Jinn of Current Events

Times: A Muslim cleric [trained in Saudi Arabia] toured Britain for four years urging audiences to observe the teachings of Osama bin Laden and kill all Jews, Hindus and Westerners by any means available, including chemical and nuclear weapons, a court was told yesterday. What exactly did he teach? You can use chemical weapons to exterminate the unbelievers. Is that clear? 

Leonard Peikoff: Thirty years after Roe V. Wade, no one defends the right to abortion in fundamental, moral terms, which is why the pro-abortion rights forces are on the defensive. Abortion-rights advocates should not cede the terms "pro-life" and "right to life" to the anti-abortionists. It is a woman's right to her life that gives her the right to terminate her pregnancy. Nor should abortion-rights advocates keep hiding behind the phrase "a woman's right to choose." Does she have the right to choose murder? That's what abortion would be, if the fetus were a person. The status of the embryo in the first trimester is the basic issue that cannot be sidestepped. The embryo is clearly pre-human; only the mystical notions of religious dogma treat this clump of cells as constituting a person. 

Washington Post: That question is relatively simple: Has Iraq agreed to immediately and voluntarily disclose and dismantle its weapons of mass destruction, and to allow inspectors to verify those actions? The answer is equally plain: It has not. 

Condoleezza Rice (NYT): In 1989 South Africa made the strategic decision to dismantle its covert nuclear weapons program. It destroyed its arsenal of seven weapons and later submitted to rigorous verification by the International Atomic Energy Agency... Ukraine and Kazakhstan demonstrated a similar pattern of cooperation when they decided to rid themselves of the nuclear weapons, intercontinental ballistic missiles and heavy bombers inherited from the Soviet Union. With significant assistance from the United States -- warmly accepted by both countries -- disarmament was orderly, open and fast... Iraq's behavior could not offer a starker contrast. Instead of a commitment to disarm, Iraq has a high-level political commitment to maintain and conceal its weapons... 

These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. —Thomas Paine 

NATO is dead. Rumsfeld explains that Germany and France are in effect opposed to the USA and NATO: Germany has been a problem, and France has been a problem... But you look at vast numbers of other countries in Europe. They're not with France and Germany on this, they're with the United States. Germany and France represent old Europe, and NATO's expansion in recent years means the center of gravity is shifting to the east. The German and French passion to undermine the US and keep Saddam in power is suspicious. Do they have something to lose if/when Iraq is liberated?