Pejman Yousefzadeh, writing at RedState.org, urged readers to contribute to the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation:

It won’t bring back the dead and it will do nothing to erase the memories of torture that continue to burden the lives of the living. But it will show that we remember, that our outrage against the perpetrators of this depravity is eternal and that our support will never flag for those who labored and labor to show the world the bankruptcy inherent in communism and who fight to free all those who remain enslaved to it.

Remember, after all, that the fight against communism is not over. Communist parties continue to vie for influence in Europe, they continue to restrain the near-limitless potential of the Chinese and they make life a nightmare in North Korea. Merely because the Cold War is over does not mean that this pernicious ideology has died out or that people don’t continue to suffer at its hands.

Last month, the National Capital Planning Commission, gave its preliminary approval to the design. It’s a pretty modest memorial, really, considering that it’s intended to commemorate the deaths of 100 million people and the enslavement and dehumanization of billions:

The 90-square-foot monument would be built on National Park Service land one block west of the Capitol. A central feature will be a bronze Goddess of Democracy statue similar to the papier-mache and Styrofoam statue erected by pro-democracy students in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square during 1989 demonstrations. 

If the design gets final approval in December, construction could begin in the spring. The foundation estimates it needs $700,000, and it’s already raised almost two-thirds of that — much of it from donors with ties to current and former communist nations. Now, it’s received "challenge grants" of $125,000, which means it has to raise that much from small donors in order to get the matching funds. By my reckoning, that would be more than enough to complete the memorial.

I’ve kicked in a few bucks. How about you?

The fall of the Communist empire was an event on the same scale of importance as the fall of the Roman Empire.
— Vaclav Havel

Hat Tip: GOPininon, which I heard of from Perry Eidelbus.

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If you haven’t seen their ads on Fox News yet, go to Kurdistan – The Other Iraq and take look at all three (broadband connection recommended, but there are 56k versions). The scripts are available as PDFs.

Save the first one, "Thank You," for last and see if you don’t get choked up. I did.

Check out some of the other links there, too. Iraqi Kurdistan is a tremendous success story that you never hear about in the MSM. Here are a few bullet points from their October update on developments:

• Erbil International and Suleimani Airports are now fully operational and receive regular direct flights from the region and Europe.
   
• 3,000 Korean Troops are stationed in Kurdistan to assist in rehabilitating infrastructure such as water supply/sewerage, roads, pavements, school renovations and constructing town halls.
   
• Erbil hosted an international trade show in September 2005 that attracted 300 national and international exhibitors and 20,000 visitors – not a single security incident occurred.
   
• The new Investment Law for Kurdistan is currently being ratified by the Kurdistan National Assembly and will be passed in the near future. Additionally, an industrial city is planned near Erbil and is open to international investment.

The site is pushing investment and paints a rosy picture, but it’s not all sugar-coated. "Relationship with the West" begins with a pretty grim account of Western (mostly U.S.) betrayal and indifference from the 70s through the early 90s:

While the Kurds have a long history of learning to live with their enemies, they have an equally long history of being betrayed by their allies. Sadly, even the great democracies of the west have not always lived up to the promises they’ve made to the Kurds.

During the nineteen-seventies the United States supported Kurdish autonomy in northern Iraq in order to pressure Saddam Hussein during his negotiations with Iran. But as soon as agreement was reached the Kurds were unceremoniously abandoned by their U.S. allies and exposed to the full fury and vengeance of Saddam’s regime.

Click on over to the Kurdistan Development Corp. site, too. It might just convince you to invest in the region — the law being drafted sounds pretty favorable to foreign investment. The KDC called it the most business-friendly investment law in the region.

The draft provides various tax exemptions for foreign investment, no restrictions on foreign ownership or repatriation of profits, no quotas for local participation (either labor or capital), and a promise (FWIW) of immunity from nationalization.

The only really negative item I see: the law opens all economic activities to foreign investment "except oil and gas." WTF?? Isn’t that the industry in which they could most use massive infusions of capital? Sigh. I suppose there are some pretty good PR reasons for taking that stand — it’s a field where past history and widespread suspicions make it easy for anti-capitalists to score points by screaming "exploitation!"

There’s such an economic boom going on in Kurdistan that Iraqis from Tikrit and Baghdad are moving north for the jobs (and better security situation). In fact, the Kurds are bringing in foreign guest workers. The city of Suleimaniyah is full of new construction, internet cafes, and young people in jeans talking on cell phones.

And then there’s this:

I can’t think of a more hopeful, positive sign than that. Makes me want to tell them "You’re welcome!"

UPDATE: Sun. AM, added more investment law details and reformatted a bit.

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Gullyborg put together a special Veterans Day Carnival of Cordite this week, and you really should check it out (after you complete the reading assignments I gave you earlier). In honor of our veterans, he began with a collection of posts about military weapons and veterans themselves.

There are also lots of posts about the gun ban that San Francisco voters approved this past week. Ironically, the deadline for turning in handguns is next April Fool’s Day. Gullyborg floated an idea for getting red-staters to help out San Francisco gun owners:

We need to put together a "Red State Gun Holder System" for those stuck in S.F. to send their firearms to an adoptive "parent" in a gun-friendly red state come April First, until this matter is settled in court.  One of us would hold your guns for you and keep them safe while lawyers fight for your rights in court.  No turn ins.  No surrendering.  We’ll look out for you and your property.  And we’ll ship them back to you when A) the law is overturned, or B) you move.

There’s much more in the legal/political section — posts about the situation in France and the right to bear arms, Alito, the lies and distortions of the Brady Campaign, the Tennessee school shooting, and criminal safe zones, for starters. And then it’s on to range reports, hunting reports, and pictures of cool guns! Go look — you know you want to!

UPDATE: Did you click the link to Silly String? Do it now — you’ll love it. Yankee ingenuity and cans of silly string are saving lives in combat! The pictures demonstrate how.

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The Watcher of Weasels is always a good source of links to worthwhile, quality blog posts. Every week, the Watcher’s Council nominates and votes on posts by Council members and non-members to pick the best pieces of writing around. The latest voting results are up (the original list of nominees is here), and this time, I want to do more than casually recommend that you check them out. 

For one thing, vanity compels me to point out that my post, Touchdown Dance, finished fourth among non-Council entries. Now, in most competitions, a fourth-place finish is not exactly a big deal. But look at the company I’m in — I’m tied with Col. Austin Bay, for Pete’s sake! I like to think this blog is worth an occasional visit and that I at times amuse or enlighten. But, Col. Bay’s every posted word is worth reading, and this post is no exception. I’m both honored and humbled to be in such company.

More importantly, I strongly recommend that you read both this week’s winners — Council and non-Council. They’re two long, thoughtful, and truly important posts that you shouldn’t miss.

The winning Council post is Dr. Sanity’s must-read, THE INTELLECTUAL AND MORAL BANKRUPTCY OF TODAY’S LEFT. Here’s a taste:

Where once they stood for freedom; they now enable dictatorships and apologize for tyrants. Where once they sought to bring justice to the world; they now defend horrific acts of mass murder and enslavement. Where once they rightly demanded equal opportunity, they have embraced all kinds of racial quotas and discriminatory practices and demand equality of outcome. Where once they sought to empower the weak; they are now instrumental in maintaining and expanding their victimhood.

After all, how can you be a “champion of the oppressed” unless you maintain and nurture an oppressed class that will always require your services to help them?

Read the whole thing. Then read the winning non-Council post, Stephen Green’s The Arm of Decision. This is a genuinely important piece of writing. It answers a critical question that few have even bothered to ask: what’s the arm of decision — the most important element — for victory in the Terror War? In WWI, it was the number of bodies in uniform; in WWII, it was the quantity of stuff — planes, ships, tanks; in the Cold War, according to Greene, it became the quality of stuff.

Today, we face an enemy with no tanks, planes, ships, or divisions, and we have a mere 10 divisions (compared to NATO’s 100 divisions at the end of the Cold War or the 150 divisions the U.S. alone had in WWII). Our Air Force is half the size it was in the early 90s, and the Navy has shrunk similarly. So what does matter in this postmodern war? (emphasis in original)

Previously, I wrote that in order to win the Terror War, we must "prove the enemy ideology to be ineffective," just as we did in the Cold War. … I argued that similar methods would win the Terror War. We’d have to fight, we’d have to maintain our freedoms, but the primary key to victory in the Current Mess is taking the initiative.

What I didn’t see then – but what I do see today – is what "taking the initiative" really means.

It means, fighting a media war. It means, turning the enemy’s one great strength into our own. Broadcast words, sounds, and images are the arm of decision in today’s world.

And if that assessment is correct, then we’re losing this war and badly.

This is important stuff. Please go read it.

The voting results and nominee lists contain several other entries that I just have to read — who can resist a title like A Week of Riots and They Still Won’t Tell Us Who’s Rioting or Moron #7 Revealed? But they’ll have to wait for the weekend. 

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Thanks to Kentucky Dan at Committees of Correspondence for these links. First, I encourage you to help the Online Coalition in supporting HR 1606, the Online Freedom of Speech Act, and opposing HR 4194. The latter purports to protect online freedom of speech, but in fact endangers it in several ways. For instance:

… In comments filed before the FEC, supporters of H.R. 4194 have stated explicitly that those websites which endorse, expressly advocate, and urge readers to donate funds to the election of preferred candidates do not qualify for protection under the law. This would force bloggers that speak forcefully about politics to seek legal counsel – a complete disaster.

I’m one of many who simply won’t obey laws to this effect (I’ll get around to explicitly adding the Patterico Pledge to my sidebar any day now). Use Kentucky Dan’s handy link to email your opinion to your senator and/or representative.

Second, Kentucky Dan links to Unite Against Terror, which asks you to electronically sign their statement, which includes the following (emphasis added):

These attacks did not begin in 2003. The first attempt to blow up the World Trade Center took place ten years before, in 1993.

These terrorists do not hate what is worst in the societies they attack, but what is best. They despise individual liberty, critical thought, gender equality, religious tolerance, the rights of minorities and political pluralism. They do not criticize democracy because it sometimes fails to live up to its principles; they oppose those principles.
…

We offer our support and solidarity to all those within the Muslim faith who work in opposition to the terrorists and who seek to win young people away from extremism and nihilism, towards an engagement with democratic politics.

We believe that democracy and human rights are worth defending with all our strength. The human values of respect and tolerance and dignity are not ‘western’ but universal.

I’ve added my name; please add yours, too.

UPDATE: Someone has kindly pointed out that a description of HR 4194 — or link to same — would have been helpful. Sorry ’bout that. I dashed this off quickly and assumed the info would be easily available at the Online Coalition site, but it doesn’t seem to be.

Yes, HR 4194 is the "Internet Anti-Corruption and Free Speech Protection Act," introduced by Representatives Christopher Shays (R-CT) and Marty Meehan (D-MA). It’s backed by Common Cause, Public Citizen, Democracy21, the League of Women Voters, and other fans of the McCain-Feingold-Shays-Meehan Incumbency Protection Act that began in earnest the current round of assaults on the First Amendment and political speech.

HR 4194 is opposed (and HR 1606 is supported) by a remarkably broad spectrum of free speech advocates. To demonstrate, I’ll point you to two posts with more information: the first is by Markos Zúniga at Daily Kos (gasp!), and the second is by Mike Krempasky at RedState.org. You don’t see those two on the same side often. Read their joint letter (at the RedState.org link) to every member of Congress.

The defeat on Nov. 2 of HR 1606 was on a pretty partisan vote, though — 82% of Republicans supported it and 76% of Democrats opposed it. The good news is it received a clear majority (225-182) and failed only because the procedure under which it was brought up for a quick vote required a two-thirds majority for passage. So the defeat was only a delay. Unfortunately, I’ve been unable to find any information about the FEC’s timetable for enacting new rules that apply to online speech, so I don’t know how important speed is.

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Go read Hugh Hewitt’s interview with Mark Stein at Radioblogger.  Stein, as usual, is articulate, intelligent, and thought-provoking. Stein on Jordan:

… Jordan is basically, you know, when people talk about a Palestinian state, Jordan is the Palestinian state, and we wouldn’t have a lot of the problems we have with so-called Palestinian nationalism if when they divided the old League of Nations mandate in 1922, that instead of calling the western bit Palestine, basically, what’s now Israel and the West Bank and Gaza, they’d call the eastern bit Palestine. Instead, they called it trans-Jordan, and the British basically had a spare Hashemite prince they didn’t have a job for, and they put him…they installed him as head of state of this country. But he’s basically a Hashemite king, presiding largely over a Palestinian state. And King Abdullah is certainly one of the more moderate leaders in that part of the world. But even so, even in sixty years since independence, they haven’t developed functioning political parties. …

Stein on Tony Blair’s defeat in Parliament on detentions (ellipses in brackets added):

I have mixed views about this, because in many ways, Tony Blair has been contemptuous of Parliament in his time as prime minister. And so I’m generally speaking in favor of parliamentary independence. And I like it when MP’s assert themselves. […] But having said that, I do think that what’s pathetic about all Western countries, including the United States, including France, including Canada, and a lot of other countries, is that they make these sort of high school sophist arguments about terrorism, as if it’s some sort of theoretical debate. It’s not. We’re dealing with a very difficult situation here. And if you accord to terrorists all the rights of somebody who gets arrested for holding up a liquor store in Des Moines, you are going to lose to the terrorists, because when you accord them the full rights of somebody who is a criminal, you make it impossible to prosecute this as a war, which is what it is.

As they say, read the whole thing.

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November 10: Happy 230th birthday to the Marine Corps! Oorah! To commemorate this day, all Marines and friends and family of Marines should go to the Gunn Nutt and make a contribution to Project Valour-IT right now! He’ll match your contribution today only! Oh, and follow some of his links, too.

November 11: Happy Veterans Day! To everyone who has served in the Armed Forces of the United States, or is serving today — thank you very, very much.

UPDATE: Don’t get me wrong, I still want your contributions to the Army team! Badly! Although the Army team was the first to reach the $21,000 goal, the Navy team has since pulled slightly ahead. So we need all the Army contributions we can get to put the swabbies back in their place. But on the Marines’ birthday, I’m feeling magnanimous enough to urge anyone with a connection to the Corps to support their team.

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If you’re interested in what’s been going on in France, you’ve probably already figured out that the mainstream media aren’t providing a very clear or complete picture. They tend to ignore, for instance, the anti-Christian and anti-Jewish incidents, including the burning of churches and the beating and stoning of Jews. Heck, for the most part, the media are still portraying the rioters as disaffected, unemployed youths essentially rioting for economic reasons. You’ll also find scant mention that the insurgency is spreading to Belgium and Germany.

The blogosphere provides a different picture. One good source of information is ¡No Pasaràn! — just follow that link to the main page and start reading. But I’ll single out this post:

If you think that French media are downplaying the extent of the actual violence and damage, you are right. Quite a bit of hard news is not being reported both by design and by the circumstances on the ground. State TV has already decided to stop repeating the number of cars burned every day and film crews (particularly white French film crews) are being chased from the suburbs after having their vehicles and equipment torched. The only journalists currently operating freely and without armed escort are from Algerian newspapers (El Watan has been cited as an example).

Callers on talk radio are starting to reveal what MSM is censuring: the racist, Islamist nature of the ongoing uprising.

Read the whole thing. Then there’s this post, which quotes (in translation) this description of one of the "corner-store jihadists" who’s instigating and coordinating the riots:

«His dream?: the revolution to destroy democracy, and to establish on the ruins of the west a totalitarian Islamic regime. His revolutionary zeal and his deliriously obscure references attracted the friendship of Nouari Khiari:
"Allah will help the Muslims eliminate the gangrenous Zionist, the spreader of evil the day when NS will be ready to sacrifice our lives for an ideal of justice which is Islam"
"my objective, inshaAllah, is to finally finish off the highest in the hierarchy with richness and power which I could assemble from the work of the (muslim) community and to advance it. Projects I have of it already have on my mind."»

Go read Mark Steyn’s column, too:

Some of us believe this is an early skirmish in the Eurabian civil war. If the insurgents emerge emboldened, what next? In five years’ time, there will be even more of them, and even less resolve on the part of the French state.

Kentucky Dan provides a good overview, with dramatic illustrations, of France in Flames.  

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This week’s Carnival of Liberty is up at The Unrepentant Individual, and Brad did a fine job of putting it together. As he noted in his introduction, the past week was a busy one from the standpoint of liberty, with some notable pluses and minuses. I was pretty busy myself and didn’t even submit an entry, but plenty of others did.

If you’re interested in eminent domain abuse, free speech, free trade, the War on (some) Drugs, parental rights, the war against Islamofascism, the price of gasoline, the survival of Israel, socialist Republicans, management fads, or the death of common sense, to name just a few, head on over to the carnival and start clicking.

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One of the interesting presenters today at the the FrameMaker 2005 Chautauqua was Dave Schell of IBM, and I had a chance to chat with him quite a bit this evening. Schell is the father of DITA, the Darwin Information Typing Architecture.

DITA is an XML "application" — a set of design principles and a tagging language for technical information:

At the heart of DITA, representing the generic building block of a topic-oriented information architecture, is an XML document type definition (DTD) called "the topic DTD." The extensible architecture, however, is the defining part of this design for technical information; the topic DTD, or any schema based on it, is just an instantiation of the design principles of the architecture.

The name reflects the fact that DITA embodies Darwinesque ideas of specialization and differentiation of information types. Schell liked my joke (not original) about the competing standard, IDITA — Intelligent Design Information Typing Architecture. <rimshot>

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I’m in Raleigh, NC, attending the FrameMaker 2005 Chautauqua, which is simply a conference-by-cuter-name for users of Adobe FrameMaker. FrameMaker is the tool of choice for authoring long, complex technical documents, so most of the attendees are technical writers.

I arrived Sunday evening, rented a car, and headed for my hotel in Cary, just outside of Raleigh, shortly after dark. I had a map and directions from MapQuest, which took me precisely to the correct interstate exit, through a couple of turns, and onto Buck Jones Rd., where my destination was. Go 0.5 miles and you’re at 1020 Buck Jones, said the directions. I did. No sign of Candlewood Suites, my destination.

I drove back and forth and around several times — and, yes, I did stop at a gas station and get some vaguely helpful directions — before finally stumbling upon the place. It was buried deep in a shopping mall kind of place nestled into a heavily-wooded area. At its entrance off the wooded drive, well off the highway, was a small unlighted sign (less than two feet tall).

At the front desk, I exhasperatedly asked the manager, "Is there some kind of ordinance against signs here?" He replied, "Is there ever!" It seems each business in Cary may only have one tiny unlit sign at the entrance to its property and may not have another sign out by the highway. He’d tried to get around it with a 65-foot flagpole, but they made him take that down. We chatted a bit about the anti-business mentality behind such nonsense. He explained that the problem stems from too many Yankees moving to the area. I told him the Cary sign rules seemed even stricter than those in the People’s Republic of Boulder.

Later that evening, I tried to follow his directions to a grocery store less than 2 miles away. I missed it, turned around, missed it again, turned back around, missed it a third time, and pulled into a gas station. As I parked to go in and ask directions, I caught a glimpse of the store through some trees behind the gas station. I’d passed the entrance, marked by an unlit gray sign about 18" high at a slight break in the trees, about a hundred yards before the gas station.

These people made their shopping malls look like woodlands, hid those ugly storefronts and parking lots with tons of landscaping and trees, and apparently mandated muted lighting of those parking lots. The result is a lovely, idyllic community that’s got to be one of the most user-unfriendly places to get around that I’ve ever seen.

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I’ve supported Soldiers’ Angels in the past, most recently their Operation Katrina Soldiers Relief Fund to help National Guard soldiers in Iraq whose families, homes, and businesses were impacted by the hurricane. It’s a terrific organization whose organizers and supporters always seem to be coming up with the most wonderful ideas for helping those who wear a uniform and go in harm’s way on our behalf.

One of their really great ideas is Project Valour-IT (Voice-Activated Laptops for OUR Injured Troops). The project aims to set up "libraries" of laptops with voice-control software that can be loaned to Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, and Marines who’ve suffered hand and arm injuries or amputations. They also want to give copies of the voice-control software to patients to take home and install on their own computers when they leave the medical center.

Soldiers’ Angels has a brief history of the project. But if you want to know how much this really means, read this. Then dry your eyes and read some of the other stuff at Fuzzilicious Thinking, especially this and this (but pay no attention to the pro-Navy stuff; see below).

To help raise funds for this project while having some fun, a bunch of Milbloggers have organized a friendly competition, with teams raising funds on behalf of each branch of the military. Team Leaders are Holly Aho (Marines), Blackfive (Army), Mrs. Greyhawk (Air Force), and Mrs. Smash (Navy). The competition runs through November 11 (Veteran’s Day).

I’m supporting the effort, and in honor of my dad, Col. (Retired) Samuel R. Combs, United States Army Signal Corps, I’m joining Blackfive’s Army team. Which is currently in second place behind the Navy, doggone it, so please help me change that. Click the button below (or in the right sidebar) to make a PayPal donation that will be credited to the Army team.

Remember, every dollar you donate goes to the laptops, software, and shipping — there is no fundraising or administrative overhead. The competition has its own Valour-IT blog where you can see how the fundraising is going and read other news — even cartoons — about the project.

Please join me and donate what you can spare. It’s PayPal, so any amount is OK and every dollar helps. Thanks!

UPDATE: As of just past midnight on Tue., 11/8, the Army team has about a $1000 lead over Navy. Go, Army!

UPDATE 2: Well, according to the Valour-IT blog, the Navy team edged out Army at the end, $23,831.76 to $23,652.57. Of course, as noted on the blog, those numbers are unofficial and subject to change as mailed checks come in, etc. In other words, the "absentee ballots" haven’t been counted, and besides, the results are so close that Army should demand a recount! 🙂

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For some fine weekend reading, head over to the Watcher of Weasels and check out the latest voting results. Every week, the Watcher’s Council nominates and votes on posts by Council members and non-members to pick the best pieces of writing around.

This week’s winning council entry is an interesting piece of speculation at The Strata-Sphere about what Joe Wilson and the CIA were really up to in Niger. The non-council winner is Cathy Seipp’s first post about her lung cancer, diagnosed over three years ago. Go read them both. Then, for more good posts, check out the complete list of nominees.

If you’re at all interested in firearms and the Second Amendment, you have to check out this week’s Carnival of Cordite, hosted at Resistance is futile! as usual. For one thing, if you checked out last week’s Kalashnikitty, then you need to see this week’s rodent response. Of course, there’s the usual fine mix of posts about legal issues, political matters, guns, hunting, gun pumpkin carving, and target shooting (competitive and pure fun), and more — all nicely introduced by Gullyborg, with lots of cool pictures of unusual or interesting weapons sprinkled throughout.

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It’s been over six weeks since I asked Colorado’s senators and representatives if they’d agree to cancel six specific Colorado pork projects to help pay for Hurricane Katrina relief. The blogosphere has moved on to PorkBusters v. 2.0. But today, I finally received a reply from my own representative, Dianne DeGette. Well, it purports to be a reply, although — like Salazar, Allard, and Udall before her — DeGette simply ignores my request for specific answers regarding six specific projects.

DeGette goes further, though, and has the nerve to actually misrepresent my position to me. I suppose she (or someone on her staff) thinks that if she tells me I agree with her, I will. Here’s her letter in full:

Dear  Richard  :

Thank you for contacting me about how best we can pay for Hurricane Katrina reconstruction. I am pleased to learn your views and appreciate the opportunity to share mine.

Like you, I believe the Republican-led Congress is out-of-touch and has sorely misplaced priorities. Instead of proposing policies that will reduce our deficit, they continue to push for massive tax cuts for the very wealthy while paying for Hurricane Katrina by cutting spending on vital programs, such as Medicaid and food stamps, which serve our most vulnerable citizens.

I believe in shared sacrifice. To pay for Hurricane Katrina in a responsible way and get our fiscal house in order, Congress must simultaneously target federal expenditures and recognize that continued tax cuts for the rich despite record deficits is simply not sustainable.

Again, thank you for letting me know your views.  Please feel free to visit my website at www.house.gov/degette for further information.  There you can sign up for my e-newsletter to stay up-to-date on current events in Congress.  I look forward to our continued communication.

Ho hum, another rant against "tax cuts for the rich." Another bogus claim that this administration is "cutting spending on vital programs." Jeez, I wish I could think of even one program on which they’ve cut spending.

DeGette is utterly without redeeming qualities. Her predecessor, Pat Schroeder, was just as far left, but she was at least reasonably bright and a much more interesting person. DeGette is merely tendentious and tedious. But she’s accomplished the difficult task of making me look back fondly at Pat Schroeder’s time in office.

UPDATE: Welcome, Instapundit readers! (And thanks, Glenn, for catching up on your PorkBusters updates!) While you’re here, please take a look around. If none of the post titles listed on the left pique your interest, you can browse by month using the calendar above them. Click the month name to see a list, with brief intros, of that month’s posts. Or just go to my main page, which includes about the last two weeks’ posts.

Oh, and please consider donating to Project Valour-IT. The competition is over (and it looks like the Navy team may have edged out Army, dammit), but the cause is still just as good.

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Michelle Malkin, thanks to an alert reader, called attention to an incredible faux pas by Washington Post writer Emily Messner (log in with BugMeNot). Messner, writing about liberal characterizations of Alito, quoted Kos as saying conservatives "wanted one of those obnoxious touchdown dances." Messner disputed some of the characterizations, but noted parenthetically, "Nonetheless, it is amusing to imagine Charles Krauthammer doing a touchdown dance."

Krauthammer has been a paraplegic — almost quadriplegic, with very limited hand use — for over 30 years. Messner has since edited her remark, replacing Krauthammer’s name with George Will’s, and added a footnote apologizing and saying she "had no idea he was disabled."

Malkin apparently believes that explanation, and agrees with Mark at Marked Up that Messner’s alleged ignorance of Krauthammer’s disability is "a good thing." I’m not sure I buy Messner’s explanation.

On the one hand, Messner is apparently a liberal, and in my experience, liberals as a group tend to be incredibly ignorant of non-liberal people, ideas, and institutions. On the other hand, Messner is a political commentator in Washington. Krauthammer is one of the leading figures in her career field and is also in Washington. And she knows nothing about him?

Imagine a young quarterback, maybe an NFL rookie, who knows nothing about Brett Favre. Or a young actor who’s unfamiliar with Robert DeNiro or Tom Cruise. It’s possible, but…

Is there another possibility? Well, Malkin herself has presented plenty of evidence, including just recently, that there are lots of people on the left who’ll say and do the most outrageous and insensitive things when the target is a conservative. Just ask Maryland Lt. Gov. Michael Steele:

I think it’s quite possible that Messner knew Krauthammer was confined to a wheelchair, and that that’s what made the touchdown dance line funny to her. Go read the line in context and see how lame it sounds with George Will’s name; with Krauthammer’s name, it’s cruel humor, but at least humor. It may not have occurred to Messner that people (other than conservatives, who don’t count) would find her humor so offensive.

I’ll concede I could be wrong. But it can’t be any great comfort to Messner that the best defense anyone can come up with is that she isn’t incredibly insensitive, just incredibly ignorant.

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