November 6, 2008

Rahm Emmanuel in, Sheldon Adelson out (of money)

All those folks who thought they had elected the Dalai Lama to be President are slowly starting to realize they actually elected a man whose driving ambition from age 25 to 40 was to become Mayor of Chicago because that job gives you what Obama has always wanted: power. By my count, the word "power" or its variants appears 82 times in Dreams from My Father.

Obama has appointed as his chief of staff Congressman Rahm Israel Emanuel, fixer-fundraiser-bruiser extraordinaire who started out with the Daley Machine.

Poor Philip Weiss, who had convinced himself from all the time Obama spent hanging out with Palestinians before he became famous, that Obama's election meant a fair shake for the Palestinians, is distraught. (As if Obama ever cared about Palestinians ...) Emanuel spent the 1991 Gulf War volunteering at an Israeli military base.

Joshua Green writes in Rolling Stone:

There's the story about the time he sent a rotting fish to a pollster who had angered him. There's the story about how his right middle finger was blown off by a Syrian tank when he was in the Israeli army. And there's the story of how, the night after Clinton was elected, Emanuel was so angry at the president's enemies that he stood up at a celebratory dinner with colleagues from the campaign, grabbed a steak knife and began rattling off a list of betrayers, shouting "Dead! . . . Dead! . . . Dead!" and plunging the knife into the table after every name. "When he was done, the table looked like a lunar landscape," one campaign veteran recalls. "It was like something out of The Godfather. But that's Rahm for you." Of the three stories, only the second is a myth ...

The second of three sons born to a pediatrician father and a civil-rights-activist mother, Rahm was raised in a middle-class family that stressed competitiveness and achievement. His older brother, Ezekiel, is a leading medical ethicist. [Ah, yes, the medical ethics profession ...] His younger brother, Ari, is a Hollywood talent agent who served as the inspiration for Ari Gold, the fast-talking agent played by Jeremy Piven on HBO's hit series Entourage. (In a recent episode shot at a Lakers game, the lead actors sat in Ari Emanuel's $2,000 courtside seats.) "After about the sixth episode, I finally caught it," says Rahm, who himself was the model for the character Josh Lyman on The West Wing. "I called Ari the next day and said, 'Hey, I finally saw the show, and you know what? I like that guy better than I like you.'"

Emanuel got his political education working as a fund-raiser for Mayor Richard Daley's re-election campaign in Chicago, where he learned how to twist arms and knock heads. Donors were used to giving $5,000 -- but Daley needed more. "Rahm took it up a notch," Daley's brother William recalled several years ago. "He told many of them they easily had the ability to give twenty-five grand." When contributors didn't pony up, Emanuel would tell them he was embarrassed that they'd offered so little and hang up on them. The shocked donor would usually call back and sheepishly comply. In thirteen weeks, the thirty-year-old raised $7 million -- an unprecedented sum at the time. His fund-raising skills eventually earned him a job in the Clinton campaign.

Emanuel was an Iraq War hawk. His father was a member of the anti-British Irgun terrorist organization in Palestine in the 1940s.

In an interview with Ma'ariv, Emanuel's father, Dr. Benjamin Emanuel, said he was convinced that his son's appointment would be good for Israel. "Obviously he will influence the president to be pro-Israel," he was quoted as saying. "Why wouldn't he be? What is he, an Arab? He's not going to clean the floors of the White House."

Meanwhile, the Las Vegas Sands Corporation, chiefly owned by Sheldon Adelson, recently #3 richest man in America and a prime funder of neoconnery in the U.S. and Israel, announced it was in danger of going broke. Adelson was a small time hustler who got insanely rich off the Housing Bubble as Californians took out home equity loans and drove to Vegas and off the Chinese mania for gambling by somehow getting the Beijing to give him something of a monopoly on casinos in Macao. His second wife is Israeli, and late in life he developed a passion for Likudism, spending a fortune on putting Netanyahu back in office.

As a convenience for all the neocons out there, here's the District of Columbia form you have to fill in to change your party registration from Republican to Democrat.

My published articles are archived at iSteve.com -- Steve Sailer

47 comments:

  1. "As a convenience for all the neocons out there, here's the District of Columbia form you have to fill in to change your party registration from Republican to Democrat."

    Haha, Touche. I know some anti-war anti-israel- lobby Obamacons who deserve that paragraph too.

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  2. Can you say more about the character of Emmanuel and what his selection means.

    Emmanuel studied ballet? Huh?

    He's extremely nasty, right? Are neo-cons in general nastier than non-neocons? Is that how they are able to enforce their views on everyone?

    Is it okay for a US born citizen to have served a foreign country?

    I thought Obama was the anti-neocon? But it turns out that he isn't?

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  3. The idea that Obama gives a rats patoot about Palestinians, Jews, Americans, or anything else other than Obama is absurd. The guy is a vain, shallow, self-obsessed fixer with daddy issues, and he should not even be a White House aide, let alone President.

    Harsh? In two years, most Democrats will agree with me.

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  4. Emanuel was an Iraq War hawk. His father was a member of the anti-British Irgun terrorist organization in Palestine in the 1940s.

    Look on the bright side: this terrorist has one more degree of separation from the newly elected president than Ayers did.

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  5. Maybe you too should have analysed Obama the Chicago politician, instead of Obama the novelist of ancestral dreams.

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  6. If his father was Irgun, there goes the war on terror.

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  7. Steve, your (all other things being equal) preference for Anti-Semitism is annoying. If you at least shared with me a dislike for the fact that more-talented folk tend to get larger shares of the socioeconomic pie then I could understand your antisemitic proclivities. But you don't, which is why you have to fall back on some protocols of zion type nonsense to explain your (albeit slight) antipathy towards Jews (all in the context of Israel of course because Israel - conveniently - exists, were there no Israel you'd no doubt focus on Hollywood, business or some other factor - all of which is most easily explained by the fact of [genetic or otherwise] disproportionate Jewish talent).

    A couple of minor notes here.

    1) The bioethicist brother is apparently somewhat Right of Center according to his wikipedia page (be the accuracy of that page what it is).

    2) The final sentence of your piece ONLY MAKES SENSE if one believes "neocon" to be identical with "what's good for the Jews". Which is pretty sick.

    3) The title of this piece similarly only makes sense to anyone who views Jews as some sort of hydra-headed monster rather than as a motley crew of individuals .

    4) I doubt whether ANY of your readers are more "pro-Israel" than I am (I've spent many many hours meeting dozens of Irgun and Lechi veterans and I've lectured internationally on Israel's behalf, etc) and I was BY FAR the most vociferous proponent of Barack Obama in this space and I also happen to despise Adelson as much as I do any millionaire/billionaire exploiter in the casino industry.

    5) The Irgun was not "anti-British". In fact, the leader of the Irgun, David Raziel, died fighting FOR the British in Iraq, and the most famous Irgun political prisoner murdered by the British, Dov Gruner, was priorly a British soldier. Calling the Irgun anti-British is ridiculous, the Irgun was fighting for the survival of a nation that was being massacred without a peep from the civilized world. As their finest publicist, Ben Hecht, used to write (and before the British made themselves the enemies of the few remaining Jews no one was more Anglophiliac than he), it was with awesome ambivalence that Jews fought the British who were turning boatfuls of them back to Auschwitz.

    6) Antisemitism often forms a bridge of love between two opposing peoples who have nothing in common but some irrational itch for the Jew. This can be seen in the White Supremacist websites that link to Islamic Fundamentalist websites and it can seen here as well. The fact that there's so much cross pollination between the readership of Isteve and Mondoweiss with nary a vile word said betwixt them is rather extraordinary. Istevers are laissez faire Capitalists while Mondoweissers are spread the wealth Socialists; Istevers are about as wary of blacks as can be found in a respectable forum whereas Mondoweissers are practically reparationsists. Yet they get on so well together. One wonders what metaphysical force can possibly be strong enough to pull that off...

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  8. As Mr. Sailer notes so acutely in the first paragraph, Obama is a politician and politicians like power.


    As for Rahm Emanuel's pro-Israel credentials: only Nixon could make peace with China.

    (Hope springs eternal. Most likely nothing will come of this, and the malnourished masses will still be rotting in their wretched refugee camps in 2016, but one can hope...)

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  9. Emanuel spent the 1991 Gulf War volunteering at an Israeli military base.

    No doubt his application to the Illinois National Guard was mislaid in the postal system. Yes, that must be it.

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  10. Mnuez - yes, they were concerned with the survival of their nation. A concern deemed too trivial for Brits or white Americans to be allowed to hold these days.

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  11. Reminds me of the old joke about the primary cause of antisemitism...

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  12. Anonymous said... "they were concerned with the survival of their nation. A concern deemed too trivial for Brits or white Americans to be allowed to hold these days."

    Just as the survival of the Palestinians is deemed trivial by the Washington/Israel axis these days.

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  13. Apparently Obama liked to quote Einstein's definition of insanity to his staff during the campaign - "doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results".

    Hmmm ....

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  14. So Emmanuel cares deeply about the safety of Israel and thus will do his ferocious best to ensure that Iran does not get the bomb, which will make America safer. What is not to like? Lefties will learn that, in his personal behavior and domestic political methods, Emmanuel fulfills their worst nightmares about Karl Rove, who was actually a Teddy Bear. A safer America and re-educated Lefties, sounds like a win-win for the sane party.

    In reviewing the rest of likely Obama appointees, keep in mind that, outside of finance, the Democratic Party is not exactly deep in governing talent. The Democrats' Wall Street boys are basically like our Wall Street boys. They know how to get rich, they understand the financial system decently (although as recent events demonstrate, nobody understands it thoroughly) and they are willing to compromise on everything else.

    The candidates for the rest of the cabinet are mostly senior national Democrats much like Chris Dodd and Joe Biden, aging gasbags who have been hanging on forever in the Senate or somewhere, never with responsibility for doing anything and never having done anything much.

    One bright spot is Anthony Williams, the former accountant-mayor of Washington, DC. Like Obama, Williams is of mixed ancestry, is very smart and hard-working and went to Harvard. Unlike Obama, Williams was raised by a strong adopted family and is the opposite of power-hungry. He had to be practically drafted into being mayor, to help clean up the mess left by the Barry Experience.

    Then there is a handful of competent business Democrats, like Mark Warner, and at least one 'interesting' Democrat, James Webb, or "Senator Grudge."

    Apart form these outliers, it is a veritable desert of incompetence in the Democratic Party. So be gentle with them as the inevitable cabinet clowns tumble out of the circus taxicab. They want your love and will seek your applause.

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  15. Obama the anti-neocon? There were no anti-neocons.

    The closest you came to that in this election were the pro-Israel yet America-firsters like Ron Paul. Romney and Palin were also suspect for their brazenly pro-American sentiments which is why the press savaged them all.

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  16. "The title of this piece similarly only makes sense to anyone who views Jews as some sort of hydra-headed monster rather than as a motley crew of individuals..."

    This is brilliant. I'm going to head outside the door now and walk on my hands all day underneath the green sky.

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  17. Steve,
    It looks like you may be vindicated in your position that Obama is less antisemitic and more anti-white.

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  18. The "Dead! . . . Dead! . . . Dead!"
    business sounds to me like something out of ANIMAL HOUSE:

    Bluto: What the fuck happened to the Delta I used to know? Where's the spirit? Where's the guts, huh? This could be the greatest night of our lives, but you're gonna let it be the worst. "Ooh, we're afraid to go with you Bluto, we might get in trouble." Well just kiss my ass from now on! Not me! I'm not gonna take this. Wormer, he's a dead man! Marmalard, dead! Niedermeyer...
    Otter: Dead! Bluto's right. Psychotic, but absolutely right. We gotta take these bastards. Now we could do it with conventional weapons that could take years and cost millions of lives. No, I think we have to go all out. I think that this situation absolutely requires a really futile and stupid gesture be done on somebody's part.

    http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077975/quotes

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  19. mnuez: What we anglos worry about is the unending and warranted hatred of Middle Easteners due to our implicit backing of Israeli settlements in conquered lands.

    This hatred could lead to the destruction of the jewels of our civilization: London, New York, Washington. And to the blood on our hands due to our response.

    These seem to me to be plenty good reasons for being "upset" with the stranglehold that US neo-cons have over US Middle East policy.

    Some people might go "over the top" in their opposition to such a state of affairs.

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  20. "mnuez said...

    The Irgun was not "anti-British".

    I'm sure that would have cheered up the Brits who were blown to pieces in the King David Hotel.

    Tell me mnuez, is it permissible to say anything bad about anyone who is jewish? Is it not at least possible to point out that an American who joins the IDF rather than the US military is perhaps more loyal to Israel than to the US, without being labeled an anti-semite?

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  21. See, Mnuez, this is what bugs me. How come you get to be pro-Israel, (which basically means, come on, What's Good for the Jews) but it doesn't make you anti-white, anti-American; but I don't get to be against American Might and Money doing Israel's dirty work for it, (i.e., my concern is with What's Good for all Americans) without someone accusing me of being anti-semite?

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  22. It's becoming ever more clear that all the right-wing tools running around yelling about "bill ayers", "socialism","radical leftist Hussein Obama" were playing right into Obama's trap. The guy is, like Steve says, first and foremost a power hungry pol. He's not going to pursue any kind of radical left-wing agenda, he's going to continue the pro-corporate "invade the world, invite the world" agenda that we've seen consistently from both political parties for the last 20 years. But the invective on the right, and the color of his skin, has protected him from attacks from the left. The people who are going to be the most disappointed over the next 4 years are the radical left-wing who are going to eventually wake up and realize Obama is just Clinton with a tan. "Democrat" and "Republican" are now just labels to fool the masses. No one who wants real change has a chance in hell of being elected to high office in this country.

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  23. Emmanuel is my congressman and he is exactly the type of politician readers of this site would like.

    In Chicago, lots of white children attend gifted public schools. If they can't get into the gifted public school, they can move into the district where the gifted public school is and still attend (in the regular but still safe classes).

    Rahm Emmanuel took credit for opening up another gifted school in a white neighborhood (Coonley) directly north of an already white and gifted school (Bell).

    The man can recognize reality.

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  24. "[Ah, yes, the medical ethics profession ...]"

    That brother is also an MD and practicing physician, in addition to being a Ph.D. ethicist. See this NYT article on the three brothers, written during the Clinton years: "The Brothers Emanuel".

    As for Israel and the Palestinians, Obama would be stupid to dull his sword on that Gordian Knot anytime soon, and he probably knows it. That ought to be about priority number 23 on any U.S. president's to-do list.

    - Fred

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  25. "But you don't, which is why you have to fall back on some protocols of zion type nonsense to explain your (albeit slight) antipathy towards Jews (all in the context of Israel of course because Israel - conveniently - exists, were there no Israel you'd no doubt focus on Hollywood, business or some other factor - all of which is most easily explained by the fact of [genetic or otherwise] disproportionate Jewish talent)."

    You say Steve has anti-semitic tendencies, but then you carefully argue that Jews are more talented. I don't believe Steve to be anti-semitic, and frankly could care less, but if your assertion about Jewish talent is true, then anti-semitism might be rational. Afterall, in your scenario, members of the highly talented Jewish group may soon see themselves as so special that they can publicly proclaim their superiority without fear of retribution. Soon they may start to believe in their own perfectionism and run roughshod over less talented groups. They may even see themselves as so special that they can socially engineer problems, such as race relations, and use the proletariat as the experimental base.

    So if you are correct in your assertion that Jews are more talented, then anti-semitism might be a rational response. Of course, I don't expect you to see it that way. I am sure you will feel it is okay to proclaim Jews as talented, while it would be wrong for an Englishman to proclaim his countrymen as more ethical than the Jews.

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  26. and before the British made themselves the enemies of the few remaining Jews no one was more Anglophiliac than he

    In other words, he wasn't a dual loyalist, eh?

    Ben Hecht, cherished screenwriter and humanitarian, the Echt American:

    "Every time you [the Jewish terrorist group the Irgun] blow up a British arsenal, or send a British railroad train sky high, or rob a British bank, or let go with your guns and bombs at the British betrayers or invaders of your homeland, the Jews of America make a little holiday in their hearts." Link. I'm sure they did.

    These are loyal people. There is no basis whatever for anti-semitism. Anti-semites are simply mentally ill. They should be institutionalized for the good of society and its loyal defenders.

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  27. Why would neo-cons want to be backing Obama?

    He selected Emmanuel precisely because he can rein in (he hopes) Pelosi and Reid, domestically.

    Obama wants to cut defense, particularly missile defense, and R&D for military items (America's key advantage) and eliminate our nuclear arsenal (to leave us defenseless against Pakistan and Iran and North Korea).

    Moreover, Emmanuel is no friend to Israel, given that Obama does not support Jerusalem as the undivided capital, his other backers like Powers want to invade Israel to erase it and replace it with Hamas, and Obama was elected with Hamas and Hezbollah and Iranian and Saudi money that just poured in.

    Neocons like Israel because it is an "unsinkable" Aircraft carrier in the ME, gives America intelligence access to valuable information almost impossible to get otherwise, and which is used to vet that from other sources. But most of all it sends the important Godfather message to the thug regimes in the area that America is powerful and capable of both protecting a client state and punishing those who attack America or American interests.

    Steve holds the insanely nutty idea that thug regimes in unstable areas with unstable, polygamy-driven societies and Big Men with hordes of seething and resentful, unmarriageable men can be dealt with in any other way than brutality. He also imagines the fantasy that oceans, separatism, isolationism, will trump nuclear proliferation, the desire to build a following by attacking successfully, Americans, and the seething power struggle that characterizes tribal-polygamous societies.

    Muslims have always been this way, but now they have nuclear weapons, are plugged into the global trade network, and are all over the place thanks to globalism. Ruthless Putin-ism ("the weak got beaten and we were weak" followed by "statements" ) is the only way to avoid constant Beslans or worse.

    You'll notice after HE leveled Grozny, the statements took hold. No more attacks.

    Emmanuel is weak and pathetic, compared to real tough guys. Stabbing a table is one thing. Actually having enemies drink polonium tea or being shot in elevators is another. Let alone leveling cities.

    Globalism has brought many good things, but not without cost. Total ruthlessness against nuclear armed enemies is one of them. Heck Putin understood that -- Russia had before he got tough, thousands of nukes as it does not. He still got attacked until he proved what he was and how much attacking him cost.

    Emmanuel? A pushover. Putin or Osama would make him wet his pants.

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  28. "Obama wants to cut defense, particularly missile defense, and R&D for military items (America's key advantage) ..."

    Innovations achieved by military R&D "trickle down" to many other disciplines/industries. To scrap it would be folly.

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  29. Does this mean Obama will not be pursuing his "deepest committments"?

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  30. a nuclear bomb did certainly drop on las vegas. MGM, wynn, and las vegas sands lost 80% of their market capitalization in only 2 months!

    station casinos went private within the last 2 years but even that seems like it won't save them from the crash.

    probably a good thing they spun off UFC into it's own LLC. john mccain was, strangely, the very guy who was out to kill UFC back in the 90s.

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  31. Globalism has brought many good things, but not without cost. Total ruthlessness against nuclear armed enemies is one of them. Heck Putin understood that -- Russia had before he got tough, thousands of nukes as it does not. He still got attacked until he proved what he was and how much attacking him cost.

    Well what the HEY t99! Where you been the past eight years? All that time writing up war games scenarioes with Russia and Iran and all of a sudden it's "Holy S***! Bush has filled the place up with FOREIGNERS! And he's a corporate GLOBALIST!" "And what's THIS you tell me? They nominated a geriatric cancer patient and a housewife?"

    But better late than never guy. I mean, recovery begins with the recognition of the problem. So over the next four years, I'm looking forward to your realizing why we liked the leader of an authentic nation-state actually acting in the interests of his people better than our own President. And who knows, maybe it'll dawn on you about that ripe-for-exploitation abyss between the Persian and the Arab.

    --Senor Doug

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  32. "Neocons like Israel because it is an "unsinkable" Aircraft carrier in the ME, gives America intelligence access to valuable information almost impossible to get otherwise, and which is used to vet that from other sources."

    Dude, we've got Centcom right smack dab in Qatar. And if water flows uphill and we start seeing unicorns and Qatar falls to the jihadis, then we just use Germany.

    Also, you are terribly naive if you think Israeli intelligence is deployed for any other purpose than to benefit Israel.

    --Senor Doug

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  33. "As a convenience for all the neocons out there, here's the District of Columbia form you have to fill in to change your party registration from Republican to Democrat."

    LOL! That's classic Sailer!

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  34. The guy is, like Steve says, first and foremost a power hungry pol. He's not going to pursue any kind of radical left-wing agenda, he's going to continue the pro-corporate "invade the world, invite the world" agenda that we've seen consistently from both political parties for the last 20 years.....

    ....No one who wants real change has a chance in hell of being elected to high office in this country.


    Correct. The Anointed One will be ushering in the "Amero" or whatever the North American currency will be called once the dollar is thoroughly destroyed. It will be backed by silver. ETA for such an event will be ~2010. Not to be cryptic, but got it on good authority.

    Steady movement towards One World Government continues and Obama was a perfect. He's a good salesman afterall.

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  35. Ari, Rahm's brother, attempted to get 'Mad Max' Mel Gibson black-listed for his alleged tirade against, well, you know who.

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  36. It should also be interesting to watch Brother Biden and Brother Dyson lock horns with Rahm over Iran.

    Maybe that's what Senator Joe means when he said;

    "Mark my words…It will not be six months before the world tests Barack Obama like they did John Kennedy…Remember I said it standing here if you don’t remember anything else I said. Watch, we’re gonna have an international crisis, a generated crisis, to test the mettle of this guy."

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  37. "But most of all it sends the important Godfather message to the thug regimes in the area that America is powerful and capable of both protecting a client state and punishing those who attack America or American interests."

    This is wrong in so many ways that I suspect you are being disingenuous.

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  38. the artist formerly known as evil neocon asks:

    Why would neo-cons want to be backing Obama?

    Because he's soon to be the President of the United States. Back and advise.

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  39. T99 - Neocons like Israel because it is an "unsinkable" Aircraft carrier in the ME

    You often say interesting things but then you repeat this nonsense again and again.

    When are we going to see this unsinkable carrier deployed?

    Ive posted something like this before I think:

    Lets start in 1986. The US raids Libya using land based F-111s launched from Britain 1500 miles away and naval aircraft from real aircraft carriers. The nearby unsinkable one, Israel, is not used.

    In 1991 US and allied airforces participate in Desert Storm. Aircraft based in Saudi Arabia, far away in Britain and far away in Diego Garcia are used as well as stealth aircraft based back in the US (very far away!). Not to mention real aircraft carriers. The nearby unsinkable one, Israel, is not used.

    After Desert Storm US and allied forces maintain no-fly zone over Iraq. Aircraft based in Saudi & Kuwait are used, and real aircraft carriers again. The nearby unsinkable one, Israel, is not used.

    In the mid 90s US and allied airforces act against Serbia. Locally based planes are used, real aircraft carriers, yet again British based B-1 & B-52 aircraft etc etc. The nearby unsinkable one, Israel, is not used.

    2003 - US and allied airforces attack Iraq. Britain, Diego Garcia, etc etc blah blah and real aircraft carriers and yes the nearby unsinkable one, Israel, is yet again not used.

    So, when is it going to be used?

    Britain has also been described as an unsinkable aircraft carrier. This description seems to have some merit based as it is on fact

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  40. So Obama's war time consilgere is Rahm Emmanuel. Is Michael Signator his Al Neri?

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  41. 1/ If the Israeli army is so desperate that they take in ballet dancers, I think the anti-Israel folks here should be pleased instead of bothered.

    I suspect the truth is his father sent him there and that he spent most of his non-piroetting time doing pretty much nothing.

    2/ Well before his DWI arrest Mr. feeling Mel-low was making his own movies so a blacklisting would have been useless.

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  42. Steve, your disdain for neocons is too visceral for it to be entirely based on their policies. Someday you should tell us what made it personal. Is it the hoax e-mail that went around years ago when your name was forged on an anti-Palestinian rant? Something else?

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  43. Obviously, that must be it!

    What else could possibly cause me to think poorly of the neocons? I mean, I can't think of anything they've done to arouse my ire.

    Oh yeah, there's that pointless 5.5-year-long war that's still grinding on, but who cares about that?

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  44. Shouldn't we be referring to him as Rahm ISRAEL Emanuel, constatnly emphasizing his middle name? Isn't that the way to refer to people in this administration?

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  45. What is wrong with stating that neoconservatism is an American Jewish political movement. It does not represent all American jews, only a portion of American jews concerned with the security of Israel. It includes catholic intellectuals(Richard Neuhaus, Michael Novak) and evangelical tv preachers(Hagee and Rod Parsley). The influence of the group on American foreign policy if there is to be an end to the Iraq war.

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  46. Interesting, Steve. I gave you a jump ball in the first sentence when I said "their policies."

    And you ran it straight to the "invade the world" net. Swish!

    Now, maybe you're just a guy who sometimes wears his emotions on his sleeve when writing about politics. But you tend to stay more cool and detached when talking about the Nativo Lopezes and Villaraigosas of the world. Even though they're in your back yard. Even though the "invade the world" doctrine is in tatters while "invite the world," not so much.

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  47. Following up on the "Israel-as-unsinkable-aircraft-carrier" takedown above, where would you locate a US base in Israel? It's hilly, crowded, and has lots of hostile Palestinians. Not to mention the Hasidim might not be too enthralled at the sight of a bunch of American troops getting drunk and throwing money at the local females on Shabat.

    Instead, you can just set up some mega-bases in Kuwait and Qatar where you can see everybody coming for ten miles in any direction.

    --Senor Doug

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