Kudos and thanks, two weeks later
The Glorious Election of 2006 is fast receding in the rear view mirror. Despite threatening to engage in "100 hours of gloating," I didn't really; I was mainly beat to bat***t -- which is mainly a sorry indication how woefully out of shape I am. In my defense, I did knock on quite a few doors this election season, and in fact on quite a few just in the last few days of it. But I doubt very seriously I did a quarter as much as three women I'd like to raise an online toast to:

eRobin ("Fact-esque") --- Robin has been an indefatigable grass roots activist for reforming electronic voting (via the Coalition for Voting Integrity), the Democratic Party (via Chuck Penacchio's primary campaign for Pennsylvania's Senate seat), and Medicare, and for getting out of Iraq, and for getting after Wal-Mart, and more besides.

Once the general election seasond rolled around, she sort of dropped from sight, though. That's because she was working as a canvass coordinator for PA Action, working on turning out the crucial single women's vote, judged to be a rich, untapped vein of progressive, Democratic votes. A local Fox news broadcast gives a sense of what the campaign was about and what it was like.

Stephanie Dray ("Jousting for Justice") --- Stephanie posted repeatedly about rallies in Maryland, but also provided information about volunteering, made phone calls and knocked on doors herself, worked on Election Day for the Maryland Democratic Party, and basically always inspired me to try to do a little more myself.

Nell Lancaster ("A Lovely Promise") --- It's hard to for me to imagine many tougher rows to hoe than being a Democrat, let alone a peace activist, in Rockbridge County, Virginia -- home of Stonewall Jackson, V.M.I., and the last refuge of Robert E. Lee. But Nell has won hearts, minds and respect doing so. If anyone threw the last block for Jim Webb running back the immaculate interception against George Allen, it was people like Nell and her pals in "upstate," nonurban or less urban Virginia. Lost in the tidal wave of votes from deep blue strongholds like Arlington and Fairfax counties was the fact that counties like Rockbridge didn't give Allen the edge they gave Bush two years earlier -- Rockbridge County, for its part, went for George Allen by about 8.5% less than for Bush two years earlier. While Webb, Bush, and Allen all certainly played their part in that, it takes volunteers and supporters walking, talking, and fundraising to seal the deal, help make it 'respectable' to vote differently, and peel away those crucial votes, a dozen here, twenty there, across the state.

These women -- and men and women like them around the country -- are my heroes of the election: they never gave up, never surrendered,* and they helped give this country a fighting chance at turning itself around.

To eRobin, Stephanie, Nell, and anyone who did half of what they did: way to go! and thank you! thank you! thank you! from the bottom of my heart. posted by Thomas Nephew at 2:44:00 PM -- |    

 
Happy Thanksgiving
In Tennessee through the weekend; posting will be light. Hope you are or will be eating plenty of good home-cooked food with your family, too. posted by Thomas Nephew at 2:26:00 PM -- |    

 
Hammering Krauthammer

Our objectives in Iraq were twofold and always simple: Depose Saddam Hussein and replace his murderous regime with a self-sustaining, democratic government.

--- Why Iraq is Crumbling, Charles Krauthammer, Washington Post, 11/18/2006

That's funny, thought Andrew Sullivan. Wasn't there some other reason? Oh yeah... weapons of mass destruction! Plus Saddam's terrorist pals equals 9/11 squared! Brendan Nyhan decided to take a look at Charles Krauthammer's old columns. In Krauthammer's Revisionism on Iraq, he writes, "A review of Krauthammer's columns from 2002-2003 shows that he certainly did believe that Iraq had WMD. In fact, he cited the alleged intersection of WMD and links to terrorists as the key reason for the war."

Now since Nyhan was understandably too worn out tracking down Krauthammer's deceptions to provide links to the columns, I will; a big thanks and shout out here to Townhall.com, where no conservative thought is too tiny to be left behind. But mainly thanks to Mr. Nyhan; while his ethical antennae are sometimes all too easily set aquiver by purported mind-reading, pictures of coffins, and sundry alleged "cheap shots," this time he's performed a service, providing key quotes from each of the following 2002-2003 Krauthammer gems:

The State of the Union (and the war), 2/1/2002; U.S. should take their eye off Iraq, 4/19/02; The anti-Saddam coalition grows, 9/13/02; Remember Kennedy?, 10/4/02; Hawks and Doves, 10/7/02; Enough with the negotiating at the UN, 11/1/02; The inspections trap, 11/15/02; It's time to act,1/24/03; Iraq to Chair U.N. Disarmament Conference?,1/31/03; Bracing for the Apocalypse, 2/14/03; Mr. President, walk away from the U.N., 3/12/03; Chasing after Saddam's weapons, 6/13/03; Niger, 7/18/03 . The last one is extensively excerpted by Nyhan.

Now in fairness, Saddam's alleged WMD were my principal reason for supporting the war at the outset, too. But between their absence, the clearly botched occupation, and finally Abu Ghraib, I saw I'd been wrong; too late, but at least I don't try to airbrush my prior position off the record.

Because no single post can capture the breadth of Krauthammer's dishonesty, I add the observation that the logic of Krauthammer's 11/18 column seems to be to -- how shall I put it -- cut and run. He lists reason after reason why the seedling of democracy was likely to wither in Iraq, and then concludes:

But unless the Iraqis can put together a government of unitary purpose and resolute action, the simple objective of this war -- to leave behind a self-sustaining democratic government -- is not attainable.

Having answered the premise in the negative, and even ignoring the WMD lie that Krauthammer can't bring himself to mention, we are therefore left with a war whose "simple" objective is not attainable. At one point, the Washington Post helpfully labeled a link to this column "Krauthammer: It's the Iraqis' fault." It would have been just as apt to title it "It's time for us to go."


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NOTE: The 2/14/03 column is dated 2/13/03 by townhall.com in its Krauthammer archives, but 2/12 on the page itself, so don't consider any date to be exact.

UPDATE, 11/21: In comments, anonymousgf recalls this by Krauthammer at an AEI 'briefing' on Iraq on 4/22/03:"Hans Blix had five months to find weapons. He found nothing. We've had five weeks. Come back to me in five months. If we haven't found any, we will have a credibility problem. I don't have any doubt that we will locate them." Krauthammer went on: "I think it takes time. They've obviously been deeply hidden, and it will require that we get the information from people who know where they are." Ticking time bombs, after all. posted by Thomas Nephew at 11:30:00 PM -- |    

 
Cool stuff
Partisan Realignment Maps: Maryland --- Nicholas Beaudrot ("Electoral Math") measures Democratic gains and losses from 2004 to 2006 by county.* Beaudrot: "As Montgomery county continues to grow more and more Democratic, Maryland will move further and further into the party's set of "base" states." He's got similar maps for Virginia, Tennessee, Pennsylvania, and the other 2006 Senate race states.

Ms. Dewey --- On the whole, a sign (OK, another sign) that Microsoft has jumped the shark, but without a doubt the most attractive but impatient search engine I've ever seen. And yes, there should be a Mr. Dewey -- but should he be a handsome executive secretary, a hunky college professor, or what?

The Ghost Pitch --- a.k.a. the "gyroball," argued to be the first truly new baseball pitch in a while.

Water's Journey, Everglades --- Animations depicting the hydrology of Lake Okeechobee and the Everglades and the manmade influences on both.

U.S. Presidential Speeches Tag Cloud --- online analysis of presidential rhetoric illustrates which words have cropped up most often and how that's changed over time. Oft-used words of 1776: assembly, constitution, independence. Oft-used words of 2006: terrorists, Iraq, economy, and (perhaps ironically) freedom. Since it's limited to formal speeches, we're spared seeing the words "interesting," (stay the) "course," and (watch this) "drive."

Party of one - and it isn't Lieberman (Stamford Advocate) --- [Fairfield University professor John Orman] visited the registrar in Trumbull, where he lives, to switch from a Democrat to a Connecticut for Lieberman-ite.

"Then I went home and called a meeting of all registered Connecticut for Lieberman members to reflect on our party's victory in the U.S. Senate race (and) organize and submit rules to the secretary of the state," Orman said.

He nominated himself chairman, seconded the nomination, cast his vote for himself and proceeded to establish party rules.

Opportunity knocks at Victoria Crater --- Remember "Spirit" and "Opportunity," NASA's Mars rovers? Still going. "Opportunity" has reached Victoria Crater, and the chance to "study a longer span of Mars' environmental history than the rover has studied in smaller craters. [...] The rovers have worked on Mars for more than 10 times their originally planned three-month missions." Unlike me, Opportunity actually sends a lot of post cards when it goes on a trip, including this panoramic view of the crater. I'll also take this opportunity (get it?) to again recommend "Six Minutes of Terror," a short movie about how each of the rovers got there in one piece -- a fantastic accomplishment in its own right.


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* Beaudrot's specific formula is [S06(county)-S06(state)] - [P04(county)-P04(state)], i.e., how much better the county did relative to its state for Democrats in the 2006 Senate race than it did in the 2004 presidential race; see Beaudrot for a discussion.

NOTES: Realignment maps via Ezra Klein; Ms. Dewey via Bill Day ("Web Undone 2"); Ghost Pitch via Montag ("Stump Lane"); "Water's Journey" via Yahoo! Cool Site of the Day; presidential rhetoric analysis via Eszter Hargittai ("Crooked Timber"); Party of one via Avedon Carol ("Sideshow") and John Aravosis ("AMERICAblog"). The first Opportunity link is dated 10/6/06, the 2d 11/15/06. posted by Thomas Nephew at 5:45:00 PM -- |