Living and dying on Route Irish

Austin Bay gives some much-needed perspective in the controversy surrounding the Baghdad checkpoint incident in which an Italian secret service agent was killed, and two others were injured.

Route Irish's approach to BIAP [Baghdad International Airport] is clearly marked with signs. Heavy trucks await inspection by troops. Concrete barriers divide the lanes.

The man driving the car carrying communist writer and newly released terrorist hostage Guiliana Sgrena didn't slow down as he approached a roadblock on the way to the airport. Perhaps he was afraid and fear led to speed, or perhaps he was laughing. Sgrena wrote that her car "kept on the road, going under an underpass full of puddles and almost losing control to avoid them. We all incredibly laughed. It was liberating. Losing control of the car in a street full of water in Baghdad ..."

Roadblocks have rules. Coalition and Iraqi troops operate roadblocks with Rules of Engagement (ROE). The ROE can change, based on current intelligence and command judgment.

But one rule never changes at a roadblock: Even escorted military convoys slow down as they approach a roadblock. As for a single civilian auto approaching at high speed? If a driver doesn't hit the brakes, the troops will shoot.

U.S. soldiers fired on Sgrena's speeding car as it approached their roadblock. The fire killed Italian security agent Nicola Calipari. His death is a tragic mistake. President Bush says we'll investigate the incident. I suspect Italian officers serving with multinational forces will help conduct that investigation. We need the facts.

But we also need a fact-based perspective. Though the Iraqi election and the democratic surge in Lebanon demonstrate that this most intricate war we're fighting has the potential for huge payoffs in hope, justice and peace, on Baghdad's streets a Fiat might still be a kamikaze. Or is it a family sedan? As the car rushes forward the soldier -- whose life is on the line -- has a split-second to decide.

Kofi Annan's bold new plan to defeat terrorism

Make it illegal.

Can anything be done about the federal judiciary?

Yes, argues Karl Maher: End lifetime tenure.

Check out Karl's blog, Vote for Judges. He makes a good case for ending lifetime tenure, and does a pretty thorough job of outlining various alternatives: retention elections (his favorite); serious use by Congress of its impeachment power to punish errant judges; fixed, nonrenewable terms.

"I'm sure the government has a perfectly good reason..."

Click the image to view the full-sized version

Texas mulls "Twinkie tax", stealth income tax to balance budget

Citizens obsess so much on national politics that state and local governments often sneak outrageous ideas into law before anybody notices something is up.

Texas, to its credit, is trying to provide some property tax relief. However, according to the Austin American-Statesman (registration required), state comptroller Carole Strayhorn says that the resulting revenue shortfall will be $3 billion, and that this must be made up by cutting spending or by finding alternate revenue sources.

Will anybody be surprised to hear that they gave up trying to cut spending? This is not a tax relief bill, it's a tax shift bill.

If the current bill becomes law, property owners will see their property tax bill go down, but they will end up paying more taxes in other ways -- ways that would probably spark a citizen revolt if they were better publicized. Here are three of the more egregious provisions:

1. A one-point increase in the state sales tax, from 6.25% to 7.25%, which would give Texas the highest sales tax rate in the country.
2. A 3% sales surtax on snack foods (cookies, chips, candy, soft drinks, etc.), for social-engineering purposes ("to target obesity"). This sets a very bad precedent which I believe would inevitably lead to additional politically-motivated taxes.
3. An income tax. No, they didn't call it an income tax, but that's what it is. The bill calls for "a payroll tax of 1.15 percent on each employee's salary, up to $90,000 per worker".

Before someone protests that the proposed payroll tax is a tax on the employer, not on the employee, answer this question:

What effect will this tax have on the money available for salaries?
(a) it will have no effect on the money available for salaries
(b) it will decrease the money available for salaries
(c) it will increase the money available for salaries

I threw option (c) in there just for fun. It's obvious that this proposed tax will be based on salary, and that it will affect the take-home pay of the employee. So let's call it what it is: an income tax. (The same applies to the "employer-paid" portion of your Social Security and Medicare taxes)

And don't be so naïve as to think that the tax will remain at 1.15%.

Conservative Republicans once held to the notion that the government can't be all things to all people. It seems like the Republican-controlled government of Texas is going to try anyway.

An abortion ban the left can support?

I have remarked before that the Democratic Party is "a coalition of innumerable special interests whose goals often conflict with one another." It turns out that abortion is one such area.

One of the most powerful constituencies of the left, the feminists, has promoted the philosophy that the right to abortion on demand, for any reason, shall not be infringed. Ever.

But wait! There's another constituency on the left that is steadily growing in influence -- homosexuals. Many in this group insist that homosexuality is genetically determined. If this is true, then a predisposition toward homosexuality could be revealed through genetic screening of preborn children. This, they fear, would lead to the abortion of many of these babies.

Although no such gene has yet been discovered, homosexual activists want to be ready. In Maine, the Pro-Life Alliance of Gays and Lesbians is supporting a bill banning the abortion of unborn children who are somehow determined to be "gay".

I am very curious to know how NARAL, Planned Parenthood, NOW, and other organizations that have never wavered from their commitment to unrestricted abortion, but which in some cases have also championed the cause of "sexual minorities", will react to this proposed ban.

Doctor insists Terri Schiavo can be rehabilitated

From LifeNews.com:

Dr. William Hammesfahr is an internationally recognized expert on cases of brain-injured patients. He has been identified in helping patients with chronic brain injuries from many causes actually leave long term disability, and return to work.

Terri Schiavo's injury, hypoxic encephalopathy, is a type of stroke that he treats every day with success.

"We, and others I know, have treated many patients worse than Terri and have seen them regain independence and dignity," Hammesfahr said.

[...]

Last year, he explained that, after examining Terri, he believed that she could eventually eat and drink on her own. He also said he believes Terri would be able to talk and have good use of one arm and one hand should be given proper rehabilitative treatment.

Hammesfahr also said he thought Terri would eventually be able to transfer herself from a wheelchair to a bed.

If the court allows Terri to be murdered later this month, her blood will be on many hands -- Michael Schiavo's most of all, but also on Judge Greer and on a nation that has for the most part watched passively as this drama has played out.

Guiliana Sgrena accuses the U.S. military of monumental incompetence

Countless words have already been written about the strange case of Italian Communist journalist Guiliana Sgrena, held for ransom by Islamist thugs in Iraq. Following payment of the ransom by Italian PM Berlusconi, her dash for freedom was rudely cut short at a U.S. military checkpoint.

As the old saying goes, there is some confusion as to what happened next. All parties involved acknowledge the fact that soldiers opened fire on her speeding vehicle. The controversy regards why they opened fire.

Apart from Sgrena herself, virtually nobody expressing opinions about what happened was actually there, but that fact has done nothing to stem the free flow of said opinions. I'm in a bit of a conformist mood at the moment, so I think I'll jump in to the fray.

Sgrena -- a communist, remember, and emphatic opponent of everything America stands for -- accuses the military of deliberately targeting her. Her ideological background alone should cause reasonable people to have reasonable doubts about her claim, but there is another reason to doubt her.

Simply put: Ms. Sgrena, if our guys had wanted you dead, you'd be dead.

GOP acting like they're still the minority party

I first became aware of George Neumayr, executive editor of The American Spectator, only yesterday, but after reading just two of his recent rants, I think he's quickly becoming one of my favorites.

Today he is ripping into congressional Republicans who seem unaware that they are the majority party in both houses, and that they have the right to at least try to implement their agenda. Instead, we get things like this:

Not all Republicans but a distressingly high number of them are colluding with the Democrats in a kind of slow-motion socialism. For example, in the Senate this week Ted Kennedy called for a $2 hike in the minimum wage. What do the Rick Santorums do in response? Instead of showing a little guts and saying that minimum wage bills are demagogic, mindless job-killers, they just split the difference with the Democrats on the wage increase (and, yes, maybe throw in a few "pro-business" provisions of largely rhetorical value).

Just like the good old days when the GOP really was the minority. Back then there was the old joke that the Democrats would introduce a bill calling for Washington, DC to be burned to the ground, and then the Republicans would try to add an amendment to phase in the Dems' plan over 5 years.

Now, the GOP controls both houses of Congress, the GOP controls the White House, and they let the Dems control the agenda and public debate on issue after issue: tax cuts, minimum wage, social security reform, and on and on. Sigh.

Supremes undermine own authority by undermining Constitution

Excellent essay by George Neumayr, executive editor of The American Spectator, on the dangerous game the U.S. Supreme Court is playing with its "living Constitution". Here's how it starts:

The Supreme Court's judicial activists are cutting off the branch on which they sit. By rejecting the law and putting their personal opinions in its place, the justices invite the people to imitate them and disregard their decrees with the same willfulness they disregard the Constitution. If Anthony Kennedy isn't bound by the framers' words, why are the people bound by his?

The authority of Supreme Court justices derives from the authority of the Constitution: once they deny its authority, they deny their own.

Good point! Read the whole thing.

Devotion to social justice lowers Penn. legislator's IQ

This one comes from a Pennsylvania legislator (Surprise! A Democrat!), all in the name of social justice. There are so many things wrong with this proposal (including the lame economics-lecture response from a Republican legislator), I think I'll just present it without further comment.

Proposed Pennsylvania Legislation to Ban Self-Serve Gas

PHILADELPHIA -- A state legislator from Philadelphia generated controversy when he introduced a bill that would eliminate self-service at Pennsylvania gas stations, the Delaware County Daily Times reported.

State Rep. W. Curtis Thomas (D-Pa.) said the bill’s intent is to reduce fire and health hazards, prevent discrimination against low-income individuals, discourage higher prices for full-service gas and provide full service for the elderly and the handicapped without an additional surcharge.

Thomas told the Daily Times he plans to amend his proposed legislation to make exceptions for service stations along the Pennsylvania Turnpike and those with adequate security or special arrangements for the disabled.

A section of his Gasoline Station Dispensing Safety Act states that the higher prices usually charged for full-service gasoline in states where self-service is permitted results in discrimination against low-income individuals and that the General Assembly "finds no conclusive evidence that self-service gasoline provides a sustained reduction in gasoline prices charged to customers."

Thomas told the Daily Times his safety concerns are driven by situations in his district where youths hang out at service stations, soliciting to help the elderly pump gas for a tip, and causing vandalism.

"If there was an attendant, that problem would be minimized, if not eliminated," Thomas said, adding that employees at the register are unable to leave their post to assist customers.

There is "no logical explanation for why gas prices are as high as they are" or why they fluctuate so rapidly, Thomas told the Daily Times. "These stations are taking in record profits, so I don’t buy the argument that prices will have to be raised in order to pay for a trained attendant."

State Rep. Steve Barrar (R-Pa.) lambasted the proposal.

"We should let the free market sort this out, not regulations from government," he said, disputing Thomas’s reasons for such legislation.

"I would be really against government mandating that our service stations get involved in this," he said, adding that self-service has been accepted by the motoring public for several decades and full-service stations remain available.

Memo to city planners: you can't close all of the loopholes

Officials in Dunkirk, MD thought they had thwarted Wal-Mart's plans to build a large store. Last year they passed an ordinance limiting retail stores to 75,000 square feet. Wal-Mart, however, was convinced that public demand for their big-box store was there, so they found an ingenious way around the ordinance:

The company now plans to build two stores side-by-side at a site in Calvert County where plans for a single big store were thwarted by a size limit adopted last year.

Wal-Mart officials are calling it one of the first arrangements of its kind in the country.

The store and garden center in Dunkirk will have separate entrances, utilities, and restrooms. And the combined size of the stores will be 30 percent larger than the 75,000 square-foot limit for a single store.

This is yet another example of why the number of laws keeps growing and growing: local governments pass law after law regulating businesses and citizens, and those affected by the laws keep finding ways around them, which leads governments to pass additional laws to close the loopholes, which leads those affected to find additional ways around them....

Wal-Mart likes their idea so much, they are ready to use it wherever needed. How long do you think it'll take for Dunkirk (as well as other likeminded city governments across the fruited plain) to pass an ordinance prohibiting two instances of a retail business from opening within a certain distance of one another?

PBS: End it, don't mend it

George Will believes (and I concur, to a point) that one might have been able to justify the existence of a taxpayer-supported television network a quarter-century ago, when a typical market had only two or three other stations available. But, since the advent of cable and satellite television, the network's raison d'être has become increasingly difficult to defend. Will says: dump it.

I'm glad to see that Will was just as annoyed as I was at the supremely arrogant motto they had for a while: If we don't do it, who will? The answer then is even more true now: Oh, just about everyone.

Walter Williams on 'social justice'

This outstanding quote is from libertarian/conservative economist Walter E. Williams' book, All it Takes is Guts.

What's just has been debated for centuries, but let me offer you my definition of social justice: I keep what I earn and you keep what you earn. Do you disagree? Well then tell me how much of what I earn belongs to you -- and why?

Eminent domain's slippery slope

Tech Central Station's Pejman Yousefzadeh has an essay on the New London case that for the most part reiterates what many others (for example, here!) have been saying about the monster that eminent domain has become. Yousefzadeh, however, brings up a point that I had not considered. Once municipal governments are comfortable with the idea of seizing private property for the "public good", the potential for eminent domain mischief is limited only by the imaginations of government officials and their advisers (emphasis added):

While the public seizure of private real property is scary enough, the power of eminent domain can be abused still further. This article calls for the exercise of eminent domain by local governments to take away the patents drug companies own on their products and give those patents to companies that will agree to sell pharmaceutical products at lower prices. Never mind the already heavy financial burden on pharmaceutical companies to perform the necessary research and development on their products. And never mind that drug companies will be less inclined to engage in research, justly worried that their inventions could be appropriated under this newfangled vision of eminent domain abuse. After all, what incentive is there for drug companies to come out with new products and engage in costly and time-consuming research if their property rights are not respected? Millions of Americans will have their lives negatively impacted by additional barriers against pharmaceutical research, development and distribution.