviction, George W. Bush has been pursuing a reckless, even ridiculous, but always right-wing agenda -- shredding a global-security structure at a time requiring unprecedented international integration, shredding a domestic safety net at a time when the private sector provides radically less security than it did a generation ago.

Global security structure? I'm assuming that somehow involves seceding sovereignty to our "Allies" like France and Germany. Somehow their "global security structure" doesn't seem too secure. Isn't that French colony of Algeria going through a bit of a rough patch? Didn't the French just have trouble controlling the massive and incredibly advanced Army of the Ivory Coast (without consulting the "global security structure" first, mind you)? Weren't the Germans and Russians providing intelligence to Iraq in the days leading to the recommencement of hostilities? Pardon me if I think the "global security structure" is a complete and total failure at providing security. I'll take my chances as a strong and independent nation instead. The international community doesn't want to integrate us, they want to subjugate us. Little difference there.

And we have already discussed the "domestic safety net" in this article. Like I said before, it's a great deal if you're not 30 years from retirement. But for me, who is now looking at probably (depending on how far they push out the "retirement age") 40+ years before I can file for Social Security it's a rip-off. Quit lying to me about how great Social Security is; if it were a private venture, it would be labeled the greatest fraud ever. Millions will pay in based on promises of future benefits only to find out they won't really get squat. I don't mind kicking in my fair share, but don't lie to me about it.

Let's get away from this safety net BS before I get really upset:

In its over reliance on a small number of neo-friendly Iraqi expatriates to gauge the mood of the Iraqi people, in its belief that our forces would be greeted as liberators, the administration has made almost the identical error that the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations made at the Bay of Pigs. In each instance, ideology and hope were substituted for factual assessment; in each instance, the people have not risen to join U.S.-backed forces (in Cuba) or U.S. forces (in Iraq) to overthrow their tyrant. In Iraq the administration has underestimated the size and intensity of the forces committed to fighting for Saddam Hussein -- forgetting everything we have learned about the infrastructure of a modern totalitarian state. It has forgotten, too, the power of nationalism in human affairs, especially in postcolonial nations. And in proposing to subordinate postwar Iraq to direct Pentagon control, it has all but ensured that our liberation (in the administration's assessment) of Iraq will be viewed as a neocolonial occupation, by Iraqis and just about everybody else. In so doing, it has inflamed anti-American sentiment throughout the world, and in the Arab world particularly, for years if not decades to come. Finally, because this is explicitly a war of choice rather than necessity, and because we have chosen to fight over the popular opposition of virtually every other nation, we are naked before our enemies. As an already apprehensive Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak has noted, we have likely created a hundred new Osama bin Ladens with this war.

So if we weren't greeted as liberators, what were we? It sure looks like nationalism in Iraq has had a positive effect for us. The Iraqis can now actually be proud of their Iraq - not Saddam's Iraq. And we certainly were wrong in our estimates of the size and intensity of the fight for Iraq. It took three whole weeks to go from Kuwait to Baghdad - that drive should have only taken, what, maybe a day - even offroading it like we did. We lost fewer Americans in an entire war than Airbus did when the tail fell off of American Airlines flight 587 out of New York. Where are the condemnations of those murdering French?

As for the Arab world being upset with us, so what? The only ones that are upset with us are the ones who haven't seen the writing on the wall. They are the ones who are still stuck in the 6th century. The nations that have started or are starting their Renaissance's aren't upset, they may not have agreed with us, but they haven't reacted by creating "a hundred new Osama bin Ladens." And if there are a hundred new OBLs, it'll be like a giant Whack-A-Mole, they pop their head out of their little homey cave, we drop the hammer on them.

What else is there?

As with his foreign policy, no level of factual refutation seems to make a dent in Bush's economic policies. His programs not only shift the burden of Americans' economic security to an increasingly deregulated private economy, they do so at a time when the deregulated private economy is singularly unable to provide economic security. Given how the market has performed over the past two years, you might think that that would slow the course of the administration's economic agenda. But, as with foreign policy, that would understate the role of blind faith within George W. Bush's White House.

Ask and ye shall receive. Deregulation? Deregulation? Someone go resurrect Marx and Lenin! The capitalist nation of America is rejecting the basic foundations of socialism!

Keep whining about deregulation. I have yet to find a case where deregulation has been a bad thing. You want to talk about the airlines? There were (and are) too many poorly run ones that need to fail. There is no justifiable reason for the government to be able to tell an airline where it can fly, when it can fly, how many times it can fly, what stops it has to make on the way, or anything like that. Deregulation of the power markets and the electricity crises in California? Why don't we ask Gray Davis about that. But ask him about power planning and NIMBY - don't just let him spew anti-Enron rhetoric. The problems in California were coming to a head before deregulation. You don't suddenly run out of electricity that quickly unless you pursued flawed energy policies. Deregulation just provides a nice scapegoat in this case because of the timing.

The only redeeming part of the article is where Mr. Meyerson acknowledges that President Bush isn't a racist! I guess we won't be hearing that campaign smear again in '04.

Like I said, I like to pretend to be open-minded. It would be nice if a shrill demagogue like Mr. Meyerson could entertain the same pleasant fiction.

Read the whole article. It's interesting to see what the miniscule left-wing wannabe-a-conspiracy has to say.

Deny, Deny, Deny

The Saudis are starting to get desperate. They have started to recognize that being a victim isn't all it's cracked up to be.

The Saudis, and all Arabs in general, have consistently blamed all their problems on Israel. Didn't matter what it was. Poverty? Israel causes it. Homelessness? Israel. Financial problems? Don't you know about Israel's control of the world financial system? War? If they would just leave Palestine. Islamic extremists? Israel creates them. Any problem - same answer. Deny responsibility.

And for years, that system worked just fine. Saudi Arabia never had to face its problems, but they still got American money and military aid to help stave off the extremists and the communists. Plus, they could sell all the oil they wanted to. For the Saudi monarchy, it was the perfect deal.

But the system only worked because of the instability of the region. In a land of maniacs and mullahs, crazies and clerics, thugocracies and theocracies, a scapegoat was needed to deflect the anger of the oppressed. Israel was the perfect scapegoat for the anti-Semitic status quo.

The war in Iraq changed the status quo. It is very probable that there will no longer be a evil, repressive regime to the north of Saudi Arabia. There is a strong possibility of an Iraqi-Israeli cooperation, with great benefit to Iraq. The stereotypical scapegoat may be exposed as a charade. That is the underlying fear of the existing regimes.

The ruling parties of these Arab nations know that Israel is not the manifestation of evil that they try to pretend it is. They fear the exposure of Israelis as humans because then these brutal Arab regimes would have to answer for their mistakes and shortcomings.

I believe this is why you see the author of this article taking such an introspective approach for about half the article. He sees the handwriting on the wall. He knows that the Saudi Royal Family will have to answer for years of corruption, decadence and extremism. If the Royal Family is to have any hope of surviving the whirlwind, they have to be able to point to signs of real change. Hence the introspection.

The author knows that the Palestinian problem has nearly played out. As the Palestinian Authority loses support for violence from its more moderate Arab brothers, it will begin to seek a peaceful solution. As more and more Arab nations see the light, the pressure will grow and grow on the PA. The Palestinian problem will be solved, just not the way the Arabs want it to be.

One of the keys to enlightenment is to know thyself. Hopefully these are the first spasms of the Arab Renaissance that will pull the region out of its equivalent of the dark ages. This could be a small start.

The War With France

Say what you will about Francois Mitterand, but he was pretty perceptive at times. It's too bad that his died-in-the-wool socialism was passed down to his political heir, Jacques Chirac, but not his power of accurate observation. There is, however, still a glimmer of hope on the horizon for Jacques, if he can mend his ways.

I really don't know if it's funny or tragic that it has taken this long for the French to begin to get a clue about the world. They are starting to figure out the UN is "without relevance." The are starting to understand the need to be "pragmatic." The only concern is that he still views French public opinion as being a key power base in the world. That belief may just keep Jacques from acknowledging reality.

What is that new reality? The reality is that France's worst fears about the war in Iraq came true. France killed off the UN Security Council as a realistic alternative in the world. France supplied arms and support to the dictator. And Saddam still collapsed in three weeks. The people of Iraq still welcomed us into their nation as liberators (much like the French did in WWII). There were some humanitarian issues, but nothing of the genocidal scale that France and the UN were so worried about. In short, France was wrong on virtually every prediction of doom and gloom, save one, WMD, that is still being investigated and will be for months to come. Jacques made France irrelevant in the view of the United States. That is his new reality.

Jacques will continue to speak of "multipolarity" and of a "strong EU." He will continue to rail against US "imperialism" and "hegemony." And he will continue to attempt to bully, weasel or slither his way back into relevance. And as he did in his dire predictions of Iraq, he will be wrong and exposed as a charlatan again and again and again.

Jacques' only success has been in poisoning the Franco-American relationship. He wanted to prove his independence from Washington, but he is now finding out that being an enemy of the US is a mighty lonely place. His cohorts in animosity won't come to his defense in any way other than flowery firebrand rhetoric. His new friends in low places won't come to his aid if the Algerian Army of Islam marches on Paris. He's starting to understand that his prime benefactor and protector was Washington. He's also starting to understand that he may have permanently pissed away friendship with a nation that has liberated his country in the past because liberating France was the right thing to do.

But I don't think we're done seeing the depths of the idiocy that Jacques is capable of. He's starting to regret his flippant dismissal of the US, but his knee-jerk anti-Americanism is too deeply engrained for him to be able to avoid more political screwups.

U.S. officials fully expect the French to obstruct the next round of Iraq diplomacy at the United Nations. “What is their strategy?” asks one sarcastically. “Are they going to refuse to recognize the new Iraqi government? Are they going to recognize the government of Saddam Hussein?”

Let's see. Saddam's inner circle has fled to Syria. de Villepin makes a trip to Syria soon afterward. I can definitely see France refusing to recognize a new Iraqi government instead choosing to recognize Saddam's "government in exile," conveniently based out of Damascus.

Mitterand was right. America and France are at war. Under Mitterand, though, the war was cultural and economic. Jacques has chosen to expand the war and to open a new front - the foreign diplomacy front. But he forgot that part of foreign diplomacy is being able to back up your words with action. France has no capacity for action, only for rhetoric. By opening his new front, Jacques playing into our strengths. And now he is paying the price for his hubris.

It will be years before the French people can recover the damage Jacques has wrought on one of their most important foreign relationships. Jacques has taken Mitterand's war and turned it into another French Vietnam. Only this time, the Americans won't bail him out.

Labor/Management Relations 101

Lesson 1. How to most effectively tick off one your core labor constituencies: Get them to vote for concessions then turn around an disclose that you're funding senior exec bonuses.

Someone needs to send Donald Carty and crew to "Get A Clue" training.

But then again, someone needs to send the labor unions to that same training class.

I know that the unions are doing their damndest to "save" American Airlines. But if they read their aviation history, they would know that labor concessions have never saved any airline.

They didn't save Eastern. They didn't save Pan Am. Same for Branniff I & II, Continental, TWA, United, USAir - the list goes on and on. Labor concessions may allow an airline to stave off bankruptcy for the moment, but all they really accomplish is putting off the inevitable upheaval that must occur for the organization to become competitive again.

Labor concessions don't work because they don't address the fundamental problems underlying the financial difficulties. A labor concession at an airline is like putting a Band-Aid on a leg that was just cut off. They're nice gestures, but they just aren't effective.

They also act as narcotics for management. Most airline management has an incredible ability to ignore reality. Their only true competition in the ignorance arena was the Iraqi Information Ministry. Seats flying empty? Buy bigger airplanes! Overbooking a problem? Fly smaller airplanes, less frequently and cut fares! And labor concessions simply cover up the real effects of the mismanagement.

The best example of how labor concessions can fail is the story of Eastern Airlines. Eastern kept getting concession after concession - to the point that the term BOHICA (Bend Over, Here It Comes Again) was bandied about quite frequently. Charlie Bryan of the Machinist's Union finally put an end to the madness and basically put Eastern into bankruptcy. Had it not been for Gulf War I, Eastern probably would have come out of bankruptcy in a much better position to try to compete.

I know why labor takes these actions - they are trying to preserve union jobs. This is certainly a worthwhile goal, but the unions view in a very shortsighted manner. The union would rather save a job for 2 months and lose 10,000 in 6 months than to lose 1000 now.

It is this very shortsightedness that makes airline bankruptcies so traumatic and so effective at the same time.

American will almost certainly need to go into bankruptcy, and soon. The unions have got to realize this. Their best course of action would have been to let it happen now while the company is in a better (relatively speaking) financial position.

Stay tuned for Lesson 2: Why It Is A Bad Idea To Buy A Bankrupt And Failing Airline Like TWA.

What Would You Do?

I know what I'd do if I were in Jarrod Martin's position. I'd do the exact same thing that he did.

Jarrod entered his burning apartment to save his dog and was arrested for doing so.

The police and the fire department are now defending the decision to arrest Mr. Martin. And while he was right in going in to rescue his dog, they were equally right to arrest him for violating the law.

It is extremely unfortunate that Mr. Martin will have a record for doing the right thing, but laws are put in place to protect everyone. A land ruled by law requires that the law be enforced equally. To let Mr. Martin get off without an arrest would allow the relativist anarchists to use it as an excuse to commit greater crimes. To protect the fabric of our society Mr. Martin had to be arrested, the circumstances around the "crime" are irrelevant to the police officer on the scene. He witnessed a crime being committed. He has to make the arrest.

It will be up to the judge to determine how the circumstances play into the penalty Mr. Martin has to pay. That is his job, not the cop's.

Mr. Martin will be convicted or will plead guilty. Unless the judge has a heart of stone, the penalty will be a token slap on the wrist. As well it should be.

As a dog owner, I know that I would gladly pay a fine or even spend a few nights in jail to make sure that I still had my friend with me. What's a few hundred dollars or a week of my time for an absolute friend? The dog won't ever know the magnitude of the sacrifice I made, but so what? It knows and understands love - and gives it back in spades.

Sometimes, the law and morality are in conflict. It doesn't happen often, but when it does the decision is usually extremely difficult to make.

This decision was easy. Obviously, Mr. Martin carefully considered his decision before acting. And he decided, as I think most people would have, that morality was more important than legality. The only thing that surprises me is that he waited thirty minutes to act. I would have been in there in less than ten.

In this case, both Mr. Martin and the police made the right decisions. I hope that the judge will take a cue and do the same.