MY FAVORITE BAATHIST: Franklin Harris has one, the man who shall forever be known as Skippy:

I admit it. I like Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf. Sure, he's the Iraqi information minister, and for all I know he could be a war criminal. But you just have to like a guy who can stand on a rooftop and tell you that U.S. forces are not inside Baghdad even as you can plainly hear automatic gunfire a few blocks away.

And he does it with a straight face.

We've all heard that the first casualty in war is the truth, but this is overkill.

So, if al-Sahhaf survives the war and doesn't wind up in prison, he should come to America. He can have a stellar second career as an advertising pitchman. He can be the new Joe Isuzu.

You should read the whole thing. It is, of course, far funnier if you remember who Joe Isuzu was. Er, links via Franklin.

THIS WAR IS FEEDING MY AMERICAN EGO, ANYWAY: It's that American self-belief that we always--eventually--do the right thing, the self-belief that Casblanca and Three Kings are all about. So I when I saw that statue coming down, it made me glad that Americans were there causing it and that Americans had helped to cause this moment that was pretty much A Good Thing. Because it was good to see a national ideal turn into reality like that. Ideals are ideals; Americans don't always do the right thing--I know that--and maybe we don't even eventually always do the right thing, but we did the right thing this time and it was good to see. Okay? Gawd, we're the goofiest imperialist colonialist superpower ever; what previous superpower just wanted to be liked? That's not in Machiavelli. If you want to understand the American version of power, you better read Peanuts when you're reading your Machiavelli.

The other American self-belief that the statue moment is feeding is that we're not a bunch of racist fuckwads and that anybody can be an American--that we're the nationality that is best at transcending ethnicity. So hopefully the fact that the Marine rubbing an American flag in Saddam's face is an ethnically Chinese child-of-immigrants New Yorker is proof of that, and that a racist past does not guarantee a racist present. I mean, in both cases (racism and Iraq) we have a lot left to do, and in Iraq there's a lot of stuff we could still go wrong with. But it's nice to see ideals in action.

STATUE NEWS: For whatever it's worth, that was not the world's longest-lasting symbol of oppression:

The Marines joined the effort to pull down the Firdos Square statue -- erected last April for the Iraqi president's 65th birthday -- when it became clear a small group of Iraqis would not be able to bring it down on their own.

Saddam was still statue-building only a year ago? Huh.

FOR THE FIFTH TIME--THIS WEEK: Diana Moon retires.

LEAGUE PASS HATE POST: Lang Whitaker explains why Mavs/Lakers was not on my teevee last night:

On Time Warner's digital cable, the League Pass is on channels 400 through 412. It used to be that channel 400 was what they called NBA.com TV. During the day they replayed all the old NBA Entertainment specials, which was always cool to park on for a minute and check out. At night, while games were going on, half of the screen was a scoreboard with live scores of every NBA game on the screen. The other half of the screen was highlights from the games, along with occasional "expert" analysis from media people I'd never heard of.

But at some point this season, the NBA decided that we were getting too much for our money, and they yanked the channel and renamed it NBA TV, then made it available only through a separate subscription service. Problem is that right now, Time Warner cable doesn't offer the channel.

All that to say that even though I paid to get all the NBA games on the League Pass, the NBA decided that it was more important to make a buck than show the most important game of the week to the customers that had already bought their product. And you wonder why there are empty arenas around the League...

The same is apparently true for Comcast cable, because that game was nowhere on my digital cable last night either. Thank you, David Stern. And how does Stern continue to allow Sterling to own the Clippers? Does Jerry Buss need a foil that badly? I don't get it.

YOUR TERRIBLE SEARCH THAT FINDS MY WEBLOG POST OF THE DAY: Number 30 for private lynch naked. Oh come on....

THANK YOU FOR PLAYING, DALLAS MAVERICKS: You cannot beat the Lakers and a first-round meeting with them looks inevitable at this point. It was such a promising season; we all wanted you to succeed, we did. But the Kings and the Spurs look like they've figured the Lakers out while you guys stiiiiiink. We wanted the team that was winning the NBA championship to be as entertaing as it was successful. Sadly, it was not to be. The Kings and Spurs will have to do what they can to be entertaining, which they are capable of, because, Kobe aside, the Lakers are not a joy to watch.

WHAT EVOLUTIONARY PSYCHOLOGY DOES AND DOES NOT DO: Steve Sailer, Man Without Permalinks, uses evpsych to explain the public fascination with Private Lynch:

Despite the advanced views on gender equality put forward in that Gallup Poll, this week's age-old tale of gallant knights rescuing a damsel in distress touched American heartstrings like nothing else in the war.

The great storm of joy and protectiveness that the photos of the West Virginia beauty contestant elicited highlight a general shortcoming of opinion polls. While calling 1,000 people on the phone and asking them questions about whether women should serve in high-risk military situations is a useful tool, it's worth bearing in mind that respondents can't fully anticipate how they'll actually feel about a novel situation until it actually arises.

More:

Nonetheless, the remarkable reaction all across America to the pictures of the girl-next-door from Hometown, USA, is a reminder that polling often fails to plumb the deepest human passions. And, fortunately, on this occasion, these passions include joy and relief at her deliverance.

However, he is on shakier ground here:

From a traditional perspective -- supported in recent years by the new science of evolutionary psychology -- it makes sense for many men to risk their lives to try to free a beautiful young woman. Humans evolved over hundreds of thousands of years in small bands. Fertile females were the critical resource. Even if all the males in the band but one died, he could still face up to his tribal duty and impregnate all the women in the band.

But if too many younger females were killed or stolen by an enemy group, the band's survival was in doubt. As University of Florida zoologist Laura A. Higgins wrote in 1988, "Because fewer of them are needed to produce and maintain offspring, from a population maintenance perspective, males are more expendable than females."

On the other hand, this primordial instinct can get in the way of rational war fighting. In the opening months of the 1947-1948 Israeli War of Independence, women were fully integrated into frontline ranks, but later in the war, the government began withdrawing women from combat. City College of New York sociologist Steven Goldberg pointed out, "The argument that clinched Israel's decision to not use women in combat was the experience of male soldiers taking militarily unwarranted risks to save female soldiers in trouble." Israeli women were then banned from combat roles until a 1996 Israeli Supreme Court ruling.

Lynch's rescue was extremely well planned and executed, and the risks were kept to a minimum. But risks there were. And the political bonanza it reaped shows the pressures and temptations commanders face regarding the fate of nice-looking female soldiers.

I mean--there are indications that this rescue was attempted because the Marines knew a female soldier was involved (via Virginia Postrel):

Mohammed was taking a chance, not only in defying Iraqi authorities but in approaching the Marines. Saddam's Fedayeen and their allies had been dressing in civilian clothes to get close to U.S. troops, sometimes even faking surrender, only to open fire at short range. U.S. troops have also fired on civilians at checkpoints.

But with the mention of a woman soldier, Mohammed got the Marines' attention, and he was quickly ushered in to talk with officers who began grilling him about the hospital and the soldier inside. At the same time, Mohammed instructed his wife to go stay with their family -- and none too soon. That night, friends told him later, the Fedayeen showed up at his house and ransacked the place, searching for something.

It was not enough to simply tell the Americans that one of their own was at Saddam Hospital. Twice over the next two days, he said, they sent him back to the hospital to gather more information. Just to get to the hospital was perilous, he said, because of the U.S. bombs that seemed to be falling all around Nasiriyah. Once in the hospital, he had to make sure he was not spotted by anyone who would inform on him to the Fedayeen.

But it seems more like if anyone was taking a huge, greater-than-average risk out of protective male feelings for women, it was Mohammed--the Iraqi lawyer above who gave up her whereabouts--and not the U.S. Marines. On the other hand, the idea that Private Lynch is a much bigger deal than Private Johnson or Private Piestawa because she's the cutest of the three of them--I mean, it's an ugly idea, but it is probably true. I really hope it isn't because she's the whitest of the three of them.

My non-war question is: how does evolutionary psychology explain away female infanticide in Asia? If women are so precious in evpsych terms, it shouldn't happen at all. So evpsych either has to come up with a reproductive fitness explanation for female infanticide that is still being unconsciously followed to this day--or it has to say that Asian people evolved in a slightly different environment from non-Asian people--or maybe it has to say both, that the latter caused the former or something. Right?

Anyhoo, I guess I think that evolutionary psychology is better at explaining why things--images and ideas; I refuse to use the godawful term "meme"--spread the way that they do within a culture than at explaining why cultures themselves exist and develop. That's where it has more explanatory power for me, anywar. Right, then.

Of related interest: Is Evolution a Secular Religion? Via Charles Murtaugh. That post also explains Charlie's self-defined elitism, which I found interesting.

"BUT THE TIMES IN LIFE WHEN YOU LIKE YOUR ODDS ARE EXACTLY THE TIMES WHEN YOU'RE MOST LIKELY TO BE OVERESTIMATING THEM.": Economics explains why, from every moment of fools rushing in (in the Elvis sense) to every war that takes a little too long:

The same holds true for everything else in life. You might be very good, on average, at estimating the quality of potential mates. But the rare one whose quality you've way overestimated is precisely the one you're most likely to marry. And you might be very good, on average, at predicting how wars will go. But the rare one you've been way overoptimistic about is the one you choose to fight. So, marriages and wars are fraught with disappointment.

Steven E. Landsburg in Slate today. Is it me, or is Slate like cyberland's NPR? Left-leaning, probably grossly unprofitable, steady and reliable for intelligent journalism and analysis. The Dialogues are like Fresh Air. The Dispatches are like NPR's on-site reporters. Kaus is like Todd Munch or somebody. It all makes sense, I tell you what.

ANNIE GARRELS ROCKS: She really does. She's so even-handed and understated and admirably cynical and she's been right there in Baghdad throughout. And I can call her Annie cause I'm down with her like Neal Conan. Here she is getting Sun-Times love:

In the case of NPR's woman in Baghdad, Anne Garrels, there are volumes to be read in the unpolished, unrehearsed, admirably unprogrammed way she reports the news. If some war reporters project a Scud-Studly eager-beaverness, she doesn't mind letting you know how lucky you are not to be in her shoes. There may be no one on the air who better conveys the difficult mood swings that this kind of assignment can produce, or its utter lack of glamor.

Sydney Shanberg, the former New York Times journalist portrayed by Sam Waterston in the Cambodian drama, "The Killing Fields," recently wrote in the Village Voice of "the adrenaline high that fuels this news-gathering drive" and the "subconscious notions of immortality" that "may begin to rattle around in your psyche." Garrels seems fueled by an adrenaline low, her sense of self kept in check after all her years in embattled places--Chechnya, Bosnia, Kosovo, Israel, Tiananmen Square, to name a few--by her highly evolved sense of mortality.

As if chatting with a stateside friend on the phone, she makes little attempt to keep in check her weariness or anxiety or disregard for simplified accounts of what's going on. Embedded with Iraqi civilians, or as much as she can be under the close control of state officials (for her, life in the Palestine Hotel is "kinda like reform school"), she reported how surreal life in the streets was in the days before the initial assaults, when people were doing next to nothing to prepare for them. Through her unjaded commentary, you could appreciate the "thud, thud, thud" of bombs hitting the city and the emotions being felt by the Iraqi people we hear so much about but don't often hear.

I hope when people are writing the media history of this war they give some room for strong individual efforts like Garrels', and don't get bogged down in endless blathering about Al Jazeera and Fox News and so on. Yes I do.

SNAPSHOT OF A WAR: Baghdad citizens pull down a statue of Saddam Hussein--but with the help of an American vehicle. There's your war right there: oppressive regime, America doing good and looking out for its own interests at the same time, Iraqis happy, even as the Arab world knows that the fact that it required Americans to bring down Saddam is yet another sign that their governments have failed them en masse. So you can, I think, condense the whole war and the geopolitics behind it into this jubilant little moment.

YOUR CAN OF WORMS FOR THE DAY: Gene Expression vs. Mac Diva.

"I HAVEN'T THOUGHT ABOUT THAT FOR ONE SECOND. THE GUY IN YOUR EAR THAT TOLD YOU, YOU HAVE TO ASK THAT QUESTION, AS A JOURNALIST THAT'S FINE, BUT AS A HUMAN BEING THAT IS NOT VERY NICE. BECAUSE IT'S NOT VERY SENSITIVE. I HAVE TO THINK THAT IN TOUGH TIMES PEOPLE SHOULD BE MORE SENSITIVE. I COULD GIVE A SHIT ABOUT NORTH CAROLINA RIGHT NOW. I HAVE THIRTEEN KIDS IN THAT LOCKER ROOM THAT I LOVE": Roy Williams, proud American, standing up to the tyranny of annoyance that is Bonnie Bernstein.

OH WOW: Why Duke players stink it up in the NBA. In Off The Glass, by Paul Forrester, on SI:

Of the two Dookies you can legitimately term stars, Elton Brand has already been traded once (whether you agree or not, at least one NBA GM didn't think Brand was a primary building block), and Grant Hill's career is in jeopardy far before his life as an athlete should be over.

Ironically, the Blue Devil with, perhaps, the most ability, Corey Maggette, is one of the few that coach Mike Krzyzewski did not give his blessing to, thanks to Maggette's early departure from Durham. While the fact that so many Blue Devils make it to the NBA may be something to crow about, the harsh reality is that for a program that recruits so many high-school All-Americans and wins so much, Duke does a rotten job of turning out top-notch NBA players. OTG won't claim to know the cause but here are some possible reasons.

More:

The Mirage of Talent: The fact that Duke plays in so many big games -- and on national TV -- gives its players a sheen of quality that exists only as long as Mike Krzyzewski is coaching those players. Shane Battier won the Naismith and the Wooden awards by scoring 19.9 ppg, grabbing 7.3 rpg and shooting 47 percent from the field during his final season at Duke. Two years later, it's clear that Battier's trophies won't have any company on his mantle soon, what with his 9.3 ppg and 4.5 rpg.

As I said before, it isn't as if the Duke boys don't have NBA skills; they just don't have NBA skills equal to the expectations we fans, and many a general manager, place on them. Trajan Langdon could have been a perfectly serviceable two-guard off the bench. Instead, he's the No. 11 pick in the first round and his inability to do much but shoot is glaringly apparent against other NBA starters. OTG wonders if Atlanta regrets selecting Roshown McLeod with the 12th overall selection in the 1998 NBA Draft before later draftees Ricky Davis, Rashard Lewis and Cuttino Mobley.

And the finale:

The Blue Devil Mystique: While Duke may not be producing future NBA All-Stars each year, no other school is consistently churning them out, either. Steve Francis may have come from Maryland, but so did Joe Smith. Baron Davis was a fabulous choice out of UCLA, quite unlike Jerome Moiso a year later. Still, for the constant flow of high school luminaries Duke receives, very few develop into the pro stars they seem to have the talent to become. Is Krzyzewski's system to blame? Dean Smith had a pretty rigid system in Chapel Hill and still managed to turn out Michael Jordan, Rasheed Wallace and Jerry Stackhouse. Whatever the reason, talented players don't come out of Duke the same way they came in.

Heh.

METEORIC RISE: Los Angeles Avengers top seed in the AFL. Wait--"meteroic rise?" Dang it.

OBSCURE SPORTS DEPT.: AVP Pro Beach Volleyball. Hey, they're coming to Jersey.

WELL THAT WAS SUDDEN, THOUGH NOT COMPLETELY UNEXPECTED: Jerry Krause resigns.

OH YEAH: I wish I had seen this on tv (the latter part, not the obnoxious Fox News part):

The cable news channels this time have shown they can be entertaining--loved the over-the-top Fox News Channel ad on Wednesday sniping at MSNBC's slogan of "America's News Channel" because it employed Peter Arnett, and the CNN shot of English graffiti on a giant poster of Saddam Hussein that read "Mean People Suck"--but they are not as vital as they were.

That's soooo great. And it's one of the good reasons for going to war. Mean People do Suck, and will Suck The Fist Of American Military Might for the foreseeable future--well, at least until 2004 when we get the adventurists out. Man, I don't know, I'm all for non-intervention, but seeing people beat the hell out of a statue of Saddam Hussein makes me think maybe we are doing the right thing overall. I still don't trust the First Neocon Expeditionary Force, though. Buncha armchair goofballs....

BRET "GIVE 'EM HELL" SCHUNDLER: Strikes again:

Schundler said arena deals are proven economic flunks - and this one will ultimately cost Pennsauken and the region by replacing permanent jobs with part-time jobs.

"The citizens of New Jersey have overwhelmingly rejected (spending public money on) arenas," Schundler said. "Yet the governor's still supporting this boondoggle spending, which benefits no one outside of his own closest associates."

Bret's dander is up because of the hideous plan to replace one of the finest and certainly the most unique shopping experience in South Jersey--the Pennsauken Mart--with an arena whose only confirmed tenant is a minor-league hockey team. Retailers are fighting back:

Tired of waiting for answers from the county, the mart's 150 small-business owners have turned into impromptu activists, mounting a campaign to save their mart with the help of a former maverick freeholder.

Many of the tenants are recent immigrants who speak little English and had ignored local politics. They are working independently of mart owner Elliot Kattan, who many fear will not look out for them.

"I want to stop the project. But if not, I don't want them to get away with it without a fight," said Pravitz, a 14-year mart tenant. "If we go down, we want to bloody some noses."

"MAXIM IS FOR YOUNG BOYS WHO ARE AFRAID TO BUY PORNO": Bernie Mac on Saturday Night Live last night. Thank you, Bernie Mac.

SONG THAT WON'T LEAVE MY HEAD: Why all of Pirates of Penzance, of course, which I have been listening to and watching at saturation levels recently (it's the movie version.)

When the foeman bares his steel,
Tarantara! tarantara!
We uncomfortable feel,
Tarantara!
And we find the wisest thing,
Tarantara! tarantara!
Is to slap our chests and sing,
Tarantara!
For when threatened with ‚meutes,
Tarantara! tarantara!
And your heart is in your boots,
Tarantara!
There is nothing brings it round
Like the trumpet's martial sound,
Like the trumpet's martial sound

And I love this part which stands as the movie's only serious moment:

KING: Although our dark career
Sometimes involves the crime of stealing,
We rather think that we're
Not altogether void of feeling.
Although we live by strife,
We're always sorry to begin it,
For what, we ask, is life
Without a touch of Poetry in it?
(all kneel)

ALL: Hail, Poetry, thou heav'n-born maid!
Thou gildest e'en the pirate's trade.
Hail, flowing fount of sentiment!
All hail, all hail, divine emollient!
(all rise)

In times like these we could all use a little 19th-century pop culture. Penzance is also interesting in that it debuted in New York City and London at the same time in an attempt to get a copyright on it and to prevent bootleg performances like there had been with H.M.S. Pinafore.

REFLECTION ON A RESPONSE TO A REJOINDER: And then there was Ampersand.

STILL GOING: Democrat filibuster still on. Miguel Estrada still a non-judge.

NEW JERSEY GOVERNED BY CRETINS WATCH: Abuse of the Gadsen Flag should not be tolerated.

ALL IN YOUR BEST INTEREST: Matt Welch breaks down PATRIOT II.

RESPONSE TO A REJOINDER: Natasha counters my counter-post.

AM I EUROPEAN OR NOT?: Jesse Walker on English national identity.

WAR WITHIN A WAR: CNN closing in on Fox News. Via Oliver Willis. Excerpt:

“Fox News does that thing it does and managed to get on top doing it,” says Robert Thompson, director of the Center for the Study of Popular Television at Syracuse University.

“It may be that its distinct personality may be a little too much to take in larger doses, though, where CNN may be easier to take since it has more straight news.”

More:

“There are a number of elements here,” says Thompson.

“One is how long the shelf life of the Fox audience is, and the second is about public opinion. As long as it stays where it is, Fox will do well. But if the war goes on and on and public opinion changes, the question will be whether Fox changes along with it.”

Meanwhile Chris Suellentrop compares Al Jazeera with the American networks, saying: "The war has given lie to the idea that American journalists don't have opinions. One question: Why must we return to the lie when it's time for peace?"

AMERICAN TROOPS LOOTING IRAQ: Carrying off all the priceless artwork.

BLOGS OF DIPLOMACY: Dr. Frank lets all the air out of the Blogs of War/Blogs of War non-controversy. Remember when there was the movie Ghostbusters cartoon and the Filmation "Real" Ghostbusters cartoon? It's kind of like that. Well, not really.

SPEAKING OF THE FEMINIST REVOLUTION: Ben Domenech proclaims Generation Roe.

YOUR GREATEST SEARCH THAT FINDS MY WEBLOG POST OF THE DAY: Perpetual ladies naked in the philippines. You and me both, li'l buddy. Let me know if you find the secret Amy Chua/Michelle Malkin "I was young, I needed the money" tapes....

THE WAR AGAINST THE WAR AGAINST BOYS: Natasha at the watch has a thought-provoking post up on why conservatives can't be feminists, which--if Natasha hadn't defined conservative feminism out of existence--could be seen as explicating the differences between liberal and conservative feminism, which may or may not be the same differences as those between gender and equity feminism. You can tell which side she is on:

American conservatives have a platform at home that consists of: Rolling back birth control options that make it easier for families to manage their lives. Rolling back family leave statutes that make it easier for parents to spend time with their children. Gutting whistle-blower protections and worker safety regulations. Reducing educational and after-school program spending. Diverting law enforcement resources from violent crime to 'moral' or, essentially, thought crime. And reducing the availability of health care while at the same time increasing health hazards.

These issues are modern feminism in a very definite way. The conservative response? Let them wear miniskirts. As long as you have the right to doll yourself up in public and don't have to wear a headscarf, you shouldn't worry whether you can afford college, if you can find a job, if your children have decent textbooks, or about what they're putting in the water. Don't worry your pretty, little heads.

There is some truth here--witness all the vapid blonde chicks on Fox News. And equity feminism is often defending the rights of hookers and strippers to make money, if only because gender feminism has no interest in defending those lines of work. My main point that I would want to make to Natasha is: didn't feminism win? Isn't everybody a feminist now? Excepting those who take an overt political stance against it, of course. But isn't feminism an established part of our culture now? There should be as many feminisms as there are subsections of our culture, and I don't think you can define them into being illegitmate--they're the mutiple heirs of the feminist revolution. I feel like Blonde Guy #1 in Wrath Of Khan: "Ma'am, NO! You have EQUAL RIGHTS UNDER THE LAW! You can do anything now--" "Damn your eyes, FULL IMPULSE POWER!" "Patriarchy...no, you can't get away...from hell's heart, I stab at thee...for hate's sake, I spit my last breath....at thee.....patriarcheeeeee....."

FINE, FINE NEWS: Tulia, Texas drug convictions overturned. Via Atrios.

THE NOT-SO-HIDDEN AND IN FACT PERFECTLY OBVIOUS SUBTEXT: Is that Private Jessica Lynch is a woman. Virginia Postrel pointed this out:

Reporters on Fox News Channel and MSNBC are displaying an exceedingly annoying habit of referring to Pfc. Jessica Lynch as just "Jessica" in news stories, the better to tug the viewers' paternal/maternal heartstrings. But Jessica Lynch is not the little girl who fell down the well. She is a U.S. soldier serving in harm's way. If you're old enough to be a POW, you're old enough to be referred to as "Private Lynch." Even if you're female.

Meanwhile Steve Sailer, Man Without Permalinks, makes a different point from deep within his stronghold of Uncomfortable Realities Born of Millions of Years of Evolution:

Pretty 19-year-old girl soldier rescued from captivity by special forces operation -- The Israelis used women as combat soldiers in 1947, but took them off the front lines for the second half of the war in 1948. One problem they found was that the male soldiers would take excessive risks to protect them.

Which is a good point, though we don't know if it applies to this rescue or not--whether the special ops guys knew she was there or knew just that Americans were there. Atrios has more, including news about an unsuccessful first rescue attempt.

OBLIGATORY SAUDI-HATIN' POST: Matt Welch brings the goods.

A DAY LATE BUT: The People's Weblog is back, as is its Benevolent Leader And True Friend To All Norwegians Bjorn Staerk.

IN A WAR WITH A MILLION STORIES, YOU PICK OUT THE GOOD ONES: Private Jessica Lynch rescued.

POOP HITTING FAN: The battle between Donald Rumsfeld and the Pentagon by Seymour Hersh. Via Josh Marshall. You know, if Rumsfeld wasn't such an asshole, people wouldn't hate him so much. I realize that's the warblog equivalent of a "MEAN PEOPLE SUCK" bumper sticker, but still. Diplomacy matters.

IF YOU NEEDED ANOTHER REASON TO HATE FOX NEWS: The blonde sameness of their on-air womenfolk is another good reason. Via Radley Balko. Fuck conservatism at the specific point where it remains frozen in the 50s and imagining blonde white chicks the highest standard of female beauty. Fuck The Man Show, for that matter, for its imagined universal standards of masculinity. And God bless the all-American multiethnic hotties of MSNBC. U-S-A! U-S-A!

THE SMOKING GUN'S WAR AGAINST FOX PROGRAMMING: Continues. Via Puzak.

THERE'S SOMETHING ABOUT MICHELLE: The deal with Michelle Kwan, I think, is that she's the best at what she does. At the same time, she is completely beatable--her skates are physically conservative. But her performances are completely flawless. So you can beat her if you do something physically spectacular and do pretty well on the performance angle. But if you're going to beat her that way, there's a much greater chance you're going to screw up. So while Michelle gets beat by the Lipinskis and Hughes of the world in these flash-in-the-pan Magic Moments at the Olympics (where Michelle, of course, assists them with her own mistakes) she ends up being a far better skater than they because of her devotion to her sport. I mean, maybe she'd've retired years ago if she won a gold and gotten overwhelmed by it all, like Sara Hughes, who is probably retiring right now. But she didn't, and so she continued to develop into the dominant figure she is now. Figure skating needs more athletes like her, doing it for the love of the game and not because East European taskmasters are driving them on. Check out this bit from The Washington Post:

"This year has been so enjoyable because it's been so relaxed," Kwan said. "Maybe it's telling me something: I should put less pressure on myself, just go out there and have fun . . . I like it this way. It's just like, no pressure, easy-going. It's the way it should have been last year, and at other competitions when I was too intense."

She found her coach, Scott Williams, whom she hired late last summer, a perfect partner with whom to take this season's weird ride. A handful of prominent coaches offered their services after she competed last year with only her father rinkside. Kwan, though, chose the little-known Williams, a long-haired, longtime friend and former elite skater who shares Kwan's California tan.

She no longer needed the strong opinions of Frank Carroll, whom she dumped a year before the Olympics. She did not need the hard-core training approach of Russian coaches Tatiana Tarasova or Alexei Mishin. She needed someone who exuded calm rather than tension. Williams seems to consider himself little more than the instrument-tuner in Kwan's symphony. And that suited her perfectly.

"He has this sort of aura, very relaxing, very calming," she said. "He has a great effect on me on the ice and off the ice. It helps me get in that zone when I am very confident."

It's like, for her, little league is over--she's got a major league mentality, where browbeating is no longer required and a soothing, dareIsay Phil Jacksonesque figure is. This can only be good for the athletic legitmacy of figure skating, which needs to encourage skater to stay "amateur" and develop into really really good skaters. It's a shame this is happening at the same time as the ISU is at it's lowest state, but what can you do.

Michelle Kwan won her fifth world title on Saturday. By the way.

FOR NEWS ABOUT PEOPLE WHO SINCERELY WANT TO BE LIBERATED: Kurdishmedia.com. All I got.

NO, IT WASN'T DAVID FRUM: It was, in fact, Harlan Ullman who came up with "shock and awe." Here's something of his from the New York Post. You learn a lot listening to NPR all day.

YOUR POLITICAL SPECULATION OF THE DAY: From Steve Sailer, Man Without Permalinks:

In the unlikely event that this war turns out very badly, Rumsfeld might go too for his credulity. Perhaps Powell would then switch to Defense to reinstate the Powell Doctrine of massive force. Pressure would then emerge for the appointment as new Secretary of State of the one man best situated to patch up American relations with the rest of the world. Who is that American statesman popular worldwide? You guessed it: Bill Clinton.

That would be a pure pro wrestling moment--Team Bush down in the ring, right after Dubya has laid out Rummy with a chair shot. "I'd like to introduce.....our NEW....Secretary Of Defense....." And out comes William Jefferson Clinton. "My God! That's--that's Bill Clinton's music!"

ON HANNITY AND COLMES LAST NIGHT: I don't know who he was, but he was the smirkiest, most sarcastic and greatest French guy ever. Hannity was trying mach-five levels of self-righteousness and nothing worked--the French guy was deep deep in a smug bunker from which he could not be rooted out of. And he had this weird shifty-eyed thing going on; he wasn't going to play that direct eye contact game, nosiree. "The ferocity of the French taunting took him completely by surprise."

FUEL, MEET FIRE. FIRE, FUEL: Evangelical aid groups poised to enter Iraq.

DR. RUTHSFELD: Sex tips from Donald Rumsfeld. Via medpundit. "There is no such thing as premature ejaculation. There is ejaculation, and there is non-ejaculation. If your husband is ejaculating, then count your blessings. Congratulations, you just had sex. That's what men do—they ejaculate."

ONE WAR I CAN GET BEHIND: The Smoking Gun's war on Fox programming continues.

WORLDS THIS WEEKEND: As figure skating self-destructs, you can still see if Sasha Cohen can finally beat Michelle Kwan, now that all the screeching teenagers seem to have eliminated themselves.

LONG NATIONAL NIGHTMARE ET CETERA: Duke loses.

MOST ENGAGING PART OF TELEVISION COVERAGE OF WAR THUS FAR MAY BE ENDING: So says Bruce O'Flit:

Sitting here, looking at a couple websites, I've been able to build up a 90% accurate picture of the strategic situation. There have been no surprises, no aces up Gen. Franks' sleeve that I didn't see coming hours or days off. Everyone in the world knows, if they care, roughly when the next U.S. armoured division is likely to arrive in Kuwait, how many tanks the U.S. lost yesterday, and to what... imagine how much more you'd have if you were the Iraqi commander and you also had the input of your own recce assets to feed into that.

In 1991, using skilful misdirection and overwhelming aerial superiority, the Americans basically denied the Iraqis ANY intelligence about their location or intent. When the hammer fell, it fell, for the Iraqis, out of fricking nowhere. Not this time. All that's been ceded over. Now everyone knows where the Americans are: it's the knowledge of the Iraqi situation that's imperfect.

Watch for the embeds to start being left behind or clawed back. We've already seen one kicked out of theatre, for saying something actually rather innocuous. It was probably more to encourage the others. In fact, the lull you're seeing today in news probably has less to do with actual quiet on the ground, and more on reporters and their minders trying to establish what the new rules are going to be. And expect the generals to start shutting up.

Lousy stupid shock and awe....

YOUR GREATEST SEARCH THAT FINDS MY WEBLOG POST OF THE DAY: Number 8 for "Tony Blair is a wanker." Read 'em and weep, beeotches. I mean, pooftas.

RALPHY 'N' RUMMY: Here's some Ralph from a few days back:

I do not doubt our ultimate success. But the impressive television images of tanks charging across the desert mask a numerical weakness for which technology may not fully compensate. One senior officer serving in the Persian Gulf complained to me that had we had sufficient forces on hand to deploy security elements along our routes of march -- the usual practice -- those American POWs who appeared on Iraqi television might not have been captured.

The troops at the front of our attack are performing superbly, but they are operating on adrenaline at this point. Four to five days into any conflict, another division should have conducted a "forward passage of lines" with the 3rd Infantry Division before the final push to Baghdad, giving the 3ID a chance to rest, rearm and reequip before returning to battle. But no other heavy division is on hand in the theater of war to relieve or reinforce our tanks and infantry fighting vehicles. The closest unit is on ships in the Red Sea, at least 10 days away from any ability to influence the battle.

Why did Rumsfeld and his most trusted subordinates overrule the advice of their military planners? For political, bureaucratic and theoretical reasons. Rumsfeld, who is otherwise an inspiring wartime official, was out to prove a point. In his vision of the future -- one shaped by technocrats and the defense industry -- ground forces can be cut drastically in order to free funding for advanced technologies. To that end, Rumsfeld has moved to frustrate the Army's efforts to field medium-weight brigades that can be deployed swiftly to a crisis, which would have been invaluable in this conflict.

This war was supposed to prove the diminishing relevance of ground forces, while shock-and-awe attacks from the air secured a swift victory. Instead, the plan had to be rearranged so that ground forces could rush into Iraq to prevent economic and ecological catastrophes -- you still cannot seize ground, prevent sabotage, halt genocide and ethnic cleansing, or liberate anybody from the sky.

We are headed for victory, but, as the Duke of Wellington observed of Waterloo, it may be a "near-run thing" on the ground.

Some lessons of this war are already clear: Ferocity, skill and determination, not theories, win wars. And our nation will continue to require balanced, adequately funded forces -- in all of our armed services -- for a very long time to come.

Oh, and here's a put-down:

Some things do not change. The best way to shock and awe an enemy is still to kill him. Those who want to wage antiseptic wars for political purposes should not start wars in the first place.

Daaaaamn.

NEOCON DECEPTICONS: Josh Marshall lays out the neocon scheming for all to see:

The hawks' grand plan differs depending on whom you speak to, but the basic outline runs like this: The United States establishes a reasonably democratic, pro-Western government in Iraq--assume it falls somewhere between Turkey and Jordan on the spectrum of democracy and the rule of law. Not perfect, representative democracy, certainly, but a system infinitely preferable to Saddam's. The example of a democratic Iraq will radically change the political dynamics of the Middle East. When Palestinians see average Iraqis beginning to enjoy real freedom and economic opportunity, they'll want the same themselves. With that happy prospect on one hand and implacable United States will on the other, they'll demand that the Palestinian Authority reform politically and negotiate with Israel. That in turn will lead to a real peace deal between the Israelis and Palestinians. A democratic Iraq will also hasten the fall of the fundamentalist Shi'a mullahs in Iran, whose citizens are gradually adopting anti-fanatic, pro-Western sympathies. A democratized Iran would create a string of democratic, pro-Western governments (Turkey, Iraq, and Iran) stretching across the historical heartland of Islam. Without a hostile Iraq towering over it, Jordan's pro-Western Hashemite monarchy would likely come into full bloom. Syria would be no more than a pale reminder of the bad old days. (If they made trouble, a U.S. invasion would take care of them, too.) And to the tiny Gulf emirates making hesitant steps toward democratization, the corrupt regimes of Saudi Arabia and Egypt would no longer look like examples of stability and strength in a benighted region, but holdouts against the democratic tide. Once the dust settles, we could decide whether to ignore them as harmless throwbacks to the bad old days or deal with them, too. We'd be in a much stronger position to do so since we'd no longer require their friendship to help us manage ugly regimes in Iraq, Iran, and Syria.

The audacious nature of the neocons' plan makes it easy to criticize but strangely difficult to dismiss outright. Like a character in a bad made-for-TV thriller from the 1970s, you can hear yourself saying, "That plan's just crazy enough to work."

But like a TV plot, the hawks' vision rests on a willing suspension of disbelief, in particular, on the premise that every close call will break in our favor: The guard will fall asleep next to the cell so our heroes can pluck the keys from his belt. The hail of enemy bullets will plink-plink-plink over our heroes' heads. And the getaway car in the driveway will have the keys waiting in the ignition. Sure, the hawks' vision could come to pass. But there are at least half a dozen equally plausible alternative scenarios that would be disastrous for us.

Via Matthew Yglesias. You should really read the whole thing, it's all about how every neocon plan could have different consequences from what the neocons say will happen. And argues one of the key neocon strategies has, in fact, been deception:

Today, however, the great majority of the American people have no concept of what kind of conflict the president is leading them into. The White House has presented this as a war to depose Saddam Hussein in order to keep him from acquiring weapons of mass destruction--a goal that the majority of Americans support. But the White House really has in mind an enterprise of a scale, cost, and scope that would be almost impossible to sell to the American public. The White House knows that. So it hasn't even tried. Instead, it's focused on getting us into Iraq with the hope of setting off a sequence of events that will draw us inexorably towards the agenda they have in mind.

More inevitability crap. Or in this case, inexorability crap. Dang it. When all the neocons form a giant robot, what do they call it? Imperius Rex? Rovinator? Machiavelli Max? Cybertron, my Cyberton, I weep rusty tears for ye.

MORE CRETINOUS DIPLOMACY: The Blame Canada party is beating their war drums. Via Matt Welch.

LISTENING TO THE BUSH/BLAIR NEWS CONFERENCE: And comparing both of their answers to a question that was something like, "Why are traditional allies not supporting the war?" The Blair answer was something like, yes, there are differences of opinion, some are for us and some against us and these will need to be addressed after the war. The Bush answer was something like are you nuts, there's no problem whatsoever, we have more nations on our side than during Gulf War I--denial, basically. This whole "aura of inevitability" crap--defined as the persistent overstatement of one's case--is as annoying now as it was in 2000.

GOOD POST: RiShawn Biddle answers Patio Pundit's question, "Have you lost any friends since 9-11?" I liked this part:

[T]here are going to be Reagan-era libertarians (Virginia Postrel, Reynolds, etc.) who will become aligned with conservatives within the next ten years. One reason: They're getting old; age can change points of view. The other reason: Because they had bought into the conceit that dollar diplomacy (a.k.a free trade can fix anything) would restrain ideologically-driven and power-hungry types such as terrorists. Now, any old-time libertarian/old whig such as Hayek could have told them otherwise; so could this newbie libertarian. But it took the World Trade Massacre to prove to them that their conceit was wrongheaded. Now that they're disillusioned, they're casting the whole baby out with the bathwater.

Which is good an explanation as any for Virginia's Frum-love.

ALSO VIA JOURNALISTA: The 50 Most Loathsome New Yorkers. It's great to see New York hate on itself. Number 2 is Ted Rall; here's #1:

1 Keith Blanchard, Editor, Maxim

The smarmy doughboy of the lad mags is still under the illusion that Maxim is the first tits and gadgets magazine ever. Honestly thinks his glossy is a populist organ of substance and not a sheep-herding, post-frat social crutch for drooling, entry-level, corporate cogs. Once disparaged lengthy articles as "rants" aimed at "cranky retirees" and claims his monthly catalogue is the brave, new face of journalism. If so, then journalism exists to give cubicle dudes whack-off material for when their web use is being monitored. No doubt all the interns blew the boss for his debut novel, the borderline-illiterate Maxim epic The Deed, but for everyone else it just cemented his rep as a grade-A asshole.

Keith: You already know that you’re a no-talent hack. Now, you’re officially the most loathsome New Yorker. And to think, you only work here! Congratulations.

IT'S NOT LIKE IT'S A SLOW NEWS DAY: Why is Wonder Woman's haircut getting press?

THE WAR COULD TAKE A WEEK--POSSIBLY EVEN TWO: Joseph Galloway, the Knight-Ridder war correspondent, was on Fresh Air today and I googled up his articles. Here's the one where he makes his points that he made on the radio today:

Five days into the war, warnings are surfacing about a potential mismatch between Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's strategy and the force he sent to carry it out.

The optimistic assumptions of the Pentagon's civilian war planners have yet to be realized, and the risks of the campaign are becoming increasingly apparent, say some current and retired military officials.

The outcome of the war isn't in doubt: Iraq's forces are no match for America and its allies.

Army Maj. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, vice chief of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters at the Pentagon on Monday he did not think the U.S. military had invaded Iraq with too small and too light a force.

But less than a week into the war, resistance is proving to be tougher than expected by some of the architects of the American strategy. As a result, the war could be longer and costlier in American and Iraqi lives.

And if weather, Iraqi resistance, chemical weapons or other factors turn things suddenly and unexpectedly sour, the backup force, the Army's 4th Infantry Division, is still at Fort Hood, Texas, as its equipment sails around the Arabian peninsula.

The 21,000 soldiers could begin arriving in Kuwait almost immediately. But the 35 cargo ships carrying their heavy armor and equipment will not arrive in Kuwait until the first week of April at the earliest.

"In my judgment, there should have been a minimum of two heavy divisions and an armored cavalry regiment on the ground -- that's how our doctrine reads," said retired Army Gen. Barry McCaffrey, who commanded the 24th Mechanized Infantry Division during the 1991 Persian Gulf War.

His comments are part of a heated debate about the "rolling start" plan, in which combat actions began before the arrival of all ready forces, which are being brought forward or held back depending on how the battle proceeds.

Army Gen. Tommy Franks, commander of the war in Iraq, has "incredible flexibility," McChrystal said. The heavy 3rd Infantry Division is pushing rapidly to Baghdad, supported by the 101st Airborne Division, the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force and a British division.

Retired Marine Lt. Gen. Paul Van Riper, now a Pentagon consultant, agreed, saying those units -- all of which have been reinforced with additional troops and equipment -- represent "more combat power on the ground than is generally recognized."

According to some Army officers who were involved in some aspects of the war plan, air power more than makes up for the firepower that would have been provided by more tanks and artillery.

Yet despite the aerial pounding Iraqi forces have taken, it's not clear that they are either shocked or awed.

Instead of capitulating, some regular Iraqi army units are harassing American supply lines. Contrary to American hopes -- and some officials' expectations -- no top commander of Saddam Hussein's Republican Guard has capitulated.

Many ordinary Iraqis are greeting advancing American and British forces as invaders, not as liberators. Even in the Shi'ite regions to the south, brutally suppressed by Hussein for decades, there has been stubborn fighting.

Retired Army Maj. Gen. William Nash, a commander during the gulf war, said: "The stability of the liberated areas is clearly at issue.. The postwar transition has to begin immediately in the wake of the attacking forces, and they seem to be short of forces for those important missions at this time."

Knowledgeable defense and administration officials say Rumsfeld and his civilian aides at first wanted to commit no more than 60,000 American troops to the war on the assumption that the Iraqis would capitulate in two days.

The ground war that is occurring was not going to happen in Rumsfeld's plan, a Pentagon official said. Because the Pentagon didn't commit overwhelming force, "now we have three divisions strung out over 300-plus miles and the follow-on division, our reserve, is probably three weeks away from landing," the official said.

Intelligence officials say Rumsfeld, his deputy Paul Wolfowitz and other Pentagon civilians ignored much of the advice of the CIA and the Defense Intelligence Agency. Instead, they relied on reports from the Iraqi opposition and from Israeli sources that predicted an immediate uprising against Hussein once the Americans attacked.

The officials said Rumsfeld also made his disdain for the Army's heavy divisions very clear when he argued about the war plan with Franks.

Franks wanted more forces and more heavily armed forces, one senior administration official said. Rumsfeld pressed for smaller, lighter and more agile units, with much bigger roles for air power and special forces.

"Our force package is very light," said a retired general. "If things don't happen exactly as you assumed, you get into a tangle, a mismatch of your strategy and your force. Things like the pockets (of Iraqi resistance) in Basra, Umm Qasr and Nasiriyah need to be dealt with forcefully, but we don't have the forces to do it."

A retired senior general who has followed the evolution of the war plan said: "The secretary of defense cut off the flow of Army units, saying this thing would be over in two days.

"He shut down movement of the 1st Cavalry Division and the 1st Armored Division. Now we don't even have a nominal ground force."

In addition, said senior administration officials who spoke on condition of anonymity, Rumsfeld and his civilian aides rewrote parts of the military services' plans for shipping U.S. forces to the Persian Gulf, resulting in mistakes and delays, and also changed plans for calling up some reserve and National Guard units.

"There was nothing too small for them to meddle with," said one senior official. "It's caused no end of problems, but I think we've managed to overcome them all."

Rumsfeld has always been the scariest member of the Bush team, his preening assholeness reminding me of no one in popular culture as mush as The Red Skull. Not that him being an asshole means he's going to make bad decisions, but I'd like to believe it counts for something. Did you notice how animated he was when he was talking about how amazing it was that the whole war was being televised? He's a geek, and geeks shouldn't be making war decisions--they all think they're newfangled Alexander the Greats who are unjustly confined by an emasculating modern culture and know deep in their hearts that their balls are bigger than the military types they're suddenly in charge of. In actuality, Alexander the Great would've stolen Don Rumsfeld's girlfriend and left him picking olives in the hardscrabble Greek rocklands. My point being, the waging of this war seems to be being as run as well as the diplomacy that led up to it.

IF I WAS A STRICT PAGLIAIST: I'd believe, like, that the greatest sandstorm ever and the torrential downpours and the Columbia explosion and that a Roman general would have turned back all add up to something. But to be that strict a Pagliaist you'd have to be Camille Paglia. Thank you, thank you, I'll be here all week. Probably.

INSERT SEAQUEST JOKE HERE: K-Dog The Battle Dolphin. Oh, woe to us hu-men, who make the peaceful and intelligent dolphin into an instrument of our aggression. Someday we will return to the sea. Or something.

Wait, why would anyone make a Seaquest joke?

IF YOU DON'T HAVE A DISH: We're in the same boat then, li'l fella. Luckily Tim Cavanaugh is watching for you, though from reading the article it seems he missed the extensive live coverage at Umm Qasr on MSNBC over the weekend, with whoever the embedded guy was crawling up to interview a Marine and drawing little maps of their position in the dirt. Sgt. Stryker is watching television too and mentions one of my favorite anchors, MSNBC's Dan Abrams, who is perpetually heading over the top. The Sarge says:

Dan Abrams of MSNBC is pissed. It's kind of wierd to see a television anchorman displaying frustration and disbelief at certain things going on. The whole thing about the Iraqis dressing in civilian clothes and shooting from protected sites has really stuck in his craw. First he hammered Gen. Trainer about it, and the General explained LOAC and all that good stuf, but Abrams just wasn't buying it. I tlooked to me that he just wanted to blurt out, "Why can't we blow up that mosque, if they're killing Marines?"

Then he had a retired JAG on and hammered him about the same thing. And then I heard something I thought I'd never hear an "objective" journalist say, and I paraphrase, "So our guys have to check with lawyers before they fire back? So we have these self-imposed rules that lawyers impose on our troops and the government imposes on itself and now Marines are dead because of it." That last line was a statement, not a question. The JAG guy's trying to explain about PR and the rest of it, but Abrams was on a roll. "Those Arab TV networks are going to show us supposedly targeting and killing civilians no matter what we do while we follow the Rules of War." It was nothing short of astonishing to hear that. I don't know what prompted all this. Perhaps he saw the tape of the Americans executed and exploited on TV. Who knows? But man, it was something to see.

This is exactly the kind of thing Abrams would do when he had his early evening show, if I remember right. Which was weirdly entertaining; he would get enraged, in a really direct, non-rhetorical way--not the shouting-down-your-opponent Bill O'Reilly way, more like genuine moments of annoyance at the sheer stupidity he face in his guests. I don't know why MSNBC is failing, they have weirdo anchors, hot chicks and the best embedded reporters I've seen.

OLD SCHOOL: Was the movie I saw this weekend and it rocked. It was like they took an 80s frathouse movie and replaced crappy stock actors with actual credible actors. And rewrote every character just slightly so they'd be distinct from the generic fraboys-versus-crusty-dean plot they were trapped in. AND just gave up on pretending 30 year old actors were 20 year old fratboys by just making the characters themselves 30. And made the sole appearance of female nudity in this movie something awful and threatening and directly causing the death of one character. Just a really original reworking of the frathouse genre. Plus I kept getting the Rushmore/Royal Tenenbaums vibes due to Luke Wilson and the first post-Rushmore Sara Tanaka role. The scene with her, Jeremy Piven and Jeremy Piven's lackey in the empty stadium was straight out of Rushmore.

A TEMPLATE, ETERNAL AND UNCHANGING: My template refuses to update, I guess the Blogger template computer is still on its seventy-year orbit around the Solar System and won't be in transmission range again until 2036. If I could update it, I would add a link to the weblog of Maria Yang, who is a medical student at UC Davis and writes cool stuff. You should visit her site and read what is contained therein. Verily. Uh, Maria found via Andrea See.

HEY, I HAVEN'T DONE A BILL SIMMONS POST LATELY: You know, you wouldn't think it would be difficult to remember that there were great NBA players before Michael Jordan. And yet, Bill Simmons seems like the only guy to consistently acknowledge that fact:

For instance, everyone became enthralled by Kobe after his February scoring binge -- playing on a superior team, in a more structured system, with the best center in the league on his side -- whereas McGrady has submitted slightly better numbers this season in relative anonymity. Hey, nobody loves Kobe more than me, but if you don't think McGrady could average 40 a game for an entire month playing next to Shaq, you're crazy. Kobe works harder for his points than McGrady does, and that's the frightening thing about T-Mac -- sometimes it feels like he's just scratching the surface of his abilities, like those games when he scores 48 in three quarters and doesn't seem like he's even breaking a sweat.

You always hear people mention how Kobe is evolving into the next MJ, but nobody ever mentions how T-Mac is evolving into Julius Erving (the ABA version), only with a more reliable jumpshot. He's the second coming of Doctor J. Believe me. Back in the mid-'80s, everyone always compared young MJ to Doctor J -- erroneously, as it turned out, because MJ played much more like an evolutionary David Thompson, the high-flying Denver guard who battled drug problems and never reached his full potential. And now here's somebody who really is the next Doctor J, and nobody ever mentions it.

Did you ever wonder what would happen if Doc and MJ ever met in their primes? The next few years of "T-Mac Vs. Kobe" should serve as a real-life computer simulation. I can't wait to see how it turns out. As an aside, I never thought we would see someone like Doc again -- the way he gracefully carried himself on the court, balanced by how he violently attacked the basket -- and yet here's McGrady doing the exact same thing. It's unbelievable.

Which reminds me, John Hollinger also has some T-Mac appreciation:

Let's not mince words: Right now, McGrady is flat-out the best player in basketball. It's not even a close call. His current average of 32.4 points per game is the highest in the league in 10 years, and if you eliminate players named "Jordan" from the equation, it's the highest since Bernard King averaged 32.9 in 1984-85.

Yet that average actually understates how well McGrady is playing. Here's a trivia question to get things started: Since Christmas, how many times McGrady has been held under 20 points?

While you ponder that answer, let's look at his accomplishments.

For starters, can we give him an Oscar for Best Performance Without a Supporting Actor? Despite a roster that, minus McGrady, would have trouble beating Cleveland or Denver, McGrady has managed to raise his game across the board and drag the Magic into the playoffs. Their current four-game win streak even has them challenging Boston for the No. 6 seed.

McGrady is shooting more -- boosting his shot attempts from 20.9 to 24.1 a game -- but yet also managed the difficult feat of shooting better -- his field-goal, free-throw and 3-point percentages are all significantly higher than a year ago. Having overcome last year's back trouble, the 23-year old simulatenously has shouldered a bigger load while improving his efficiency.

Now, back to that trivia question. The correct answer is zero. McGrady has scored at least 20 points in 40 straight games -- he'll make it a full half-season Monday night against Memphis. He's also been Orlando's leading scorer in all 40 of those games. That accomplishment is a monument to his consistency.

Look closer at his 40-game stretch. He's averaging 33.9 points a game -- even Jordan averaged that many only twice, and other than His Airness, the last player to score that much in a season was Bob McAdoo in 1975-76.

McGrady's raised his game even more down the stretch, averaging an amazing 37 a game over his past 15 contests as he leads the Magic's playoff charge. That includes Sunday night's stellar performance in Miami, when he had 32 at halftime and then put it in cruise control as Orlando rolled to a blowout win.

And yet, when the topic of MVP comes up, McGrady's name is mysteriously absent. Despite putting up the best scoring season in a decade and taking an otherwise talentless team into the postseason, all eyes have been focused westward, toward Tim Duncan, Kobe Bryant and Kevin Garnett.

All three are great players and worthy candidates in another year. But McGrady has been head and shoulders above the rest, and in a fair world, his amazing 40-game stretch should have cemented the award a long time ago.

T-Mac is so much fun to watch--just so smooth and effortless-looking. I think I've said this before, but for completely aesthetic reasons I'll always prefer his game over the shot-forcing, ref-baiting Kobe/Jordan style of basketball.

MORE REMIXED PROPAGANDA: Though not Micah Wright's this time. Via Dr. Frank.

MSNBC'S WAR COVERAGE RULES, FOR COMPLETELY PREDICTABLE REASONS: I mean...Jeannie Ohm, Rosalind Jordan and Kelly O'Donnell? That trio is the best of all possible Miss April, May, and Junes and I will always look forward to Jeannie's cute, fumbly reports from the Pentagon as I lay in my lonely bed somewhere in the vicinity of 2 in the morning. Is it.....still....midnight choking......if it's past.......MIDNIGHT? Huh?

TODAY'S FRESH LIVE GNOME BAIT: From the Salon interview with Paul Berman:

I'm sure this one line in your book will infuriate some and surprise others -- especially Europeans. You wrote: "In this country, we are all Noam Chomsky." What do you mean by that?

Chomsky is a man who thinks the entire world operates on simple and rational principles. The reason he's able to crank out these thousands of pages a year on all subjects is because he has an extremely simple analysis: Evil American corporations are acting in their own self-interest and trying to increase and spread their exploitation around the world. The American government is in their hands and is acting to expand its nefarious control over the world. The press has been corrupted by the wealth and power of corporations and spreads the propaganda messages required by the corporations. American claims to ever do any good around the world are merely hypocritical mendacities uttered for the purpose of advancing the larger cause of exploitation and oppression. And the response of other people in the world is that of resistance as inspired by an instinct for human freedom, even if the resistance sometimes takes a perverse and unfortunate form. Therefore, from Chomsky's point of view, all events are rationally explicable according to one or two tiny little factors: the self-interest of American corporations and the urge to resist the American corporations.

It's a very simpleminded view in which nothing inexplicable ever occurs. And yet although Chomsky is regarded by some people as the great anti-American, this kind of thought is entirely typical of America itself, of people across the political spectrum in America. People tend to think that everybody around the world is acting on some rational calculation, that the mad and pathological movements I describe that have emerged from the First World War really can't exist, that surely everybody is acting in some way in their own self-interest in a fashion that could be calculated and addressed. Finally, even the FBI and the CIA have obviously thought along these lines because it never crossed these people's minds -- not seriously anyway -- that somebody was going to be so mad to attack the United States directly. Sept. 11 revealed many shocking things and the most shocking was that the Pentagon had no plan to defend the Pentagon. In that sense, everybody in the United States, even the Joint Chiefs of Staff, everybody is a simpleminded fool.

Berman being the author of that New York Times article on Sayyid Qutb everyone and their mother has linked to. And with good reason--it explains the Islamist point of view I found myself yearning for a universal order. But all my favorite porno movies starting playing in my head and drew me back into modern living. Meanwhile while I was tiptoeing through the cybertulips I came across this book, which seems like Berman's, and this review, which made this point:

Islamic fundamentalism is not an indigenous growth. It is an exotic hybrid, bred from the encounter of sections of the Islamic intelligentsia with radical western ideologies. In A Fury for God, Malise Ruthven shows that Sayyid Qutb, an Egyptian executed after imprisonment in 1966 and arguably the most influential ideologue of radical Islam, incorporated many elements derived from European ideology into his thinking. For example, the idea of a revolutionary vanguard of militant believers does not have an Islamic pedigree. It is "a concept imported from Europe, through a lineage that stretches back to the Jacobins, through the Bolsheviks and latter-day Marxist guerrillas such as the Baader-Meinhof gang".

In a brilliantly illuminating and arrestingly readable analysis, Ruthven demonstrates the close affinities between radical Islamist thought and the vanguard of modernist and postmodern thinking in the West. The inspiration for Qutb's thought is not so much the Koran, but the current of western philosophy embodied in thinkers such as Nietzsche, Kierkegaard and Heidegger. Qutb's thought -- the blueprint for all subsequent radical Islamist political theology -- is as much a response to 20th-century Europe's experience of "the death of God" as to anything in the Islamic tradition. Qutbism is in no way traditional. Like all fundamentalist ideology, it is unmistakeably modern.

I know Nietzsche is a major figure in philosophy, and wasn't actually anti-Semitic, but when you end up inspiring the Nazis and Al Qaeda, I mean--daang.

BEST SIGN OF THE DAY: Seen on CNN: "TONY BLAIR IS A WANKER." And I like Tony Blair.

FROM ONE WASTELAND TO ANOTHER: Welcome to Camp New Jersey, ladies and gentlemen. Awwwww yeah.

BY THE WAY: It's weird seeing the Ottoman Empire back in the news. Back in grade school I only remember hearing about the Ottomans when they sort of added, "oh, they were with the Germans too" when they taught us World War I.

NOVICE GEOPOLITICAL QUESTION: What--exactly--are the arguments against letting Iraq break up into Shia, Sunni and Kurd states? It would rid the world of one more illogical state. You wouldn't have to force a central government on a bunch of people who don't want to live together. It would be reverse-colonial and not neo-colonial because you'd undo the post-World War map-redrawing that gave us the modern state of Iraq. You wouldn't have people on the radio talking about "the Iraqi people", as if there was such a coherent group of people who defined themselves as being Iraqi. I mean, what's the point of remaining attached to colonial-era national boundaries? Is this an oil thing?

THE TIME HAS COME, THE WALRUS SAID, TO TALK OF LAKERS AND KINGS: Last night was kind of a repeat of the Christmas Day game, with a competitive game for three quarters and the Kings pulling away in the fourth. This is kind of low tide for this Lakers team, as the Associate Lakers are finally breaking down and being exposed for the pikers they are. And the Kings are starting to figure them out. It's going to be a fun fun postseason.

ALL OUT OF MAVS LOVE: The Mavs novelty has worn off on me, what with the latest Mavs loss last night. Wherein Tony Parker beat five Mavs to the basket to take the lead in overtime with like a second and a half left. Just horrrrible. The Mavs are in first place and they've already been written off by most basketball people, including me.

THE MOTHER OF ALL ROAD TRIPS: That's what's been on my teevee lately. What the hey? I mean, there aren't any roads, but still....

NASCENT REPUBLIC OF KURDISTAN: I love reading the Tim Noah "Kurd Sellout Watch" posts, for me if the Kurds end up with their own state at the end of all this it would be a Good Non-Cynical Reason for going to war. So I was chagrined when I read this Melik Kaylan piece in the Wall Street Journal a few days ago which claimed that not just that the Kurds weren't all marshmallows and sunshine but that they were a pack of thugs and not really a blooming democracy at all. But Tim saw it too and he's got the goods on Kaylan, which make me feel better about my Kurd-support:

Kaylan is on the scene, whereas Chatterbox is not. Consequently, Chatterbox would ordinarily grant Kaylan considerable deference. But Kaylan completely ignores the demonstrable facts that Iraqi Kurdistan enjoys a free press and has held an election that passed muster with independent observers—not something you can say about almost any other part of the Middle East. You'd think Kaylan would want at least to refute these points. That he doesn't arouses suspicion. Chatterbox's confidence in Kaylan's judgment was further undermined when he remembered an earlier Journal op-ed in which Kaylan argued for a tax cut on the grounds that America needed to nurture and expand an aristocracy that lived entirely on inherited wealth. (Chatterbox answered Kaylan here, here, and here.) Is Kaylan the Journal editorial page's designated crash dummy, sent out again and again to test the viability of outrageous new doctrines? Chatterbox is beginning to think so.

Tim also linked to this choice rundown on the situation in Kurdistan. And you should read any and all Elizabeth Rubin in TNR you can--she's reporting from Kurdistan as we speak. No links though, you gotta pay for TNR these days--but it's usually worth it, as Charles Murtaugh suggests. Their arts coverage is kind of snotty, but there's usually one or two really great articles per issue.

AM I SADDAM OR NOT?: My guess is no, that dude looked a little too unconcerned and he didn't have that Saddam-like glint in his eyes, which is I guess what the giant glasses were meant to cover up. And I'm a guy with a weblog, so you better recognize.

SHANE BATTIER, QUIET PATRIOT: Lang Whitaker pointed out this Battier quote:

"We all have a role to play in this world," Battier said. "A lot of times, people scoff at our profession and those in the entertainment industry. But we know there are so many people in this country who work hard and who are under pressure who need to take a break from the world events. That's when they can watch sports on TV, or maybe come to a Grizzlies game, and maybe relax for a few hours."

It also struck Battier that the role of sports intensifies in time of war.

"I was watching SportsCenter and it was pretty moving to me when they were talking to a young infantry man in Kuwait," Battier said. "He was saying how important sports was to our guys and girls in the Middle East. A lot of them follow us and want us to keep on keeping on.

"So my approach is I'm going to do my job as an American. I'm going to do my job to the best of my ability, and try to bring a piece of America to the Middle East, and raise morale over there."

It's weird how Duke players become dramatically less annoying once they reach the pros--well, maybe not that weird, their annoying on-court behavior is all part of the Mike Krzyzewski game plan.

FROM THE DEPARTMENT OF WARLIKE TOYS: The GI Joe Hovercraft actually exists. And, also on the Hasbro war front, Optimus Prime just shipped out. Via Hit&Run. You know, it's weird how the pop culture of my childhood (the early 80s) is almost completely un-nostalgiaized--and I'm not sure what I even mean by that. Mainly that the pop culture images of that time are not in general circulation; they only make guest spots in cultish areas like The Cartoon Network and comic books. Like everyone recognizes Yogi Bear or Marvin The Martian or KISS or Darth Vader, but you have to have actually been there at the time to remember Optimus Prime or Skeletor or Cobra Commander. Is it just demographics--late Gen X/early Gen Y being a small generation? Was the 70s the last gasp of a shared national popular culture? Maybe Franklin has some thoughts.

AND HEY, THERE'S MARCH MADNESS TOO: Early games are on ESPN--there's some kind of geopolitical conflict on CBS....

SAC KINGS/LAKERS TONIGHT AT TEN: And good ol' Shaq has been adding fuel to the fire:

"How did Mike Bibby get on the team?'' Shaq wondered aloud. "Any Cub Scout with Boy Scouts can do Boy Scoutish things. When (Bibby) was in the Cub Scouts, he was a Cub Scout. When he was with Vancouver, nobody heard about (him). Now that he's with Sacramento ... he's on the team. I ain't going.

"And Allen Iverson isn't on the team? Why not? (U.S. coach) Larry Brown should have said, 'If he's not on the team, I'm not going.'''

The best part was Bobby Jackson's comeback:

"That's just talk from a guy who likes to talk,'' Sacramento's Bobby Jackson said. "Nobody cares. You can't listen to everything he says. Even he don't listen to everything he says."

OTHER AFL BLOGS HEARD FROM: The Unofficial Blog of the AFL. The Australian Football League, of course, and not our decent God-fearing Arena Football Leauge.

DERB DERB DERB WELL THE DERB IS THE VERB: I guess you would call this John Derbyshire piece a more Bush-apologetic version of that Fareed Zakaria article:

We don't understand — How badly George W. Bush travels. Never having been schooled in the fast repartee of a parliamentary debating chamber, Bush seems slow and inarticulate in response. Coming from the openly confessional tradition of Southern Christianity, he seems to foreigners to be religiose rather than religious. Having spent most of his life in a region with a strong sense of identity, he speaks his local dialect unselfconsciously, which makes him sound like a bumpkin to other English-speakers (and even to some Americans). Pronouncing "nuclear" as "noo-koo-luh" tells you nothing more about the man than that he comes from Texas and doesn't care who knows it. It is no more reprehensible than my pronouncing "schedule" with a "sh" instead of a "sk," and it is very unfair of non-Texans to snigger at it. They do, though, and I am not sure they are wrong to do so, bearing in mind what terrible responsibilities lie behind that word "nuclear."

Via the DVDVR. Of course, it only explains why Bush travels badly in the U.K., not everywhere else.

YOUR GREATEST GOOGLE SEARCH THAT FINDS MY WEBLOG POST OF THE DAY: "Steve Nash and Dirk Nowitzki fan fiction." Which is two steps away from "Steve Nash and Dirk Nowitzki slash fiction." Holy crap, there actually is some. Crikey. I am appalled and amused. Nash/Nowitzki slash fiction is going to give Kirk and Spock a run for their money. You heard it here first.

I DO SO LOVE THE BLOGS: So I love the Jason Malloy response to a Marc Miyake article, and when I go to Amritas to get a follow-up I don't get one but I do get further criticism of the Scientist-Gnome. I'm not informed enough by a long ways to judge how right either guy is; Marc is clearly deep in the Chomsky hate, but he can back up what he says with actual linguistic knowledge--which impresses me, anyway. But I do think Chomsky is going to wind up being closer to the Freud of his field than the Darwin; you know, paradigm-altering, dead wrong about a lot of things, and ceaselessly entertaining. (Chomsky not so entertaining to me as Freud, but others find him entertaining, I understand.) Not someone they keep going back to years after the fact like biologists still do with Chuck Darwin.

READ FAREED: My favorite part of the Fareed Zakaria article everyone's linking to:

President Bush’s favorite verb is “expect.” He announces peremptorily that he “expects” the Palestinians to dump Yasir Arafat, “expects” countries to be with him or against him, “expects” Turkey to cooperate. It is all part of the administration’s basic approach toward foreign policy, which is best described by the phrase used for its war plan—”shock and awe.” The notion is that the United States needs to intimidate countries with its power and assertiveness, always threatening, always denouncing, never showing weakness. Donald Rumsfeld often quotes a line from Al Capone: “You will get more with a kind word and a gun than with a kind word alone.”

But should the guiding philosophy of the world’s leading democracy really be the tough talk of a Chicago mobster? In terms of effectiveness, this strategy has been a disaster. It has alienated friends and delighted enemies. Having traveled around the world and met with senior government officials in dozens of countries over the past year, I can report that with the exception of Britain and Israel, every country the administration has dealt with feels humiliated by it. “Most officials in Latin American countries today are not anti-American types,” says Jorge Castaneda, the reformist foreign minister of Mexico, who resigned two months ago. “We have studied in the United States or worked there. We like and understand America. But we find it extremely irritating to be treated with utter contempt.” Last fall, a senior ambassador to the United Nations, in a speech supporting America’s position on Iraq, added an innocuous phrase that could have been seen as deviating from that support. The Bush administration called up his foreign minister and demanded that he be formally reprimanded within an hour. The ambassador now seethes when he talks about U.S. arrogance. Does this really help America’s cause in the world? There are dozens of stories like this from every part of the world.

In diplomacy, style is often substance. Consider this fact: the Clinton administration used force on three important occasions—Bosnia, Haiti and Kosovo. In none of them did it take the matter to the United Nations Security Council, and there was little discussion that it needed to do so. Indeed, Kofi Annan later made statements that seemed to justify the action in Kosovo, explaining that state sovereignty should not be used as a cover for humanitarian abuses. Today Annan has (wrongly) announced that American action in Iraq outside the United Nations will be “illegal.” While the Clinton administration—or the first Bush administration—was assertive in many ways, people did not seek assurances about its intentions. The Bush administration does not bear all the blame for this dramatic change in attitudes. Because of 9-11, it has had to act forcefully on the world stage and assert American power. But that should have been all the more reason to adopt a posture of consultation and cooperation while doing what needed to be done. The point is to scare our enemies, not terrify the rest of the world.

The phrase "Mayberry Machiavellis" keeps running through my head. Something about having unsophisticated weirdos running the country. And how I can't wait to vote for anybody else in 2004. But I can't, like, prove any of that. Except that last part.

MEMO TO CHUCK TAYLOR: Don't be an ass. Your guy Clinton cost you assholes the White House by being a morally reprehensible creep who ended up costing Gore half the country and any chance of a coherent message. And you're blaming the war on Nader-voters? Kee-ripes....

HAPPY ST. PATRICK'S DAY: From me, and then--in idiosyncratic linguistico-Chomsky hatin' fashion--from Amritas.

HEY WOW, MY FIRST BIG MEDIA MENTION: And in the beloved paper-of-college-years Baltimore Sun, no less:

Bloggers have a knack for devising creative titles -- such as "Insolvent Republic of Blogistan" -- and ingenious new words. When one blogger assails another's claims in a long, point-by-point screed, it's called getting "fisked" -- after left-wing British journalist Robert Fisk, whose articles inspired such attacks.

There you go. Via Radley Balko. Meanwhile, the new SI is reporting that Manu Ginobili gets 50 hits a day on his site--more when he plays well--making me nearly as popular as everyone's favorite Spurs rookie. How about that?

INITIAL "GODS AND GENERALS" REACTION: You know, I can't help but think that a movie like "Gods And Generals" that attempts to interpret the Civil War as a national tragedy whose combatants--on both sides--are worthy of being remembered and understood, and tries to make the Southern perspective part of a larger American history--tries to give both sides equal standing and in effect makes the War accessible to all Americans, as something that happened to all Americans, where the South's perspective is an American perspective, as much as the North's was--is about a million times more constructive than the playing-to-Northeastern-vanity morally superior "Just say slavery"* mindset that I think was behind many of the negative reviews G&G got. Maybe I'm engaging in political fantasy here as much as the "It was all slavery. Yep." types, but I like my tragic War Between The States fantasy way better than the Virtuous North Beats Racist South fantasy, because it is (ironically, I guess) that much less divisive. I don't see the point in continuing the demonization of an entire region of the country. Besides, how can you not love a movie with the stones to have a twelve-minute intermission in the year 2003? See it somewhere with free refills.

*--From that Simpsons episode where Apu take his citizenship test and one of the questions asks for the reason for the Civil War and Apu gives a bunch including slavery. But slavery is the right answer. Thus, "Just say slavery."

MOST SURPRISING THING ABOUT THE AFL ON NBC THUS FAR: Michael Irving is completely non-annoying, and actually quite good. He was the least annoying member of the Cowboys' Big Three, so maybe it isn't that surprising.

WARBLOGGER AWARDS POSTED: Nobody I voted for won, except for Instapundit in the "Best Linker" category. Dang it.

ABORTION LINKAGE: First, a post from FuturePundit on sex selection and abortion in Asia, which is full of detail and reports that the gender imbalance is all out of whack in East Asia and India because of sex-selective abortions that prevented millions of women from existing. Grrreat. Meanwhile MedPundit reports on the emotional aftereffects of abortion.

COLUMBIA: It is sad all around--what makes it truly depressing for me is seeing all the video of the crew in orbit and noticing how wildly happy they all were. Granted, they all seemed like the kind of people who were permanently high on life to begin with, so maybe they weren't solely buzzed on the thrills of antigravity and being actually in outer space. In any case, the contrast between their bubbly happiness and the fact that their lives were about to be torn away in the upper atmosphere saddens me more than anything else I've seen about STS-107.

There's this weird, neat Kalpana Chawla quote that I saw her say on C-SPAN--they were rebroadcasting the 1/29/03 briefing--and that has "In the retina of my eye, the whole Earth and the sky could be seen reflected" in it--that's definitely not the whole quote, which I can't find anywhere. But if I had to do a On The Transmigration Of Souls for Columbia it would be one of those lengthy, mysterious "trance" (in quotes because I have no idea what I'm talking about) electronica records and that full sample of her words would be in there as the musical centerpiece.

And I have no idea what to make of this:

Top investigators of the Columbia space shuttle disaster are analyzing a startling photograph -- snapped by an amateur astronomer from a San Francisco hillside -- that appears to show a purplish electrical bolt striking the craft as it streaked across the California sky.

The digital image is one of five snapped by the shuttle buff at roughly 5:53 a.m. Saturday as sensors on the doomed orbiter began showing the first indications of trouble. Seven minutes later, the craft broke up in flames over Texas.

The photographer requested that his name not be used and said he would not release the image to the public until NASA experts had time to examine it.

Although there are several possible benign explanations for the image -- such as a barely perceptable jiggle of the camera as it took the time exposure -- NASA's zeal to examine the photo demonstrates the lengths at which the agency is going to tap the resources of ordinary Americans in solving the puzzle.

Late Tuesday, NASA dispatched former shuttle astronaut Tammy Jernigan, now a manager at Lawrence Livermore Laboratories, to the San Francisco home of the astronomer to examine his digital images and to take the camera itself to Mountain View, where it was to be transported by a NASA T-38 jet to Houston this morning.

A Chronicle reporter was present when the astronaut arrived. First seeing the image on a large computer screen, she had one word: "Wow."

Jernigan, who is no longer working for NASA, quizzed the photographer on the aperture of the camera, the direction he faced and the estimated exposure time -- about four to six seconds on the automatic Nikon 880 camera. It was mounted on a tripod, and the shutter was triggered manually.

In the critical shot, a glowing purple rope of light corkscrews down toward the plasma trail, appears to pass behind it, then cuts sharply toward it from below. As it merges with the plasma trail, the streak itself brightens for a distance, then fades.

"It certainly appears very anomalous," said Jernigan. "We sure will be very interested in taking a very hard look at this."

Via Ken Layne.