Jay Reding.com

Power Line has an interesting piece on a Washington Post story that reveals that the GOP’s political goal hinges around – gasp! – winning the fall midterm elections. As John Hinderaker notes:

On reflection, though, the title may not be as silly as it sounds. One would think that electoral victory is the chief, if not sole, object of any political party. Yet it sometimes seems as if the Democrats are pursuing some other agenda, as they dominate Hollywood, Washington and New York, but generally lose most of the rest of America.

That’s the fear that underlines the Post’s analysis: that those pesky Republicans will somehow be able to pull a rabbit out of the hat and stymie the paper’s beloved Democrats once again. Which is quite likely to happen, I think.

I’m not so sanguine about the GOP’s chances, but as Hinderaker points out, they do have one big advantage: they’re running against Democrats:

The Democrats have a real problem on subjects like the Hayden nomination. Because almost all of the press is loyal to them, they can easily generate negative headlines and misleading (or outright false) stories implying that the NSA programs, for example, are illegal or dangerous to civil liberties. But then comes the hard part: they have to take a position. Do they really want to go on record as saying that the NSA shouldn’t be spying on al Qaeda, and doing its best to intercept its communications? No, they don’t. So we have the weird spectacle of DNC Chairman Howard Dean sending out emails denouncing Hayden and demanding that his nomination be rejected, while Senate Democrats are pretty uniformly praising him and saying that he will be confirmed easily. Once again, the Republicans can take comfort from the fact that they don’t run for election against newspaper headlines; they run against Democrats.

The essential problem the Democrats have is that what excites their base turns off everyone else. The Democrats think that because Bush’s approval ratings are in the toilet that everyone drinks their anti-Bush Kool-Aid. That line of logic assumes that thinking that Bush is doing a bad job is enough to get people to vote for Democrats. That just isn’t in the case – there are plenty of conservatives who are angry at Bush but have no intention of letting the Democrats near the majority in November. The Democrats keep trying to run against Bush, but that just isn’t enough. They have to have some semblance of an alternative, and the Democrats offer nothing but retreat in Iraq and war at home. Their sense of petty and vituperative partisanship is all they have.

Granted, the GOP is hardly doing much better, but at least the Republican Party has some semblance of an agenda, which puts them ahead of the curve. In the end, it all comes down to candidates and issues. The GOP’s candidate recruitment has not been great, but the Democrats aren’t doing that much better. It’s quite possible, even probable that the Democrats will make gains in the House, but the Senate is shaping up fairly well for the Republicans, especially with Tom Kean in New Jersey, Michael Steele in Maryland, and Mark Kennedy in Minnesota. The Democrats have the tendency to put their feet firmly in their mouths, and with “Howlin’” Howard Dean as the Democratic National Chairman, there’s plenty of room for the Democrats to embarrass themselves even more.

The Democrats offer a referendum on someone who isn’t even on the ballot: the Republicans are trying to offer a real choice. As bad as the GOP’s political fortunes are at the moment, that fundamental difference exposes why the Democrats are simply unfit to lead.

Chances are it’s made of the scent of money, new-Lexus smell, and diamond particles.

Mark Krikorian has what I think is the best explanation for the President’s views on immigration:

…I get asked this question all the time and the conclusion I’ve come to is this: The president is morally and emotionally opposed to immigration enforcement, especially on the Mexican border. He sees it as uncompassionate and un-Christian, at best a necessary evil that must be entered into with the greatest reluctance and abandoned as soon as is practical. And this is especially true with regard to Mexico because he sees it as a “cousin” nation, like Britain or Israel, and thus enforcing immigration laws against Mexicans is even worse than doing so against Chinese or Pakistanis.

I don’t say this to hurl epithets — President Bush is a conviction politician and sincerely believes this, which is why he sticks to his anti-enforcement guns despite potentially catastrophic political damage. This is unlike President Clinton, who was actually better on immigration in many ways precisely because he was (is) completely amoral and willing to embrace almost any position.

I think he’s right. One of Bush’s greatest strength is his conviction in the idea of the US’ role in spreading liberty across the globe. Even at great risk – such as Iraq. Toppling Saddam Hussein was an enormous political risk – one that hasn’t played out very well for the President at all. Immigration is the same. The President seems to be acting out of a fundamental conviction that barring immigrants from the United States is an immoral act. At the same time, that conviction is in direct conflict with the economic and social health of the United States. Bush’s non-amnesty amnesty through the guest-worker program is an attempt to take a reasonable middle ground without sacrificing his values – something that may ultimately not be possible unless Bush is willing to compromise on things such as border security.

We always clamor for a politician with strong convictions – and Bush is certainly such a politician. However, as the old saying goes, be careful what you wish for, you just might get it…

The assassination of Turkish judge Mustafa Yucel Ozbilgin has set off a firestorm in the Turkish capital of Ankara. Members of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) were loudly booed by the crowd, and Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan did not attend the funeral. However, Turkish generals were cheered.

Turkey has been a strongly secular country since the fall of the Ottoman Empire and the reforms of Mustapha Kemal Atatürk, the founder of the modern Turkish state. On several occasions, the Turkish military has felt forced to step in and act to prevent governments from undermining the democratic tradition in Turkey. In 1998 the Turkish military asked then-Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan to resign due to his position on religion in Turkey. Erbakan did stand down, and his Welfare Party was banned from Turkish politics. However, Prime Minister Erdogan was a member of the Welfare Party.

Erdogan himself is problematic for many in Turkey. In 1998, he was arrested for inciting religious hatred and served a ten-month sentence. He had a history of supporting the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, and Turkish newspapers showed pictures of him with Afghan warlord Gelbuddin Hekmatyar. The anger of the Turkish people towards Erdogan expressed at the funeral comes directly from the sentiment that Erdogan would lead Turkey away from their secular principles and towards an Islamic government.

It is probably a good sign that the Turkish people are rejecting Islamism, and while Turkish anti-Americanism is a problem, especially with the Turkish mass media’s insatiable desire for anti-American fantasies such as Iraq: Valley of the Wolves and Metal Storm – stories with a distinctly anti-American bent. US/Turkish relations may be somewhat strained, but the Turkish government and military understand the value of our shared interests and won’t take things too far.

Erdogan’s government is almost certainly in trouble. The military may end up asking him to resign once more and new elections may be called – and unless the situation spirals into a coup that eventuality may not be so bad. At the very least, Erdogan is going to have to start showing his secularist credentials through some serious actions such as enforcing Turkey’s ban on Islamic headscarves.

Turkey is in some ways a model for Iraq – the Turks have proved that an Muslim country can maintain democracy over the long term, even if it isn’t as stable as other countries. The fact that we’re seeing protests for secularism and democracy indicate how well these concepts have become part of the Turkish national character. Turkey is hardly a model democracy, but it is vastly more democratic than most Muslim states in the region, and its example can be a guide to its neighbor to the southeast.

UPDATE: Michael Rubin has more on the situation there. He’s right, we’re very lucky that this is a pro-democracy movement and not the other way around. Atutürk’s secularism remains alive and well 80 years later…

At The Corner, John Podhoretz notes that Thomas Friedman is nothing but consistent. No matter what time it is, it’s always a critical time in Iraq – or at least the next six months will be.

Now, there is some truth to that – in democratization, previous successes (and failures) build upon each other, but one would think that Friedman would have something more than variations on a theme here. There’s nothing technically incorrect about what Friedman’s saying, but it still seems like the same old tune with a different beat each time.

Meanwhile, if one is looking for truly insightful commentary on the war, the journalistic class has nothing on people like Michael Totten or Michael Yon who have provided the sort of in-depth analysis and insight that the traditional media used to excel at – but have largely abandoned for safer fluff pieces. Both their work is easily Pulitzer quality, and both display the kind of intrepid spirit and open minds that mainstream media seem to have lost.

None other than Kos has made his political TV ad debut, and it is quite possibly one of the dumbest and most disturbing political ads I’ve ever seen – and even features Kos’ making light of his despicable and shameful comments about the four American contractors killed in Fallujah.

An ad that dumb will almost certainly ensure that Kos goes 0-18. This is quite possibly the dumbest political ad I’ve ever seen, and I’ve seen some truly awful ones.

Kos’ tradition of being the Typhoid Mary of politics continued unabated…

UPDATE: The “Screw them” bit was a Photoshop and wasn’t part of the ad – which I should have noticed. Mea culpa.

If singing the national anthem in Spanish is unpatriotic, would singing it in Klingon be unpatriotic, incredibly dorky, or both?