Don't let the door hit you on the way out, Helen

Well, finally the bile-filled Helen Thomas said something so egregious that she had to retire. What do you bet that her employers told her to choose retirement or be fired? As Meryl Yourish notes, Thomas's remarks that were so offensive barely received any coverage in the major media until she announced her retirement. I'm sure we'll get all sorts of respectful retrospectives concentrating on her supposedly impressive career instead of focusing on the ugly things that she's said throughout her career. But those statements didn't do anything to diminish the honored place that she held in the White House press room with presidents calling on her first at press conferences and press spokesmen deferring to her crazy aunt questions. As Karl writes in The Green Room,

Helen Thomas was humored and honored by the establishment media because she was its institutional id. More often than not, Thomas said the the things they wanted to say, the way they would have liked to say them, were they not (ineffectively) pretending to be objective.

The Helen Thomas story thus serves as a timely rebuke to those in the chattering classes who spent the past few months arguing that the Right had a serious problem with ideological cocooning (or “epistemic closure”) and needed to engage more with the establishment Narrative if it was going be worthy to govern in the future. The critics always dismissed the bias of the establishment press as a type of tu quoque or as a phenomenon separable from groupthink on the Right. The reality is that the people most in charge of the establishment Narrative in America — ensconced in a cocoon of their own — tolerated and feted Thomas for decades. They would be doing it still, if not for that meddling blogosphere.

Regarding her hate-filled spew about the Jews in Israel needing to return to Germany and Poland, the open letter by Yoram Dori, an aide to Shimon Peres, that Drudge linked to expresses my thoughts quite eloquently.

IN THE 62 years of our existence, we have had seven wars, thousands of terror attacks, buses which have exploded in streets, firing into schools, mortars fired on kindergartens. Yet you wish to exile us back to the inferno, as if nothing happened 65 years ago in Europe, as if our hands have not been stretched out for peace since the establishment of the state?

We were victorious in the wars imposed upon us by Egypt and we signed a peace agreement with it after yielding all the territory and all the oil. We signed a peace agreement with Jordan. We yielded all the territory and much water. We withdrew from Lebanon to the international border and, in return, we received Hizbullah katyushas on our citizens. We left Gaza and in return, we received massive firing on our citizens in the South. Are you aware, Ms. Thomas, that many children from Sderot and the area around Gaza wet their beds until a late age out of fear of the Hamas missiles? And it is us that you wish to exile? Why? Because you think that we are weak or because it annoys you that we are not defeated?

That's the history that all the protesters in the streets of Europe, diplomats at the UN, and those of Helen Thomas's ilk like to ignore. Sadly, the Israelis live with this truth and can't ignore it.

So I won't be joining those who will look back on Helen Thomas's career with respect. Instead I appreciate the delicious fact that it was an interview with a rabbi that served to pull back the mask to let us see the ugly person beneath. She deserves all the opprobrium and humiliation coming her way now. As Jonah Goldberg writes, she's always been "a nasty piece of work."

Also, let's just get the liberal bias thing out of the way. If there was a right-winger who'd spouted so much bile, hate, and ideological agenda-driven nonsense in the White House briefing room for half a century it would be . . . oh wait, no such person would have ever been allowed to become a Washington "institution" in the first place. According to the media graybeards, it's always been a sign of seriousness and unwavering truth-seeking for reporters to attack from the left (c.f. Dan Rather, Daniel Schorr, et al.).

See? She's not biased she asks Obama and Clinton tough questions too! Yes, from the hard, loony left.

All of these condemnations, equivocations, repudiations, and protestations are all fundamentally silly because they are part of a D.C. Kabuki that treats the last straw as if it was wholly different than the million other straws everyone was happy to carry.

Suddenly, all of these people and groups are stunned to discover that Helen Thomas is . . . Helen Thomas. Feh.

It shouldn't have taken this long for her to have been cut loose, but better late than never.

Cruising the Web

Michael Barone notes that Republican senatorial candidates are experiencing some setbacks on their road to predicted victories this fall. That's why it's very hard to extrapolate from spring poll numbers to November electoral results.

What is it about the real world and how businesses respond that Obama just doesn't get? Last week, Attorney General Eric Holder made a very public announcement that the Justice Department has begun criminal and civil investigations into BP and the oil spill. And then Obama, two days later, said he wanted to "make sure that BP is not lawyering up." Well, what do you expect any company to do when the American Attorney General personally announces that the Justice Department is coming after them? Or doesn't Obama want to grant BP their rights to legal representation?

Political correctness kept the British from making a full investigation of the 7/7 bombings that led to 52 deaths. Authorities were worried that a full inquiry into analyzing what had led to the bombings might upset Muslims so instead they just published a "narrow" inquiry into the events leading up to the bombings. Yes, better not to upset British Muslims than to try to understand what led the four bombers to kill so many British citizens so as to prevent any further occurrence. One imagines a similar discussion taking place in the Pentagon whitewash of the Fort Hood shootings that never once used the words Islam or Muslim or jihad. It's a reminder of how political correctness can lead to people's deaths.

The New York Times covers mistakes and confusion on who was in charge of the BP oil rig both before and after the spill started. Despite the administration's claims of having been focused like lasers from the beginning there were inexplicable delays that slowed reactions to the spill. The Anchoress responds to the news how serious the spill would be from Day One. While a president can't fix the hole, don't try to tell us how in charge they have been from the very beginning.

Thousands marched in Paris against Israel. A theater is even refusing to air a movie made in Israel. Demonstrations occurred in Ireland and Dublin. Did any of these people think to demonstrate against terrorist bombings that killed Israeli citizens? As Mark Steyn reminds us of all the people who get so excited about Rachel Corrie who was killed while kneeling in front of a an Israeli bulldozer while protesting against Israel's actions during the Second Intifada, none of them seem to care about another Rachel, a British 16-year old who was killed in an Israeli shopping mall after a suicide bomber blew a crowd shopping there. British journalists didn't have any interest in profiling that Rachel, but we have ships named after the other Rachel. And Jay Nordlinger points out the true background of the so-called humanitarians on the Rachel Corrie, the ship that so ostentatiously just headed for Gaza.

Let's send Helen Thomas to a happy, hate-filled retirement

Helen Thomas is finally getting the response that she has richly deserved for years. This time it's for her remarks saying that the Jews in Israel should go back to Poland and Germany. Apparently, it's slipped her mind what happened to the Jews the last time they were major populations in Poland and Germany. She's tried to weasel out of her remarks and say that they don't reflect what she really thinks. Come on. Are Fleischer said what many more are thinking - she should lose her job over this. But the White House Correspondents' Association is trying to weasel out from taking any sort of action.

"She doesn't speak for the WHCA," said White House Correspondents' Association President Ed Chen. "Her views are hers alone. And now she's apologized. Policing the views of opinion columnists can start us all all down a path that history suggests is best avoided."

Oh, sure. And a journalist who said it would be better for all concerned if African-Americans returned to Africa or Hispanic-Americans returned to Mexico or wherever would get the same sort of mealy-mouthed response and respect for an apology after the uproar. Good for Lanny Davis for making that exact point. It appears that her booking agency has refused to represent her. Imagine that there are people who paid to hear her come talk. Joe Klein wants just to send her to the back of the room. Will Robert Gibbs and President Obama call on her anymore? What about questions that she might have regarding the Middle East? Will they answer those so we can get more interrogations like this?


The Media Research Center has a file of Helen Thomas comments expressing her hatred for Republican presidents and Israel. She herself said in 2000 that she wakes up and asks herself "Who do I hate today?"

Now everyone knows. Does Hearst Newspapers want to continue employing this woman. Let her retire and marinate happily in her hatreds.

Wrong but scoring points

Maybe the reason kids put forth such bloopers on their AP history tests is that they're used to getting credit for writing silly stuff and just haven't ever gotten out of the habit. For an example, check out how New York scores its state math tests where the test graders are instructed to give partial credit if the student demonstrates some clue about how to approach the problem even if it's totally wrong.

Examples in the fourth-grade scoring guide include:

* A kid who answers that a 2-foot-long skateboard is 48 inches long gets half-credit for adding 24 and 24 instead of the correct 12 plus 12.

* A miscalculation that 28 divided by 14 equals 4 instead of 2 is "partially correct" if the student uses the right method to verify the wrong answer.

* Setting up a division problem to find one-fifth of $400, but not solving the problem -- and leaving the answer blank -- gets half-credit.

* A kid who subtracts 57 cents from three quarters for the right change and comes up with 15 cents instead of 18 cents still gets half-credit.

* A student who figures the numbers of books in 35 boxes of 10 gets half-credit despite messed-up multiplication that yields the wrong answer, 150 instead of 350.

These questions ask students to show their work. The scoring guidelines, called "holistic rubrics," require that points be given if a kid's attempt at an answer reflects a "partial understanding" of the math concept, "addresses some element of the task correctly," or uses the "appropriate process" to arrive at a wrong solution. Despite flubbing the answer, students can get 1 point on a 2-point problem and 1 or 2 points on a 3-pointer.

Imagine how these kids will be after a few more years if they get used to getting half credit just for knowing that subtraction is involved in figuring out change or that multiplication is involved in figuring out the books in boxes problem.

For a contrast, check out this video from Uncommon Schools of these seventh grade students being called on to answer math questions.

That's what students can do if you set high expectations for them instead of giving them partial credit for figuring out that a division problem involves division.

More bloopers from the AP US History exams

My friend keeps posting some of the bloopers that kids wrote on the exam. Here are some more for your enjoyment.

QUESTION 2: Deals with the factors that led to America's victory in the Revolutionary War.
- (entire essay) The political, diplomatic, and military reasons were as follows: we were better, stronger, and smarter than them.
- As the angry parent, Britain wanted to straighten America out, not spank it.

QUESTION 3: Deals with the role of slavery in causing the Civil War.
- California secretly became an independent state.
- John Brown viciously attacked a man named Harper at an event known as Harper's Fury.
- After the Confederates bombed Fort Sumter, it was on like Donkey Kong.
- Whites were angry after James Brown's martyrous raid in Kansas.

QUESTION 4: Deals with the role of women in causing reform during the Progressive era (1880-1920).
- *Carrie Nation carried out smashings and hatchetations.
- *Betty Friedan's book "The Mystic Feminine"....
- *In 1907, women gained their suffrage by abolishing the 16th Amendment.
- *Margaret Singer invented the sewing machine.
- *Women were encouraged to join the Army, throw up their hair, and show a little leg.
- *Since women did not have the right to vote, all they could do was try to spay their husband's opinion at home and hope he would vote her way come election time.
- *Women were meant to mend the children.
- *Husbands dressed up their wives and paraded them around.
- *The women's constant nagging and pestering finally paid off.
- *Without women's suffrage, I would probably not be able to write this essay. I would be married, at home, taking care of my kids, and cooking my husband dinner.
- *The Progressive era saw the development of the light bulb, the telephone, and the television.
- During this time, Lespians came out of their nests.
- Of course with no saloons to visit after a long day at work, husbands had no choice but to go home to their crazy radical wives.
- People were terrified by what they saw in the Gelded Age.
- Women wanted to choose the type of meat they put in men's sandwiches. Lucretia Mott even wrote a book about this subject, but the sandwiches lacked sufficient meat. Men were not amused one bit.
- Prostitution declined during this time. Who needed prostitutes when flappers were giving it away for free?
- Women's attitude changed from "nag, nag, nag" to "reform, reform, reform."
- Women are social creatures, as evidenced by their tennis outings and book clubs.
- Jane Addams satisfied people who were poverty-stricken.
- Jane Addams founded Full House in Chicago.
- Jane Addams founded the settlement houses, then told her husband John to remember the ladies.
- Factory machines were very dangerous. Women's big hair got caught in the machinery, leading to scalps of hair torn from heads, clothes ripped from bodies, and limbs on the floor.
- Betty Friedan was concerned over unwanted pregnancies, and wrote a book called "The Feminine Mistakes."
-- These women were listed by various students as Progressive reformers: Sarah Palin, Oprah, Geraldine Ferraro, Lady Bird Johnson, Carrie Bradshaw, Sylvia Plath, Grace Metalious, Mother Theresa

QUESTION 5: Deals with the importance of population shifts (suburbanization, immigration, Sunbelt) after WWII.
- Suburbanization led to infidelity in homes.
- The 1950s backlash to immigration was called naturalism.
- Millions moved west during the Dust Ball.

You know that James Brown was the hardest working man in U.S. history.

I love how their opinions of women reformers emerges in their answers. I think I've had several male students who felt the same way as some of these students. I just hope they knew better than to write that in their essays!

Obama willing to let Iran arm Gaza

Allahpundit links to this NYT story that the Obama administration wants Israel to end its blockade of Gaza.

The Obama administration considers Israel’s blockade of Gaza to be untenable and plans to press for another approach to ensure Israel’s security while allowing more supplies into the impoverished Palestinian area, senior American officials said Wednesday.

The officials say that Israel’s deadly attack on a flotilla trying to break the siege and the resulting international condemnation create a new opportunity to push for increased engagement with the Palestinian Authority and a less harsh policy toward Gaza.

“There is no question that we need a new approach to Gaza,” said one official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the policy shift is still in the early stages. He was reflecting a broadly held view in the upper reaches of the administration.

Israel would insist that any approach take into account three factors: Israel’s security; the need to prevent any benefit to Hamas, the Islamist rulers of Gaza; and the four-year-old captivity of an Israeli soldier held by Hamas, Staff Sgt. Gilad Shalit.

Since the botched raid that killed nine activists on Monday, the Israeli government has said that the blockade was necessary to protect Israel against the infiltration into Gaza of weapons and fighters sponsored by Iran.

If there were no blockade in place, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Israeli television on Wednesday evening, it would mean “an Iranian port in Gaza.” He added, “Israel will continue to maintain its right to defend itself.”

And now that is what Obama wants to pressure Israel to do - allow "an Iranian port in Gaza."

“Gaza has become the symbol in the Arab world of the Israeli treatment of Palestinians, and we have to change that,” the senior American official said. “We need to remove the impulse for the flotillas. The Israelis also realize this is not sustainable.”

Oh, please. Don't these guys realize that the Arab world doesn't need a symbol - they've been attacking Israel since 1948 long before there was a Gaza strip. Remember, Israel left Gaza so that they could rule themselves. That is what the foreign governments pressured Israel to do because that would, presumably, give the Palestinians in Gaza an opportunity to move on from their attacks on Israel. But of course those attacks continued. What do they think would happen if Israel abandoned the blockade? Iran would be shipping loads of arms into Gaza so they could continue their attacks on Israel. The Palestinians wouldn't suddenly wake up and smack themselves to say that since Israel abandoned the blockade they now have abandoned any desire to send rockets into Israel. How naive are these senior American officials?

As Charles Krauthammer writes today, the blockade is totally legal.

The world is outraged at Israel's blockade of Gaza. Turkey denounces its illegality, inhumanity, barbarity, etc. The usual U.N. suspects, Third World and European, join in. The Obama administration dithers.

But as Leslie Gelb, former president of the Council on Foreign Relations, writes, the blockade is not just perfectly rational, it is perfectly legal. Gaza under Hamas is a self-declared enemy of Israel -- a declaration backed up by more than 4,000 rockets fired at Israeli civilian territory. Yet having pledged itself to unceasing belligerency, Hamas claims victimhood when Israel imposes a blockade to prevent Hamas from arming itself with still more rockets.

In World War II, with full international legality, the United States blockaded Germany and Japan. And during the October 1962 missile crisis, we blockaded ("quarantined") Cuba. Arms-bearing Russian ships headed to Cuba turned back because the Soviets knew that the U.S. Navy would either board them or sink them. Yet Israel is accused of international criminality for doing precisely what John Kennedy did: impose a naval blockade to prevent a hostile state from acquiring lethal weaponry.

Oh, but weren't the Gaza-bound ships on a mission of humanitarian relief? No. Otherwise they would have accepted Israel's offer to bring their supplies to an Israeli port, be inspected for military materiel and have the rest trucked by Israel into Gaza -- as every week 10,000 tons of food, medicine and other humanitarian supplies are sent by Israel to Gaza.

Why was the offer refused? Because, as organizer Greta Berlin admitted, the flotilla was not about humanitarian relief but about breaking the blockade, i.e., ending Israel's inspection regime, which would mean unlimited shipping into Gaza and thus the unlimited arming of Hamas.

Israel has already twice intercepted ships laden with Iranian arms destined for Hezbollah and Gaza. What country would allow that?

But even more important, why did Israel even have to resort to blockade? Because, blockade is Israel's fallback as the world systematically de-legitimizes its traditional ways of defending itself -- forward and active defense.

Krauthammer goes on to explain how the world has denied Israel any method of defending itself. It doesn't matter what Israel does, any action they take will be attacked as disproportionate and contributing to the "cycle of violence." And why is that? We know why.

But, if none of these is permissible, what's left?

Ah, but that's the point. It's the point understood by the blockade-busting flotilla of useful idiots and terror sympathizers, by the Turkish front organization that funded it, by the automatic anti-Israel Third World chorus at the United Nations, and by the supine Europeans who've had quite enough of the Jewish problem.

What's left? Nothing. The whole point of this relentless international campaign is to deprive Israel of any legitimate form of self-defense. Why, just last week, the Obama administration joined the jackals, and reversed four decades of U.S. practice, by signing onto a consensus document that singles out Israel's possession of nuclear weapons -- thus de-legitimizing Israel's very last line of defense: deterrence.

The world is tired of these troublesome Jews, 6 million -- that number again -- hard by the Mediterranean, refusing every invitation to national suicide. For which they are relentlessly demonized, ghettoized and constrained from defending themselves, even as the more committed anti-Zionists -- Iranian in particular -- openly prepare a more final solution.

And now the Obama administration is joining up with those who would like this whole problem to disappear - even if that means the destruction of Israel.

Meanwhile, Danielle Pletka has a good question that may give Americans pause before they jump on the flotillas-to-Gaza bandwagon.

On Tuesday, I posted a short piece over at the American Enterprise Institute's blog asking what we would do if a flotilla made its way toward Guantanamo to deliver aid and comfort to the victims of American aggression, illegal detention or some such. And if that flotilla ignored warnings to turn away and refused to allow U.S. security to board peacefully to examine the contents. And if, once boarded, those on the boats attacked our servicemen. It hasn't happened -- yet. But why not?

After all, the flotilla wasn't really about the Palestinians. If it were, then why not float a shipment to the refugee camps in Lebanon? And it's not really about rights. If it were, then why not protest Hamas' treatment of girls in U.N. Relief and Works Agency camps? The spokeswoman for the flotilla made clear that the mission was more about Israel than it was about actually helping anyone; indeed, the flotilla refused to dock for inspection and transportation of goods to Gaza (maybe they were worried someone would think bulletproof vests and night-vision goggles were not educational). It's not even about getting food and medicine to the Palestinians, something Israel facilitates already.

There's no need to detail the reactions to this incident -- nor note the glee with which such champions of human dignity as Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Daniel Ortega and the U.N. Human Rights Council have responded -- because others have done that job. The Obama administration is getting some credit in some quarters for not jumping on board the anti-Israeli bandwagon. But it deserves little. It is precisely the administration's harping on Israel from nearly day one that has given credence and legitimacy to these over-the-top criticisms.

Or ask Turkey how they would feel if so-called "humanitarians" wanted to funnel arms disguised as aid to Kurds in areas in Turkey. I don't think they would be so blithe about those humanitarian provacateurs, would they?

Why does the Justice Dept need a delay to answer Obamacare lawsuits?

Remember how all the Democrats ridiculed constitutional objections to Obamacare as just frivolous lawsuits? Well, now that the suits have been filed, they wanted a one-month delay in answering the suits. The federal judge hearing the case denied their request.

'Frivolous," says Nancy Pelosi. "More to do with politics than with policy," in the words of Kathleen Sebelius. En masse, Democrats claim that the constitutionality of ObamaCare is so elementary that the matter doesn't deserve even a half-serious thought. The Obama Justice Department is finding it a bit more difficult.

Last week, Administration lawyers motioned for a one-month extension in Florida district court, where 20 state Attorneys General and the NFIB, the small business association, are arguing that ObamaCare is unconstitutional. Justice is asking for the suit to be dismissed, presumably on the same assumptions of the Washington establishment. Only "presumably," though, because the government lawyers say they need more time to file a brief. Could ObamaCare's constitutional problems be more serious than liberals advertise?

....Taking these matters with more gravity was Judge Roger Vinson, who denied Justice's extension request on Friday. A delay isn't warranted, he wrote dryly, because the defendants "have at their disposal the very substantial resources of the federal government, including numerous attorneys and staff within and outside the United States Department of Justice." Then again, maybe this is the first time they've actually had to think about what they've done.

Congress did something unprecedented: requiring that people buy something - health insurance - merely because they're adults and alive. Yet Congress wouldn't hold any hearings about that issue and rushed through the legislation. And now they want more time to figure out what arguments they should use to defend Obamacare. Cheers for the judge in denying their request.

Bloopers from AP US History tests

A friend is at the grading of this year's exams and has shared these howlers from actual student essays. Enjoy. And weep.

QUESTION 2: Deals with the factors that led to America's victory in the Revolutionary War.
- Connecticut was the first state to leave the colonies and form the Confederacy.
- George Washington crossed the Delaware River and landed at Yorktown.
- The French were convinced to join the war after America's victory at Antietam.
- At the time, the United States had the most advanced communication system in the world - Paul Revere.
- England viewed the colonies as nothing more than a back-talking teenager that needed smacked.

QUESTION 3: Deals with the role of slavery in causing the Civil War.
- With the end of Reconstruction, the Civil War was not far ahead.
- Slavery was like the crazy uncle in every family - everyone acknowledges the problem, but no one wants to confront it.
- Most western states are in the South.
- Harriet Beecher Stowe's book "Uncle Tom's Cabinet" angered whites.
- The Misery Compromise only delayed the Civil War.
- The Boxer Rebellion showed whites the need to control their slaves.
- The biggest victory for Southerners before the Civil War was the Dred Scopes Trial.
- Bleeding Kansas was like the JV game before the Civil War.
- When the war began, Lincoln turned to his most trusted general, Harvey E. Lee.
- As Mr. Miyagi once said, it is important to keep balance. Congress knew this when they admitted Maine and Missouri to the Union.
- Many slaves were black.

QUESTION 4: Deals with the role of women in causing reform during the Progressive era (1880-1920).
- *Now women had full equality. But was that REALLY so grand? Let's discuss...
- *In the 20s, women were smoking, drinking, and dressing more sketchedly.
- *The women's rights movement began in 1876 at the Serpent Fall Convention.
- *Just a couple of decades ago, women didn't have the right to vote.
- *Flappers were women, but new and improved!
- *The main motivational character for women was Rosie the Riveter. She was a strong woman with biceps. She would always flex her arm but she wore makeup. Her message was that she was pretty but talented as well. She was outstanding.
- *Women made a dent in history, and in the future.
- *Most importantly, men now know how to make their own sandwiches.
- *When the men left to fight the war, women were allowed to frolic in public.
- Progressive women were like ants: they worked in groups and got stuff done.
- Elizabeth Cady Stanton was an important flapper.
- Being a woman was considered a disease, as if you could catch it if you were male.
- Women fought for many years for equal pay and equal love from their bosses.
- The representative of the "new woman" was Molly Maguire.
- Seen throughout the Reading, women who were apparently progressives between 1880 and 1920: Dorothea Dix, Betty Friedan, Gloria Steinem, Upton Sinclair, Eleanor Roosevelt, Sandra Day O'Connor, Jackie Onassis, Phylis Schlafly, Harriet Tubman, Abigail Adams, Hillary Clinton, Sonia Sotomayor

QUESTION 5: Deals with the importance of population shifts (suburbanization, immigration, Sunbelt) after WWII.
- The U.S. implemented the Monroe Doctrine to keep the Canadians out.
- The Baby Boom made the population sore.
- The Sun Belt was popular because our screen porches kept out bugs.
- The Sun Belt was a highway that stretched from California to Nevada.

If you thought that the flotilla to Gaza was about humanitarian aid, think again

If the true concern of the Turkish flotilla to Gaza was about humanitarian aid, this story should open eyes.

Israel has attempted to deliver humanitarian aid from an international flotilla to Gaza, but Hamas -- which controls the territory -- has refused to accept the cargo, the Israel Defense Forces said Wednesday.

Palestinian sources confirmed that trucks that arrived from Israel at the Rafah terminal at the Israel-Gaza border were barred from delivering the aid.

Ra'ed Fatooh, in charge of the crossings, and Jamal Khudari, head of a committee against the Gaza blockade, said Israel must release all flotilla detainees and that it will be accepted in the territory only by the Free Gaza Movement people who organized the flotilla.

Israel said it had 20 trucks of aid found on the ships, such as expired medications, clothing, blankets, some medical equipment and toys.

Of course, Israel had been allowing humanitarian aid into Gaza all along. The world seems to be deliberately ignoring that inconvenient fact because it doesn't fit with their Israel as evil tyrant storyline.

Allahpundit links to this Financial Times story that belies the whole myth that Gazans are deprived of food or necessities.

Some argue that Gaza’s tunnel economy is becoming a victim of its own success. Hundreds of tunnels have shut down over the past year as a result of greater Egyptian efforts to stop the flow of goods – and weapons – into the strip. But the remaining tunnels, about 200 to 300 according to most estimates, have become so efficient that shops all over Gaza are bursting with goods.

Branded products such as Coca-Cola, Nescafé, Snickers and Heinz ketchup – long absent as a result of the Israeli blockade – are both cheap and widely available. However, the tunnel operators have also flooded Gaza with Korean refrigerators, German food mixers and Chinese air conditioning units. Tunnel operators and traders alike complain of a saturated market – and falling prices.

“Everything I demand, I can get,” says Abu Amar al-Kahlout, who sells household goods out of a warehouse big enough to accommodate a passenger jet.

Obama abandoning Israel to the jackals

Eliot Abrams points out that Obama let through and voted for a watered-down resolution on the flotilla incident when it could have blocked the entire thing. They might think that the U.S. was defending Israel, but it is clear that what they have done is signal their weak support for Israel.

This week the mob formed again, instantly, after the Gaza flotilla disaster, reinforced this time by the leadership of Turkey, whose language at the UN was more vicious than that used by the Arabs. As usual there was really only one question once the mob began to gather. It is the question that arose repeatedly in the Bush years—when the Hamas leaders Sheik Yassin and Abdel Aziz Rantisi were killed by Israel, when Israel acted in Gaza, when Israel put down the intifada in the West Bank, and during the 2006 war in Lebanon and the late 2008 fighting in Gaza: would Israel stand alone, or would the United States stand with her and prevent the lynching? Would the U.S., in Daniel Patrick Moynihan's memorable phrase, "join the jackals?"

This week the Obama administration answered the question: Yes we would, and Israel would stand alone. It is simple to block the kind of attack issued as a “President’s Statement” on behalf of the Council, for such a statement requires unanimity. The United States can just say “No,” and make it clear that orders have come from the White House and will not be changed. Then negotiations begin on a serious statement—or, there can be no statement at all. The killing of dozens of South Korean sailors by North Korea in an action that truly threatens the peace did not evoke the kind of action the Security Council took against Israel, proving that the UN does not always act, or act in the same way, when news flashes hit. Whether Israel is slammed depends on whether the United States is willing to take a stand.

On the Gaza flotilla, the Obama administration waffled and straddled. It agreed to a statement in which the United Nations condemned the “acts” that led to loss of life but did not say “We condemn Israel.” Presumably White House congratulated itself on this elision, but no one is fooled: the world media keep repeating that the Security Council condemned Israel, and in this case it is hard to argue. Yet it would have been simple to stop the mob had the White House wanted to.

The result is that Israel is standing alone without the strong support from the United States that all previous presidents had provided.

Israelis see clearly the problems they face when the United States is calling for another international investigation and will not defend Israel. They understand that no one is going to investigate Turkey and its role, nor investigate the pro-terror groups on board those ships—not if the United States fails to insist on it. They realize that, thanks to the Obama policies, it is now open season on Israel in Europe and at the UN. They speak candidly (Israelis of the left, center, and right, not just Likud supporters) in private about all these problems, but they cannot speak openly about them, not when they may have the Obama administration to deal with for six and a half more years. They wonder most about whether their friends see their predicament, and will speak up for them even when they must—to retain a working relationship with the White House—remain silent or speak very carefully. So this crisis is not only a test for Israel, which faces difficult weeks ahead, and for the Obama administration, which in fact has already failed. It is a test for Israel’s supporters, facing the combined onslaught of the news media (from BBC coverage to New York Times editorials), scores of governments, UN bureaucrats, and a White House that views excessive solidarity with Israel as a diplomatic inconvenience. The United States abandoned Israel in the United Nations and in the NPT Conference in the course of one week. Israel’s friends in the United States should say so, say it was shameful, and gear up for a long fight.

And now Barney Frank is piling on saying that, "as a Jew," he is "ashamed" of how Israel treats a minority.

Remind me again why Jews vote overwhelmingly for this party? Oh, yes. They prefer the liberal policies and don't really care that much about Israel's continued existence. Perhaps, they, like Barney Frank, are "ashamed."

This isn't going to help Obama's reputation for openess and clean politics

With more questions than answers swirling around the administration's statement on their job offer to Joe Sestak, another story enters the mix. Andrew Romanoff, a candidate opposing Michael Bennet's campaign to be elected to the position as senator from Colorado, issued a statement last night that he was offered a choice of three positions if he wouldn't run against Bennet.

One of President Barack Obama's top advisers suggested to a Colorado Democrat that he forgo a primary challenge to Sen. Michael Bennet and instead apply for one of three international development jobs.

The disclosure came just days after the White House admitted orchestrating a job offer in the Pennsylvania Senate race with the similar goal of avoiding a messy or divisive Democratic primary.

The back-room deals - former President Bill Clinton led the Pennsylvania effort and White House deputy chief of staff Jim Messina worked with former Colorado House Speaker Andrew Romanoff - called into question Obama's repeated promises to run an open government.

Romanoff said in a statement Wednesday night that he was contacted by Messina last fall and told that the White House would support Bennet in the primary. When he said he would seek the nomination anyway, Messina "suggested three positions that might be available to me were I not pursuing the Senate race," Romanoff said. "He added that he could not guarantee my appointment to any of these positions."

Romanoff added: "At no time was I promised a job, nor did I request Mr. Messina's assistance in obtaining one."

Earlier Wednesday, a White House official insisted nothing inappropriate or illegal took place but didn't provide the details Romanoff offered in his statement and a copy of an e-mail he had received from Messina.

"Mr. Romanoff was recommended to the White House from Democrats in Colorado for a position in the administration," White House deputy press secretary Bill Burton said. "There were some initial conversations with him, but no job was ever offered."

Yet even the appearance of trading taxpayer-funded jobs to ease an ally's political path left questions for an administration that was the most transparent in history.

Doesn't Romanoff know that he's supposed to issue this kind of news late on a Friday before a three-day weekend?

Though it sounds like Romanoff was having a particularly hard time getting a job handed to him in Colorado.

Romanoff had sought appointment to the Senate seat that eventually went to Bennet, publicly griped he had been passed over and then discussed possible appointment possibilities inside the administration, one of the officials said.

After being passed over for the Senate appointment, the out-of-power Romanoff made little secret of shopping for a political job. Romanoff also applied to be Colorado secretary of state, a job that came open when Republican Mike Coffman was elected to Congress. Gov. Bill Ritter again appointed a replacement, and again passed over Romanoff.

Next, according to several Colorado Democrats speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss internal negotiations, Romanoff also approached Ritter about being Ritter's running mate for Ritter's re-election bid. It was only after that attempt failed, the Colorado Democrats said, that Romanoff joined the Senate contest.

The guy should have been in Illinois and hooking up with Blagojevich. If no one particularly liked him in Colorado, why were they so scared about having him run in a primary against Bennet? Don't the Democrats trust their primary voters to pick a good candidate?

I'm not particularly upset about the thought that, horrors!, the White House is playing normal politics and skirting the edge of federal law in offering jobs if, wink, wink, some guy will stay out of a primary. But I do find it delicious that Barack Obama has been exposed, yet again, as just the kind of backroom dealer that he pretended to be above in his messianic campaign for president. And once you strip away that aura of being a transformative politician, what is left of his appeal other than his leftist politics?

Darn! It looks like there won't be any third SEIU-sponsored party in NC

Blame North Carolina's tough laws making it very difficult for third parties to get on the ballot.

A defiant move by one of the nation's most powerful unions to help oust Democrats who voted against the health-care bill by establishing a third political party in North Carolina has failed because organizers did not collect enough signatures to qualify for the November midterm elections.

The Service Employees International Union and its North Carolina affiliate did not gather the 85,000 signatures by Tuesday's deadline.

How Israel could go on offense in the propaganda wars

Noah Pollak has some ideas of how Israel would behave if it were on the offense, rather than the defense, in the propaganda wars.

Quite a performance! Wouldn't it be remarkable if the Israelis had gotten ahead of the story by making their own accusations and demands? Here are a few ideas of the kind of concrete action the Israelis could take -- if they had the stones to really take a stand.

1. Expel the Turkish ambassador and declare his return contingent on a full, credible, and public Turkish investigation of the terrorist organization that planned and funded the "aid flotilla."

2. Publicly demand reparations from Turkey for the costs of the operation, including the medical bills of the thugs and Jew-haters who have been given such lovely medical care in Israeli hospitals.

3. Demand a UN investigation of why Turkey is funding terrorist organizations that are involved in attacks on Israel.

4. Fund a Kurdish human-rights NGO in Israel -- there are lots of Kurdish Jews who I'm sure would be happy to help -- that raises awareness of the plight of Kurds in Turkey. (Short answer: they are treated horribly.) This organization must publicize the apartheid conditions of Kurdish life in Turkey and churn out op-eds, studies, videos, and press releases denouncing Turkey's brutal and racist treatment of its own minorities.

5. Fund a Turkish-language documentary on the Armenian genocide, upload it to YouTube, and promote it heavily in Turkey. If Erdogan wants to call Israel a criminal and a murderer, there's no reason why Israel shouldn't return the favor on this most sensitive of issues.

Whoosh! I like it. Of course, it wouldn't do much good since there are those who will never achieve balance on any story involving Israel, but it would warm the hearts of those of us who support Israel to see such a pushback when these nations culpable of their own gross violations of human rights get on their high horse to denounce Israel for trying to defend herself.

Cruising the Web

With the news that there might have been something shady in the recruitment of yet another of Coach Calipari's top players, here's a list of the top shady stories in college basketball. The story of how the coach at Baylor tried to cover up a murder by trashing the victim has to top all these other rather mundane money scandals.

Mona Charen has a clarifying fact check on Israel and Hamas and the flotilla story. She then brings up a cogent question. Why has there been such international outrage about this story and relatively little about the story of North Korea's unprovoked attack on a South Korean ship that killed 47 people? It's clear which story has the propaganda push behind it.

Eric Pearson explains a dumb change that the Obama administration just instituted in how Title IX is applied to sports programs in colleges.

Nancy Pelosi finds her inner Catholic to explain her politics through a religious lens in language that a conservative would be excoriated for using. The Anchoress has more.

Robert Gibbs is having a lot of trouble squaring the circle of the administration's version of what went on with Joe Sestak. So he's reverted to a stonewall.

SEIU is now protesting at churches that don't use union labor.

The voters apparently don't like party switchers who seem to be switching simply to win an election.

Michael Barone thinks that Obama has indeed brought the Chicago Way to the White House.

The government can't do everything

With all this talk about whether or not the oil spill in the Gulf will be "Obama's Katrina," I'm struck by the widely accepted belief that somehow it is up to the president to fix such a disaster. In a way, Obama is suffering for the perception that he's supported his entire political life that, when there is a crisis, the government, particularly the federal government should be the one to rescue us.

Perhaps my memory is faulty, but I don't remember the Exxon Valdez oil spill sparking all sorts of calls for what President Bush was going to do to fix the problem. But now we seem to readily accept that the president has omnipotent powers to address all sorts of problems. As Gene Healy writes, those on the right and the left are looking to Obama much as his daughter seems to be doing - expecting Daddy to fix the hole.

"Did you plug the hole yet, Daddy?" 11-year-old Malia demanded Thursday morning while the president was shaving. Poor President Obama: even his kids won't give him a break about the Gulf oil spill.

Tough. It's hard to feel sorry for the "Yes We Can" candidate, who got the job by stoking the juvenile expectation that there's a presidential solution to everything from natural disasters to spiritual malaise.

But the adults among us ought to worry about a political culture that reacts to every difficulty by screaming "Save us, Superpresident!"

Those who screech for the federal government to be taking over the efforts to, as Obama fatuously ordered, "plug the damn hole" don't seem to realize that the government doesn't have the knowledge or technology to cap a hole in deep ocean water. Healy rightly claimed that the public has taken the approach that, if there is a problem, the federal government must be able to fix it in a manner reminiscent of the running joke from the BBC's comedy "Yes, Minister:"

"Something must be done. This is something. Therefore we must do it!"

Mark Steyn evokes the legend of King Canute trying to prove to his fawning subjects that even a king does not have the power to command the waves. Despite Barack Obama's rhetoric that implies his presence in our politics has that sort of power, he is not that omnipotent.

Two years ago this week, then-Senator Obama declared that his very nomination as Democratic-party presidential candidate (never mind his election, or inauguration) marked the moment when “our planet began to heal” and “the rise of the oceans began to slow.” “Well, when you anoint yourself King Canute,” remarked Charles Krauthammer the other day, “you mustn’t be surprised when your subjects expect you to command the tides.”

So while Republicans are happy if the BP oil leak tarnishes Obama's poll numbers, they're just feeding into this perception that the federal government can address all and every crisis that erupts. Perhaps there are things that the government could have done more expeditiously like approve the sand berms that Governor Jindal wanted to build or to have realized earlier what a disaster this was going to be, but conservatives should be leery about buying into the storyline that the president of the United States is capable of mandating perfect responses to every sort of crisis that occurs.

Hamas's Willing Dupes

The whole story of the flotilla headed towards Gaza loaded with so-called activists was a set up from the beginning. As Max Boot summarizes, the people on these boats do not fit the image of your average peace activists.

The flotilla was organized by the Turkish group Insani Yardim Vakfi (Humanitarian Relief Foundation), which bills itself as a philanthropic organization. But both the Danish Institute for International Studies and the Israeli Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center have documented copious links between Insani Yardim Vakfi and the global jihadist terrorist movements including al Qaeda. One of Insani Yardom Vakfi's activists, Izza Shahin, was arrested by Israeli forces in the West Bank recently and expelled on charges of transferring tens of thousands of dollars to Hamas-controlled "charities."

Other members of the flotilla came from such organizations as the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood. Al Jazeera quoted one woman aboard the flotilla saying "Right now we face one of two happy endings: either Martyrdom or reaching Gaza."

Melanie Phillips adds in some more details.

Gaza’s markets are full of produce, thousands of tons of supplies are travelling into Gaza every week through the Israeli-controlled border crossings, and there is no starvation or humanitarian crisis. It was always obvious that the flotilla was not the humanitarian exercise it was said to be. Here is footage of the IDF offering to dock the Marmara -- the main flotilla ship -- at Ashdod and transfer its supplies and being told ‘Negative, negative, our destination is Gaza’.

And now we can see that the real purpose of this invasion -- backed by the Turkish Humanitarian Relief Foundation (IHH), a radical Islamic organization outlawed by Israel in 2008 for allegedly serving as a major component in Hamas’s global fund-raising machine -- was to incite a violent uprising in the Middle East and across the Islamic world. As I write, reports are coming in of Arab rioting in Jerusalem.

The notion – uncritically swallowed by the lazy, ignorant and bigoted BBC and other western media – that the flotilla organisers are ‘peace activists’ is simply ludicrous. This research by the Danish Institute for International Studies details the part played by the IHH in Islamist terror in Afghanistan, Bosnia and Chechnya. According to the French magistrate Jean-Louis Bruguiere testifying at the Seattle trial of would-be al Qaeda Millenium bomber Ahmed Ressamin, the IHH had played ‘[a]n important role’ in the al Qaeda Millenium bomb plot targeting Los Angeles airport. It was also involved in weapons trafficking, and played in addition a key role in galvanizing anti-Western sentiment among Turkish Muslims in the lead-up to the 2003 war in Iraq. ‘Peace activists’ these people most certainly are not.

And this flotilla was but the latest jihadi attack, deploying the Islamists’ signature strategy of violence and media manipulation. Here from MEMRI (via Just Journalism) is a clip showing the hysteria against Israel being whipped up on board before the ships set sail, with the chanting of intifada songs about ‘Khaybar’ – the iconic slaughter of Jews by Muslims in the 7th century which is used as a rallying cry to kill the Jews today -- and threats of ‘martyrdom’. This was not merely a propaganda stunt, but a terrorist attack.

Clearly, their goal was to initiate the sort of international incident that has occurred. And then the willing dupes of Hamas in the international press and European capitals would chime in just as expected with cries of outrage. Melanie Phillips adds in some more details about how the underlying purpose of this convoy was to elicit just the reaction they got.

As mobs across Europe are incited to demonstrate against Israel for protecting itself against Turkish terrorist aggression, here is a video clip of Gaza-based Yemeni professor Abd al Fatah Nu’man who spells out what that convoy was really all about:

‘This scent is the message of the Islamic message worldwide: Islam is coming, and Gaza is the spearhead that sets the nation in motion...The heroes were selected by Allah to carry out their mission: the mission of awakening the nation...

These are people who wish to be martyred for the sake of Allah; as much as they want to reach Gaza, the other way is more desirable to them.

Martyrdom, in case anyone still doesn’t get it, means in this case killing Jews in the cause of the Islamic jihad. That was the real aim of this flotilla.

For all the international outrage that purports to find that Israel was deliberately killing peace activists, doesn't anyone realize that, if Israel truly wanted to target activists, they could do so much more effectively than having commandos rappel from helicopters armed with paint guns?

As George Friedman writes at Stratfor, the goal of Hamas is to leverage international opinion against Israel no matter what the facts are. Reality doesn't matter, just the perception of reality. And so many in Europe and the international community are quite willing to buy into the mythology of the Palestinians as victims and Israel as the overpowering predator nation. It is completely false, but such willing dupes don't care about reality, just the perception that they buy into against a country whose legitimacy they want to undermine.

Cruising the Web

The WSJ exposes how Senator Bob Casey wants the government to bail out underfunded and overpromised union pension funds. Why the federal taxpayers should pay for pensions that were managed poorly while not taking enough contributions from participants is a mystery except for that unions like the Teamsters really want them to. If his bill were enacted, it would create a flood of other union pensions being dumped off on the federal government.

For a man who promised that he was the one that we had been waiting for, President Obama is remarkably thin-skinned.

Are you ready for all the changes that a reduced salt grocery cart will bring? Be prepared for Cheez-Its that "fell apart in surprising ways. The golden yellow hue faded. The crackers became sticky when chewed, and the mash packed onto the teeth. The taste was not merely bland but medicinal." Yum!

The Washington Post contrasts Montgomery County in Maryland and Fairfax County in Virginia. Two suburbs of Washington that are very close together yet have two vastly different economic fates mainly because Montgomery County has promised much more generous benefits to public employees.

Robert Samuelson explains why the administration is using an out-of-date measure of poverty in America.

ESPN profiles the wacky wardrobe of Craig Sager. The article links to this marvelous take-down of one Sager pink and red outfit by Celtic Kevin Garnett who tells Sager that he needs to take his outfit home and burn it.