ELSEWHERE

I knew that the smokers would strike back after my recent mention that they are more likely to be wackos. Here is one comment: "I do recall some study made the news a while ago, although I cannot now find them on the web, that tobacco actually alleviated symptoms of schizophrenia. As well, I once had a tenant who told me that he chain-smoked for that very reason (for whatever that is worth). Still it is not unreasonable to suggest that maybe schizophrenics smoke because they are schizophrenic (and it alleviates symptoms)rather than to suggest that smoking is a symptom, or even a cause. After all, do we not all die after a life-long addiction to dioxide? And an excess of oxygen can also cause cellular damage."

Jeff Jacoby too has now come out slugging at the way most of the media have misrepresented the recent report on Iraqi WMDs.

Maybe Australia’s ABC (public broadcaster) has learnt a tiny bit from the recent debacle at its British equivalent (the BBC). It has just admitted that ONE of its programs was biased about the Iraq war. Very big of them! The finding of bias was by “an independent panel” which was “appointed by the ABC board” (!).

Margaret Snyder compares American "liberalism" with Communism and Fascism and concludes: "So it is that liberalism has taken away the self-respect of whole classes of people. It has done so by the same elitist mentality that characterized the two vilest socialisms of the twentieth century. Most people who consider themselves liberals consider their motives to be pure, and I don't doubt that they are. But by their attitudes and policies, they encourage dependency on the state and ultimately do much more harm than good."

This is from 8 months back but a sensible column in the Guardian is a bit of a rarity so I can't help quoting it. Nick Cohen notes how the Left cheerfully allied itself with the Islamic fundamentalists to oppose the Iraq invasion and comments: "The absence of principle is matched only by the absence of intelligence. What is the Left offering Iraq? It has no strategy other than the continuation of a brutal status quo. It can't support the Iraqi democrats because they say Saddam can only be overthrown by violence. It can't support the Iraqi Kurds because they agree. It has been reduced to allying with religious bigots". But who ever said the Left had principles?

Leftists often claim St. Francis of Assisi as one of their own -- because of his vow of poverty. That vow was solely for religious reasons however and it was in fact the disciples of St. Francis who first put together what we now recognize as the theory of capitalism and free markets!

Admiral Carey puts the boot into the U.S. Iraq skeptics: "Yet it certainly appears to me that we have men and women dying in Iraq and Afghanistan right now that in some instances are facing this danger because these enemy actions are being inadvertently encouraged by public statements made by some of their fellow citizens."

Arafat was trained and for many years bankrolled by the KGB.

It's an article of faith among Leftists that FDR rescued America from the great Depression. If you look at some of his absurd policies, however, it is clear that he PROLONGED it rather than cured it. Previous depressions where the government did nothing ended much sooner.

Research shows 'negative' political campaign advertising works better than positive adverts. This research seems to reinforce the findings of the public choice school of economists who argue that people have more incentive to make a reasoned choice in the private marketplace than under traditional democratic political rules, thus markets more closely resemble 'ideal democracies' than do modern states.

Speaking of Schwarzenegger’s victory, Henninger notes: “23% of blacks voted Republican, as did 41% of Hispanics. That this should happen once under any circumstances is extraordinary” and argues that it shows a Rightwards shift in American politics generally.

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