but two hours later The Times found her in a black burka in a madrassa linked to the Taleban

This is from The Times, with thanks again Luke for directing me to it. J

Molly Campbell, the 12-year-old girl at the centre of an international custody battle, is wearing a burka and living in a religious seminary suspected of harbouring Islamic militants, The Times has learnt.

Barely four months after fleeing her mother’s home in the Outer Hebrides to live with her father in Pakistan, Molly, who wants to be known by her Islamic name Misbah Rana, has enrolled at the Jamia Hafsa madrassa in Islamabad, known for its pro-Taleban views and suspected links to al-Qaeda.

Just two hours after facing the press yesterday dressed in a traditional purple headscarf and shalwar kameez, she spoke to The Times at an office at the madrassa, with her face only partially visible behind a black burka. Surrounded by officials at the madrassa and appearing slightly overwhelmed by her surroundings, she spoke briefly about the latest twist in the custody battle between her parents. Molly’s mother, Louise, has given up the fight for her daughter’s return because of the strain it has put on her health, it was disclosed yesterday.

Molly did not talk about her new education, but Sajad Rana, her father, confirmed that his daughter had moved out of his home in Lahore to study at the seminary. Admitting that he did not know when she would be back, he said: “She is a grown person, she is an adult. I would have liked her to be near me, but she wants to study Islam and she has joined this group for her education.”  He added: “The last time we were in Islamabad she spent a day at the madrassa, but now she’s made up her mind and she’s going to join it.”

The Jamia Hafsa madrassa is affiliated to Islamabad’s Lal Masjid, or Red Mosque, which has been repeatedly accused by President Musharraf’s Government of providing shelter to Islamic militants wanted on terrorism charges.

Molly’s father said that his daughter had decided to attend the seminary after meeting human rights activists in Islamabad at a demonstration last month organised by the Islamic Centre for Research and Defence of Human Rights, which called for the Government to release suspected terrorists. Asked whether he knew that the Jamia Hafsa madrassa, which teaches about 3,500 girls aged 5 to 20, had been accused of harbouring terrorists, Mr Rana said: “I don’t know about that. What concerns me is whether my daughter is happy. If she is happy in Islamabad then it doesn’t matter to me what kind of views they have, I am not bothered with that.”

Molly, who is expected to board at the seminary, was sceptical of an offer by her mother, Louise Campbell, to drop her attempt to take her back to Scotland. Lawyers for Ms Campbell, 38, told the Supreme Court in Pakistan that she would abandon her attempt to gain custody in return for regular access to her daughter and telephone calls. Nahida Mehboob Ellahi, Ms Campbell’s lawyer, told the court that her client wished to negotiate an out-of-court settlement. Ms Campbell was no longer insisting on full custody because of the “mental and psychological strain” of fighting the case, she said.

Molly, who did not attend the hearing, appeared suspicious of the offer, which comes weeks after a judge in Lahore ordered her to be sent back to Britain. . . She said: “I don’t want to meet my mother. She made me do things which I didn’t want to do.”

Mary and I expressed concern yesterday at how every time the child is photographed her hijab gets ever more enveloping. I attributed her desire to live with Daddy down partly to his wealth. Partly to the natural trials of being a growing girl, tricky enough, with the added tension of a stepfather and his different ways, plus jealousy of a new baby. These sorts of changes cause arguments in the most placid of families, even when there is not an ideological and cultural difference. But to join a Taliban madressa is more worrying. Girls will grow out of belly button piercing and boys with bad hair (or the boys with bad hair grow up into nice men with bad bald patches) but this is dangerous, and for life.

I can’t imagine how Mrs Campbell feels, or what she will do next, but I don’t imagine the problem can be solved by phone calls and a holiday in The Isles twice a year now. Pray for them. 

This speech ("We are Diversity, Diversity is Community, Community is Diversity, Diversity is Us") would be funny if it were not real. The gushing tone is reminiscent of Gwyneth Paltrow accepting an Oscar, but actresses are trivial people who don't matter. Universities do matter and should be better than this.

Of course universities should not discriminate - or rather they should, but on merit alone. It is quite astonishing that as recently as the Seventies only a handful of Oxford and Cambridge colleges admitted women. Such injustices had to be remedied, and were. And, on a case-by-case basis, there is an argument for taking an applicant's background into account. Faced with two candidates with identical A-level grades, one of whom went to Eton and the other to an inner-city "sink" school, an admissions tutor might well be justified in considering the potential of the second to be greater. But academic potential, not pity and not  diversity, should be the deciding factor. 

Let’s stand together to say: We are Michigan and we are diversity.

In Monty Python's Life of Brian, the crowd roars, "We are all individuals." A dissenter pipes up, "I'm not." Diversity, as advocated by Coleman and others, applies to race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, disability and so forth, but not to opinion. When it comes to ideas, a sinister uniformity rules. Diversity is Good. We all agree on that, don't we?

Coleman's ideal is a diverse university, replete with multi-abled, multi-ethnic, polysexual men, women and transsexuals who are all of one mind.

Thanks to Harry's Place for this moment of intimacy:

The University of Michigan has retreated, if not surrendered before voter mandate to end affirmative action admissions policies, reports the NY Sun:

The University of Michigan announced yesterday that it will comply with a new voter-approved ban on affirmative action and immediately stop considering race and gender in admissions.

The move came in the middle of the admissions process for next fall's freshman class. The university has already begun sending out acceptance and rejection letters.

The state constitutional amendment approved by the voters in November bans the use of race and gender preferences in public university admissions and government hiring and contracting.

After it passed, the university put its admission process on hold and asked the courts that it be given until this summer to comply with the ban, saying it would be too disruptive to change its policies now. But a federal appeals court said no.

"We cannot sustain any further delay in our admissions process without harming our ability to enroll a class of students for the 2007–08 academic year," Teresa Sullivan, executive vice president of academic affairs.

The university will continue its legal challenge of the measure in the meantime, Ms. Sullivan said.

"This is a big step forward, there's no doubt about it. It's good news," said Terence Pell, president of the Center for Individual Rights, a group that sued to force immediate compliance with the ban. "It's a watershed moment."

The university said it would use other criteria that are not explicitly race- or gender-based to achieve diversity.

And we already know how good these folks are at inexplicability.

Sheik Hilali opens his mouth and inserts his foot yet again. From The Australian

TAJ Din al-Hilali has ridiculed his adopted country on Egyptian television, dismissing the furore over his insults to women and defence of gang rapists while claiming Muslims had more right to live in Australia than the ancestors of convicts.

I once heard Australia described as the British working class set down in paradise; certainly my father’s cousins who emigrated in 1946 worked very hard to build a new life and secure prosperity for their families.

The latest outburst by Australia's chief Muslim cleric came during an interview as he enjoyed what was meant to be a self-imposed exile in the Middle East to duck the national outrage he sparked late last year. But rather than douse the controversy, which divided Muslim Australia and further strained relations with the broader community, the imam of Sydney's Lakemba mosque has inflamed it.

"The Western people are the biggest liars and oppressors and especially the English race," the mufti of Australia said in Arabic during the extensive interview in Eqypt, his birthplace. "The Anglo-Saxons who arrived in Australia arrived in shackles. We paid for passports from our own pockets. We have a right in Australia more than they have."

Having last year suggested victims should share the blame for being sexually assaulted, Sheik Hilali used the interview to blame the September 11 attacks on the US for influencing lengthy sentences given to Sydney's notorious Lebanese Muslim gang rapists. “Up until then the worst crime in Australia had received seven years' jail," he said.

He told the two interviewers during the wide-ranging discussion that his time in Australia since the early 1980s had given him a great insight into the Australian way of life and the Western mentality, which he labelled "oppressive".  But then, referring to gay unions, Sheik Hilali said: "I understand the mentality of the West and especially the Australian mentality and I understand that the Australian law guarantees freedoms to the point of insanity."

Having held on to his title as mufti of Australia and survived widespread calls last year for him to be sacked as Lakemba's religious leader, Sheik Hilali will come under renewed pressure to stand down when he returns to Australia.

Hilali, you are hilarious. Keep telling us what you think, you are doing more good than a regiment of inter faith dialogue representatives.

It's been a revelation, the world-wide attention and affection for this horse.  (And, once again, we have trainer Tim Woolley, a former steeplechase jockey in his native England, to thank for helping keep the world informed.)  This, on Barbaro's serious setback, in New Zealand-based Horsetalk:

Kentucky Derby winner Barbaro has had a significant setback over the last day.

Overnight, he became acutely more uncomfortable on his left hind foot. The foot cast was removed and some new separation of the medial (inside) portion of his hoof was found.

This required some additional debridement (removal of the damaged tissue) overnight on January 10.

He is being treated much more aggressively at this time for his discomfort. He is continuing to eat well and is otherwise stable. He has been put back in a sling in his stable.

The cast that was removed was applied on January 3, 2007 by Dr. Scott Morrison, an equine podiatry expert from Rood and Riddle Equine Hospital in Lexington, Kentucky.

"This cast was applied with the goal of starting to help re-align his coffin bone properly in that foot," said Dr. Dean W. Richardson, Chief of Surgery.

"His comfort on that foot has been good since the procedure." According to Dr. Richardson, radiographs taken on January 8, 2007 "show improved alignment of his coffin bone and continued healing of the fractured right hind pastern region.

His condition is stable and a firm decision concerning his discharge from the hospital has not been made."

Dr. Richardson leads Barbaro out on December 20.

I knew it! 

" 'People should be concerned about what we are doing to the climate,' said Jay Lawrimore, chief of the climate monitoring branch of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. 'Burning of fossil fuels is causing an increase in greenhouse gases, and there's a broad scientific consensus that is producing climate change.' "--Washington Post, Jan. 10

(h/t: James Taranto)

Supporters of the war on terror — the global war against jihadists as distinguished from its isolated battlefields in Iraq and Afghanistan — were surely heartened last night by President Bush’s monitory words for Iran and Syria. The president declared with apparent boldness:

Succeeding in Iraq also requires defending its territorial integrity and stabilizing the region in the face of extremist challenges. This begins with addressing Iran and Syria. These two regimes are allowing terrorists and insurgents to use their territory to move in and out of Iraq. Iran is providing material support for attacks on American troops. We will disrupt the attacks on our forces. We’ll interrupt the flow of support from Iran and Syria. And we will seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies in Iraq.

Sounds great. But there is less there than meets the ear — maybe much less.

At a background briefing before the president’s speech, administration officials, quite appropriately, refused to get into what the new strategy for dealing with Iran and Syria precisely entails. But it was fairly clear that military steps outside Iraq are highly unlikely.

An official pointedly explained that, while the violence in Iraq is being “fiercely stoked” by Iran and Syria, the mayhem would not end even if the Iranian and Syrian influence were to disappear. 

True enough, but still, this is a very strange distinction to draw. Material support is, after all, material support. Under the Bush Doctrine as articulated in September 2001, it is supposed to be met with a vigorous American response because we deem rogue regimes to be just like the terrorists they abet. Patently, in the case of Iran and Syria, we have not done that. In turning away from the Bush Doctrine in this most essential of its potential applications, we have turned away from the blueprint for winning the war — not the Battle of Baghdad but the War on Terror.

More importantly, though, this is not a zero-sum game. It is not a case in which, if the Iranian/Syrian influence were, say, 30 percent of the problem, subtracting it would leave the same 70 percent we face now.

No, even if you wish, for argument’s sake, to consider the war as existing only in Iraq, dealing decisively with these terror-facilitators would have a dynamic effect on the insurgency. It could be the difference between how the United States was perceived in the first six or so shock-and-awe months after the March 2003 invasion and how American resolve was seen in the ensuing three years — characterized by temporizing in Falluja, negotiating with terrorists (even some affiliated with al Qaeda), and abiding the provocations of Tehran and Damascus.

Thankfully, the president has not gone for the frivolous Iraq Study Group notion of direct negotiations with these enemy nations. All signs, however, are that nuance rather than unambiguous resolve is still the note we are trying to hit.

Administration thinking is that Iran is a neighbor of Iraq and, consequently, it is unreasonable to expect Iraq to have the same relationship with Iran that we have. Geopolitically, the theory goes, they have to have a different modus vivendi.

Maybe so. But if Iran is still part of the “axis of evil” — and, let’s face it, the mullahs and Ahmadinejad have gotten only more provocative since the president famously used that phrase in January 2002 — it is difficult to understand what accommodations we foresee. In the raging sectarian warfare, Iran promotes jihadists of both Sunni and Shiite stripe. Plainly, it sees its interest in a destabilized Iraq. For our part, we’ve shrunk from making regime change in Iran official American policy. So just what kind of constructive role do we really think Tehran, as presently constituted, could ever play in Iraq?

In any event, most telling was one administration official’s sense that our forces in Iraq had “sure sent a signal to the Iranians” by detaining the Iranian military officials who were captured in raids in mid-December. Yet, even as the president was preparing his new strategy, even as he was readying the words of warning he uttered so forcefully last night, those Iranians were released by the Maliki government and sent back to Iran after about a week in custody.

What signal can this have sent? This one: If you’re an Iranian in Iraq helping to kill American troops, the comeuppance is that we’ll hold you for a few days and then send you back home.

Actions, the old saw tells us, speak louder than words. Given our actions, and what they imply about our sentiments, it’s going to take a lot more than last night’s rhetoric to make an impression on Iran and Syria.

"I am already looking for alternate education for my children. It seems that collegiate level educational institutions in this country are a colossal waste of time and money. With the mental depravation that these schools foster, I might recommend sniffing glue as an alternative. besides being cheaper, how much worse can it be?" --from a reader

"mental depravation..."

A splendid slip, or a deliberate petticoat?

Se non è fatto apposto, è ben trovato.

Or perhaps you meant to write "depravation" and not "deprivation" and it is I who misunderstand. After all, in this case, the deprivation is in the depravation, and vice-versa.

John Hawkins carefully demolishes several such conspiracy theories, concluding,

The reality is that even if Bush were a diabolical mastermind who wanted to dump the dollar and form a North American Union, he doesn't have the authority to do it without the consent of Congress and without it passing muster at the Supreme Court, neither of which would happen.

This is what the conspiracy theorists don't want you to realize because once you get out of the weeds and stop talking about roads, obscure reports, and professors, it becomes obvious that this conspiracy theory doesn't hold water. But, people like Corsi have gone too far out on a limb to ever admit that. So, they'll keep on insisting that the Bush Administration is about to implement a North American Union until Bush is out of office and then they'll try to take credit for preventing the implementation of a non-existent plot rather than admit that they didn't have the slightest idea what they were talking about.

But, for just a moment, let's forget about Corsi and let's talk about you. Do you think America should jealously guard its sovereignty? Good, so do I. Do you oppose the amnesty plan for illegal aliens that George Bush favors? Good, so do I. Would you oppose any sort of North American Union if it were ever offered up? Good, so would I.

Yes, Mr. Hawkins, of course, but simply doing nothing about open borders guarantees a defacto continental mobocracy, a North American Blob that would make a return to feudalism look like progress.  Crawfordonia, anybody?

The Maroon, the University of Chicago's self-described "independent" student newspaper, endorses enforcement of "gender neutral" dorms (emphasis added):

Inter-House Council (IHC) recently considered the possibility of gender-neutral housing—and hopefully will move forward with this idea. Implementing gender-neutral housing options would be a positive decision for the University community. Past additions of gender-neutral bathrooms to our campus accommodated the privacy of transgendered individuals or individuals who felt constrained by traditional gender labels. The University would be in keeping with this philosophy of promoting a diverse campus community by extending this policy of gender-neutral options into the dorms. This would allow students to live in an environment that conforms with their notions of gender.

Gender-neutral housing would obviously not be universalized. We aren’t advocating the imposition of this policy on all students, as that would also hinder the quality and improvement of student life. People with religious, cultural, or personal reasons for wanting gender-specific housing should have that option. Yet it’s important that not only their requests, but also other students’ requests be honored—and this can be done by including the option of gender-neutral housing. Student demand for such a housing option is just as valid as student demand for gender-specific rooms, suites, or floors.

This plan wouldn’t only benefit students, but would most likely benefit the University as well. The University is a fan of keeping students in Housing, and adding gender-neutral facilities to dorms would add incentive for students to stay in the dorms.

But keeping transgendered students in housing is not only something the University ought to stride toward in order to achieve its own ends. Forcing different types of students together is for everyone’s benefit and is one of the best ways to overcome the stereotypes and prejudices that are rampant in our society.

But most importantly, if the University wants to act consistently with the thinking behind the initial proposal of gender-neutral bathrooms, and respect members of the University community who do not primarily identify themselves with a specific gender, then gender-neutral housing is the only logical next step.

(h/t: Guy Benson)

"pretty much like the rest of us—has no clue where to go from here" - John Derbyshire

Speak for yourself, John. I'm sure Hugh Fitzgerald, who has been forwarding a comprehensive Iraq strategy for the last 3+ years, would disagree, as do I. A coherent, comprehensive strategy is impossible for those who refuse to study Islam, but not for those of us who have undertaken this study. The way forward is simple and blindingly obvious, though not politically correct in the current climate.

Islam is quintessentially tolerant. Its adherents are hospitable to liberty, equality, and pluralism, the rudiments of modern democracy. Those committing terror in its name are heretics — a fringe which has “hijacked” a “religion of peace.”

This conventional wisdom brims over the mainstream media’s daily servings. It is, moreover, the not-to-be-questioned premise of U.S. policy on a host of paramount issues: everything from how the war on terror is conceptualized and prosecuted, to the wisdom of negotiations with Iran, a sovereign state for Palestinians, agitation for freedom and popular self-determination throughout the Middle East, and the assumption that our own growing Muslim population will seamlessly assimilate.

But is it true?

Emphatically, the answer is “no.” So argues best-selling author and Jihad Watch director Robert Spencer in The Truth about Muhammad — Founder of the World’s Most Intolerant Religion (Regnery, 256 pages, $27.95). And he does not expect you to take his word for it.

the rest is here

I was genuinely flummoxed by this post about "gender neutral bathrooms".

Does it mean unisex toilets, as in Ally McBeal?

In the UK we don't tend to use "bathroom" as a euphemism for toilet. A bathroom is a room with a bath and/or shower in it, though it may also have a toilet.  So that that kind of bathroom is the first thing I thought of. I was then puzzled as to how it could be "neutral" about gender. People, and perhaps colours, are neutral, but a bathroom has no opinion or attitude.

It was only when I read the bit about transgendered embarrassment that I came to the conclusion that it could mean mixed or unisex toilets. Am I correct? If so, this is a very bad idea. Men's toilets, as I can tell from the odd whiff you get when the door is opened, are nasty, smelly places. Women chat to each other in toilets. I am told that this is unheard of in men's. If two couples are in a pub together, it is quite normal for one of the women to say to the other, "I'm off to the loo - are you coming?" The men would not do this, but would stay behind, wondering what the women were gossiping about.

Incidentally, unlike Americans, we  do not generally say "rest room". I remember on a visit to a rather primitive country,  our local guide, who had learned American English, would invite us to visit the “rest room”. Since the “rest room” was often just a hole in the ground or a bucket, there was not much rest to be had. At any rate, you would need to be very tired.

Succeeding in Iraq also requires defending its territorial integrity - and stabilizing the region in the face of the extremist challenge. This begins with addressing Iran and Syria. These two regimes are allowing terrorists and insurgents to use their territory to move in and out of Iraq. Iran is providing material support for attacks on American troops. We will disrupt the attacks on our forces. We will interrupt the flow of support from Iran and Syria. And we will seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies in Iraq.--from The President's Speech

And then the Sunnis will acquiesce in the loss of power to what more and more of those Sunnis are willing to call "Rafidite dogs" and "Persians," and are aided by the howls and screams against those Shi'a all over the Sunni Muslim world -- not least in the influential press of Cairo, and the Arab-language press of London.

And the Shi'a will not object, apparently, to the sealing of borders with Iran's Shi'a, even as Sunni money -- through all kinds of financial finagling -- flows in, and of course the borders not only with Syria, but with Jordan and even with Saudi Arabia (the Shammar tribe flows over that border of Iraq and Syria) and Kuwait, would have to be sealed.

Last I looked, the American government was not capable of controlling or monitoring successfully a certain border much closer to home. But now we are told that the Americans will seal off the very long border between Iraq and Iran, with all kinds of the most difficult terrain -- here desert, there mountain -- and will somehow interdict as well the Syrian border.

And then what? Does the Administration think that it is conceivable that the Shi'a will ever turn on their own militia, other, that is, temporarily, and half-heartedly, only in order to keep the Americans pleased so that they remain to inflict one more year of damage on the Sunnis of Anbar Province and, so it is hoped, of Baghdad as well, and of course to "train" more of those "Iraqis" who consist largely of Shi'a who look covetously at all that fancy American military equipment and are determined to lay their hands on as much of it -- or make the Americans leave as much of it behind ("we need it in order to fight the terrorists") as they can, and the Administration, with all of its bright trust in the Good People of Iraq, and its inability, its fear, of ever recognizing the menace and full malevolence of Islam, will no doubt play along, in order to help those "ordinary moms and dads all over the Middle East" whom Bush, and those who wish to share his hallucinatory view of things, tell us exist in such numbers, and all we need to do is put Iraq on the right path, and things will be well.

But for Muslims -- not for Chalabi, not for Allawi, not for Kanan Makiya, who represent the thinnest stratum, that of the secular, advanced, thoroughly westernized Iraqis in exile, but for the 95% or 98%% of Muslim Arabs in Iraq as elsewhere, the Right Path is quite other. It is the Right Path of jihad fi sabil allah -- struggle in the path of Allah. And we all know where that path, without undue meandering, leads.

Not a glimmer or a hint of recognition that the depth and duration of the Sunni-Shi'a split, which goes back to the first century of Islam, and the effects of which can be seen all over the Muslim world -- just look at Pakistan, where Sipaha-e-Sahaba is a Sunni terrorist group devoted to attacks on Shi'a professionals and Shia' institutions, or at Saudi Arabia, where the Shi'a (almost all located in the Eastern Province, Al-Hasa, and right where the oilfields are located) are treated with such contempt by the Wahhabis; or Bahrain, where Shi'a  who make up 70-75% of the population chafe under a Sunni ruler; or Lebanon, where for decades the Shi'a have been treated with contumely by the Sunni Arabs, and now reveal, in their belief that their time has come round at last, that they will give back as good as they got, and not only to the Christians and the Druse, but to the Sunnis as well; and then there is Afghanistan, where the Sunni Taliban was engaged in systematic mass-murder of the Shi'a Hazara.

Yet Bush thinks this can be overcome. After all, in 2002, when making plans for the invasion of Iraq, and in 2003, in carrying it out, he apparently never understood -- and no doubt hardly understands today -- the depth of the Sunni-Shi'a clash, and because he does not understand Islam, cannot possibly understand the failure or inability to compromise with enemies, the aggressive worldview, in which Believers are always at war with Infidels, being so easily and naturally transferred to other enemies, and in the case of the Sunni those enemies are the Shi'a and in the case of the Shia' those enemies are the Sunnis, and on top of that, there is the ethnic divide, which Sunnis now -- inaccurately -- emphasize, by which the Shi'a of Iraq, many of whom may in fact now seek the support from, as they once sought exile in, the Islamic Republic of Iran, are described for Sunni audiences, and then taken to be, "Persians" which of course means "not-Arabs" and if "not-Arabs" then that means that they are inferior Muslims, and still worse, as Shi'a are painted as "Persians" and worthy of that phrase "Rafidite dogs" that al-Zarqawi so often employed.

Bush simply cannot think ahead because he cannot think clearly now. Whatever his sport may be, it is not chess. He doesn't think in those terms. He doesn't know how much one has to know, and how little one can just wing it. He didn't grow up with those nice books on chess for young boys, and he didn't discover, at the age of ten, that when Capablanca, in 1928, at Bad Kissingen, makes a certain move, it is exactly the right move, and his famous opponent (Alekhine?) will as a result lose that game a few moves later. Chess is not Bush's game, but rather football -- or rather, watching football.

By now even Bush must realize that there is no possibility of making Iraq into a Light Unto the Muslim Nations. It is crazy to think that the very countries, Sunni Arab lands, would ever be happy at what the removal of Saddam Hussein's Sunni despotism would naturally result in: diminished political and economic power for Sunnis in Iraq, and the entrenched dominance of the Shi'a, in the Land of Two Rivrs which, with Egypt, is one of the two historic centers of Arab power, and above Egypt as the main historic center for high Islamic civilization, and therefore essential to Arab mythologizing about the Great Arab and Islamic Past. How could any Sunni Arab ruler or people, given the inevitably of that transfer of power to the Shi'a, ever be expected to take this transformed, Shi'a-dominated  Iraq as a "model" of anything. This should have been clear long ago. It was clear, to some, at the very beginning of the whole business, and they were not shy about stating it. But no one in power, no one at My Weekly Standard, none of the loyalists, none of the policy-planners and think-tankers, were among them.

 And when Bush goes on again about "democracy" spreading around the Middle East, and mentions Lebanon, where a moment's thought would tell him that real "democracy," that is one-man-one-vote without any of those confessional power-sharing arrangements, according to the 1932 Census figures, by which the Christians still maintain themselves, would lead to a disaster for those Christians, and when he continues to mention the "Palestinian territories" as an example of wonderful "democracy" at work, he shows that he is one of those innocents who might be called "process-oriented" rather than "outcome-oriented," and who is therefore not someone intelligent enough to fight a war, a war that requires a knowledge and a cunning beyond anything he, or his loyalists, can conceivably understand.

And when he praises the participation of the "Iraqis" in "democracy" he still overlooks the main point: the Shi'a went out and voted, as a collective, for Shi'a parties, because they were told to by Al-Sistani and other figures (the leaders of SCIRI, the Da'wa party, even Moqtada al-Sadr), and the Sunni Arabs did not participate because they, unlike the Shi'a, are "against democracy" but because they knew that they could not come out ahead through a vote -- unlike the Shi'a -- because they constitute 19% of the population and not 60-65%, as do the Shi'a Arabs. Bush can't see that.

Nor, at this point, can he conceivably allow himself to believe that the Sunni-Shi'a split cannot be overcome, precisely because of its duration and depth that go far beyond whatever Saddam Hussein did. Why not? Because if he were to do so, then the public would begin to ask: if the Sunni-Shi'a split was so profound, so that it cannot be healed by a jobs program or another 21,500 men "surging" in Baghdad, then why did you ever have the schemes and dreams that you did have for Iraq?

And Bush will have no answer. Nor will all those Bush loyalists.

And then others will begin to think the obvious: if the Sunnis and Shi'a are unable to compromise, and if they both dislike or hate their American saviors because those Americans are Infidels, and if furthermore both sides exhibit such such aggression, such violence (all those dozens of bodies, found in so many cases to have been fiendishly tortured, with drills as well as with those all-purpose knives), toward each other, and such obvious meretriciousness and manipulation of the not-quite-endlessly naive and hopeful Americans (including those go-to-guys, those officers specially trained in "anti-insurgency techniques" who keep forgetting about the central role of Islam, and that there is no good and loyal side to protect and work beside, but merely differing groups of hostile Muslim Arabs -- the Kurds, about whom much more could be said, are a different matter, and deserve support for geopolitical as well as, in some cases, sentimental reasons).

Bush has learned nothing. He even dares to suggest that if this effort does not work then "American troops" will have to stay longer.

No they won't. Because he will be out. He will have done great damage to an intelligent effort to divide and demoralize the Camp of Islam, and to limit Muslim use of Da'wa and demographic conquest. He has already squandered enormous sums of money, war matériel, and lives that did not have to be lost, for the Americans could have left in early 2004, when the regime had been crushed, Saddam Hussein captured, his sons killed, and the inevitable -- which Bush seems incapable of recognizing and then putting to use, for the benefit of Americans and other Infidels -- began to happen, as the Sunnis, alarmed at their loss of power, and the Shi'a, bent on revenge and feeling their new power, began to go at it -- and will, even more, just as soon as the Americans leave. And the Americans should have left the day before yesterday.

Ah yes. "If we don't fight them over there, they will follow us home." (Sen. Mitch McConnell)

"They will follow us home."

A statement made by many, who think that no one will challenge the idiocy of such a remark. How exactly?

I'll tell you how.

In the ways that are already occurring. For every time people get off a plane or a boat who are Muslim, who believe in Islam, who adhere to the teachings of Islam, who are taught that their loyalty is only to Islam and the umma al-islamiyya, and that there is a natural division of the world between Believer and Infidel, and that the world belongs to the first, so that Dar al-Islam and Dar al-Harb are in a state of permanent, uncompromising conflict, and furthermore that mere mortal man has a duty to submit to the will, not of other mere mortal men (which is the basis of all advanced Western democracies), nor to accord to mere mortal men rights which contradict Islam (those rights, including the right of free speech, and freedom of conscience, and the legal equality of men and women, and of all faiths, are also now part of, deemed essential to, those advanced Western democracies), then those people getting off those planes or boats carry with them undeclared in their mental baggage a belief-system, for most of them unshakeable, that has in time and space proven inimical to all non-Muslims, sometimes leading to forcible mass conversion, sometimes leading to mass killings (as the 60-70 million Hindus killed by Muslim invaders and rulers), and sometimes, by the infliction, sooner or later, of that status which, according to the immutable Shari'a, must be imposed on non-Muslims under Muslim rule -- the status of the dhimmi, which is to say a status of humiliation, degradation, and permanent physical insecurity.

And because Muslims are inculcated with the idea of Muslim superiority, and the natural right of Muslims to rule and Muslim institutions to prevail, and since further they have a duty, sometimes collective and sometimes individual, to participate in Jihad (which need not involve military force, for money, propaganda, Da'wa, and demographic conquest are also instruments of Jihad), it is clear that they cannot, and cannot rationally be expected to be, supporters of the legal and political institutions of Infidels, nor of their social arrangements and understandings (though they may temporarily acquiesce in such arrangements and begrudgingly accept, for now, those legal and political institutions) -- for these are flatly contradicted by Islam.

Islam "is to dominate and is not to be dominated." Muhammad said that. Muhammad, the exemplar of right conduct (uswa hasana), Muhammad the Perfect Man (al-insan al-kamil).

It is folly not to take Islam seriously. It is folly to entrust the teaching of Islam to apologists for Islam, both Muslim and non-Muslim. It is folly not to study the canonical texts, and what are made of those texts by imams and jurisconsults and such figures as al-Qaradawi. It is folly to participate, lemming-like, in an act of collective Pollyannism or perhaps merely criminal negligence, as Europeans have discovered, late, as they look around their own countries and discover what the large-scale presence of Muslims has meant, means, will mean, for them.

Such "staunch allies" as Saudi Arabia and Egypt and Jordan (all of which are not staunch allies, not allies, not friends but enemies) have tried to make the Americans believe that they, the Americans, have to stay in Iraq to "prevent Iran" from taking over. By this what they mean is that the Sunnis should be protected from the Shi'a militia (so that outside Sunnis, such as those in Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Jordan) will not have to supply money, matériel, and men themselves, and the best way to inveigle the Americans into doing what you want -- all the Arabs, and indeed even non-Arab Muslims, have been so good at this.

Just look at how so many in Washington were snookered by the assurances of plausible Shi'a in exile about how once Saddam Hussein was removed all manner of things would be well, and Iraq would practically be a Light Unto the Muslim Nations. Those Shi'a-in-exile, or some of them, may simply have misremembered the violence and aggression of their own Muslim country, having been away so long, and having allowed themselves to believe that it was all a matter of Saddam Hussein (did they forget how Nuri es-Said died? Or Qassem? Or the history of coups and counter-coups and massacres and tribal rebellions in Iraq? Apparently, they did, or convinced themselves that they, those most unrepresentative men, were representative of some non-existent Iraq).

And now it is the turn of the Sunni Arabs to snooker the Americans. And by raising the specter of Iran as the sole worry, and insisting that the best way to deal with Iran is to stand up for the Sunnis and Sunni interests in Iraq -- my, how surprising -- they are in fact preventing the Americans from dealing with the most important task involving Iran, which is not to help the Sunnis in Iraq, or to hold back the Shi'a militia (who will not be held back, and the Shi'a government will not really allow those militia to be destroyed or truly disbanded), but to damage or destroy the nuclear weapons project.

Since the Sunni Arabs calculate that those nuclear weapons are likely to be used first against Israel, and the Sunni Arabs would not at all mind an exchange in which Israel were to be destroyed and in turn to destroy much of Iran, that is not what they wish to have the Americans focus on. No, the Sunni Arabs argue, the way to limit the power of Iran is to do two things. One is to help the Sunni Arabs of Iraq, in their brave and principled stance against the Shi'a domination which merely reflects this hideous one-man-one-vote idea. And the second, of course, is to pressure Israel, to force it to give up still more territory to the Arabs, in order, and now a look of the utmost sincerity from Mubarak, from Abdullah of Jordan, from assorted Saudi potentates and powers, is directed at the American official with whom that particular Sunni Arab ruler is speaking, "that is the best way to deprive Iran of its appeal to the Arab street."

In other words, throw Israel to this particular pack of wolves, and let the leaders of that pack howl with delight, howls which translated into the real language of men will mean  "see, we're the ones who managed to achieve the further weakening of the Zionist entity and we're the ones who later can go in for the kill -- not that other pack of wolves over there, the ones who live in Teheran. "

It is disgusting that such obvious manipulation of those who are entrusted with the task of instructing and protecing us should succeed, shoudl succeed so ften, and so repeatedly, and with transparent guile and obvious wiles, or that should be transparent, should be obvious. But those who they refuse to sit still and study Islam -- not rely on the bulleted summaries of aides, nor on a quick lecture by someone who himself is shaky about the whole matter -- makes those in charge easily fooled, easily distracted, easily undone. How many books on Islam do you think Bush and Rice have managed to read, and what might those books have been? -- both the texts (and what the authors of tafsir, or commentators on the Qur'an, have made of those texts), have no mental ballast and no way to stay grimly and unshakably on course, and the teachings of Islam as demonstrated in the behavior of Muslims, over the past 1350 years of Jihad-conquest and subjugation of non-Muslims, and in the current behavior of Muslims, toward non-Muslims in the countries where Islam now rules, and the behavior of Muslims toward non-Muslim legal and political institutions in the countries still under the control of non-Muslims? How many books? Twenty? Five? Or as I can hear Bush and Rice and the others saying -- we rely on our staffs, our excellent staffs. They prepare position papers. They give us all the "background" we need. So, our leaders imply as they are caught out in their self-assured ignorance -- "'What need one?"  

One can keep avoiding finding things out, or telling oneself they cannot possibly be true, because then the responsibility to deal with that reality becomes, for some, simply too complicated and troubling. Or one can continue to pretend that one grasps the key matter at hand, and that all kinds of brilliant strategies exist, are being executed, but are deliberately being kept hidden from the public.

Or one can get out the way -- or in an election be forced out of the way-- so that those who understand that one of the responsibilities of rule is to fully inform oneself about things, and right now, above all other things, about Islam.

It was not in a game with Alekhine that Capablanca made the move I referred to below. He had played Alekhine for the world championship the year before, and lost, to his own amazement and that of Alekhine. From then on Alekhine was careful to avoid being in a tournament with Capablanca. At Bad Kissingen the Cuban's opponent in the game I was alluding to was Nimzowitsch.

There is something particularly attractive about Capablanca. Perhaps it has to do with his having been a lonely Cuban among so many chess players who were predictably either Russian or Jewish, because we all like a little "diversity," don't we, especially when it the result of unforced individual genius or talent,  and is not quite being achieved in the programmatic and forced way that American university presidents seem to like it. Are we pleased to discover that when Capablanca married, his wife's maiden named turned out to be Olga Chagodaeva? Or perhaps a little chagrinned?

"But President Bush clearly understands that we absolutely cannot give al Qaeda and its abettors a victory in Iraq — on that, our lives depend.  He should be applauded for that." -- Andy McCarthy 

But why would a withdrawal from Iraq give Al Qaeda -- a Sunni organization -- a "victory in Iraq"? Would not Al Qaeda in Iraq take the side of the Sunnis, and thus be hunted by the Shi'a militia, unleashed, and aided (and abetted) by other Shi'a who would be fighting for their lives and their new position in Iraq, and unlikely to remain as inhibited as they have been as long as the tsk-tsking Americans have remained? What makes anyone think that "Al Qaeda" would gain "victory in Iraq"? Where? In Basra or anywhere else in the south? In the Kurdish-dominated lands? In Baghdad itself? Suppose Al Qaeda were to rule the roost, somehow, in a reduced Sunni dominion in Anbar Province, an area now cut off from the central government's oil revenues, cut off from almost everything except the Syrian Desert, and under constant pressure from Shi'a (perhaps determined to extend ethnic cleansing to the whole of Iraq, or as much of it as they can reach) to the east and south, and Kurds from the north? How would this be a "victory for Al Qaeda"? Why does Iraq suddenly become, whenever an American withdrawal is spoken about, in the writings of those who oppose such a withdrawal, either a certain victim of Al Qaeda which will magically come to dominate, or a certain vassal to Iran (ditto)? Does the Sunni-Shi'a warfare suddenly come to an end when the Americans leave?

There are "abettors" of Al Qaeda -- some Sunnis in and out of Iraq, and then there are the "abutters" of Iraq, including the most powerful immediate abutter, Iran. And that abutter, and those abettors, are not likely to deal kindly with each other.

Let the best abutter win, after an endless decade-long fight. Or let the best abettor win, after ditto. And let them exhaust themselves, and use up their men, money, matériel, morale, and everything else.