Here's a nifty write-up of counterinsurgency sensei David Kilcullen's speech at Johns Hopkins, delivered last night. Kilcullen's been in the news recently, warning of a "Suez-like disaster" should the White House lowball USFOR-A boss Gen McChrystal's request for 40k additional combat troops. DoD Buzz's Greg Grant gives us the synopsis.

I wanted to highlight some of the points [Kilcullen] made in remarks the other day to a British newspaper to clarify his position on Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s troop request, and why a large troop surge is needed. First off, he said the Taliban are much better fighters than the insurgents in Iraq. “The Taliban love to fight,” he said, and their operational skills have improved significantly over the past three years as they’ve learned and adapted to U.S. and NATO tactics.

The Taliban’s rapid adaptation — a theme we return to again and again here in our discussions of irregular warriors — is what makes them so tough on the battlefield. American units rotate in and out of theater. The Taliban stay and can work a group of new recruits up the skill chain pretty rapidly by exposing them first to small ambushes or sniping away at American outposts and letting them grqduate to larger firefights. If they survive the early engagements, they become quite experienced and skilled fighters. They are going up against the world’s most advanced military after all.

“One of the [Taliban’s] biggest strengths is that they’ve shown the ability to absorb and adapt to successive increases in foreign presence… and come back stronger,” Kilcullen said. He believes trickling in a few thousand troops at a time as reinforcements is a bad idea: “They’ll just take it in stride and adapt; they’ve done that four times already.”

That’s why Kilcullen has publicly called for a plus-up of at least 30,000 to 40,000 troops and has said a “middle ground” option is just courting failure. McChrystal said he needs to launch a counteroffensive to knock the Taliban off stride and regain the initiative. That requires a large enough force that can keep the Taliban off balance, Kilcullen says. “The worst place to be is in that middle band of 20–30,000 troops.”

Nothing to fear. Though the President will likely shortchange General McChrystal's troop request, his charm, charisma, and supernatural diplomacy powers will soon make war obsolete anyway.

Standing on a riser wearing a blue suit and red tie, with a cluster of troops and a large American flag behind him, Obama expressed "the gratitude of the American public" and said his meetings in four countries over eight days in Asia will help deliver a "safer more prosperous world for all of us."

America's fighting men and women play a vital role in this ambitious plan.

"You guys make a pretty good photo op," the president said.

If bin Laden is captured, the Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee doesn't see any need at all to interrogate the al Qaeda founder and mastermind -- because we already have enough on him for a "conviction."

If the U.S. captures Osama bin Laden, there's no need to interrogate him, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee said Thursday.

Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), the chairman of that committee, said that arguments raised by Republican senators about whether bin Laden would be afforded Miranda rights if he were captured amount to a "red herring."

"The red herring that my friend [Sen.] Lindsey Graham [R-S.C.] was covering is not realistic," Leahy said during an appearance on "Washington Journal" on C-SPAN.

"For one thing, capturing Osama bin Laden — we've had enough on him, we don't need to interrogate him," Leahy added.

Leahy went on to defend Holder, saying "We're going to bring them back to New York and prosecute them...I think we ought to stand up and applaud that." Why would we stand up and applaud that? Democrats seem to genuinely believe that this is all a show, that as soon as the decent and law-abiding Obama administration starts giving terrorists their due process rights, our enemies will lay down their arms and simply surrender to our moral superiority. But we've already tried it this way. The first time these guys attacked the WTC, the Clinton administration did everything by the book -- due process for terrorists in U.S. courts. And how'd that work out?

According to a lot of media coverage, the only difference between Florida governor Charlie Crist and former Florida House speaker Marco Rubio is that the governor supported the Obama stimulus package. Therefore, conservatives are waging an ideological crusade against Crist for straying from conservative orthodoxy on this one issue. The reality is different. Crist has a "moderate" record on other issues as well: he supported California-style emissions standards in Florida, appointed liberal judges to the Supreme Court, and though he calls himself "pro-life" he's said he can't think of a single restriction on abortion he'd favor in Florida.

So conservatives are naturally backing Rubio. But what's really fueling the excitement about Rubio's candidacy is not just his beliefs but the fact that he's a young, charismatic Cuban-American who has a record of developing ideas and fighting to implement policies of conservative reform. It's unfortunate that Charlie Crist, still far ahead in the polls, continues to avoid debating Rubio. Crist is no slouch. He comes across as a likeable person, he's popular, and isn't nearly as liberal as Arlen Specter or Dede Scozzafava.

So Rubio is left trying to get his message out through stump speeches and, beginning today, a series of YouTube videos. In the first "Marco In His Own Words" two-minute spot, Rubio makes the case against Obamacare as the first step to a single-payer system. He also calls for reforms on which there's a consensus. You can watch it here:

When Paul Krugman and Niall Ferguson agree on something, it's worth paying attention. In recent weeks, both the liberal New York Times columnist and the free-market Harvard University historian have penned op-eds calling on China to allow the renminbi to appreciate against the dollar. Here's Ferguson:

Right now, Chimerica clearly serves China better than America. Call it the 10:10 deal: the Chinese get 10 percent growth; America gets 10 percent unemployment. The deal is even worse for the rest of the world — and that includes some of America’s biggest export markets and most loyal allies. The question is: What can the United States offer to make the Chinese abandon the dollar peg that has served them so well?

The authorities in Beijing must be made to see that any book losses on its reserve assets resulting from changes in the exchange rate will be a modest price to pay for the advantages they reaped from the Chimerica model: the transformation from third-world poverty to superpower status in less than 15 years. In any case, these losses would be more than compensated for by the increase in the dollar value of China’s huge stock of renminbi assets.

It is also in China’s interest to kick its currency-intervention habit. A heavily undervalued renminbi is the key financial distortion in the world economy today. If it persists for much longer, China risks losing the very foundation of its economic success: an open global trading regime.

Does Obama have the pull to convince the Chinese that something like the arrangement Ferguson describes is in Beijing's interest? I'm not so sure. Which is why Chinese currency manipulation, which helped fuel the U.S. real-estate bubble in mid-decade, may be fueling a much larger asset bubble today. No one will be happy when it pops.

Among the health-care proposals advanced so far, here is the clear order of merit:

1. the House Republican bill (the only proposal the CBO says would lower insurance premiums);

2. the status quo;

3. the massive Democratic attempts to overhaul our nation’s health-care system and dramatically increase government control.

Over at NRO, however, former Deputy Secretary of Health and Human Services Tevi Troy and I outline a proposal that's modeled off of the small bill presented in these pages. It would combine the best features of the House Republican bill with far more effective help for the uninsured. Our proposal would end the unfair tax on the uninsured (and self-insured)—giving them a long-overdue tax-break similar to that which is already enjoyed by those with employer-provided insurance.

The proposal, which we’re hoping Senate Republicans will review and will consider adopting as the Republican alternative, would be a “triple crown” bill: It would lower health costs, significantly reduce the number of uninsured, and be deficit-neutral. The House Republican bill hit on two of these three (not bad), while the Democratic bills in the House and Senate hit on only one (the number of uninsured) while making the other two substantially worse (health costs and deficits).

And unlike the Democratic bills, our proposal would also have the added advantage of not raising Americans’ taxes by hundreds of billions of dollars, or siphoning hundreds of billions of dollars out of already barely-solvent Medicare and spending it elsewhere.

We hope you’ll give the proposed bill a look—and will encourage your GOP senators to do the same.

Via Hot Air, the Washington Times unearths a quote from New York Senator Chuck Schumer in which, just a few weeks after the 9/11 attacks, Schumer mocks the idea that anyone would give the 9/11 plotters the same rights afforded to American citizens charged with pick-pocketing.

There are also those prisoners of war who we have captured and will capture in Afghanistan and other countries who will receive a trial of some sort. It is clear we need to try those suspects in a forum that achieves two primary goals—two goals, I might add, that may not conflict. First, the Government must have the power to use even the most sensitive classified evidence against these suspects without compromising national security in any way, shape, or form. In addition, those who commit acts of war against the United States, particularly those who have no color of citizenship, don’t deserve the same panoply of due process rights that American citizens receive. Should Osama bin Laden be captured alive—and I imagine most Americans hope he won’t be captured alive. But if he is, it is ludicrous to suggest he should be tried in a Federal court on Center Street in Lower Manhattan.

Yesterday, when Holder was asked whether bin Laden would be read Miranda rights if he were captured by U.S. forces, his answer: "that all depends..." Ed Morrissey asks, "What has changed in eight years to transform KSM and his cohorts into people who do 'deserve the same panoply of due process rights that American citizens receive'?" On that, the Washington Times was unable to get a straight answer from Schumer.

No surprise here, Tehran doesn't believe sanctions will materialize and have buried the lion's share of their HEU stockpiles -- and accompanying centrifuge cascades -- in a massive underground complex near the Isfahan Nuclear Technology Center. Isfahan, Tehran's version of Cheyenne Mountain, is well protected by advanced Russian radar systems, surface-to-air missile batteries, and roughly 150 meters of rock and concrete. The logistical hurdles involved in destroying such a facility would be nearly insurmountable.

Iran’s foreign minister said in remarks reported Wednesday that he opposes sending the country’s enriched uranium abroad under a tentative deal negotiated with the United States and other big powers last month. The foreign minister’s remarks cast further doubt on the deal, which the Obama administration had hoped would defuse a standoff over Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

The foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, told the student news agency ISNA that Iran would consider a simultaneous swap of its nuclear fuel for other uranium. But he told ISNA, “Definitely, Iran will not send its 3.5 percent-enriched fuel out.”

Mr. Mottaki is the highest-ranking Iranian official to openly reject the deal, which was brokered by the United Nations nuclear agency and would require Iran to export much of its low-enriched uranium abroad for processing. But it was unclear whether Mr. Mottaki’s comments reflected Iran’s official stance or were simply more posturing from Iran, which has yet to give an unambiguous official response to the nuclear deal.

So Iran has very publicly played President Obama for a fool, faking their way through negotiations that were a farce from the get-go. The question now becomes one of response. Israel has indicated that the current negotiations could be Iran's last chance for a non-military solution. Now that Iran's own foreign minister has admitted that negotiations will fail, will the United States drop its objections to Israeli military action? And, more importantly, will Obama green light the massive ordnance penetrator -- a weapon widely believed designed specifically for the inaccessible Isfahan facility -- for export?

Chances that the White House will order a U.S. strike hover between slim and none and equipping the capable Israeli Air Force with MOPs would essentially be the same thing as condoning an attack. It's more likely that the Obama administration has resigned itself to a restructured deterrence framework with the Iranians -- an increasingly difficult task, considering how aggressively the president is cutting both our strategic arsenals and missile defense.

The mammogram message: "Democrats cannot afford to lose the support of women on this issue, but the announcement plays into a narrative already advanced by the pro-choice movement that ObamaCare will ration healthcare for women. The Obama administration is clearly worried about this."

And, this won't help.

Harrycare is a rotten deal: "To pay for the bill, Reid would impose $371.9 billion of new taxes over 10 years, including $67 billion on health insurers; $23 billion in on drug companies; and $20 billion on medical device makers. All of these taxes are likely to be passed directly on to consumers in the former of higher health care costs."

Post-racial Jesse Jackson: "You can't vote against health care and call yourself a black man."

Report: Palin photographer breached contract by selling photo to Newsweek.

America's safest cities.

Gay marriage opponents suing D.C. over decision not to allow a ballot initiative.

Video: Holder confronted by 9/11 families at testimony about KSM trial.

HarryCare is a rotten deal: "To pay for the bill, Reid would impose $371.9 billion of new taxes over 10 years, including $67 billion on health insurers; $23 billion in on drug companies; and $20 billion on medical device makers. All of these taxes are likely to be passed directly on to consumers in the former of higher health care costs."

Maybe he knows what really happened to Tupac?

In yesterday's Wall Street Journal, Michael Boskin made the case for a payroll tax cut:

My Stanford colleague Pete Klenow and Rochester economist Mark Bils estimated that cutting the payroll tax by six percentage points (of the 12.4% Social Security component) would, under standard assumptions, increase employment by three million to four million workers—an amount equal to all the job losses since the stimulus was passed.

The payroll tax cut would have reduced firms' costs by roughly the same amount as from the entire decline in employment. It would have cost less than half as much as the stimulus bill, gotten far more income into paychecks quickly and, most importantly, greatly reduced incentives for firms to lay off workers. In fact, it would have created incentives to hire.

Even using the administration's claims of one million jobs "created or saved," the stimulus program passed in early February is millions of jobs short of what a cheaper payroll tax suspension would have delivered (see nearby chart).

Interestingly, Sarah Palin also has some kind words to say about the payroll tax cut in Going Rogue: "And if we really want to help the poor and middle class get through this recession, how about cutting their payroll taxes?"

Sounds good to me!

One of several e-mails I’ve received on the KSM trial:

“I'm an attorney and a former civilian and military prosecutor. Congress can indeed remove jurisdiction for Article III courts to try this case or any other terrorism case. I think Republicans should get a bill going fast on this and make the Democrats go on record right away on this.”

I agree. But when you suggest this to Senate Republicans, they point out that Majority Leader Reid is moving to the health care bill, that he will presumably get 60 votes for cloture on the motion to proceed to the bill Saturday or Monday, and that health care will then be on the floor until the (attempted) showdown final cloture vote just before Christmas. The only interruption will be a brief one, for an Omnibus bill that will take care of government funding (the Continuing Resolution runs out Dec. 18) and a few other issues—and that will be an unamendable conference report. So, it was explained to me, there are procedural obstacles to getting a floor vote on the KSM to New York issue in the near future in the Senate (and the minority has no power to start with in the House).

But this isn’t a fact of nature. This is a choice Reid has made. Of course he could interrupt the health care debate for a day or two—what’s the rush on health care?, most of it doesn’t go into effect for a few years anyway, except for the taxes—to allow for a debate and vote on some version of the Lieberman-Graham legislation to reverse Holder’s reckless decision. But Reid certainly doesn’t want to do this. And House Republicans have filed a discharge petition to force their legislation to the floor. But Pelosi will put pressure on Democrats not to sign on.

There will only be congressional action if popular outrage forces it. The public needs to understand that if Congress does nothing, they’re enabling Holder and the KSM trial. Especially after Holder’s appalling performance yesterday before the Senate Judiciary Committee, you wouldn’t think congressional Democrats would want to be known as Holder’s enablers. So exposing the emptiness of the arguments on Holder’s side, and putting pressure on Congress to step up to prevent KSM from getting his wish, a gold-plated trial and bully pulpit for jihad in New York, is key.

The man to focus on, I think, is Harry Reid. Many Nevadans are family members or friends of those who died on 9/11. Many other Nevadans have contributed—many through serving in the military—to our efforts in the broader war on terror. If they—along with everyone else in the country—let Sen. Reid know they want an up or down vote on KSM, they might be able to force Reid to change the Senate calendar, and allow Congress to do its duty.

Harry Reid unveiled his $849 billion health-care bill tonight. It weighs in at 2,074 pages. Keith Hennessey runs through the tax hikes in the bill:

The following is from the Joint Tax Committee estimate of the revenue effects of the Reid bill. I have listed provisions with major revenue effects (+$20 B / 10 years) and a few others that have significant policy or political impacts. There are some smaller changes as well, which you can see for yourself in the 3-page document. All revenue figures are revenues raised over the ten-year period 2010-2019.

1. 40% excise tax on health coverage in excess of $8,500 (individuals) / $23,000 (families). Amounts are indexed for inflation by CPI-U + 1% – begins in 2013 – $149 B tax increase

2. Additional 0.5% Medicare (Hospital Insurance) tax on wages in excess of $200,000 ($250,000 for joint filers) – begins in 2013 – $54 B tax increase

3. Impose annual fee on manufacturers and importers of branded drugs – begins in 2010 – $22 B tax increases

4. Impose annual fee on manufacturers and importers of certain medical devices – begins in 2010 – $19 B tax increase

5. Cut in half (to $500K) the amount of an executive’s compensation that a health plan can deduct from its corporate income taxes – begins in 2013 – $600 million tax increase

6. Impose 5% excise tax on cosmetic surgery and similar procedures – begins for surgery in 2010 – $6 B tax increase!

In total the bill would raise taxes by $370 B over ten years.

Analysis on the tax hikes from Hennessey at the link. Reid has decided to raise the Medicare payroll tax on individuals making more than $106,800; perhaps not the smartest way to boost employment.

The CBO report says the bill would save $127 billion over 10 years--but as Allahpundit notes "$127 billion over 10 years sounds like a lot until you remember that $176 billion was October’s monthly deficit." We still haven't gotten a look at the CBO report to see just how bad the Medicare cuts will be [Update: The CBO (download here) reports Medicare will be cut by $491 billion over 10 years], but tell grandma and granpa not to worry: Under this bill they'll get $500 in 2010 when Harry Reid just so happens to be up for reelection.

The bill also allows taxpayer-funding for abortions through the public health insurance plan and the health insurance exchanges; the language is similar to the Capps amendment that tried to conceal federal funding of abortion through an accounting gimmick (see here). National Right to Life Committee calls the amendment "completely unacceptable."

Senator Mitch McConnell said in a statement: “This bill has been behind closed doors for weeks. Now, it’s America’s turn, and this will not be a short debate. Higher premiums, tax increases and Medicare cuts to pay for more government—the American people know that is not reform.”

Andy McCarthy on the Holder hearing.

Obama not planning to screw up Iraq until April or May.

Ace goes supernova on Sullivan.

NIAC shockingly uses the same PR firm as Qaddafi.

Christian Whiton and Greg Jenkins: Hope for conservatives in California?

When Jeffrey Toobin isn't busy ripping off Matt Labash he finds time to misinform New Yorker readers.

House Republicans have introduced a discharge petition to try to force a vote on a bill to keep the Obama administration from transferring Guantanamo detainees to the United States. From a press release:

U.S. House Armed Services Committee Ranking Member Howard P. "Buck" McKeon (R-CA) today joined with the senior Republicans of the Judiciary, Intelligence and Homeland Security Committees, and Appropriations Commerce, Justice and Science Subcommittee Ranking Member Frank Wolf (R-Va.), to demand answers to questions posed over the past ten months about the Administration’s ill-advised decision to close Guantanamo Bay. In a letter to President Obama, the Ranking Members outlined the national security concerns posed by the decision and insisted that the Administration provide responses to the American people before any terrorists are imported to the U.S. for detention or prosecution.

“By choosing to prosecute Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and the 9/11 co-conspirators in United States federal courts, the President has revealed that he views the terrorist attacks on New York City and the nation’s capital as a crime—not as an act of war,” stated Rep. McKeon. “Make no mistake about this fact—Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and his cohorts are hardened terrorists who declared war on America by planning and sanctioning the attacks that killed thousands of people on September 11th.”

McKeon continued, “From the classified information that I have seen on these guys, I can assure you that they are some of the worst of the worst. They wake up in the morning with the sole purpose of devising new ways to kill or attack Americans and the western world.”

“In my opinion, Guantanamo Bay provides America the safest location to detain these terrorists. Earlier this year, I traveled to Guantanamo to inspect the facilities and meet first-hand with our military personnel down there,” said McKeon. “The facilities rival any that you would find in the United States—as does the care that is being provided to the detainees.”

“As the President admitted to Fox News earlier today, he’s finding it harder than he thought to close Guantanamo. That’s because—in Guantanamo—you have a unique facility capable of detaining hundreds of terrorists in a secure environment that is detached from American population centers—but still relatively accessible for prosecutors and defense counsel. As the President and his Administration have discovered, it’s nearly impossible to replicate all of these factors at a facility in the continental United States,” concluded McKeon.

The members also introduced a discharge petition to force a vote H.R. 2294, the “Keep Terrorists Out of America Act.” Republican Leader Boehner introduced the bill earlier this year, along with 169 Republicans, to require the President to notify Congress 60 days before the transfer or release of a Guantanamo detainee occurs and to certify that such a transfer or release will not result in the release of any detainee into the U.S., adversely affect the prosecution of any detainee, or otherwise pose a security risk to the U.S.

Today’s actions follow the decision by President Obama to move self-confessed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other accused terrorists to New York City for trial in a U.S. civilian court.

I cannot compete with Allahpundit's write-up of this exchange, from the Holder hearing today, so go forth and read his take.

Holder says Miranda wouldn't be an issue in KSM trial or Osama bin Laden's because the evidence is so overwhelming against the two that prosecutors wouldn't need "custodial statements" gotten without Mirandizing them. But as Allahpundit notes, the question is what happens in the future, when soldiers on a field of battle, knowing that combatants may be tried in federal courts, have to start Mirandizing terrorists instead of interrogating them. And, if they don't do that consistently (soldiers are not supposed to be cops), does it not mean that many a future conviction of future terrorists would be impossible?

Here is the video:

Way back in March 2008, widespread protests erupted across the Tibetan plateau and were brutally crushed by a massive Chinese security response. On March 28, then-Senator and presidential candidate Barack Obama, who had previously shown little interest in Tibet, sent a letter to President Bush chiding him for not doing enough about the situation there and helpfully suggesting some specific steps he should be taking. A few choice selections:

The United States has many issues for which China's cooperation is important, including denuclearization of North Korea, ending Iran's nuclear program, stopping the genocide in Darfur, confronting repression in Burma, and combating global warming. However, it is important that we give high priority to the plight of Tibetans and make clear to President Hu that the way in which China treats all Chinese citizens, including Tibetans, profoundly affects how China is viewed in the United States and throughout the international community.

===

I hope you made clear to President Hu the American view about the importance of the following: a negotiation with the Dalai Lama about his return to Tibet; guarantees of religious freedom for the Tibetan people; protection of Tibetan culture and language; and the exercise of genuine autonomy for Tibet. That is the path to the stability and harmony that the Chinese leaders say they are seeking in Tibet.

In addition to your personal intervention with President Hu, there are other steps I hope you will take to highlight our concern. I support your call for the foreign press and diplomatic personnel to have free access to Lhasa and other Tibetan cities and villages to ensure that repression and human rights violations cannot escape the world's notice. Beijing has committed to the International Olympic Committee to allow foreign journalists free access to cover stories throughout China, including Tibet. We should hold them to that commitment. The U.S. and our democratic allies and friends should also urge the UN Human Rights Council to send an investigatory team to Tibet. China should be encouraged to allow the International Committee for the Red Cross to visit prisons in Tibet to ensure that detainees are not held under inhumane conditions, tortured, or mistreated.

Like you, I want to take steps that increase the chance of a negotiated solution between Beijing and the Dalai Lama, and that have the best chance of improving the lives of ordinary Tibetans. Therefore, I support your effort to aggressively use your relationship with President Hu to achieve these goals. Should it appear, however, that the Chinese are taking private diplomacy as a license for inaction or continued repression, I would urge you to speak out forcefully and publicly to disabuse them of the notion that they can thus escape international censure.

How times have changed. When President Obama stood next to Chinese President Hu Jintao in Beijing yesterday and uttered the words "Tibet is part of the People's Republic of China", he may have been the first U.S. president to do so on Chinese soil. In any case, this was more than just an idle (and unnecessary) repeating of long-standing U.S. policy; rather it was a concession to a very specific and intensely-sought Chinese demand for this trip.

In the weeks before Obama traveled to China, following on his refusal to meet with the Dalai Lama, three Tibetans were executed in Lhasa after closed trials that failed to meet minimum standards of due process, and a prominent Tibetan blogger was sentenced to 15 years in prison for his writings, without any comment from the White House. Talks between the Dalai Lama's representatives and China have been stalled for the past year. The repression on the ground has not changed, but Obama's views on how to treat those responsible for it certainly have. Instead of seeing Tibet as a priority in U.S.-China relations, he now seems to view Tibet as a cheap bargaining chip to be traded away in a futile attempt to curry favor with the Chinese. Hypocrisy we can believe in?

Click the picture for the punchline.

Earlier this month, when Rep. Mark Kirk accused Trita Parsi, the Iranian national who heads the oddly named National Iranian American Council, of being a "regime sympathizer," NIAC accused Kirk of making a "slanderous allegation." Yet internal emails reveal that Parsi certainly did not see himself as an opponent of the regime in Tehran. In fact, Parsi was confident that an affiliation with NIAC would be looked upon favorably by officials in Iran.

In an email exchange with Parsi, Mohammad Mansouri, listed as a project manager on NIAC's website, worries "how reasonable it will be to take the risk and actually go to Iran." It's not clear whether Mansouri's concern is the threat from regime officials or from American bombs -- the correspondence is dated March 17, 2006, and came as NIAC was warning of an imminent war between the U.S. and Iran -- and Mansouri explains that given "what's going on in the world, it might be very dangerous and we may be forced to cancel [the trip]."

Parsi reassures Mansouri -- "NIAC has a good name in Iran and your association with it will not harm you."

On 3/17/06, Trita Parsi wrote:

Re the Iran trip, I think it will be difficult to get out of this one. Since nothing extraordinary has occurred since we submitted the proposal (Ahmadinejad was already in office) we are going to have a tough time with this one. Nevertheless, we have to be careful and not put you in risk. I can tell you though that NIAC has a good name in iran and your association with it will not harm you. In fact, I believe two of our board members are in Iran as we speak!

How can NIAC have had a "good name in Iran" if it was working to promote human rights, to foster democracy, and to undermine the authoritarian regime? Simple: it couldn't, and it wasn't. While the left screams about AIPAC and the "Israel Lobby," they rise to defend a man who, by his own estimation, was in the good graces of the Ahmadinejad regime as recently as two years ago. Surely that was because the regime viewed NIAC as "sympathetic."

The full exchange after the jump...

Attorney General Eric Holder seemed to take an unorthodox view of the guarantees of the American justice system today during a committee hearing about his decision to try 9/11 co-conspirators in federal courts in New York City.

Asked by Sen. Herb Kohl (D-Wis.) if the justice department had contingency plans, should by some technicality, KSM and others not be successfully prosecuted, Holder replied:

“Failure is not an option. These are cases that have to be won. I don’t expect that we will have a contrary result.”

The answer met with audible snickers in the gallery, perhaps from those who were under the impression that the very essence of our court system is that failure to prosecute is always an option.

"Well, that's an interesting point of view," Kohl said. "And, I'll leave it at that."

Sen. Chuck Grassley later criticized Holder's assertion.

"I don’t know how you can say failure is not an option," Grassley said. "I’m a farmer, not a lawyer, but it seemed to me ludicrous."

Holder sought to soothe critics by explaining the administration has already determined that if something did go wrong, and a mistrial or acquittal happened, it would "not allow release into this country of anyone who was deemed dangerous." KSM and others would remain detained as enemy combatants, Holder said, in that case.

Holder was asked on several occasions about his confidence in convictions. He said it lay in evidence that others don't have access to—evidence he had determined could be best used in U.S. courts instead of military tribunals.

"My top priority is to select the venue where the government will have the opportunity to present strongest evidence," he said.

Republican senators asked repeatedly why, if Holder is concerned with which evidence would be admissible, he had picked civilian courts rather than military tribunals, which have fewer restrictions on what evidence may be considered.

"There is really, from my perspective, very compelling evidence that I’m not at liberty to discuss now that will probably not be revealed until we are in a trial setting," he said. "The evidence that I am not talking about I think is compelling, is not tainted, and I think it will prove to be decisive in this case."

Alice Hoagland, who lost her son Mark Bingham on Flight 93, disagrees with Holder's decision about 9/11 co-conspirators, and was in the gallery for the hearing. She approached him after the hearing and the two spoke for about five minutes, surrounded by media and cameras.

"It's a bit of a 'trust me' thing, I suppose," Holder told her. "There are reasons why bringing this case in an Article III (federal) court, in terms of admissibility of certain evidence, is really the right thing, and really maximizes our chances to be successful."

President Obama responds to a question from CBS about the Afghan policy leaks:

“I think I am angrier than Bob Gates about it, partly because we have these deliberations in the Situation Room for a reason – because we are making decisions that are life-and-death, that affect how our troops will be able to operate in a theater of war. For people to be releasing information during the course of deliberation -- where we haven’t made final decisions yet -- I think is not appropriate.”

In the same breath as Obama pats himself on the back for making the tough decisions required of a wartime president, he simultaneously concedes that no, he hasn't actually made any "life-and-death" decisions on Afghanistan over the last four months. Meanwhile, the wires are reporting once again that the president is "very close" to making an actual decision -- i.e., a decision is "just weeks away." A very generous interpretation of the phrase "very close" indeed. It's like how President Bush was "very close" to making a decision about sending federal assistance to New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina, and true to his word just a few weeks later there were FEMA trailers and everything.

Update: Gary Schmitt hits the above and adds:

Finally, the president also said that a “multi-year occupation” would not serve the interests of the United States and he repeatedly referred to the Afghan mission as “this thing”—as in, “the American people will have a lot of clarity about what we’re doing, how we’re going to succeed, how much this thing is going to cost” and “what’s the end game on this thing.”

“Occupation?” Does the president really think of the Afghan mission as an occupation? Doesn’t that, in turn, mean the Taliban are “freedom fighters?” Presumably, the president’s use of the term “occupation” was just sloppy on his part. And maybe his use of “this thing” is a product of a tired, travelling chief executive.

On the other hand, having spent several weeks supposedly knee-deep in reflection on Afghanistan and America’s role there, the fact that he would have such slips of the tongue is hardly reassuring that his Afghan strategy review is headed in the right direction or, as we used to say, “his head is in the right place.”

Earlier today, Dick Durbin argued no one complained about Zacarias Moussaoui's trial in civilian court. In fact, as a friend on the Hill points out, "several Democrats" said the 20th hijacker should have been tried in a military tribunal:

During the Attorney General’s appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee this morning, Senator Durbin asserted that he did not recall any Republicans, and certainly no Democrats, complaining that Zacharias Moussaoui was not prosecuted before a military commission. Actually, two very prominent Democrats contemporaneously complained about that decision, including the Democratic Chairman of the Senate Armed Services.

At a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on December 12, 2001 concerning President Bush’s Military Order creating the military commissions, S. Hrg. 107-513, Senator Lieberman expressed that he was “troubled by the precedent that this sets” in prosecuting Moussaoui in a civilian court rather than the military commissions existent at the time. Senator Lieberman asked, “if we will not try Zacarias Moussaoui before a military tribunal, . . . who will we try in a military tribunal?”

The New York Times coverage of that hearing reported that “[s]everal Senate Democrats . . . [expressed] that Mr. Moussaoui appeared to be a perfect candidate for a military tribunal and that they were baffled about why no tribunal had been sought. ‘The glove fits so perfectly here,’ Senator Carl Levin, the Michigan Democrat who is chairman of the Armed Services Committee, said after [the] hearing.” In its coverage of the hearing, the Atlanta Journal and Constitution referenced Senators Levin and Lieberman in its December 13, 2001 article under the title “Senators Question [Moussaoui] Terror Trial in Federal Court.”

Oddly enough, after the Moussaoui trial began, even the Washington Post suggested, in a way that seems quite prescient in hindsight, that “it may be best” to have moved Moussaoui into a military commission, editorializing that “[t]he administration deserves credit for having tried to bring the Moussaoui case under the regular order. But the better part of valor now is to end the experiment.” Editorial, Washington Post, “The Moussaoui Experiment,” Jan. 27, 2003.

At the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing this morning, Sen. John Cornyn asked Attorney General Eric Holder about the decision he announced Friday to try some detainees, including the 9/11 plotters, in Article III courts: "Does the president agree with you?" Holder’s response: "I believe he does. I have not spoken to him directly, but the decision I made is consistent with his Archives speech...”

This is ridiculous. This decision has national security, foreign policy, intelligence, and homeland security implications, as well of course as legal aspects. The idea that the Attorney General would decide how to deal with the mastermind of 9/11 without talking directly to the president is unbelievable. Either Holder isn’t telling the whole truth here, and he got guidance indirectly—if not “directly”—from his boss. Or Obama is so concerned to distance himself from the decision that he’s willing to let it appear Holder’s alone, even though that would constitute a remarkable presidential dereliction of duty. Or both.

The good news is that, having decided on this kind of decision-making process—or having decided to say there was this kind of decision-making process—Obama and Holder have left the door open for Obama to overrule Holder, as he did a few months ago with respect to releasing the photos of alleged military-prisoner abuse.

So the conclusion I draw from the Cornyn-Holder exchange is this: Those who want to reverse this reckless and irresponsible decision need to turn to their attention both to Congress, which could act to prevent Article III court trials for some or all Guantanamo detainees, and to the president, who could reverse Holder with a stroke of a pen or a simple statement.

I imagine senators and congressmen will move ahead with legislative efforts. But they might also send a letter to the president—who hasn’t yet been “directly” involved in this decision—explaining why he should step in to overrule Holder.

Mary Katharine Ham is on Capitol Hill reporting on Attorney General Eric Holder's testimony to Congress and capturing lots of very interesting exchanges on Twitter:

Holder says: "Failure is not an option. These are cases that have to be won. I don't expect that we'll have a contrary result." To which Senator Grassley replied: "I don't know how you can say failure is not an option...I'm a farmer, not a lawyer, but it seemed to me ludicrous."

As Senator Kyl said, "How could you be more likely to get a conviction in federal court when [KSM] has already asked to plead guilty to military commission?"

Andy McCarthy writes at NRO:

AG Holder's testimony has resumed, and Senator Durbin claims that no one complained about the Moussaoui trial being in a civilian court. In fact, many of us complained — I pointed out several times that Moussaoui was the "poster child" for commissions.

More importantly, though, Senator Durbin and the attorney general fail to point out that the Moussaoui trial was a three-ring circus, that the district judge actually tried to dismiss the indictment, and that we don't know what would have happened had Moussaoui not surprised everyone by pleading guilty. When the Court of Appeals reinstated the Moussaoui indictment, it also said it was sensitive to the trial judge's concerns and would look very carefully to ensure that the government made available to Moussaoui all the information he needed to present his defense. What would have happened if Moussaoui had continued to press his demand for access to classified information and testimony from al-Qaeda captives like KSM? We don't know.

Attorney General Eric Holder confirmed to the Senate Judiciary Committee this morning that Gitmo will not be closed by the initial January 2010 deadline. Holder’s comments follow President Obama’s earlier announcement that the deadline will be missed. There are, according to published accounts, around 210 detainees or so still at Gitmo.

Holder offered the following breakdown for these remaining detainees.

“We have more than 100 detainees who have been approved for transfer,” Holder said. Who are these detainees? The Obama administration has not said. But this seems like an awfully high number.

There were roughly 250 (or so) detainees at Gitmo when the Obama administration assumed power. The Obama administration is now saying that 100 of them (40 percent) are considered transfer-worthy. This may be in addition to the 25 detainees Holder said had already been transferred. If so, that would mean that 125 detainees (50 percent), in total, are either going to be transferred or already have been under the Obama administration.

Concerned parties on the Hill should push for additional transparency on this. How is it that the Obama administration determined that so many detainees, who were considered a threat by the Bush administration and military officials, should no longer be held?

This question takes on more urgency when you review the Obama administration’s previous transfer decisions. Binyam Mohamed was transferred to the UK in February, despite the fact that he admittedly trained at an al Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan and was originally detained because he was likely traveling to the U.S. to take part in an al Qaeda attack orchestrated by senior al Qaeda members in 2002. U.S. intelligence officials never backed down from that assessment. In June, the Obama administration transferred Ahmed Zuhair -- a known al Qaeda terrorist and likely murderer of a U.S. diplomat -- to Saudi Arabia. And the Obama administration has also approved Ayman Batarfi -- a known al Qaeda doctor with troubling ties to al Qaeda’s anthrax program -- for transfer as well. Batarfi has not been transferred as of yet (at least, there has been no public announcement of Batarfi’s transfer).

The Bush administration made its own mistakes in transferring detainees. The Obama administration is posed to make additional mistakes and has, in fact, already made additional mistakes. Congressmen and senators should push for additional details concerning the Obama administration’s transfer decisions.

Holder also noted that “more than 40 detainees have been referred for prosecution.” Thus far, the administration has only publicly commented on 10 of the detainees who have been referred for prosecution. Who are the other 30 detainees that have been referred for prosecution? And are they going to be prosecuted in federal courts or military commissions?

Finally, who are the remaining dozens of detainees that the administration hasn’t made a final decision on?

Attorney General Holder has only given the broad details concerning the administration’s efforts to close Guantanamo. The devil is in the details. It is up to Congress and the press to ferret out those details.

Sarah Palin weighs in on settlements:

Barbara Walters: Governor, let's talk about some issues. The Middle East. The Obama administration does not want Israel to build any more settlements on what they consider "Palestinian territory." What is your view on this?

Sarah Palin: I disagree with the Obama administration on that. I believe that, um, the Jewish, uh, settlements should be allowed to be expanded upon, because that population of Israel is, is going to grow. More and more Jewish people will be flocking to Israel in the days and weeks and months ahead. And, um, I don't think that the Obama administration has any right to tell, um, Israel that, that, uh, the Jewish settlements cannot expand.

Barbara Walters: Even if it's Palestinian areas?

Sarah Palin:I believe that the Jewish settlement should be allowed to expand.

J Street says Palin's comments "reveal a glaring ignorance of damaging facts and a callous disregard of past and present U.S. policy," but isn't Palin just following the administration's lead? Indeed, the Israelis continue to build -- allowing for natural growth -- and at the same time Secretary Clinton has praised the Netanyahu government's "unprecedented" concessions on settlements.

In my interview with Governor Palin yesterday evening, we touched briefly on some current events, including President Obama's trip to Asia and the place of the tea-party movement in the Republican party. Some highlights:

1) I asked Palin about the anti-tax-and-spending tea parties. "I love the tea party movement," she said. "It's beautiful, it's healthy. It's part of that good healthy competition that's needed in a political party." She contrasted the somewhat tumultuous state of the GOP to what's going on in the Democratic party today. "It seems like the Democratic party is filled with more sheep-like individuals, who go along and get along," she said.

I brought up the Senate primary fight in Florida between Governor Charlie Crist and former state house speaker Marco Rubio. Palin isn't ready to make an endorsement. She told me she's just starting to look at the candidates "and see what their positions are." Palin added that she is eager to meet Rubio. She worked with Crist at the Republican Governors Association and thought highly of him. "I hear good things about Rubio, too, though," she added. No question, if Palin decides to endorse a candidate in this race, her influence will be powerful.

2) Would Palin bow or curtsy to the emperor of Japan? "No," she said. She went on to say that Obama's recent bow to the emperor was "symbolic" of the new administration's "apologetic mode of operation." "I'm not comfortable with it, and I don't think most Americans are as well," Palin said.

In other Asia news, Palin expressed a willingness to meet with the Dalai Lama, and said that she was happy to hear that Obama brought up the "abuse of human rights in China" during his visit. But she also said that Obama needs to focus on "getting our house in order." "There are so many things that need to be taken care of domestically," Palin said. The president, in her opinion, ought to "buckle down on the huge challenges facing our country."

3) I was surprised to learn that Palin, who is using social media to speak directly to her supporters, is the only member of the Palin family on Facebook. "Ironically, I banned the kids from using it," she said.

Associate editor Matthew Continetti is the author of The Persecution of Sarah Palin.

I tweeted this a few days ago, but deliberately kept it vague. Capt. Shannon Meehan, an old college associate and former patient at Fort Hood's medical facility, said that Hasan had a reputation for telling his patients to report themselves to the legal office for war crimes, an unbelievably sick offense and deep betrayal of the doctor-patient privilege. Now that Shannon has relayed the same to the Dallas Morning News, I'll amplify.

Fort Hood massacre suspect Nidal Malik Hasan sought to have some of his patients prosecuted for war crimes based on statements they made during psychiatric sessions with him, a captain who served on the base said Monday.

Other psychiatrists complained to superiors that Hasan's actions violated doctor-patient confidentiality, Capt. Shannon Meehan told The Dallas Morning News.

One day after the Nov. 5 attack that killed 13 and wounded 29, a Fort Hood official said she had never received complaints about Hasan's job performance. Col. Kimberly Kesling, deputy commander of clinical services at the base's Darnall Army Medical Center, also said he was a "hardworking, dedicated young man who gave great care to his patients."

Shannon's is a sad tale. During his deployment in Iraq, he called in an airstrike on a residence believed to double as an IED factory. The intelligence was wrong, the house was a civilian residence -- occupied by a family of eight (this is the crushing burden of leadership our young officers shoulder daily). Shannon was deeply traumatized by the horrific incident, a condition exacerbated by a severe brain injury suffered a few days later while leading his men in combat. When his road to recovery finally led him back to Fort Hood (his home station), Shannon -- in his fragile mental and physical state -- could have easily been assigned to Hasan. Fortunately, fate was on his side -- the Army placed him in the care of another therapist shortly before treatment started.

The thought of soldiers having their conscience and pain manipulated by the likes of Hasan is chill inducing. This is how far the Army has been pushed and corrupted by political correctness, in that they were willing to sacrifice the mental health of their soldiers on the altar of religious and political neutrality.

Aside: Though he's quick to emphasize that the quality of care he received at Fort Hood was top-notch, Shannon's most effective treatment came in the form of paper and quill. His combat memoir, Beyond Duty, was released this past fall to wide accolades.

The president of the United States has expressed his displeasure with Israeli government plans to build 900 new housing units in Jerusalem’s Jewish neighborhood of Gilo. Glad to know Mr. Obama, with all he has to occupy him, is able to maintain so deep an interest in city planning. But just how deep is it? And how wide? Does it extend to the Tehran neighborhoods of Naziabad, Niavaran, Farmanieh, Saadat, Abad, Shahrak, Gharb, and Vanak Square? Will he be demanding that the mullahs who send their Basij murderers into those areas to put down demonstrators discontinue doing so as a precondition for negotiations?

A new CNN poll "indicates that 61 percent of the public opposes the use of public money for abortions for women who can not afford the procedure, with 37 percent in favor of allowing the use of federal funds."

How much stronger must opposition to public funding of abortion be in states like Byron Dorgan's North Dakota and Blanche Lincoln's Arkansas?

What's really remarkable is that a majority of Americans oppose private insurance coverage of abortions:

38. Now think about women who are covered by private health insurance plans that are paid for by
private individuals or employers with no money from the government involved. Do you think private health insurance plans should cover some or all of the costs of an abortion, or do you think that women who want to get an abortion should have to pay the complete costs of that abortion out of their own pockets?

Health insurance should cover 45%
Pay all costs herself 51%

In their attacks on the Stupak amendment, a number of pro-choice Democrats, like Rep. Nita Lowey of New York, have claimed that the amendment "puts new restrictions on women's access to abortion coverage in the private health insurance market even when they would pay premiums with their own money." Even the St. Petersburg Times's Politifact, which has a history of flacking for the Democratic party, reports that this claim is "false."

It turns out that a majority of Americans support even the supposedly scary and radical position that Nancy Pelosi and Planned Parenthood falsely ascribe to Stupak supporters.

While it's remarkable, opposition to private insurance coverage of abortion is hardly surprising. The CNN poll reports that 55 63 percent of Americans want abortion to be illegal in all but a few circumstances. It's not shocking that they don't want public funds or private insurance to pay for something they believe to be so unjust that it should be generally banned.

Update: Via Ramesh Ponnuru, the Washington Post/ABC poll had a similar finding:

21. Say someone buys private health insurance using government assistance to help pay for it. Do you think insurance sold that way should or should not be allowed to include coverage for abortions?

Should 35
Should not 61

Correction: 63 percent of Americans believe abortion should be illegal or legal in only a few circumstances. I had originally reported 55% believed so. That number was from a 2005 poll.

In his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee today, Eric Holder will say, according to the Associated Press, that "I have every confidence the nation and the world will see him for the coward he is....I'm not scared of what (Mohammed) will have to say at trial and no one else needs to be either." And, "we need not cower in the face of this enemy. Our institutions are strong, our infrastructure is sturdy, our resolve is firm, and our people are ready."

I suppose we should be grateful Holder is calling Khalid Sheikh Mohammed a coward, rather than describing the American people as "a nation of cowards" (as he did earlier this year). But is anyone else struck by the tinny bravado of Holder's prose? When politically correct careerists start beating their chests and proclaiming their own courage--you know they're in deep trouble. Let's see how Holder does today when he finishes posturing and has to answer the intellectually serious and morally compelling criticisms of his plan to grant KSM and his fellow terrorists a trial in federal court in New York. And if he does badly (as I expect), let's see if some congressional Democrats have the courage to break with the administration and join in passing legislation to block Holder's plan.

The White House realizes there are no settlements in Jerusalem -- and yet their position remains unclear.

David Frum says it isn't enough to take Trita Parsi at his word.

Russia gives Georgia the 411: We're annexing your sovereign territory.

Ace examines the "diplomacy of deference."

"He ought to get professional help, perhaps from Maj. Nidal."

Good news: Terrorist lawyer and enabler Lynne Stewart may get a longer sentence.

Obama's going to get to that whole Afghanistan war thing any day now.

Flashback from the day of the Ft. Hood massacre: watch Dr. Phil and Shoshana Johnson attack this former Army JAG for daring to suggest that Major Nidal Hasan might be a jihadist. How about having all three back on for a follow-up?

I spoke to Governor Palin by phone this afternoon. Lots of interesting material, but to me the most interesting takeaways were the following:

1) I asked about Palin's upcoming visit to Ft. Hood. "We had planned on that before the tragedy struck," she said. She commented on the trail of evidence linking the alleged Ft. Hood shooter, Maj. Nidal Hasan, to militant Islam. "There were such clear, obvious, massive warning signs that were missed," she said. "This terrorist, even having business cards" that identified him as an "SoA" or soldier of Allah. Palin blamed a culture of political correctness and other decisions that "prevented -- I'm going to say it -- profiling" of someone with Hasan's extremist ideology. "I say, profile away," Palin said. Such political correctness, she continued, "could be our downfall." If the upcoming investigations into the attack reveal bad decision-making on the part of senior officials, Palin continued, those officials ought to be fired.

Palin visits Ft. Hood on December 4. She plans to donate all the royalties from her book-signing there to the families of the victims.

2) I also asked Governor Palin about Attorney General Holder's decision to try September 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohamed in federal court in New York City.

"Does KSM deserve constitutional rights?" I asked.

Palin's response: "Not no, but hell no."

And she went on: "That was an atrocious decision," she said. "And it makes a mockery of our judicial system." She focused in particular on the fear that "war criminals" like KSM and his accomplices will use the trial as a "platform" to denigrate America.

More Palin to come, including her thoughts on President Obama's trip to Asia and the role of the tea-party movement in the GOP ...

Associate editor Matthew Continetti is the author of The Persecution of Sarah Palin.

As NIAC prepared its duplicitous campaign to scuttle the appointment of Dennis Ross as the Obama administration's envoy to Iran, Trita Parsi and his policy director, Patrick Disney, conferred with their allies on two separate listservs to devise a strategy. The date was January 7, 2009, and as the administration started floating names to reporters, Disney suggested that the group and its allies (which presumably included J Street, already a participant in NIAC's Campaign for a New American Policy in Iran) to "start a conversation about what our response will be if Dennis Ross is named Iran envoy." Disney explained that "NIAC is obviously still formulating a plan, but we're exploring the idea of coming out publicly, and relatively strongly, against Ross." In the end, NIAC decided not to come out publicly against Ross, choosing instead to lobby Congress and the administration behind closed doors while sending out fundraising appeals casting Ross as a fellow proponent of engagement and a victim of the same "smears" being launched against NIAC.

Disney concludes that "if it's simply impossible for us to work with Ross, we should be in a position to say I told you so after he messes everything up." Eleven months later and everything is messed up, but not because of Ross. Indeed it seems like NIAC's strategy of engagement minus sanctions has not produced any result other than providing the Iranian regime with more time to work on their nuclear weapons program and kill dissidents. But Parsi was acutely aware of the fact that on this issue, like so many others, his views closely resembled those of the regime in Tehran. Parsi wrote,

From: Trita Parsi [mailto:tparsi@niacouncil.org]
Sent: Wednesday, January 07, 2009 1:55 PM
To: Patrick Disney; new-iran-policy-coordinating-committee@googlegroups.com; IranPWG@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: Response to Ross as Iran envoy

Just to add to Patrick's points: Coming out strongly against him will likely also make it more difficult for him to go the neo-con way. The pressure should be on him. He is so obviously conflicting with Obama's views so we could make that very clear - criticize him, without criticising Obama.

Also, by being on record now, we protect ourselves for the time when Ross does screw up - then our criticism will be consistent with what we've sai all along, and will be able to defend oursleves against any attacks that our views on Ross may resemble Tehran's.

Love to hear other ideas and views.

Sincerely,
Trita Parsi, PhD
President

Because Parsi and his group chose not to go on record with their objections to Ross but to lobby against his appointment behind closed doors, no one could connect the dots that both NIAC and Tehran happened to have the same view of the appointment. The effect of NIAC's duplicity is that the group was lobbying for Tehran's preferred outcome (the scuttling of the Ross appointment) while appearing before its members and the press as though it was supporting the administration approach. That is shady pool. But here's another question: how did Parsi know what Tehran's view of the Ross appointment was two weeks before Obama was even inaugurated? Is Parsi so plugged in to the regime that he would have a good sense of Tehran's disposition on this subject? Did Parsi simply assume that the regime would not welcome the appointment of a Jew as the administration's interlocutor? Or is there some other explanation?

And now that Ross has been moved out of the Iran job, and John Limbert, a member of NIAC's board, has been installed in his place, it seems fair to ask whether it was NIAC's objections or Tehran's objections that ultimately led to Ross's departure. Is there even a difference between the two?

The full email exchange after the jump...

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner is in trouble again, and this time he may not be able to save his job. You’ll recall that his confirmation was threatened by revelations of cheating on his income taxes. Now he’s accused of paying billions too much for the bailout of AIG and allowing the insurance firm’s Wall Street creditors -- Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, Wachovia -- to be paid in full for their derivative contracts with $27.1 billion in taxpayers’ money.

The accusation comes from Neil Barofsky, the inspector general for the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) in a report issued yesterday. At the time of the bailout in September 2008, Geithner was president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

Rather than bargain with AIG and its creditors for a reasonable bailout, Geithner agreed to pay “an amount far above the market value at the time,” the report said. The bailouts for the big creditors was agreed to by Geithner “even though senior policy makers contend that assistance to AIG’s counterparties was not a relevant consideration in fashioning the assistance to AIG.”

In extending $85 billion in credit to AIG, Barofsky said, the New York Fed “did not craft its own terms and instead simply adopted in substantial part the economic terms of a draft term sheet under consideration by a consortium of private banks, which included a high interest rate.” The banks, which had declined to help AIG, “believed AIG’s liquidity needs exceeded the value of the company’s assets.”

The shorthand of what the inspector general concluded is this: Geithner bailed out AIG and its investment bank creditors without negotiating for tougher terms that would have saved the taxpayers billions. And he did this though one of the “counterparties” was willing to agree to concession. In Geithner’s defense, Barofsky noted that Fed officials “believe they will recoup the loan made to AIG to pay off the big creditors.

The private report, first disclosed by Huffington Post, is officially titled “Factors Affecting Efforts to Limit Payments to AIG Counterparties.”

The Republican to call for Geithner’s resignation as treasury secretary was Rob Simmons, a former House member who is running for the Republican nomination for the Senate seat in Connecticut held by Chris Dodd. Polls show Simmons running ahead of Dodd.

In a statement, Simmons said: “The cozy relationships between the bailed out financial companies and powerful politicians like Tim Geithner and Chris Dodd are exactly why Americans have lost trust in Washington, D.C., and why we need new leadership with the skills and integrity to clean up the mess and get our economy back on track.”

As the Barofsky report circulates on Capitol Hill, more Republicans are likely to raise the matter of Geithner’s conduct in the AIG case. “There were already serious doubts about Secretary Geithner’s credibility, stemming from his failure to pay taxes and subsequent poor performance,” Simmons said.

For anyone who's been in Washington for the past year, it's become increasingly obvious that the only moments of true bipartisanship come when everyone in the city is waiting for Douglas Elmendorf to deliver a CBO report.

No matter which persuasion, political junkies universally hunker down with their e-mail accounts and Twitter on constant refresh mode as Washington awaits another all-important judgment from the fiscal overlord of the federal government.

Douglas Elmendorf, the CBO economist on whose numbers the world waits, is the very picture of the kind of unlikely, unassuming man whom the geeky business of politics makes into an unwitting celebrity. The New York Times, in an interesting and fair piece, takes a look at the toll the numbers take on the numbers man.

A thumbs-up from Mr. Elmendorf could speed the process along, helping Mr. Obama fulfill his hope of signing a bill into law this year. A thumbs-down on any of the critical questions — how much the bill costs, how many people it covers, whether it reins in the runaway growth of health spending — could leave the White House and Democrats scrambling.

Democrats, who have been chafing at his calculations, sound nervous.

The glamorous life of the Elmendorf (who is, incidentally, a Democrat):

Mr. Elmendorf — bearded, bespectacled and cautious to a fault — shuns publicity and almost never appears on television, except for the occasional hearing shown on C-Span. He and his team of number crunchers occupy the cramped fourth floor of a government building that once housed F.B.I. fingerprint files. His own office has a view of the freeway.

In a way that's also quintessentially Washington, Elmendorf's celebrity comes with all the criticism and none of the glitter, all downside and no up:

Yet for a quiet man who thinks carefully about everything — he courted his future wife by inviting her to a baseball game, after calculating that games offer precisely enough activity to fill in conversation lulls — Washington’s health care cauldron is an uncomfortable place to be. He is a Democrat who left partisan politics to join the budget office in January, and he is irking old friends.

“I get e-mail messages and read blog postings that think I’m a brilliant hero, and I also get blog postings and e-mail messages that think I’m a stupid traitor, and I’ve learned to let that roll off my back,” he said in a rare interview about himself.

Also revealed: Elmendorf coaches his daughters' youth soccer team on weekends, has a black Labrador, and generally behaves in exactly the way you'd expect a man named Douglas Elmendorf to behave, even if it means he'll lose friends over the numbers:

David Cutler, an economist at Harvard and Mr. Elmendorf’s close friend, agrees. He said the budget office was “doing a great disservice” by ignoring evidence about how to reduce cost savings. He and Mr. Elmendorf have known each other since their student days; Mr. Cutler said the relationship is suffering.

“It’s a bit painful,” Mr. Cutler said, “which is sad.”

Hearing this, Mr. Elmendorf grows quiet, though unapologetic. “Obviously,” he said, “I can’t lead C.B.O. to reach conclusions to make particular friends of mine happy.”

Douglas Elmendorf, avatar of unaffected, average, honorable Americanness, found against all odds in the abyss of the federal government's finances. As a longtime Elmendorf fan, I say it's downright Capra-esque.

There are thoughtful arguments to be made against Sarah Palin's future as a national politician, her persona as a conservative folk hero, her political ideology. Relatively few liberals or critics in the media bother to make them. It's a testament to how thoroughly they caricatured her the first time around, and how little respect she warrants in some circles, that all questions about her are presumed perfectly settled, and serious engagement about her is often treated as a nuisance to be avoided.

To them, Palin is audacious (not in that good, Obama way) and out-of-line to even write a book. Her criticisms of the McCain campaign leakers who anonymously bashed her while the campaign was still going on are "ungrateful." To venture to promote the book is more audacious still, and means she gets exactly what's coming to her in all interviews and coverage, no matter how unfair. The fact that the book she's daring to promote is selling extremely well means more license still to sully the woman from Alaska once again. I've heard each of these sentiments uttered or implied by pundits or reporters in print, on Twitter, or on TV this week.

The thoughtlessness of these critics, who never see the irony in attacking Palin's alleged anti-intellectualism using debunked doctored photos of the governor in a bikini, is crystallized in Ana Marie Cox's review of Sarah Palin's Going Rogue today. It is perhaps overly generous to call the Washington Post piece a review. It reads like an off-the-cuff e-mail to a friend with very low standards in e-mail correspondence. It's atrocious, not in its assessments necessarily (of which there are few), but in its laziness. I hesitate to excerpt much of it, because at 379 words, I would quickly be dealing with questions of fair use, but here's a taste:

Rush Limbaugh last week proclaimed "Going Rogue" to be "truly one of the most substantive policy books I've read," though that certainly raises questions about what other policy books Rush has read and by what lights he considers the Palin book to be one. For all I know, it may be true. There may truly be substantive discussion of policy, something that goes beyond the thudding "taxes bad"/"government small" rhetoric that characterizes the moments when Palin turns her personal narrative into a discussion of government workings.

I cannot claim to have completely read "Going Rogue" -- I had to skim the last 150 pages (or more than one-third). I only got the thing into my hands late Monday afternoon with a deadline of early evening. It's terrible, I know, but if I didn't read it all, neither can Sarah Palin claim to have completely written it.

One of the few surprises of the book: For a frontierswoman, Palin really doesn't like smokers.

It's a Washington Post book review, for goodness' sake, not a note you pass in between classes before that book report you totz didn't prepare for. In the print version of the article, Cox is introduced as a national correspondent for Air America who has described Palin as "crazypants with arrogant sauce on top," right before she criticizes Palin's take on campaign strategy as unsophisticated. Feel free to click over and read her devastating, postcard-length critique of Palin's, ahem, lack of substance.

But if you're short on time, skip it, and read our own Matt Continetti's thoughtful review of the same book, also in the Washington Post today—a juxtaposition by which Cox's effort suffers all the more. Sure, I'm biased, so here's a taste of his review by which you can judge:

Through no fault of her own, Sarah Palin has become a sort of political lens, refracting the different ways conservatives and liberals see the world. To her supporters, she is, as she puts it, a "common-sense conservative" who isn't afraid to make moral judgments. To her detractors, she's a moronic zealot who has no place in American public life. The two interpretations are concrete. "Going Rogue" won't do much to change any minds. But for what it reveals about our current political culture, Hans Robert Jauss would say it can't be beat.

I was originally just going to use this post to tout Continetti's review, but Cox's review was so emblematic of the frequent laziness and lack of professionalism that characterizes media coverage of Palin, that I thought it important to point out.

For more from Matt on Palin for the Palinistas in the audience, try his book.

Israel has approved the construction of some 900 housing units in their own capital city, Jerusalem:

... Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat said he refused to be part of a halt to Jewish and Arab construction in west or east Jerusalem.

"Israeli law does not discriminate between Arabs and Jews, or between east and west of the city," he said in a statement. "The demand to cease construction just for Jews is illegal, also in the US and any other enlightened place in the world."

"It is inconceivable that the US government would demand a construction freeze in the US based on race, religion or sex, and the attempt to demand this from Jerusalem constitutes a double standard and is unacceptable," continued the statement. "The Jerusalem Municipality will continue to enable construction in every part of the city for Jews and Arabs alike."

To which the White House responds:

We are dismayed at the Jerusalem Planning Committee’s decision to move forward on the approval process for the expansion of Gilo in Jerusalem. At a time when we are working to re-launch negotiations, these actions make it more difficult for our efforts to succeed. Neither party should engage in efforts or take actions that could unilaterally pre-empt, or appear to pre-empt, negotiations. The U.S. also objects to other Israeli practices in Jerusalem related to housing, including the continuing pattern of evictions and demolitions of Palestinian homes. Our position is clear: the status of Jerusalem is a permanent status issue that must be resolved through negotiations between the parties.

Obviously this administration's approach to the Arab-Israeli conflict has been so successful, there is no need to adjust the rhetoric. Just keep making demands of the Israelis and expressing dismay and offering objections and the peace process will, no doubt, get on back on track any moment now. But let's be clear -- the Obama administration's position on Jerusalem is not clear. From the moment during the campaign that Obama declared "Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel, and it must remain undivided," to the subsequent walkback, to the demand that all settlement construction in East Jerusalem come to an end, to the subsequent walkback on that -- nobody knows what this administration's position is on Jerusalem, least of all the parties involved in the peace process.

The only "achievement" this administration can claim is having driven the Israeli public into Bibi's arms, helping him solidify his support across party lines, and destroying President Obama's credibility with the Israeli public -- smart power.

Where lie the sympathies of the UN nuclear watchdog agency's chief dog has been no secret: Mohammed El Baradei earned his 2005 Nobel Peace Prize not for shepherding rogue states to denuclearization—on the contrary, North Korea and Iran spent his (soon-to-be-over) watch as head of the IAEA in a frenzy of development and proliferation—but rather for spending his years in the anti-nuke saddle singling out the Bush administration and Israel for vicious criticism. Beyond his purview, maybe, and very non-aligned-movementy of him, but bad sympathies alone do their mischief only in the ether. It’s where reverse transubstantiation occurs—words into deeds—that the real harm lies, and Mr. El Baradei has been engaging in some of that recently, securing a legacy he may one day wish he hadn't.

In August, the AP revealed he’d been sitting for a year on “compelling” intelligence about Iran’s active pursuit of “research into developing nuclear warheads and the way to deliver them”; in September, the French foreign minister excoriated him for omitting this crucial information from his report to the Agency’s September 14 General Conference; in October, he described a newly-uncovered secret nuclear site near Qom as "a hole in the mountain . . . nothing to be worried about," suggesting at best an extremely poor job of inspecting, and at worst shameful—treasonous?—colluding. And just today, TimesOnline reports that Mr. El Baradei has conspired secretly with the Iranian despots on the formulation of a “deal to persuade world powers to lift sanctions and allow Tehran to retain the bulk of its nuclear programme in return for co-operation with UN inspectors.”

How beautiful the irony that the UN's chief champion of a nuke-free peace is a collaborator with tyrants threatening the destruction of Israel, and that the defense of the West on this issue has been left to France. Yet there’s some comfort in knowing Mr. El Baradei’s days there are numbered—the moment of his retirement cannot come too soon—and in believing the UN will be hard-put to find someone worse to fill his shoes.

Americans disapprove of the way Obama is handling health care by a 49-47 percent margin, according to the latest Washington Post poll. Americans disapprove of Obama's handling of Afghanistan by a 48-45 margin. In April of this year 63 percent of Americans approved of Obama's handling of that conflict -- that support is now down 18 points. And why wouldn't it be -- Obama has showed zero leadership on that issue.

Meanwhile, Obama has broken the record for travel in the first year of his presidency and the DNC has sent out no less than 5 releases this morning attacking Sarah Palin. I understand that the Democrats fear Sarah, but maybe this administration and its allies could better spend their time making the case for the incumbent president and his increasingly unpopular policies?

The doc-fix's decline: The conflicting maneuvers suggest that, rather than a permanent solution, the best the doctors might get is yet another one- or two-year fix, which could threaten their support for health care reform.

Stop the presses: Obama "braved" freezing temperatures in China.

What's the matter with Arkansas? "Lincoln, a second-term senator, helped write some of the legislation's key provisions as a member of the Finance Committee, and her sometimes uncomfortable role near the center of the debate could cost her in culturally conservative Arkansas. Despite the potential benefits for many in her state, polls show her support weakening, and constituents are expressing doubts about the proposed overhaul."

Thinking the American public and system wants Dodd's perpetual TARP legislation would be like assuming they desperately want a sequel to "Gigli."

Meet the GOP's 2012 dark horses.

The Obama administration wants you to pay back your tax credit now that he's gotten credit for the campaign promise.

Hoffman un-concedes in NY-23.

DVR alert: Vice President Biden tapes an appearance for Comedy Central’s “Daily Show.”

Obama's town hall in which he criticized censorship in China, censored by China.

Late, but still hilarious, which is a testament to the Onion staff's skills:

The petitioners in McDonald v. Chicago, the Supreme Court case challenging Chicago's handgun ban, filed their merits brief yesterday, and it's a doozy. Rather than just citing the well-established Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, the brief invokes the long-dead Privileges and Immunities Clause and seeks to overturn three 19th-century Supreme Court cases. From SCOTUSblog:

In a bold thrust, the attorneys for the challengers to Chicago’s strict handgun ban asked the Court to strike down three of its prior rulings: the Slaughterhouse Cases in 1873 — the ruling that made the privileges clause a nullity — and two decisions limiting the Second Amendment to a restriction only on federal laws: U.S. v. Cruikshank in 1876 and Presser v. Illinois in 1886.  “Faced with a clear conflict between precedent and the Constitution, this Court should uphold the Constitution,” the brief argued.

The brief spends only seven pages addressing the Due Process Clause. Over at the Volokh Conspiracy, Orin Kerr is impressed by the novel approach:

It’s certainly an attention-getting way to brief the case. It’s not just arguing for a win: It’s arguing for a revolution.

Or, to put it another way, it's like calling a pass play on fourth and two on your own 28*. But like any good gamble, there are heavy rewards if the petitioners win out. Lower courts cited the Cruikshank and Presser decisions in ruling the Second Amendment only applied to the federal government. If the Supreme Court overturns those antiquated decisions (Cruikshank also rather quaintly ruled that the First Amendment did not apply to the states), it will definitively close a line of argument used for decades to restrict Second Amendment rights.
 One good sign for the petitioners: The Court hinted that it didn't consider Cruikshank good law when it struck down D.C.'s handgun ban in 2008.
 The city of Chicago now has 30 days to file its merits brief. You can read the full petitioner's brief here.


*Which was the correct decision according to The Numbers.






When President Obama took the stage in Shanghai on Monday for his faux town-hall with 400 carefully selected Communist Youth Leaguers future Chinese leaders, he had already lost the crowd. Amid reports that the town-hall participants had been held in splendid isolation in the days prior to the town-hall and subjected to special "training" for their participation, the Chinese authorities managed to wring every ounce of spontaneity out of the event. Not that it mattered much, since most Chinese were unable to watch what the White House had billed as its big attempt to reach out directly to the Chinese people because their government had helpfully blocked it online and was only carrying it on local TV in Shanghai.

While the Chinese government's countermeasures to control the event are unsurprising, the degree to which the Obama administration went along with them should be. At one point there were reports that the advance team working on the trip was fighting back against the Chinese efforts at control, but those efforts apparently stopped at some point over the weekend and the Obama team gave in to Chinese demands for a tightly controlled forum. In the end, Obama seemed uncomfortable dealing with the non-responsive crowd, which did not laugh at his jokes despite their apparent English fluency, and he seemed to be self-censoring, even in response to the "tough and straightforward" questions about how it felt to win the Nobel Peace Prize. When he did get a serious question such as on Taiwan arms sales or his knowledge of the Great Fire Wall that tightly controls access to the internet in China, he ducked and flinched. In an otherwise decent answer to the Internet censorship question, in which he praised the value of freedom of information in American society (albeit in typically self-regarding terms), he undercut his whole message by referring to the "different traditions" that Chinese internet users supposedly have. Huh?

Nevermind that his predecessors were somehow able to get the Chinese to agree to let them speak on live TV. As the White House explained in response to criticisms of Obama's lack of direct contact with the Chinese people, he really was unable to do more because of the shortness of his trip (during which he reportedly did manage some sight-seeing at the Great Wall and Forbidden City).

But you would never know there was any controversy about any of this from reading the White House website, which referred to the town-hall as "unprecedented" and "historic." Yes--I suppose it was both those things, in that it has now set a new low standard for what American presidents can expect in terms of their ability to directly address the Chinese people without the filter of China's authoritarian government. Apparently oblivious to all this, Katie Lillie, the White House Director of Press Advance told the White House Blog that: "What was so amazing to her about today’s town hall in Shanghai, was the similarities it had to hundreds of events held all over the United States during the campaign." Well, that explains a lot.

On the homepage, James W. Ceaser asks: will President Obama show as much respect for the Dalai Lama as he did for the emperor of Japan?

Keep America Safe is joining forces with The Bravest and 9/11 Families for a Safe & Strong America to encourage people to attend AG Eric Holder's appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday morning. The hearing promises to be a major event, with Holder answering questions about his decision to bring KSM and other 9/11 plotters to New York City for trials in federal criminal courts:

AG Eric Holder will appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, November 18, to testify about the administration’s plan to bring Khalid Sheikh Mohammed back to the scene of Al Qaeda’s greatest single atrocity–Ground Zero–where he will brag about the slaughter of 3,000 innocent men, women and children and his lawyers will tell a “jury of his peers” that HE is a victim of the U.S. Government.

This is insanity.

Please join 9/11 Families for a Safe & Strong America, the firefighters of TheBravest.com and Keep America Safe in Washington, D.C. to tell Eric Holder, President Obama and their supporters in Congress:

“WE WILL FIGHT YOU ALL THE WAY!”

More details here.

President Obama has responded to critics of the administration's weak human rights policies by getting tough on Asian abusers during his trip.  Sort of.  

While sitting across the table from the Burmese junta's prime minister, General Thein Sein, at the US-ASEAN Summit in Singapore, President Obama publicly and privately reiterated the pointed statements on Burma he had made earlier in the week in Tokyo.  According to NSC spokesman Ben Rhodes:

“[I]n his intervention,” Obama “used exactly the same language that he used in the [Tokyo] speech. So privately he said the exact same thing that he said publicly in enumerating the steps that the government of Burma must take: freeing all political prisoners, freeing Aung San Suu Kyi, ending the violence against minority groups, and moving into a dialogue with democratic movements there.”

Contrast his vigorous advocacy for Aung San Suu Kyi and Burma's democrats, however, with his unwillingness to mention the name of another Asian Nobel Peace Prize winner: the Dalai Lama.  There was no mention of the Dalai Lama or the situation in Tibet in Obama's remarks in Tokyo or, so far as we know, during his time in China. Despite having been given a serious opening by the Chinese Foreign Ministry's ham-fisted moral equivalence of the American Civil War and the Chinese occupation of Tibet, Obama used a vague reference to the rights of "ethnic and religious minorities" when talking about human rights to the Communist Youth League representatives who participated his so-called town hall in Shanghai. There was no teachable moment for China's future leaders.  

While he may yet raise concerns about Tibet during his bilateral meetings in Beijing, none of us will know what he said and how his interlocutors responded.  It is good to know that Obama is willing to stand up for his fellow Nobel Peace Laureates and the suffering people they represent.  Except when he isn't.  

Joementum, in Israel, says Iran "has failed the test."

While Obama dithers on Afghanistan, Lang Sias asks what happened to the "fierce urgency of now."

Steve Clemons says "the dark side has taken hold at the White House."

Fact: It took 11 AP reporters to fact-check Palin's book.

Jamie Kirchick asks what NIAC is and who it represents.

Iran to establish "cyber police" -- but Obama and NIAC will bear witness.

Even Chinese artists are fired up (!) about President Barack Hussein Obama. At right is a work created by Chinese artist Liu Bolin. It's a bronze bust laced with gas lines so that every few minutes President Obama is engulfed in blue flame. (Much as he will be during his Assumption.) Says Liu, "He's so hot right now, so I wanted to translate that through my work. . . . Yes, setting something on fire can have negative connotations, but this piece represents energy and life that Obama has given to the world." The AP report helpfully notes that Liu made a similar piece commemorating Mao Zedong.

Our first Pacific President^TM is also being celebrated in Beijing with "Oba Mao" T-shirts picturing Obama dressed as a Red Guard soldier. In America, this sort of thing might set Robert Gibbs off on one of his sputtering sneers of indignation. Happily, in China the image is meant as a compliment.

It's all about context.

Andrew Sullivan is digging in to defend Trita Parsi -- and to attack Parsi's critics:

But it does reveal a classic neoconservative move. They are essentially trying to accuse Iranian-Americans who disagree with them of dual loyalty. Even as they rightly scream blue murder if that is ever applied to them. You realize after a while that they have no principles but the maintenance of their own power and the destruction of their perceived enemies. War for ever indeed - within American and outside it. At any cost. Whatever it takes.

It is not a classic neoconservative move to accuse people of dual loyalty -- it's a classic Sullivan move. Neoconservatives tend to be pretty careful not to accuse people of dual loyalties. And, of course, nobody is accusing Parsi of dual loyalties -- we're asking if he has any allegiance to America at all. Parsi is not, contra Sullivan, an "Iranian-American." Parsi is not an American citizen, and yet he claims to speak on behalf of Iranian-Americans. Parsi did not even have a green card when he started NIAC, and the organization he set up before NIAC sought only to "safeguard Iran's and Iranian interests." Dual loyalty would be a huge improvement I think. Meanwhile, Sullivan sees in all this a neoconservative plot to undermine Iran's opposition. "Smearing the non-neocon Green opposition as essentially pro-Khamenei solidifies the neoconservative war project," Sullivan writes.

If Parsi is part of the opposition, why was he working to silence regime dissidents? After the jump is an email exchange between Parsi and Siamak Namazi, who helped Parsi establish the group that sought to "safeguard Iran's and Iranian interests," and Hadi Semati, an Iranian who served as an adviser to Khatami, in which they plot to keep Fatemeh Haghighatjoo, a former Iranian parliamentarian who resigned in protest over her government's crackdown on reformers, from participating in a panel discussion on the democracy movement in Iran. The panel was sponsored by the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and the Iranian Students for Democracy and Human Rights.

Parsi first asks his two confederates, only one of whom is an actual Iranian-American, "Will either of you discuss with Haghighatjoo how she should deliver her message on the Hill?" The problem, it seems, was that Haghighatjoo supported the idea that Americans should do more than "bear witness," as Obama likes to say, to the repression of the Iranian people. Namazi responds that "I spoke to her in Boston and tried to emphasize that she should not go around saying 'we need foreign help to promote democracy in Iran' w/o being very clear." Semati then chimes in to explain that while Haghighatjoo is a "very brave and genuine democrat...[she] does not know the field at all." Semati, an Iranian national, wants democracy to "develope [sic] authentically from within" Iran. And Semati adds that he is "very skeptical of the true intent of the US."

And then Parsi returns to the conversation and offers to intervene himself if necessary. "I am fond of convincing Iranians of the hostile intentions many players in DC based on my own observations from within Congress," Parsi writes. So what does that mean? Parsi is an Iranian national working to convince Iranian dissidents of the "hostile intentions" of those who would give voice to regime dissidents -- something isn't right here. It was Parsi who wanted to kill the National Endowment for Democracy State Department funding for Iranian civil society groups, not the neocons. It was Parsi who wanted to keep this particular dissident from speaking out, not the neocons. At the height of the protests in Iran, Sullivan used his blog to amplify the voices of those who were standing up to the regime, so I wonder how Sullivan feels about Trita Parsi using his organization to try and prevent those same voices from being heard in Washington.

The email exchange is after the jump -- read it from the bottom up.

According to a Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services report:

CMS took a close look at the health care bill that was passed by House Democrats and endorsed by the White House, and it found that not only would the bill not reduce health care costs -- it would increase them. Time and again, we have been reminded that the United States spends a higher percentage of its GDP on health care than any other nation -- about 16 percent. As Obama but it in his June speech to the American Medical Association, "If we fail to act, one out of every five dollars we earn will be spent on health care within a decade." Yet if we adopt the legislation supported by Obama -- which finances expanded coverage through tax increases and Medicare cuts -- health care spending will actually rise to 21.1 percent of GDP, according to CMS, compared to 20.8 percent if we simply do nothing.

"Make no mistake: The cost of our health care is a threat to our economy," Obama told AMA. "It's an escalating burden on our families and businesses. It's a ticking time bomb for the federal budget. And it is unsustainable for the United States of America."

This is not the first entire justification fail of the health-care reform process, nor will it be the last. Why? Because as "Saturday Night Live" notes, "The President wants to pass a health-care bill so bad that he will literally sign anything...As long as it's a stack of paper with the words 'health care' on it, he'll sign it."

Because what's important in this time of 10.2 percent unemployment is to pay several trillion dollars to preserve the fantasy that Congress knows anything about bringing down the cost of health care, despite the fact that the fallacy has been laid bare on numerous occasions by lawmakers, CBO, CMS, and trusty common sense.

Now, go forth, and get that giant, directionless hodge-podge of made-up policy remedies and government largesse on the president's desk before the make-believe deadline of the end of the year, lawmakers! That'll fix everything.

In light of ABC's reporting on the Obama adminstration's reporting do-over on stimulus jobs, which slashed 60,000 jobs from the count due to funky reports, please click over to this new interactive map of bogus stimulus job reports.

Hey, Recovery.gov has its map.

And, now recovery doubters have a map of their own, which charts the locations of more than 75,000 fake "saved or created" jobs boasted by stimulus-boosters.

Ross Douthat writes in the New York Times:

If there’s any comfort for Democratic legislators in this landscape, it’s the possibility that the angst-ridden health care debate may matter less to their re-election prospects than anyone expects. Amid the town-hall tumult in August, Obamacare looked like 2010’s defining issue. But when you talk to Republicans on Capitol Hill today, it sounds as if health care will play a relatively modest role in the campaign they plan to run.

If a bill passes, they’ll attack the Democrats for reorganizing the nation’s health care sector instead of putting Americans back to work. If the legislation fails, they’ll attack the Democrats for trying to reorganize the health care sector instead of putting Americans back to work.

Either way, though, they expect the jobs issue to matter much, much more than the specific details of health care reform.

It's not entirely clear that unemployment will matter "much, much more" than the Democrats' health-care legislation, but it will obviously be a very big issue in 2010. Here are just a few articles from around the country that Republicans are highlighting to show that the stimulus package isn't doing what President Obama said it would do.

The Detroit Free Press: "Car orders not lifting auto jobs"

The hundreds of millions of dollars the federal government spent to buy thousands of vehicles from metro Detroit's three automakers under the $787-billion federal stimulus act didn't retain or keep a single job, a Free Press analysis shows.

The Greenville News in North South Carolina: "State's stimulus job count questioned"

The Greenville Housing Authority “saved or created” 118 jobs by use of federal stimulus money, according to the Obama administration.

Not bad for an agency that has 35 employees.

Those jobs, like many of the 8,147 jobs listed by the feds as having been saved or created in South Carolina through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, weren't actually permanent positions.

The Atlanta Journal Constitution: "Georgia jobs created by stimulus dollars overstated"

At issue is the federal government’s reporting of jobs created or preserved by the Obama administration’s $787 billion stimulus program, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The stimulus Web site, recovery.gov, says 24,681 jobs have been created or saved so far in Georgia, and 640,329 nationwide.

But an AJC examination of records posted on the Web site calls into question the accuracy of the numbers. The AJC found:

● An Augusta agency reported creating 68 jobs even though the work has not started yet.

● A private contractor counted the same 10 jobs six times, erroneously reporting 60.

● A Head Start organization in LaGrange reported 77 jobs based on raises it gave its employees with the money.

The AJC found the errors after downloading records from recovery.gov, examining those that reported the most jobs, and contacting recipients of the federal funds to verify their job numbers.

There is no doubt much more muckraking to be done on the Obama administration's claims of jobs "created or saved" by the stimulus package. And the national media are beginning to catch on. This just in from ABC News:

The Obama administration, under fire for inflating job growth from the $787 billion stimulus plan, slashed over 60,000 jobs from its most recent report on the program because the reporting outlets had submitted "unrealistic data," according to a document obtained by ABC News.

The Office of Management and Budget document shows that before an Oct. 30 progress report on the program the administration asked the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board to remove information from 12 stimulus recipients that contained "unrealistic data," including "unrealistic job data."

One recipient -- Talladega County of Alabama -- claimed that 5,000 jobs had been saved or created from only $42,000 in stimulus funds.

Normally I tend not to get as worked up about our national eating habits like, say, the Center for Science in the Public Interest or Mayor Bloomberg. Is there an obesity problem in America? Sure. Childhood obesity even moreso. Do we need to ban trans-fats from cities like New York or sue fast-food giants because their food makes us fat? Probably not. But what about enormous cupcakes the size of your kitchen microwave? And what about the commercials for them on children’s channels like Sprout? I’m talking about Big Top Cupcake. And this, I firmly believe, must be stopped, if necessary, by congressional legislation. Judge for yourself. (And if you think this is directed toward large birthday parties, notice how the “cupcake” is served to only two kids!)

Jen Rubin corrects the L.A. Times: "And to prevent (Ft. Hood) from happening again, we need to get over the diversity fetish (which imagines that Americans are too dumb to distinguish between nonviolent Muslims and those who've adopted a murderous ideology) and get on with the business of fighting a war against those who want many, many more Fort Hoods."

Finding an impartial jury for KSM should be easy, right?

WSJ: Meet the health-care rationing commission.

"Going Rogue" reviewed: "This is not the prejudiced, dim-witted ideologue of the popular liberal imagination."

Is the Washington Post still stuck on the PTSD narrative? "Attack is a reminder of the mental demons unleashed by combat," even though Hasan had never been in combat, and we here at the Post don't consider those he killed to have died in combat. Wait, what were we saying?

U.S. Chamber and other critics of Obamacare plan an economic study to illuminate the job-killer.

Barone advises a Democratic president, whose job-saving policies are hard to recognize, but job-killing policies are obvious: "So here is a suggestion for the jobs summit. The president should put on again the bipartisan hat he wore during much of the campaign and embrace the proposal by some Republicans for a payroll tax holiday. Cutting our most regressive tax should appeal to Democrats. And it would immediately reduce the cost of job creation. Voting for health care legislation may or may not help incumbents. Voting for a payroll tax cut would."

Another illustrious member of the Party of Tax Hikes has to go pay her back taxes before running.

Japanese press to Obama: "Were the bombings of Nagasaki and Hiroshima the right decision?" Obama: "Err, uhh, wanna talk about N. Korea?"

An Obama supporter on the bow: ""The bow as he performed did not just display weakness in Red State terms, but evoked weakness in Japanese terms....The last thing the Japanese want or need is a weak looking American president and, again, in all ways, he unintentionally played that part."

Heart-ache: Health care is least wished for Christmas gift in a New York Magazine poll.

SNL goes after Obamacare.

Video: The UCONN College Republicans explore the prevalence of the bowing protocol Obama observed with Akihito:

NIAC and J Street might seem at first an odd alliance. J Street is "pro-peace, pro-Israel" and NIAC is pro-engagement, pro-Iran. But J Street isn't all that pro-Israel, and NIAC will take any allies it can find in the fight against sanctions, so few and far between are such organizations in Washington. J Street director Jeremy Ben-Ami co-authored an op-ed with NIAC chief Trita Parsi making the (extremely unpopular in the Jewish community) argument against sanctions. J Street invited Parsi to speak at their conference last month. And the two groups have together constructed and embraced a narrative that explains away all the questions about their credibility and legitimacy as the work of the same nefarious right-wing conspiracy.

But follow the money and the tie that binds seems to be George Soros, who provides substantial funding to both groups. Also, Morton Halperin, one of the top men at Soros's Open Society Institute, sits on the boards of both J Street and NIAC. As Ben Smith reported Friday, Soros pays the salary of the NIAC staffer who runs the Campaign for a New Policy on Iran. Documents reveal that J Street participated in the discussions that determined the group's agenda.

And there's another thing the groups have in common: they've both been caught telling their supporters they've taken one position while lobbying behind the scenes for the exact opposite outcome.

Jennifer Rubin notes two examples of this dishonest conduct. J Street declared publicly that it would not lobby against passage of a resolution in the House of Representatives condemning the Goldstone Report. (Neither would J Street support the resolution, of course. The group's position was somewhere between oppose and support.) Yet this blog reported and Morton Halperin has not denied that either he or someone in his office was the author of a letter circulated to members of Congress and signed by Judge Goldstone. J Street, or at least one of its top advisers, was actively lobbying against the resolution and in support of Goldstone.

NIAC gets caught in a similar lie. Eli Lake's Washington Times report details NIAC's campaign to "create a media controversy," in the words of one NIAC staffer, in order to scuttle the appointment of Dennis Ross to oversee Iran policy. NIAC failed, but just last week NIAC put on its website a "Myths and Facts" page to set the record straight about the organization's work:

NIAC is not the only organization that is under attack. In fact, almost every distinguished American policymaker, intellectual and administration official that supports Obama's pro-engagement policy in the Middle East is being targeted. This includes:

* Ambassador Dennis Ross - Currently serving in the U.S. National Security Council...

So after trying to kill Ross's appointment in a secret and perhaps illegal lobbying campaign, the group touts Ross on its website as a "distinguished policy maker" who is the victim of neoconservative smears. Now we know that the smears against Ross were being conceived and directed by the staff at NIAC, and all the while NIAC was playing the victim.

Trita Parsi has charmed his way into the very heart of the "progressive left," and no progressive organization has been more easily or completely charmed than J Street. So what is a "pro-peace, pro-Israel" group doing allying itself so closely with a man who is himself so closely allied with a Holocaust-denying regime that daily threatens the existence of the State of Israel? And why is it that neither organization is able to represent in public the views that they so aggressively promote behind closed doors?

Anwar al Awlaki, the radical cleric contacted by Major Nidal Malik Hasan, gave an interview to a "terrorism expert" who spoke on behalf of the Washington Post. (See the story for WaPo disclaimers/cautions.) Awlaki , who issued a statement praising Hasan for his killing spree, says he neither directed nor pressured Hasan to kill US Army soldiers.

But according to the Post:

On Dec. 23, 2008, days after he said Hasan first e-mailed him, Aulaqi also posted online words encouraging attacks on U.S. soldiers, writing: "The bullets of the fighters of Afghanistan and Iraq are a reflection of the feelings of the Muslims towards America," according to the NEFA Foundation, a private South Carolina group that monitors extremist Web sites.

The FBI and others familiar with Hasan's emails to Awlaki have described them as "benign" and consistent with his research. It's always good to be skeptical of self-serving accounts from al Qaeda clerics, but Awlaki has a different view. Again, according to the WaPo:

Aulaqi described Hasan as a man who took his Muslim faith seriously, and who was eager to understand how to interpret Islamic sharia law. In the e-mails, Hasan appeared to question U.S. involvement in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and often used "evidence from sharia that what America was doing should be confronted," the cleric told Shaea.

Who is telling the truth? We should see the emails.

In the online-only "Panel Plus" segment of Fox News Sunday, the boss and Liz Cheney continued their assault on the Obama administration's decision to try Khalid Sheikh Mohammad and his associates in a federal court in New York City. You can watch it here:

Politico reports that “A senior administration official said President Barack Obama was simply observing protocol when he bowed to Japanese Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko upon arriving at the Imperial Palace in Tokyo on Saturday.”

Why won’t that “senior administration official” come out from behind the curtain and make that assertion in his own name? Because it’s nonsense. As these photos make clear, numerous heads of state and the former U.S. vice president didn't bow to the emperor; they shook hands. The New York Times criticized Bill Clinton in 1994 for almost bowing to the Japanese emperor.

We await the release of a State Department briefing paper that says it’s “protocol” for an American president to bow to a Japanese emperor.

The Hill reports that a Republican member of Congress is claiming that he was denied access to General Stanley McChrystal during a recent trip to Afghanistan:

"Miller, who sits on both the Armed Services panel and the Intelligence Committee, told The Hill that the Pentagon denied his request for a meeting with the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan

The top-ranking Republican on the Intelligence oversight subcommittee was in Afghanistan in mid-October.

“I wasn’t allowed to [meet with him]. I was there for four days, asked to meet with Gen. McChrystal and was told I couldn’t, although Sen. [Daniel] Inouye [D-Hawaii] met with him and Sen. John Kerry [D-Mass.] met with him,” Miller said in an interview.

Miller, who is serving his fifth term, stressed that McChrystal was in Afghanistan when he was there.

“I said I’d meet with him anywhere,” Miller said, sarcastically adding, 'that’s OK … I’m just on HASC [the House Armed Services Committee] and Intel.'"

This raises a larger question about whether the Obama administration is trying to muzzle General McChrystal. White House aides opposed to the deployment of additional troops to Afghanistan have been shamelessly leaking details of National Security Council meetings and classified cables even after National Security Advisor Jim Jones chastised General McChrystal in early October for publicly discussing his request and explaining why other options, such as a more limited counterterrorism strategy, would not be successful. The administration has rejected repeated requests, including from some Democrats, for General McChrystal to be allowed to appear in front of Congress to discuss his assessment.

Last month, the Washington Post reported that prior to President Obama making his final decision, General Jones said that the president would meet again in person with General McChrystal. "When the White House is ready, he said, McChrystal -- along with the U.S. ambassadors to Afghanistan and Pakistan -- will fly to Washington so that the three 'can meet with the president before a decision is made.'"

President Obama told reporters in Tokyo that he would make a decision "soon." Does he still plan to meet with General McChrystal in person to tell him whether he is rejecting his strategy and request for additional troops?