12.16.2005 | This and that

Just a few things to mark our continuing descent into...well, pick your metaphor. But make sure there's "handbasket" in the refrain:

• "Bush Authorized Domestic Spying." Lions and tigers and spying on terror suspects, oh my. Story here. I'd only be concerned about this story if it concerned real Americans. It does not. It concerns those with links to terrorist groups or nations. In the latter category I very much include "our friends the Saudis" and Syria. It is useful, as always, to consider the source: the Gray Lady, who never met anything meant to keep our country safe that they did not condemn.



• "Experts Cautious in Assessing Iraq Election." WaPo story here. Every silver lining has its cloud. The MSM just can't give Bush and Co. a break. Iraq is a "quagmire", a "Vietnam." Don't confuse me with any facts on the ground.



• "In Iran, Arming for Armageddon." This one, by Dr. K. (no, the good Dr. K., Charles Krauthammer) does us the service of reminding us of the plans the Iranians have for their nuclear weapons. Which, of course, they've convinced the Euros that they're not really working on. Mo ElBarelySee will go, at most, "tsk tsk," and propose a really, really terse note for the Security Council to sit on for two years. By which time Tel Aviv may be a smoldering ruin. But not if Tehran is first...

It could be depressing, were it not for the fact that there are still a few good men, stout-hearted patriots, who will not let things come to that pass. Here, and, in Israel. Not too many other places, I'm afraid...