Il Duce Speaks: GOP Loss Means Another 9/11

I see America’s Mussolini Mayor is giving us a preview of the Republican strategy in 2008:

“Rudy Giuliani said if a Democrat is elected president in 2008, America will be at risk for another terrorist attack on the scale of Sept. 11, 2001. But if a Republican is elected, he said, especially if it is him, terrorist attacks can be anticipated and stopped.

“‘If any Republican is elected president —- and I think obviously I would be the best at this —- we will remain on offense and will anticipate what [the terrorists] will do and try to stop them before they do it,’ Giuliani said.”

Yeah, Rudy — just like you did last time, eh? Remember how you insisted on putting the command-and-control headquarters of New York City’s anti-terrorist squad in … the World Trade Center — even though it had already been attacked once before, in 1993? Smart move.

Well, anticipate this, Senor Giiuliani: While your platform of making the trains run on time is probably a good reflection of the red-state fascist mentality rampant in what used to be the Republican party, others may be more willing to look at your actual record. not to mention your, uh, unusual personal life. And i wouldn’t count on shameless fear-mongering to divert attention from other issues important to Republican primary voters. After all, you’re hardly a fiscal conservative, and you have some other positions that Republicans of the more traditional sort might find horrifying.

In a wider context, I find it hard to believe that Giuliani’s campaign will survive a closer examination of his character and personality. Here, after all, is someone who ridiculed a man with Parkinson ‘s disease, and looks lovely in a party frock. Scandal has stalked his political career, and the myth of “America’s mayor” is likely to be fatally subverted by close scrutiny.

There’s a new documentary, “Giuliani Time,” that looks interesting. And go here for the real dirt. A leaked Giuliani campaign strategy paper bemoans the “weirdness factor” as an obstacle on the road to the White House, and you can see on it on full display about 3 minutes into this Youtube video of the candidate’s appearance at a meeting of the Churchill Club.

Exposing Shady NYT Reporting on Somalia

We’ve had a lot of people asking why we would run this article from the New York Times on Somalia. Well, we’re not ones to crush news, and quotes like this:

Omar Hussein Ahmed, an olive oil exporter in Mogadishu, the capital, said he and a group of fellow traders recently bought some missiles to shoot at government soldiers.

“Taxes are annoying,” he explained.

are news.

Jeffrey Gettleman’s slimy, repulsive smear-style writing doesn’t need a rebuttal (here’s one anyway) — you all figured it out yourselves, and that’s why you wrote, outraged. When this brazen propaganda popped onto the internet yesterday, we were all laughing at the sheer ridiculousness of this piece. We thought we’d share it with you.

I don’t need to school anyone on the priorities of world bureaucrats. They want a state in Somalia — the idea of millions of people making their own choices and their own connections scares the crap out of them. How are they supposed to, say, get the loans they lent the Somali dictator in the 80s back if there is no way to tax his victims? They consider a sitting government in Mogadishu to be the definition of “peace.” It doesn’t matter that hundreds are dying and hundreds of thousands are fleeing. They at least now have one guy to call when they want to hear someone grovel. And that makes international types very happy.

James Bovard

Working for the Clampdown: Congress gives president new martial law powers

The great libertarian author James Bovard discusses his new article for The American Conservative, “Working for the Clampdown,” about the new martial law powers in the John Warner National Defense Authorization Act.

MP3 here. (30: 26)

James Bovard is the author of Attention Deficit Democracy (St. Martin’s/Palgrave, January 2006), and eight other books. He has written for the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, New Republic, Reader’s Digest, and many other publications. His books have been translated into Spanish, Arabic, Japanese, and Korean.

The Wall Street Journal called Bovard “the roving inspector general of the modern state,” and Washington Post columnist George Will called him a “one-man truth squad.” His 1994 book Lost Rights: The Destruction of American Liberty received the Free Press Association’s Mencken Award as Book of the Year. His Terrorism and Tyranny won the Lysander Spooner Award for the Best Book on Liberty in 2003. He received the Thomas Szasz Award for Civil Liberties work, awarded by the Center for Independent Thought, and the Freedom Fund Award from the Firearms Civil Rights Defense Fund of the National Rifle Association.

His writings have been been publicly denounced by the chief of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Secretary of Agriculture, the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, the Postmaster General, and the chiefs of the U.S. International Trade Commission, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, as well as by many congressmen and other malcontents.

David Beito

The Military Industrial Consequence: Historian ranks FDR near top of worst presidents list

History professor David Beito discusses the history of America’s empire and some of the movements that have opposed it.

MP3 here. (42: 32)

David T. Beito is Associate Professor at the University of Alabama. He received his Ph.D. in history at the University of Wisconsin in 1986. Professor Beito is the author of Taxpayers in Revolt: Tax Resistance during the Great Depression and From Mutual Aid to the Welfare state: Fraternal Societies and Social Services, 1890-1967. An urban and social historian, he has published in the Journal of Southern History, and the Journal of Urban History, among other scholarly journals. He is currently writing a biography of Dr. T. R. M. Howard, a black civil rights pioneer, entrepreneur, and mutual-aid leader.

Eric Margolis

Occupying Afghanistan Never Works: Not even when America does it

Veteran war correspondent Eric Margolis discusses the war in Afghanistan, the “enemy” pashtuns and our “allies” the Tajiks and Uzbeks who fought on the side of the Soviet Union back when the U.S. backed the pashtuns against them, the shaky status of America’s puppet dictator in Pakistan, that countries relationship with India, the current chances for peace in the Israel/Palestinian conflict, the chances of war between Israel and Syria and of America with Iran.

MP3 here. (18: 37)

Award winning author, columnist, and broadcaster Eric S. Margolis has covered 14 wars and is a leading authority on military affairs, the Middle East, South Asia, and Islamic movements.

Notes and Asides

I have noted the growing convergence of left and right on various issues, from the war in Iraq to the fight in defense of civil liberties on the home front, and here’s another proposition that is a part of this developing left-right consensus: the rise of Jonah Goldberg as a right-wing commentator points to a qualitative degeneration of American conservatism. Yes, it’s “Goldbergism and the Decline of the Right,” the latest installment of my column for Taki’s Top Drawer.

I have to say that I really get a kick out of reading as well as writing for Taki Theodoracopulos’ spanking new website, because I get venture into topics I wouldn’t normally cover in this space, and I can frankly tell you that I enjoy the opportunity to let my hair down, so to speak, and write about what amuses me rather than what needs to be written about. Over the last few days I’ve done two radio interviews: go check out my appearance on Jim Ostrowski’s new radio show on WNYmedia.net, and yet another interview with our very own Scott Horton, on Antiwar.com Radio. Regarding the latter: well, yes, I was a little … loquacious, shall we say, but then again everybody has days like that, don’t they …? Well, maybe not quite like that …

I also have a new piece coming out soon in The American Conservative on the upcoming trial of Steve Rosen and Keith Weissman, two employees of AIPAC charged with passing U.S. secrets to Israel. I’m not sure if the editors are going to put it online – and, yes, I’m urging you once again to subscribe to TAC.