Watcher's Council nominations, 1/24/07

Every week, the Watcher's Council nominate two posts each, one from the Council members and one from outside for consideration by the whole Council. The complete list of this week's Council nominations can be found at the site of our fearless leader, Watcher of Weasels



OK, here's this week's lineup:

1. J O S H U A P U N D I T: `Moderate' Abbas: "Aim the guns against Israel!" One of the most depressing aspects of the Arab Israeli conflict is that you can read articles and books about the conflict dating 20 years ago - and very little has changed except the names of the players.

Here we have a case in point. Yet again, the US, the EU and a weak Israeli government have identified a `moderate' Fatah leader and given him arms and money with the idea that he's going to control all those extremists. And once again, this `moderate' leader has terrorists on his payroll, and is saying one thing to Israel and the West in English and something quite different in Arabic to the home crowd.

There is a road to the solution of the Arab Israeli conflict, believe it or not..but it doesn't rely on establishing a second Arab Palestinian state. The opposite, in fact.

Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results is one definition of insanity.

2. Done With Mirrors: Iraqi Refugees Callimachus focuses on the plight of Iraqi refugees, and suggest that the US should make special provision to import them into the US. Just what we need...more potential jihadis.

A well written piece that I disagree with.


3. Soccer Dad: Too much munich?Soccer Dad takes on some idiots who have second thoughts about why people were so quick to lambaste Stephen Spielberg's "Munich." As you know, I devoted a bit of space at the time to this warm and fuzzy portrait of Palestinian murderers. The original screenplay was deemed too `pro-Israeli', so a self-hating leftist Jew by the name of Tony Kushner was hired to make it more `politicaly correct.

Here's the real skinny on people like Spielberg - nobody wants to offend a fat wallet. "Munich" was a despicable film that attempted to `humanize' some despicable people who committed murder on innocent people. End of story

4. Right Wing Nut House: D’SOUZA AND THE ILLIBERALITY OF CRITICISMHere, Rick writes about author Dinesh D'Souza's latest work, in which D'Souza theorizes that the Left in America, with its embrace of certain social policies, was responsible for the attack on 9/11. Unlike Rick, I generally like D'Souza's writing, but I agree with Rick that he's wrong about this one.

The jihadis hate all non-believers, Liberal or Conservative, because we are part of dar harb (literally, the place of war, the part of the world not under Islamic domination) and need to conquered. This was inevitable as soon as we liberated them from the Ottoman Turks and dug the oil out of the ground for them.

5. The Sundries Shack: Obama, the apostate Here, Jimmie Bise examines the `Insight' story on Barak Hussein Obama growing up Muslim and being educated in a madrassah. Frankly, as much as Barak Hussein Obama might protest that he's no longer a Muslim, I prefer to err on the side of caution an dsay `no thanks'.

6.Rhymes With Right:Opposing Obama Isn't About RaceHere, Greg likewise takes on Obamarama and correctly states that his skin color is the least of reasons to not support his run for the White House.

7. The Glittering Eye: Taking responsibility Here, Dave looks at the limits on Congressional power to stymie the executive branch.

8. AMERICAN FUTURE - On the Possibility of an Embargo of Iranian Oil Marc's piece this week seems to indicate that he's moving in the direction I suggested last week in J O S H U A P U N D I T: Operation Mullah Stomp: The military option on Iran. Of course, any embargo will need to include significant military action, as I wrote in the piece.



9. The COLOSSUS OF RHODEY: Teacher merit pay Hube discusses an idea making the rounds in his home state...partially evaluating teacher pay by test scores.

I like it, but the real way to improve education, IMO, is to open the education biz to competition.and that means school choice and vouchers, something many people who voted for the self-described `education president' would have expected him to do in his first term.


10. The Education Wonks: No Spanky-Spanky In The Golden State? Yep..they're proposing legislation in California to outlaw spanking of any child under three. Enough said.


11. Eternity Road: A mandatory disaggregation Francis has a great post this week. He examines the oft spoken caveat that not all Muslims are terrorists or supporters of terrorism and the all important BUT..that one could also say that the Holocaust, the Inquisition, slavery in the South and a lot of other evil was not supported by the entire group either,and voice a truth that was generally useless in terms of practicality or strategy.

Islam indeed has violent hostility towards other faiths ( and more importantly, domination of other faiths) as a major part of its creed, no matter what its apologists might tell you.

Francis advises his fellow Americans that forewarned is forearmed in terms of our attitudes toward Muslims here in America, and a major degree of caution is mandated. I agree with him.


That's this week's lineup..enjoy!