As the State of the Union flap and George Tenet’s G. Gordon Liddy turn dominate the headlines, InstaPundit is headlining something else, something which may well turn out to be much more important. A “lifelong Democrat and a man of unimpeachable integrity,” Judge Gilbert S. Merritt of the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, has, “through an unusual set of circumstances,” come into contact with direct evidence of a Saddam-Osama connection:

The document shows that an Iraqi intelligence officer, Abid Al-Karim Muhamed Aswod, assigned to the Iraq embassy in Pakistan, is ”responsible for the coordination of activities with the Osama bin Laden group.”

The document shows that it was written over the signature of Uday Saddam Hussein, the son of Saddam Hussein.

Merritt’s article is hardly an exercise in sucking up to Bush:

Up until this time, I have been skeptical about…claims [of a Saddam-Osama connection]. Now I have changed my mind. There is, however, one big problem remaining: They are both still at large and the combined forces of the free world have been unable to find them.

I doubt Howard Dean and his ilk will pay much attention to this story. They certainly haven’t paid much attention to any of the previous stories indicating that substantial evidence of direct connections between Iraq and terrorists, including Al Qaeda, was and is being uncovered. Indeed, I am constantly being told by some of my more liberal friends that no evidence whatsoever of a terrorist connection has been found, which is just patently untrue. Well, anyway, this is another piece of the jigsaw puzzle. And we’re really just beginning to put it all together.

Oh, and about that State of the Union thing, I think Alex Knapp, a blogger who has already announced his intention to vote against Bush in 2004, has it about right:

Heaven knows I’m no Bush supporter, but if this is the best the Democrats can do, then they’re going to keep losing for a long, long time. This was one sentence in one speech, people! The Bush Administration’s case for going into Iraq was a lot more than this statement. Hell, I wouldn’t even have remembered Bush had said it if it hadn’t sparked so much brouhaha. This was not a vital part of Bush’s case. It was hardly part of it at all.

Surely, the opposition party can do better than this. But instead, they’re so blinded by their hatred of Bush that they’re not accomplishing sh*t, nor are they offering any constructive alternative to his policies.

UPDATE: As usual, ScrappleFace has the answer:

In an effort to make sure all of his public statements are accurate, U.S. President George Bush said today that he will personally verify all CIA reports before using them publicly.

“I regret that I didn’t go to Niger to check out that uranium sale to Iraq story,” said the President. “Today I deputized myself as an agent in the CIA. I’ll go on deep-cover missions, onto foreign soil, sometimes behind enemy lines to verify all crucial information.”

Heh.

Thanks to my Aunt Patty for this tip: A bunch of researchers with an interest in art history, a talent for astronomical sleuthing, and an overabundance of time of their hands say they have determined the exact date and time when Vincent Van Gogh witnessed the scene that he immortalized in his painting “Moonrise.”

A 12,000-square foot, 76th- and 77th-floor penthouse condominium in Columbus Circle has been sold for $40 million, the largest residential transaction in New York City history.

The condo is part of the new AOL Time Warner Center, which consists of two under-construction skycrapers. They are due to be completed this fall, but they’re already quite impressive. As it happens, I took a picture of them on Monday after getting off the subway at the Columbus Circle station:

Becky and her friends went to a concert by Great Big Sea, one of my favorite bands, at D’Arcy McGee’s Irish pub in Buffalo.

I didn’t. I’m in Connecticut at the moment.

Am I jealous? Nah…

(pout, pout)

SpaceWeather.com is linking to a photo gallery and an article about something called “noctilucent clouds” — mysterious, wispy clouds that hover literally on the edge of outer space, 50-plus miles high. (They are most often visible at this time of year, hence the sudden attention.)

Here’s a whole website devoted to noctilucent clouds. I’d never heard of them before, but they seem pretty cool. I’d like to see them someday.

Meanwhile, aurora borealis — a.k.a. Northern lights — are possible tomorrow night.

A newly discovered, extremely old planet “means that 13 billion years ago, life could have arisen and then died out. This has immense implications.”

Too bad Carl Sagan isn’t alive to comment on this discovery. “Billions and billions…”

I’ve been playing with my blog categories even more. It’s a work in progress, but I’m liking how things are going so far. You can use the drop-down scrolling thingy at right to check them out.

Pittsburgh Pirates first baseman Randall Simon was fined $432 for disorderly conduct after he hit a sausage mascot over the head with his bat.

Conan O’Brien said, “He was the first person to pound a sausage in public since Pee Wee Herman.” (If you don’t understand the joke, don’t try to figure it out. This is a family website.)

A while back, shortly after Joe Biden snuck the RAVE Act into the Amber Alert bill, I wrote an e-mail to my congressmen (well, I composed it using one of those auto-generated e-mail senders on some drug-policy group’s website) expressing my opposition. Recently, I received a response from Senator Chris Dodd, defending his decision to vote for the law. I am not impressed. Excerpt:

I understand your concerns about this bill. However, like Senator Biden, I am deeply concerned with the growing popularity of Ecstasy and other “club drugs” among America’s youth. In addition, I do not believe that this bill is intended to shut down lawful activities such as “rave” parties. Rather, it targets unscrupulous and predatory event promoters and organizers who profit by placing our children at risk.

Oh, really, Senator Dodd? “Unscrupulous and predatory event promoters” like the Montana lodge owners who cancelled a benefit concert for two legitimate political advocacy groups because they were intimidated by federal drug-enforcement agents who threatened them with the RAVE Act’s promised $250,000 fine? “While the…event was advertised as a benefit concert for two local groups interested in drug law reform — not as a drug-taking orgy — it still attracted the attention of the DEA,” according to this article, which I posted about here.

Anyway, Dodd goes on:

Many have criticized Senator Biden’s legislation as unfairly victimizing legitimate promoters and property owners who sponsor events at which there is incidental drug use by patrons. In response, Senator Biden explained that his legislation specifically applies only to individuals who “not only know that there is drug use at their event but also hold the event for the purpose of illegal drug use or distribution.”

Well, that might have been Biden’s intent (actually, I doubt it, but let’s give him the benefit of the doubt, for the sake of argument), but even if so, that’s obviously not the intent of the drug-enforcement officers who Biden’s bill gives the power to restrict the constitutionally protected freedom of assembly. It couldn’t have been more obvious that this is what would happen, and now it’s happening. But my senator is still apparently clueless:

I…believe it is important to strike a balance which prevents illegal drug use but does not infringe on the ability of law-abiding individuals to hold, or participate in, otherwise harmless events such as concerts and dance parties. I would not support legislation if I believed it would stifle free expression or civil liberties. Please be assured that I will monitor the implementation of the Illicit Drug Anti-Proliferation Act to ensure that it is not being used against law-abiding event promoters and participants.

Sorry, Senator Dodd, but I’m not feeling remotely “assured.” Dodd’s letter was dated June 13; the Montana incident occurred in late May. Apparently he isn’t “monitoring the implementation” closely enough.

I will, of course, be writing back to Senator Dodd eventually, and when I do, I will post my letter here. In the mean time, if you would like to write to him, go here.

In an attempt to reduce the number of posts in my rather vague Misc. News category, I have created three new blog categories and significantly expanded an old one.

The new categories are Connecticut News, Elections & Politics and The Law. The category formerly known as “Critiquing the New York Times” has been expanded into The Media.

These changes are still a work-in-progress. The new categories will gradually grow as I discover old posts that belong in them.

(more…)

Howard Dean: the Left’s Pat Buchanan?

Arthur Champagne, one of my father’s former co-workers at the Secretary of the State Elections Division who was laid off last fall, has been re-hired!

After months of bleak news, courtesy of our state budget crisis and our poor excuse for a governor, this is a very good development, not only for Arthur (who had been working there for nearly a decade, but not quite long enough to qualify for retirement and a pension) but for the Elections Division as a whole. The division had been absolutely decimated by the combination of layoffs and early retirements (the latter category includes my dad) just when the state legislature increased its workload by adding a primary-by-petition law. Now they’ll have at least one of their excellent, experienced workers back.

Congratulations, Arthur!

Tropical Storm Claudette, which formed on Tuesday, is nearing hurricane strength as it barrels toward the Yucatan Peninsula of Mexico. According to the Tropical Prediction Center, “Strengthening is forecast during the next 24 hours and Claudette could become a hurricane later today or tonight.”

The long-term forecast track suggests this storm could be a threat to Texas early next week. But will undoubtedly weaken over the Yucatan first. Anyway, stay tuned.

Basketball player Damon Stoudamire was arrested last week at the Tuscon airport when he was found to be in possession of marijuana. Was he caught by a drug-sniffing dog? Did an exceptionally observant security guard notice his bloodshot eyes and pull him aside for questioning? No — he tried to pass through a metal detector with his stash of pot wrapped in aluminum foil.

Dumbass.

Last Thursday’s Best of the Web column from the Wall Street Journal’s OpinionJournal had a truly excellent item about Liberia and the Left. The whole thing is quoted below; I boldfaced the part that I found most compelling.

The Associated Press reports that Howard Dean, who emerged as the Democratic presidential front-runner with his uncompromising antiwar stand, now favors military intervention–in Liberia, where he’d like to send 2,000 U.S. troops:

The second difference is that, as Dean puts it, in Liberia “the world community is asking the United States to exercise its leadership.” But if America simply does whatever the “world community” wants it to do, in what sense can it be said to be exercising “leadership”?

Yep, that’s true too, but let’s go back for a moment to the point I boldfaced, because I really think it’s so dead-on accurate. If a “serious human catastrophe” is enough to justify military intervention, then surely Saddam’s tyrannical and murderous rule — his totalitarian regime, his brutal suppression of political opponents, his record of burying children in mass graves — made the liberation of Iraq just as justified as the drive for regime change in Liberia.

“But,” you protest, “the Bush Administration’s motive for war wasn’t humanitarian at all, it was based on deception, lies, and bald self-interest!” Fine, I’ll grant you that, for the sake of argument at least. But if you feel so strongly about American military humanitarianism, shouldn’t you have supported the Iraq war, not because of the Bush Administration’s rationales but in spite of those rationales, since the war’s (inevitable) end result was such a profound humanitarian good (the removal of Saddam)? Or is opposition to Bush’s policies — and the preservation of America’s “moral purity” — more important than the fate of millions of Iraqis?

If the Bushies were doing the right thing (pursuing a war with a profoundly good humanitarian result) for the wrong reasons (bald self-interest, ficticious WMDs, oil, avenging Bush’s daddy, etc.), while the Left was doing the wrong thing (opposing a war with a profoundly good humanitarian result) for the wrong reasons (moral vanity and blind adherance to the belief that Bush is always wrong), I’m thinking Bush is batting .500 and the Left is batting .000.

By the way, I personally strongly support military intervention in Liberia — but that doesn’t alter my belief that the United Nations, the “world community,” and the Howard Dean Left are all being completely hypocritical on this issue.