Brad DeLong's Semi-Daily Journal (2004)

Brad quotes Matthew Yglesias's: No one, obviously, because there's no one to invade.

Oh, really? How about Iran?

AP reports (http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=540&ncid=736&e=10&u=/ap/20040313/ap_on_re_mi_ea/nuclear_agency_iran):

"The board served a search warrant on the Iranians that we're coming after your secret weapons program," he [senior U.S. State Department official] told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

As Iraq's oil starts flowing, sanctions on Iran are almost certain. And as US troops now in Iraq and Afghanistan become available, well, people of Iran are going to get a taste of democracy.

I keep telling you that "liars" is not the right word. Certainly what they say is false, and for the most part they know it is false, but the role they are playing is richer than that of "liar".

"Storyteller" was my preferred label until recently, but I am leaning towards "wizard" since I came across Gregory Bateson's quote (from "Towards an Ecology of Mind"):

"The practitioners of magic do not unlearn their magical view of events when the magic does not work."

Colin Powell is a huge disappointment. He has turned into a hack. He didn't have to twist Kerry's words to engage a debate. Why is he continuing to disgrace himself? His level of denial is truly incredible.

Even though Kerry is right about this (of course he's right, it's a no-brainer) it is still not politic for him to take this line in the election.

Why not? Because it is a subtlety that is lost on American public.

All they want to know is will the guy defend us, or is he some kind of wussy goody-two-shoes who doesn't believe in capital punishment, and cannot be depended on to do what it takes.

Put another way, this is a wonk position, which fails as a signal to the electorate.

It is precisely the sort of thing Rove and co. know how to exploit. And given their manifest incompetence in actually governing the country, where else are they are going to concentrate their fire?

Kerry needs to realize that it's not always good to be right -- at least not in what you say.

Oh, and one more thing: the moussed-back hair and starched white shirts? I know they look good in the mirror (hell, I wouldn't mind looking like that myself) but he needs to know they are probably costing him a couple of million voters in the heartland.

To the ordinary Joe, they make him look like the spitting image of a stuffed shirt.

Somebody tell him he needs to scruff up a bit.

IMHP, for what it's worth

There's a strange kind of psychosis where a man will cheerfully dive into the ocean with an anvil tied to his ankles if only he has his hands firmly around the neck of his enemy.

Terrorists may have changed the outcome of an election in a free nation, and still none of you can get past an almost Ahab-like obsession with Bush.

You deserve Kerry, a vacuous cipher who was the third choice or worse of Democrats going into the primaries, and was selected for no other characteristic than that he has a chance to beat Bush. Good luck with him.

"Terrorists may have changed the outcome of an election in a free nation, and still none of you can get past an almost Ahab-like obsession with Bush."

tbrosz, you ignorant slut, the Spanish PP lost the election by adamantly pointing fingers at ETA against mounting evidence: http://tinyurl.com/3gqm7 then http://tinyurl.com/2wxua and by ignoring their own previous reconnaissance: http://tinyurl.com/yutyl At least Spaniards seem to be able to recognize a corrupt and lying government if they see one, a skill Americans seem to have lost twenty years ago.

tbrosz: Terrorists may have changed the outcome of an election in a free nation, and still none of you can get past an almost Ahab-like obsession with Bush.

Spanish goverment supported US invasion of Iraq against the will of the majority. It failed to protect people of Spain from terrorists. Right after the terroist attacks it tried to cover up by claiming Basque separatists were behind them. Why are you surprised they got thrown out?

tbrosz: "Terrorists may have changed the outcome of an election in a free nation..."

No - - the SPANISH VOTERS changed the outcome of their election, because because they were tired of a regime that lied to them,and that placed George Bush's miscalculations above the security of their own people.

Come November, it'll be the American electorate's turn to throw Bush and his cronies out.

Come on, Matthew Yglessias just hasn't thought the problem through. OBVIOUSLY the appropriate response to a bombing by Al Quaeda would be to invade the basque country and beat up all them ETA supporters.

tbrosz: "Terrorists may have changed the outcome of an election in a free nation..."

Is he calling the Rehnquist court "terrorists"?
Or is he referring to today's free election in Spain?

My response to tbrosz

(Javascript required)

http://studentweb.tulane.edu/~djatres/

tbrosz may have an interesting point:

Before Thursday, the Popular Party had been favored to win by a comfortable margin.

http://edition.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/europe/03/14/spain.blasts.election/index.html

Now it appears that the Socialists will have almost enough seats to govern alone. This article points out that although the government continued to point at ETA, there was a lot of information to the contrary, including this:

The private Spanish radio station, Cadena SER -- which has connections to the Socialists -- reported Saturday that sources in the Spanish intelligence agency said they were "99 percent sure" Thursday's attacks were carried out by Islamic extremists who probably fled the country immediately after the attacks.

So, arguably, between the terrorists and the Aznar government, the people changed their minds overnight.

It is nauseating indeed to think that the people were prepared to leave in power a party that completely ignored their opposition to the war in Iraq (as I recall, over 80% of Spaniards were opposed). It is terrible to think that they only changed their minds because of the terrorist attacks.

Sorry, the second and fifth paragraphs are quotes.

"Before Thursday, the Popular Party had been favored to win by a comfortable margin."

"The private Spanish radio station, Cadena SER -- which has connections to the Socialists -- reported Saturday that sources in the Spanish intelligence agency said they were "99 percent sure" Thursday's attacks were carried out by Islamic extremists who probably fled the country immediately after the attacks."

http://edition.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/europe/03/14/spain.blasts.election/index.html

The hypotheses "The terrorist acts brought about the change in voter opinion" and "The pronouncements of the government after the attacks brought about the change in voter opinion" are quantitatively inseparable. But it is really a moot question because the government chose its course of action deliberately to influence voters and has to accept responsibility for negative repercussions. The first hypothesis could only hold water if the PP had not tried to distort the evidential findings. Only in this case they could claim they were ousted by terrorist acts.

Crooked Liars!

I think the whole "Kerry won't defend America. Bush will." line is wearing very thin. Perhaps Bush could change his line to "Bush believes in spreading democracy around the world. Kerry believes in leaving dictators in power when it's inconvenient"?

Some idealistic voters might believe that if George W. Bush exposed us to more danger from terrorists, but brought imminent democracy to Iraq, it's a price worth paying for us privileged Americans to face a slightly higher risk of death if 22 million people are almost free. I doubt it'll sell well with most people, but it might convince a few. In the grand scheme of things, even if we had a 9/11 every year, the loss of lives to terrorism would be a fraction of, say, the domestic murder rate.

I have a feeling Bush won't be making that argument, though.

It really doesn't matter what any of you think about the terrorist influence on the election in Spain, does it? What matters is if the bastards who blew up that train think they had an influence on the election. We also have an election coming up that the terrorists are intensely interested in. Sleep well.

tbrozs: We also have an election coming up that the terrorists are intensely interested in.

And it is Bush's responsibility as a President to make sure nothing like that happens here. He failed us on 9/11/2001. He might have had some excuses than. He has none now.

Islamic extremists by and large don't care who wins which election in the West. The differences between the candidates which we see as critical look very minute from the distance.

"Colin Powell is a huge disappointment. He has turned into a hack. He didn't have to twist Kerry's words to engage a debate. Why is he continuing to disgrace himself? His level of denial is truly incredible."

Posted by: Knut Wicksell on March 14, 2004 06:03 PM

Colin's always been a hack. He was involved with an investigation of My Lai which was conveniently fruitless, and illegally furnished arms to a terrorist country (Iran-Contra). He opposed allowing gays to openly serve in the military, after discharges for homosexuality were suspended for the Gulf War. His disrespect for Clinton was obvious and odious, for somebody seving in uniform.

What happened was:

a) In the post-Vietnam world he was comforting figure, and the mainstream media loved him.

b) He avoided damage in Iran-Contra.

c) During the Gulf War, he was serving in a competant administration, which had sane goals
and policies. This made him look better.

What Kerry has said is that law enforcement and intelligence are merely important parts of his approach, not the whole thing. He has not ruled out military force if appropriate. Will's filtered question was intellectually dishonest.

A, in the first post, is correct. There are still countries left to invade, despite the fact that US forces have now intervened in Mali, Mauritania, Chad and Niger (didn't hear about that? Read the British press.) In addition, they are in by "invitation" (i.e., due to paying bribes) throughout Central Asia.

But, this being a rich and diverse world, there *are* countries left to invade. Iran. North Korea. Venezuela. Iraq.

Oh, wait, we did that one. But there are others:

Italy. Japan. Egypt.

Let your mind run free. There are many, many more countries left to invade.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Luke Lea, Kerry is a duck hunter, rides motorcycles, and is a former garage rock band artist. He's well-balanced. The media reporting on him is not.

First Bush, then Kerry...those poor ducks.

tbrosz: Last time I checked, Bush was counting on a terrorist act to change the outcome of an election here in the U.S. Or have you not seen his campaign commercials?

Events of major significance to a country have a way of influencing voters. Should we all just vote for Bush to "send a message" to the terrorists: competent governance is less important to us than preventing delusional madman from drawing insane conclusions from our electoral outcomes. Yup. That'll show 'em.

As Mickey Kaus pointed out, Osama might want Bush to win -- in order to "sharpen the contradictions". Perhaps we should vote for the candidate we want, instead of trying to figure out who Osama wants.

By my guess, about 10% of the Spaniards switched parties. But this is enough to relegate (formerly "plucky, heroic") Spain to the hellhole of loathsome Old Europe. The chauvinism and hysterical militarism of American hawks is not at all far below the surface.

We don't even know yet either why the voters switched parties, or what the foreign-policy consequences will be. But off with their heads!

As Matt Y. says -- if Bush's war goes well, we have to vote for him, and if it goes badly, we have to vote for him even more. May this house be safe from tigers.

Aznar may have lied about ETA involvement, but it's already been firmly established here in the US that that kind of lying is OK. What are you people talking about? (Yes, the US precedent is valid in Spain. Globalization, you know).

Tbrosz, the terrorists are after your ass. Osama doesn't really care about Mecca. He just wants tbrosz's butt. You sleep well too.

" The difference between "primarily" and "all" here is rather crucial."

Not at all, the crucial difference is between "occasionally" and "primarily". Because Kerry's answer to Tom Brokaw's question about Bush's exaggerating the threat of terrorism, was that the threat was only occasionally military, it was primarily a matter of law enforcement and intelligence.

If Kerry wants to stick to that story, he'll be blown out of the water in November even bigger than McGovern in '72. If he wants to have a chance of winning--and he's not got much hope, as Hillary Clinton realizes--he should immediately and repeatedly warn Al Qaeda that a Kerry Admin would be even more committed to destroying all terrorists.

Otherwise, when the inevitable bombing of NY subways happens prior to the election, Kerry will be logically seen as responsible for incentivizing it.

What do the usual semanticists here have to say about this...um...discrepancy:

March 8, 04 JFK II:

"I've met foreign leaders ... boy, they look at you and say..."

March 14, 04, JFK II:

"I think the quote, the quote in the comment I made publicly, I believe, was that I `heard from,' that's the direct quote....I've likewise had meetings. I've also had conversations. I said I've heard from, that was what I believe I said."

Patrick R. Sullivan wrote: Otherwise, when the inevitable bombing of NY subways happens prior to the election, Kerry will be logically seen as responsible for incentivizing it.

You got it backwards. Bush is a President. He proposed a plan for war on terror. He got everything he wanted - invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq, a pile of money, tightening of domestic security - everything. If there is no terrorist acts he can say that his measures worked. If there is a terrorist act, it would happen on Bush's watch and Democrats will correctly point that the sacrifices of American people have been for nothing - and Bush is toast.

"...an election in a free nation..."

Sorry, tbrosz, that's something Americans can only dream of, today and for the foreseeable. Address THAT, and maybe someone will listen to you.

We have two issues here -- and, while they look as though they're completely linked, they're not:

(1) Al Qaeda blew up the trains to try to swing the Spanish election in such a way as to get Spain out of Iraq, and succeeded. Unquestionable.

(2) Were the US and their allies militarily wise to get into Iraq in the first place, and to stay there now? This doesn't follow from (1). Iraq was not the primary military threat to us; that threat is nations which actually do have actual or imminent nuclear capability, and the willingless to either use it against us in some circumstances or give it to terrorist groups that will. As such, our first priority was making sure that Iran did not have the ability to acquire the Bomb, which -- unlike Iraq -- it unquestionably was on the verge of doing. It sill is our first military priority.

And if the US had made the reasons genuinely clear to the rest of the world why nuclear proliferation is a deadly and immiment danger to all human civilization -- including dictatorships as well as the other democracies -- it would have had far more support in its actions abroad than Bush got through his all-too-obvious attempts at international Three-Card Monte (which was motivated by the neocon Iraq Pollyannas' stupid belief that Iraq could easily and cheaply be turned into an attractive advertisement for peaceful and non-anti-Western democracy in the Moslem world).

Since no post of mine is complete without a response to Patrick: yes, that is indeed a singularly unattractive performance by Kerry. (Indeed, it's disturbingly reminiscent of the monotonous parade of howlers told by Bush.) What worries me more about Kerry, however, is the possibility that -- like Bush -- he has his eye on the wrong ball, and that his particular Moby Dick will be chasing Al Qaeda's top oficials around ad nauseam in the mountains of Afghanistan and Pakistan at precisely the time when it's becoming increasingly clear that "Al Qaeda" has broken up into a swarm of independent, semi-autonomous terrorist cells without any single Evil HQ crucially controlling them.

Patrick E. Sullivan wrote: What do the usual semanticists here have to say about this...um...discrepancy ...

Glad you asked - http://www.drudgereport.com/kerrybo.htm :

Healy claims in an e-mail correction: "Transcribing on the bus in Florida, and again on the plane ride to Tampa, I heard 'foreign leaders' rather than 'more leaders'. I am very sorry for this screw-up, and please feel free to hold me accountable to your editors and higher-ups."

As press mistakes go, here's a real howler: http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&cid=1512&u=/afp/20040315/wl_afp/spain_vote_attacks_040315190326&printer=1

A spokesman for President Bush also phoned to congratulate Zapatero on his win.

Well, if Kerry didn't say "foreign leaders", then why the hell didn't he SAY he definitely hadn't said "foreign leaders"? Are we to assume that he didn't remember whether or not he had made such a major claim? This is enough to be highly unnerving in itself.

Powell is retiring anyway.

NEW YORK, March 15: President George Bush has asked US Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld and the Secretary of State Colin Powell not to participate in the election campaign now full swing although elections are to be held in November.

In an interview with CBS programme "Face the Nation" on Sunday Mr Rumsfeld when asked whether he expected to be involved in the president's re-election campaign. "There won't be a role," he said. "The president has specifically asked Colin Powell and me not to be involved in the campaign," Mr Rumsfeld said.

I find it incredible that the American media is acting like the Spanish election is a victory for Ossama. Or that Spain is caving in to Ossama. It is not. The Iraq War has always been unpopular. The PP was only tolerated because of a good economy. However, misguided policies will not sustain economic good times. They voted the liars out.

It is not clear that the date of the attacks, 3/11, was meant to coincide with their elections at all. A Spain not in Iraq might turn more attention to Morocco and N Africa and the types of covert operations that have been effective against terrorism in Europe for the past half-century. The Moroccans don't want terrorists causing trouble for them either. The solution is not to invade Morocco and turn it into chaos as the US did in Iraq and Afghanistan. The solution is to work more closely with all the N Africans to eliminate groups that use violence to achieve political ends.

I would like nothing better than to see these terrorist groups eliminated. War and chaos are not effective tools for eliminating terrorism.

' Well, if Kerry didn't say "foreign leaders", then why the hell didn't he SAY he definitely hadn't said "foreign leaders"? '

Who are you, and what have you done with Bruce Moomaw?

Maybe Kerry means Dick Cheney and Don Rumsfeld are going to vote secretly for him.

"It's a matter of law enforcement ..." ?

If a city is beset by rival gangs, (Crips and Bloods; or ETA and AQ) and innocent people are killed, (Drive by shooting, train bombs, hijacked jet liners ...) is the appropriate response detective work to identify the particular individual criminals?

Or, it is better to attempt "gang busting" activities? For example, some law enforcers conduct no knock raids on areas thought to be gang 'hide outs', looking for illegal weapons, drugs, or other contraband. It might well be that the evidence sufficient to obtain a warrent for the no-knock search and entry was flawed, and that no weapons -- or at least not the weapons alleged to be illegally present -- will be found. But, that is the nature of law enforcement...

Right?

Bruce Moomaw wrote: This is enough to be highly unnerving in itself.

What really amazes me is that even AFTER the press mistake was cleared Bush tried to blaim Kerry for it. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/16/politics/campaign/16CND-POOL.html?hp

In a short session with reporters in the Oval Office, President Bush challenged Mr. Kerry to identify whom he is talking about when he asserts that some foreign leaders privately support him over the president.

A question for George Bush: did you know that Kerry was misquoted before trying to use the misquote against him?

"Or, it is better to attempt "gang busting" activities? For example, some law enforcers conduct no knock raids on areas thought to be gang 'hide outs', looking for illegal weapons, drugs, or other contraband. It might well be that the evidence sufficient to obtain a warrent for the no-knock search and entry was flawed, and that no weapons -- or at least not the weapons alleged to be illegally present -- will be found. But, that is the nature of law enforcement...

Right?"

Posted by: Pouncer on March 16, 2004 09:50 AM

Wrong - in terms of trying to justify the war on Irag. The correct answer is: it's better to conduct actual gang-busting activities, against actual gangs, as opposed to using gang activity as a pretext to hit somebody else, and to pump up one's political/business prospects. It's also better to be careful not to piss off neighboring city/county/state governments, unless those governments are aiding the gangs.

"A question for George Bush: did you know that Kerry was misquoted before trying to use the misquote against him?"

Okay, genius, just who are these leaders Kerry is talking about if they aren't foreign leaders?

"A": "A question for George Bush: did you know that Kerry was misquoted before trying to use the misquote against him?"

Sullivan: "Okay, genius, just who are these leaders Kerry is talking about if they aren't foreign leaders?"

Actually, as Ryan Lizza points out in the New Republic, Kerry's context still makes it clear that he WAS referring to foreign leaders -- and he still won't say who they are:
http://www.tnr.com/blog/campaignjournal?pid=1453

In short, we have further disturbing evidence that Kerry is sometimes capable of being as dishonest as Bush regularly is.

"Who are you, and what have you done with Bruce Moomaw?"

See the thread above on Matt Yglesias and Colin Powell, Patrick. I realize that it may come as a dreadful shock to your Sense of Cliche to realize that the fact that I think Bush is a consistent sleaze does not mean that I automatically regard Kerry as an angel. Nevertheless, there it is. Shocking, isn't it?

All right, lets go to the sources: http://www.drudgereport.com/kerrybo.htm
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/16/politics/campaign/16CND-POOL.html?hp

At the fundraiser Ferrell says that some people (presumably some European leaders) "hate Bush but know we're going to get rid of him". Kerry replies that he met more leaders (in addition to those mentioned by Ferrell) who "can't go out and say it all publicly, but boy they look at you and say, you gotta win this, you gotta beat this guy, we need a new policy".

The key (and the one where I beleive Kerry was deliberately misinterpreted) is that Kerry was not boasting about support from the foreign leaders in general - he talked to some in addition to those mentioned by Ferrell and they told him they would want him to win. That is a very reasonable thing to say, if true. And is it? Guess what, it is.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/16/politics/campaign/16CND-POOL.html?hp

Even after the quotation had been corrected, Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico and Richard C. Holbrooke, President Bill Clinton's delegate to the United Nations, called reporters to offer their response.

"It's so obviously the truth what Kerry said, and the Republicans are just having fun with it — everybody knows it's true," Mr. Holbrooke said, adding that he called after speaking to Ms. Cutter. "In the last six or seven months, I've been in Africa, the Middle East, Asia and Europe. I've met with leaders in all of those regions, and they have overwhelmingly — not unanimously but overwhelmingly — said that they hope that there's a change in leadership."

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4542516/

BIDEN (discussing Kerry’s campaign for President): “I have had world leaders, heads of state, make it pretty clear to me that they’re hopeful that there is a change in the Administration.”

Bruce: Actually, as Ryan Lizza points out in the New Republic, Kerry's context still makes it clear that he WAS referring to foreign leaders -- and he still won't say who they are:
http://www.tnr.com/blog/campaignjournal?pid=1453
In short, we have further disturbing evidence that Kerry is sometimes capable of being as dishonest as Bush regularly is.

Why is he being dishonest - because he won't say who they are? He does not need to name them - he has more corraboration than it takes to acquit Roadrunner of the speed violation.