The Gift That Keeps on Giving

I was just browsing through the news and came across this item, which reports on how the New York Observer was just purchased by the 25 year old scion of a real estate baron.

The first thing that popped into my mind was the classic movie Citizen Kane. The title character buys an ailing New York daily with his millions because he thinks “…running a newspaper will be fun!” Then he turns the paper into a real powerhouse by ignoring professional ethics and embracing go-for-the-throat yellow journalism.

It remains to be seen if The Observer will go that route, but all thoughts of classic movies were driven from my mind when I read what the new owner’s father had been up to…

His father, Charles Kushner, a philanthropist and Democratic fundraiser, was sentenced in March 2005 to two years in prison for assisting in the filing of false tax returns, making false statements to the Federal Election Commission, and retaliating against a witness in the case – his sister.

He hired a prostitute to seduce his brother-in-law, made a videotape of the encounter and then sent it to his sister, the man’s wife, in retaliation for her cooperation with federal authorities who were looking into his business activities.

Holy crap! Isn’t that amazing? That prostitute must have been really something!

Our biggest customers at Police HQ were prostitutes, and none of them were attractive enough to make me want to pay a nickel for their attention. I suppose all of the hot whores move to New Jersey to ply their trade.

Other than that, I’d have to say that it would have been the perfect gift if Charles had mailed the tape directly to his brother-in-law instead of to his sister. It certainly would have made those vanity license plates he made himself while in prison look like a booger.

What does this say about the Democrat’s claims that the Republicans wallow in a “culture of corruption”? I note that the elder Kushner might have been wallowing in some corruption of his own, but he wasn’t an elected official. This means that the Republicans commit their own crimes, while the Democrats contract the work out.

Blog Upgrade

Sparing no expense, Chicagoboyz has installed the latest screed technology to improve your reading experience.

Engineered with rhetorical precision.

Lockdown

Crime in the United States was pretty much out of control by the 1970’s.

There were a variety of reasons for that, but I think the biggest factor is that a new strategy of enforcing the law came in to vogue. The public was encouraged to view criminals not as bad people who need to be punished for their misdeeds, but as lonely forgotten souls who were driven to crime due to bad experiences during their formative years.

Perps were sick, you see, and they needed healing and compassion more than hatred and marginalization.

This attitude eventually got turned around, but it took awhile. It took even longer for the damage caused by this touchy-feely crap to get cleaned up, but it finally happened. This is due to the fact that the number of convictions started to climb, and the number of convictions that resulted in jail time also started to increase. This resulted in a larger prison population, but the results are hard to ignore.

Crimes against property started to fall by 1980, but it wasn’t until 1993 that we saw a reduction of violent crimes.

Still, once the ball started to roll it just kept on hurtling downhill. Today the people in the United States enjoy an aggregate crime rate that is less than half of what it was during the dark and lawless days.

Read more

Coverage of the War Against Hezbollah

I am finding it difficult to figure out what is really going on in Lebanon. So I am keeping my vehement opinions to myself. I find my vehemence is, unfortunately, not much impacted even by a factual vacuum. But when I really, really don’t know what I am talking about, I try not to blog about it. I look for others who do actually know something. For now, the best things I have seen, that seem the most convincing, have been on StrategyPage. Check these out:

You Can Look It Up

The UN Takes Sides in Lebanon

Iran Halts Arms Shipments to Hizbollah

The fact that Wretchard himself says he does not really know what is going on convinces me that pretty much nobody does. Nonetheless, he offers this interesting speculation, which seems more or less consistent with what StrategyPage is saying.

On the other hand, Ralph Peters is being pessimistic. I like Peters’ harsh and bloody way of talking. It stirs my dark and brooding soul. But if I had to bet a dollar, I’d say that StrategyPage is more likely to be correct – that Israel is determined to impose a crushing defeat on Hezbollah, than Peters’ conclusion that the Israelis are going to pull out allowing Hezbollah to declare victory. I sure hope not.

But I really don’t know. And I have no way to know. Or even to guess.

UPDATE: The EU Referendum blog has this interesting piece, noting the large number of vehicles depicted in media reports which are used by Israeli combat engineers. This suggests that the current Israeli effort is in large part about clearing a path for further troops to be committed. Wretchard meanwhile analyzes some reports and finds the situation to be clear as mud. Much like the situation during the march on Baghdad, we will not have much idea of what was going on until it is over. If then.

Precious Dirt

I confess that my thinking on the Israeli-Arab conflict has gone through a major revolution in the last 24 hours. In the past, I felt great moral revulsion at the use by Arabs of tactics that clearly qualify as war crimes. I thought that no one had an excuse to intentionally target civilians for no other purpose than killing them. I thought that the very purest instance of a war crime. However, after reading many blogs and comments I learned something that completely altered my thinking. I understand that my thinking lacked sophistication and nuance. Now I understand what the Israelis did to the Arabs that was so incredibly unjust that it justifies any response no matter how horrible it might appear to unsophisticated eyes.

Here it is: It seems that, sixty-odd years ago, The Israelis, in connivance with the rest of the free world, stole some land from the Arabs!

I know! Shocking, isn’t it? Don’t you feel like an idiot for supporting Israel all these years? I know I do.

Read more