A passel of pundits weigh in with counter-conventional-wisdom contrarianism. Such as Amir Tehiri, writing for Opinion Journal.

Dean Barnett, writing over at Hugh Hewitt's place, thinks everyone got it right the first time.

Posted by: Ace at 06:37 AM | Comments (24)
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His first v-blog for Hot Air.

"Sooo hot... want to touch the hein-ey..."

He looks a little like a friend/commenter here, not_steve_in_hb.

Who, speaking of pussified men, had this really, really lame rap with chicks he was convinced was a winner.

I wonder if I can get him to post about that, and if he still believes in it.

At least he wasn't doing the "friends" thing, though.

Correction: Okay, it wasn't that lame. It pushed the flattery button hard, which, I admit, is the right button to push with a chick.

It was just how he described it that made it sound so lame. He was doing a schtick, but the way he described it, he made it sound like groveling.

Thanks to Slublog for the screencap.

Posted by: Ace at 05:57 AM | Comments (33)
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FDA approves:

Women can buy the morning-after pill without a prescription, the government declared Thursday, a major step that nevertheless failed to quell the politically charged debate over access to emergency contraception.

The manufacturer, lawmakers and other advocates said they will press the government to allow minors to purchase the pills over the counter.

The Food and Drug Administration said that women 18 and older -- and men purchasing for their partners -- may buy the Plan B pills without a doctor's note, but only from pharmacies.

Girls 17 and younger still will need a prescription to buy the pills, the FDA told manufacturer Barr Pharmaceuticals Inc., in ruling on an application filed in 2003.

Here's where CNN parses the meaning of the word "pregnant:"

Plan B contains a concentrated dose of the same drug found in many regular birth-control pills. Planned Parenthood estimates 41 other countries already allow women to buy emergency contraception without a prescription.

If a woman takes Plan B within 72 hours of unprotected sex, she can lower the risk of pregnancy by up to 89 percent. Plan B is different from the abortion pill: If a woman already is pregnant, Plan B has no effect.

I assume CNN is taking "pregnant" to mean a fertilized egg implanted on the uterine wall, or however the hell that works. They know this is a key disagreement with social cons, who by and large take fertilization to be the beginning of life, but elide right over that question as if it's not a question at all.

You can probably guess my take, as I'm generally more pro-choice on these questions than mainstream conservatives. It seems to me that if abortion is currently practiced, it's probably best that the abortions occur so early in the cycle, rather than later, when the egg becomes more baby-like.

As for the health issues: Well, all drugs are dangerous. We usually don't ban a drug which is useful for some purpose just because there will be that one in ten thousand serious adverse reaction. We just give a warning, and let people take their chances.

Posted by: Ace at 05:54 AM | Comments (29)
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The real news here is that the French are capable of embarrassment:

French President Jacques Chirac said Thursday that France would commit 2,000 troops to a new international peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon. The decision breaks a stalemate that has held up the dispatch of soldiers seen by diplomats as crucial to maintaining the 11-day-old cease-fire between Hezbollah and Israel.

...

France helped broker the U.N. cease-fire and initially indicated it would commit 2,000 troops to help maintain the truce. But Chirac was chastised at home and abroad when he later said he would dispatch only 200 engineers to augment the 200 French troops serving in an existing U.N. monitoring force on the Lebanon-Israel border.

...

Chirac said he hoped France's decision Thursday would spur other countries to join the force, including the United States and Britain. Both have said they are too taxed in Iraq and Afghanistan to take part.

Then what was his hope, precisely, with his absurd first offer of sending 200 engineers?

Was Chriac hoping that would spur other countries to send a couple dozen engineers as well?

...

So far, Italy is the only other European country to make a major commitment, offering to send as many as 3,000 troops and to command the force.

But the direction of the expanded force appears to be in French hands. French and U.N. officials said French Maj. Gen. Alain Pelligrini will retain command of the U.N. mission until his term ends next February. U.N. officials said an Italian general will head a new military command center at U.N. headquarters to map out strategy for the operation.

The French mindset is truly breathtaking. They really think that their superior morality and culture -- and "leadership" -- alone is quite enough contribution to any mess. They scream the loudest, make the greatest demands for a leadership role, and then offer up 200 engineers.

Good Lord.

Italy has been relatively quiet as a state throughout this, has no historic ties with Lebanon, and immediately offered up 3000 troops -- to be led, presumably, by French engineers.

What insufferable Gaul.

Thanks again to Memeorandum.

Posted by: Ace at 05:46 AM | Comments (17)
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But of course.

Wanted: Scarier Intelligence

Note: that's meant ironically, or from the POV of the "fearmongering" GOP.

The last thing this country needs as it heads into this election season is another attempt to push the intelligence agencies to hype their conclusions about the threat from a Middle Eastern state.

That’s what happened in 2002, when the administration engineered a deeply flawed document on Iraq that reshaped intelligence to fit President Bush’s policy. And history appeared to be repeating itself this week, when the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Peter Hoekstra of Michigan, released a garishly illustrated and luridly written document that is ostensibly dedicated to “helping the American people understand” that Iran’s fundamentalist regime and its nuclear ambitions pose a strategic threat to the United States.

It’s hard to imagine that Mr. Hoekstra believes there is someone left in this country who does not already know that. But the report obviously has different aims. It is partly a campaign document, a product of the Republican strategy of scaring Americans into allowing the G.O.P. to retain control of Congress this fall. It fits with the fearmongering we’ve heard lately — like President Bush’s attempt the other day to link the Iraq war to the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

But even more worrisome, the report seems intended to signal the intelligence community that the Republican leadership wants scarier assessments that would justify a more confrontational approach to Tehran. It was not the work of any intelligence agency, or the full intelligence panel, or even the subcommittee that ostensibly drafted it. The Washington Post reported that it was written primarily by a former C.I.A. official known for his view that the assessments on Iran are not sufficiently dire.

While the report contains no new information, it does dish up dire-sounding innuendo, mostly to leave the impression that Iran is developing nuclear weapons a lot faster than intelligence agencies have the guts to admit. It also tosses in a few conspiracy theories, like the unsupported assertion that Iran engineered the warfare between Israel and Hezbollah. And it complains that America’s spy agencies are too cautious, that they “shy away from provocative conclusions.”

Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker, put it even more bluntly in explaining some Republicans’ dissatisfaction with the C.I.A. reporting on Iran: “The intelligence community is dedicated to predicting the least dangerous world possible.”

All in all, this is a chilling reminder of what happened when intelligence analysts told Vice President Dick Cheney they could not prove that Iraq was building a nuclear weapon or had ties with Al Qaeda. He kept asking if they really meant it — until the C.I.A. took the hint.

...

The nation cannot afford to pay the price again for politiciansÂ’ bending intelligence or bullying the intelligence agencies to suit their ideology.

Liberal politicians cannot say these things. Therefore, it's up to their proxies at the NYT to explicate the Michael Moore "fictitious threat" thesis.

Via the great Memeorandum.

Guess which blogs are gang-chatting this story up?

Posted by: Ace at 05:33 AM | Comments (18)
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Glad to see someone else riding tall on my hobbyhorse:

Critics of President Bush's conduct in the War on Terror get testy when they are accused of not taking the threat of terrorism seriously, but with increasing prominence, they are making their true feelings known.

Quite simply, they don't think terrorism is a big deal.

In a recent American Prospect column, Mathew Yglesias wrote that the Bush administration has been "fostering a climate of panic and paranoia" and "blowing the risks of conventional terrorism all out of proportion..."

John Mueller, who has lately been making a career out of downplaying terrorism, has an article in the current issue of Foreign Affairs entitled, "Is There Still a Terrorist Threat?" In it, he writes: "The massive and expensive homeland security apparatus erected since 9/11 may be persecuting some, spying on many, inconveniencing most, and taxing all to defend the United States against an enemy that scarcely exists."

Etc.

Shall we stop the massive funding and "scare campaign" for AIDS, then, I wonder?

Call me crazy, but when a disease is killing people, I say fight it.

Hugh Hewitt recently posted on "reasonable liberal" Cass Sunstein's advice to Democrats: Whatever you do, keep terrorism out of the news.

Sunstein is just telling it the way it is. Democrats have a huge reason to deny the dangers to the nation's security. And they routinely do. Which is why you can't trust them on this issue, and why you shouldn't vote for them in this time of war.

Larwyn makes her own point: Doesn't this imply that Democrats control, or at least strongly influence, what gets covered in the MSM?

Posted by: Ace at 04:46 AM | Comments (30)
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I don't know if this is such a big deal myself, but it's getting a lot of play, so:

On a tour of the decimated Ninth Ward, Nagin tells Pitts the city has removed most of the debris from public property and it’s mainly private land that’s still affected – areas that can’t be cleaned without the owners' permission. But when Pitts points to flood-damaged cars in the street and a house washed partially into the street, the mayor shoots back. "That’s alright. You guys in New York can’t get a hole in the ground fixed and it’s five years later. So let’s be fair."

I just file this in the you-know-what-he-meant folder. But others seem to think it's evidence that Nagin is an idiot.

As if that case still needed to be proven.

Thanks to all who sent tips.

Posted by: Ace at 04:30 AM | Comments (30)
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Kodiaks, on the other hand, are doin' just fine.

Who are these people who have become scientists in order to go out into the field and weigh bears' balls?

The icecap may not be the only thing shrinking in the Arctic. The genitals of polar bears in east Greenland are apparently dwindling in size due to industrial pollutants.

Scientists report this shrinkage could, in the worst case scenario, endanger polar bears there and elsewhere by spoiling their love lives and causing their numbers to peter out.

Many male polar bears were observed avoiding aggressive courting rituals, prefering to try to be "friends" with a female for three or four years before attempting to mount her and the awkwardly explaining, "I'm sorry, I thought you were giving me a signal."

...

The researchers experienced harrowing times on their expeditions with dog sleds into the wilds of Greenland to study polar bears.

"One evening a bear came just next to us in the night when we were doing the toilette," Sonne recalled. "They shot and it ran." Another time, "we almost had to eat the dogs as we ran out of food and seals. It was cold sleeping in -50 degrees C [-58 Fahrenheit] in five weeks with no heater."

For their courage, they advanced the discipline of science. So here now is the answer to the the question you've all been asking yourselves since the headline:

The adult polar bear testicles the researchers examined were on average roughly three inches across and 1.8 ounces in weight, although they could dramatically enlarge during the height of sexual activity from January to July. Their bacula, or penis bones, were on average nearly seven inches long.

Good news-- many of you, or your husbands/boyfriends, are hung like polar bears, if not better. There's a little opening gambit for you all at your next cocktail party.

Thanks to CraigC.

Posted by: Ace at 08:49 PM | Comments (51)
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Brit Hume. I'll know I'm cool when Brit Hume mentions Ace of Spades.

And kudos to German TV for actually bothering to test the bodies claimed to have been killed by Israeli chem weapons, unlike some wire services that simply ran with the outlandish claims without conducting the simplest medical tests to confirm or disprove the allegations.

None of this helps in the previous Israel-Hezballah war, of course. Hezballah fed the media absurd propaganda and the MSM (especially the BBC and Reuters) were more than happy to run with unsubstantiated claims, so long as they reflected poorly on a US ally and thus could be used as a hammerclaw to slash away at the despised Tony Blair and demonic George Bush.

But it might help in the next war.

And there will be a next war. As George Patton told a group of eight year olds, there always has been a next war and there always will be.

Posted by: Ace at 04:05 PM | Comments (37)
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Found over at Pretty Numbers, who partly concurs and partly dissents from the decision:

You loveless heartbreaker. You see, you are a manipulative hot chick. I am one of several (maybe more) guys that you keep around by giving us hope. Hope for a kiss that night, hope we will bang you, hope for a hand-job, hope for a real relationship - none of which we will get. We give you a rides, buy you drinks, talk to you when your "bored", listen to your bullshit about your boyfriend. We do all this for one thing: to get further with you. But here is the problem: I am not getting sex. I don't need another pal. I have "buddies" and chums. I have my homeboys and my crew.

What I don't have is a hot piece of ass that I'm banging on the side. I am done. Tired of the games and manipulation. I've put my time in, played the game, (oh boy did I play the game). But I am trying to move along now. It's too much work. It's too fatiguing to actually pretend to care about your ailments and theories on who is cool and who isn't. The constant stream of self-absorbing drivel has become numbing. I finally see you for what you are: A manipulative hot chick. Every time I see you on your cell phone (always), I can't help but think there is some other sucker on the other end of the phone, endlessly listening to you babble about yourself in the hopes of getting into your pants. You man eating psycho. Good luck to the new guy,..maybe he'll get further than me. I'm passing the torch. I am removing your # from my cell phone. Good luck. I am through playing the game. ....unless your plans fall through on Saturday. In which case, maybe we could hang. this is in or around Bostonish

More grist for the mill, and no, I don't live in "Bostonish."

Pretty Numbers thinks it's largely the guy's own fault. Well, yeah.

What's this whole "Woe is this attention whore" whine? This sissy is operating under pretenses more false than the chick is. If she's a sex-tease, he's a friendship-tease. He's as uninterested in friendship with her as she is in sex with him.

This whole "friends" thing is a pussy way to get close to a girl without putting anything on the line. I've done it dozens of times myself. It's unmanly and counterproductive. Make a move or don't, but don't be chickenshit chump waiting months and months for the "right opportunity."

The "right opportunity" comes the night you meet the person you're interested in. The girl knows within three minutes of meeting you, if not sooner. She's not going to change her mind either way by "getting to know you."

I think a lot of guys -- and chicks, for that matter -- really overestimate the power and attractiveness of their personality. Personality doesn't make someone date you. Personality makes someone want to keep dating you if they're already attracted to you, but personality alone is not getting anyone's heart aflutter.

Either someone finds you attractive enough to be datable or they don't, and this calculation is as rapid and automatic as putting out your hand to catch a baseball.

When did men (myself included) become such insufferable pussies?

This guy needs to watch Kate & Leopold and take Hugh Jackman's advice to heart: "No one wants to be courted by a buffon."

Be a man. Don't hide behind the "friendship" skirt. Don't be a "merryandrew."

Personality Goes A Long Way: Someone disagrees and says that personality matters.

Well, yes, but the superficial personality you put on when meeting people, charm, wit, magnetism, "confidence," etc. All these superficial qualities are on display immediately.

And all are factored into the decision immediately.

Guys like this are convinced that if a woman just gets to know their "deep personality," the "real person" underneath, the chick will go for them.

Wrong. First of all, no one falls in love with a really good personality. You fall in love with the superficial qualities and looks of a person. A good personality, and having virtue, and basic goodness, etc., makes someone love you more, but it doesn't make someone love you to begin with.

Second of all, as Steve Martin said in My Blue Heaven, everyone thinks they have a sense of humor, but not everyone does. Similarly, everyone thinks they have some kind of totally-cool "deeper personality," just blazing with attractiveness if only someone would take the time to get to know them, but they are, by and large, assholes, as most people are.

And I have the feeling the 10% of the population with truly stand-out virtues also tend to have the virtue of modesty, so they're not even really strongly aware they're a particularly fine specimen, personality-wise.

This particular guy's "deeper personality" is that of the sort of chump willing to spend countless hours being a girl's emotional tampon without having the balls to ask her out on a date.

So, she probably knows his "deeper personality." And that's not working for him either.

Posted by: Ace at 12:01 PM | Comments (395)
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