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Maimon Schwarzschild posts in Right Coast on Armistice Day.
It was 89 years Sunday since the Armistice that ended the First World War in 1918 – the day the guns finally fell silent on the Western Front (and on all fronts) at precisely 11-11-11: 11.00 am, November 11.
In Britain and Commonwealth countries every year, there are remembrance ceremonies on the Sunday that falls nearest November 11 – Remembrance Sunday – but this year November 11 itself is Sunday, which will make these remembrance events somehow especially poignant.
Even now, 89 years later, there is a lot more emotion about all this in Europe and in the countries that were British dominions than in the US. …
Suzanne Fields on the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Nearly 20 years ago, the Berlin Wall finally came tumbling down. If Humpty Dumpty had been foolish enough to sit on it, that’s where he would have had his fatal fall. Not all the East German guards nor all the Stasi operatives who spied on everyone could have put poor Humpty together again.
It was a defining moment for mankind, exposing the ultimate failure of the brutal and goofy Marxist economic system. As John F. Kennedy noted on his visit to the Wall in 1963: “There are some who say communism is the wave of the future. Let them come to Berlin.” …
Three folks, Peggy Noonan, Dick Morris, and Michael Goodwin comment on Hillary’s problems.
Noonan;
The story as I was told it is that in the early years of her prime ministership, Margaret Thatcher held a meeting with her aides and staff, all of whom were dominated by her, even awed. When it was over she invited her cabinet chiefs to join her at dinner in a nearby restaurant. They went, arrayed themselves around the table, jockeyed for her attention. A young waiter came and asked if they’d like to hear the specials. Mrs. Thatcher said, “I will have beef.”
Yes, said the waiter. “And the vegetables?”
“They will have beef too.”
Too good to check, as they say. It is certainly apocryphal, but I don’t want it to be. It captured her singular leadership style, which might be characterized as “unafraid.”
She was a leader.
Margaret Thatcher would no more have identified herself as a woman, or claimed special pleading that she was a mere frail girl, or asked you to sympathize with her because of her sex, than she would have called up the Kremlin and asked how quickly she could surrender. …
Morris;
During the Bill Clinton presidency, it became obvious that the president and the first lady were locked in a zero sum game of perception. The stronger people perceived her, the weaker they felt he was. Early in his tenure, news stories were rife about Hillary’s extraordinary influence on appointments, policy and political strategy. Each of these leaks sapped confidence in Bill Clinton’s strength and led to a drop in his ratings.
The solution was to exile Hillary from the White House. She stopped attending strategy meetings, no longer had a direct or public role in policy formulation and redoubled her schedule of foreign travel and writing.
Now, as Hillary runs for president and Bill speaks out on her behalf, the Clintons’ zero sum conundrum has returned. His stout defense of his wife saps her credibility and raises doubts about her potential strength as a president. With his every speech and utterance, the question grows: Can she stand up for herself or does she need to hide behind her husband? …
Goodwin;
Hillary Clinton has a man problem. No, no, not that kind of man problem. And not the man problem she had in mind when she accused her rivals of “piling on” at the debate debacle. Her man problem comes from her friends.
Friends like Gov. Spitzer, who has thrown her the hottest political potato of the year with his plan to give driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants.
Friends like booster Charlie Rangel, the Harlem congressman whose massive tax-hike proposal is fast becoming a millstone around her political neck.
And the biggest man problem of all is Hubba Bubba, who is developing a habit of saying stupid things. A bimbo eruption would almost be comic relief compared with his nonsense of saying that critics who blast wifey’s habit of ducking tough issues are practically “Swift-boating” her. He followed that turkey with a free-association ramble to an Iowa audience that seemed to suggest the rough and tumble of the immigration debate resembled Al Qaeda tactics.
Tech Central Station has a side of Mexican immigration you might not have considered.
I wish my American friends who fret about Mexican immigrants could be here with me. Listening to Emiliano Zapata, a laborer who happens to be the grandson and namesake of the legendary Mexican revolutionary, they perhaps would get a clearer sense of how the migration of Mexicans originated a few decades ago and why it continues today. …
American Thinker likes the Hugo Chavez put-down.
Power Line has Chavez thoughts too.
Contentions posts on the U of Deleware PC programs.
Bjorn Lomborg was in the Sunday Telegraph.
This week, the United Nations’ climate scientists will release a major report synthesising the world’s best global warming research. It will be the first time we’ve heard from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) since its scientists won the Nobel Peace Prize with former US vice-president Al Gore.
The IPCC’s Assessment Report will tell policy-makers what to expect from man-made climate change. It is the result of rigorous and painstaking labour: more than can be said for the other Nobel Prize winner. The difference between Gore’s claims and IPCC research is instructive.
While Gore was creating alarm with his belief that a 20-foot-high wall of water would inundate low-lying cities, the IPCC showed us we should realistically prepare for a rise of one foot or so by the end of the century. Beyond the dramatic difference, it is also worth putting that one foot in perspective. Over the last 150 years, sea levels rose about one foot – yet, did we notice?
Most tellingly, while Gore was raising fears about the Gulf Stream halting and a new Ice Age starting, the scientists discounted the prospect entirely. …
Speaking of green, Jonah Goldberg comments on NBC’s new program.