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Like all good neocons, Podhoretz attempts to point the finger anywhere but at his own crew:

As for dealing with the illegals already here, there’s a sense in which this debate has been radicalized to such an extent that the Right won’t be satisfied with a policy that does not explicitly advocate expulsion — all other policies being dubbed “amnesty” and therefore illegitimate — while the Left refuses to consider any policy other than special-treatment affirmative-action line-jumping legalization. In other words, there is nothing our politicians can do, absolutely nothing, to satisfy the activists — because neither extreme will be reflected in any kind of law or policy that emerges even from a Washington energized to deal with them.

If a more sober reckoning of political reality does not intrude here, the Right will hurtle headlong toward schism, division, a third party and all sorts of other “pox on all your houses” actions. The cost of this is what I detail in the direst parts of my book Can She Be Stopped? — the easy transfer of power on Capitol Hill and the White House to the Democrats, and particularly to Hillary Clinton.

It’s doubtful the policies she will follow as president on immigration will please anyone on the Right. It’s certain that the policies she will follow on courts, on social issues, on foreign policy, on taxes, on regulation and on almost everything else you can think of will be deeply displeasing to people on the Right. And then, as a result of the pursuit of an impossible policy of purity on immigration, the country and the world will suffer the consequences.

The potential for self-destruction is terrifying. The potential for grave national harm is worse. Please, you guys, pull back from the edge.

Mr. Podhoretz’s first problem here is that granting anything except expulsion is an amnesty for an illegal alien. If a thief steals a car, it would be considered outrageous to let him keep it as long as he agreed to take care of it for two years, in fact, it would be considered outrageous to let him keep it even if he served a short jail sentence.

Even more outrageous, however, is Podhoretz’s attempt to shift the blame from those who created and exacerbated the situation to those who are angered by it and are motivated to bring it to an end. Pro-immigration Republicans have no one but themselves to blame if the Lizard Queen outmanuevers them and steals a very popular position from them, and they will be among those Republicans most responsible for her victory, not those who rightly refuse to support a majority party that has repeatedly refused to respect their political positions.

It was clear in Mr. Podhoretz’s email to me several days ago – it was not a public discussion and so has not been posted here – he subscribes to the ownership view of voting. His interpretation is that Republicans have an inherent right to the votes of everyone who identifies themselves as being left of center, so therefore one must vote Republican no matter what Republicans do or say. Failure to do so is voting for the Democrat because this is a two-party system, all those other names on the ballot notwithstanding.

I assert that this is absurd, that the vote count starts from zero in every election and every vote must be earned every time. The Republicans have richly earned their right to return to the political wilderness, due to their repugnant behavior regarding immigration and many other matters. They will not have my support in either 2006 or 2008 and I hope the lesson will be bitter enough to prove salutary to those shallow “pragmatists” in the party who stupidly continue to insist that moving left and expanding the big tent is an election-winning strategy.

They are mere tacticians, not strategists, which is why they consistently fail to see the big picture.

Considering that the most successful Republican politician of all rejected that strategy in favor of forthright conservativism, it is amazing that so many “conservative” commentators and Republican strategists continue to cling to it even in the face of what may be an epochal defeat.

By the way, notice what I wrote back in 2003, when all the talk was of the Lizard Queen running for president in 2004:

While I have much respect for the raw animal cunning and devious creativity of America’s most famous foot-fetishist, I honestly think that Dick Morris is forgetting something about his former client. The Lizard Queen is cold-blooded. She is not a risk-taker, at heart, and she is far more prone to finishing off the sick and wounded than taking on an alpha male in a full-frontal attack…. So, the Lizard Queen will continue to lurk quietly in the gaseous morass of the Senate, biding her time, waiting for the right moment to strike an unsuspecting America and drag it beneath the dark waters of her totalitarian vision.

I suspect that moment is fast approaching. Her 2008 campaign shifts into a higher gear as soon as the polls close and all the votes are counted this November.

JB is obviously unfamiliar with my ouvre:

I predict you won’t have the balls to publish or publicly address this e-mail (you seem to be the type of charlatan who only engages in fights he can manipulate, like only publishing and eviscerating letters easily dispatched in front of your drooling fan club). But can you please explain again how it is that having women stay home from work is better for the economy? I’m sure it’s better for kids, but if having women stay home improves the economy, then wouldn’t having half the men stay home be even better, still? You seem to know just enough economics to make a fool of yourself. It is true that labor prices will go up if women stay home, but that doesn’t mean it will be good for the economy. It may be that we have a glut of labor (though with brick layers making more than college professors, I doubt it) but it’s ludicrous to say that the women in the field are exactly the people who should leave. Why not the men? Why not half of each?

Jonathan Birge
Ultrafast Optics and Quantum Electronics Group
Massachusetts Institute of Technology

To JB’s credit, at least he recognizes what so many feminists keep stubbornly trying to deny, that labor prices will go up if women stay home. However, I have never argued that increased labor prices will be good for the economy, I have instead argued that they would be good for wage rates and household income. Household income |= GDP. Still, I can certainly make that case on at least two different grounds without even having to seriously ponder the subject.

First, the fact that real GDP growth has grown while wage rates have not only failed to keep pace but have actually declined proves that a growing economy is not beneficial to every aspect of that economy. If the benefits of economic growth is channeled towards corporations that invest their profits outside the national economy and away from workers/consumers, the results of current economic growth is likely to be detrimental to both wage rates and the economy in the intermediate term.

Second, higher wage rates and increased household income equates to either increased spending or increased savings, or more likely, both. Since GDP=C+I+G and, the Keynesians assure us, S=I, then increased spending (C) and increased savings (I) have to lead to an increase in GDP. One seldom sees a country with low wage rates and high GDP per capita, after all.

Now, one could certainly argue that since the increase in wage rates derives from a decrease in the supply of labor, that there is no difference. But there are two big differences, one immediate and one long-term, even if the total household income was identical. The immediate difference is that due to household realities and the current tax regime, two household incomes equals more C at the expense of I(S) and more G at the expense of C. I don’t think there’s any question which of two identical GDP’s, one with larger G and smaller I and one with smaller G and larger I, is the healthier. And, I note, two household incomes with increased government spending and no net household savings is exactly what we’ve got, just as my little model here would predict.

The long-term problem with two household incomes instead of one is the birth rate. Two-income, one-kid families are going to shrink the economy in the long term, which is why every country with low birth rates is importing hordes of Muslims, Mexicans and other foreigners. That leads to other problems, of course, but that’s not relevant here.

In the perfect world of economic modeling, it would make no difference if men or women were working. And in fact, the deleterious effects on wages of women entering the work force was largely hidden until 1973, when men finally stopped leaving the work force in numbers sufficient to conceal what was happening. In fact, one could characterize the period from 1950 to 1973 as women working so that men over 60 could play golf. The BLS numbers make this clear.

But in the real world, labor is more than a mere variable and women in the work force come with unique costs all their own. They inhibit productivity, inspire a host of costs ranging from regulatory compliance to the loss of experienced and productive workers. It has been repeatedly proven that students in same-sex classrooms learn better, and I have little doubt that a study on workforce productivity would exhibit much the same results.

Why can’t the men stay home, JB asks? Well, if you’ve seen what women have done in several decades of academia and believe an economy revolving around Women’s Studies would be a functional one, then there’s no reason why they can’t. Should some brilliant man conceive a system wherein economic growth relies primarily on group discussion, personal expression and color-matching, men will be able to head home and fire up their Playstations. But as long as economic growth depends on technological advancement, men will be the necessary component of the labor force.

You see, JB, I don’t have to cherry pick the emails I eviscerate. It’s just that as an Internet Superintelligence, I’m so far beyond most of my critics that I make it look easy.

Derbyshire doesn’t grasp the possibilities:

I shall run screaming from the room if the President utters any of the following words or phrases:

jobs Americans won’t do
nation of immigrants
compassionate
family values don’t stop at the Rio Grande
good-hearted people
path to citizenship
my good friend Vicente Fox
this is not amnesty

I, on the other hand, am happy to interpret this as the required list for Dear Jorge’s Immigration Speech Drinking Game. One merely slams a shot of one’s chosen poison or a healthy slug of beer – chug the whole can/cup if you’re in college – upon hearing any of these phrases.

This is also known as the Jamie R experience. It is rumored that upon completion of the game, one may actually be able to comprehend the wisdom of the sage from the Land Down Under.

Good news on the coffee front:

One to three cups of coffee a day may protect people from heart disease and strokes, according to research which contradicts numerous studies that have suggested that coffee is bad for you.

The good news for coffee drinkers comes from a report in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition and is based on a study of 27,000 older women, followed for 15 years.

Between coffee and red wine, I appear to be assured of a healthy old age. If they can find similar benefits to amaretto, buffalo mozzarella and Maddens, I may well prove to be immortal.

The entire board of Italian champions Juventus has resigned after days of press revelations over embarrassing telephone interceptions involving its top management.

The Italian Football Federation is investigating the content of tapped telephone conversations involving Juve general manager Luciano Moggi talking of refereeing appointments for games with a Football Federation official responsible for selecting match officials.

That would certainly explain all of those mysterious injury-time penalties that are inexplicably given every time Juve needs three points….

I don’t like Real Madrid. I actively dislike Manchester United. Galatasaray makes my skin crawl. But I absolutely loathe Juve, from their awful uniforms to their overrated strikers and their front-running fans.

Between this and Trotspurs, it’s been a good week. Let’s hope things continue on this vein through Wednesday in Paris.

Dear Mr. Day,

I am concerned about the recent post at the Fraters Libertas involving something called “American Idol”. While it was my original understanding that the individuals producing that blog were fine, upstanding Christian gentlemen, I am now worried that they may actually be pagan idolaters. Can you please tell me if my concerns are misplaced or if I should call for a gathering of right-minded folk during my sermon next week in order to stone the Northern Alliance studio?

Deuteronomically yours,
The Reverend Olaf Magnusson
1st Viking Lutheran
Lake Owasso, Minnesota

Dear Reverend Magnusson,

While your concern does you credit, sir, please be assured that a little research on the part of your Representative indicates that no worship of false gods on the part of any of the Fraters is involved. The matter is a serious one, though, as apparently JB Doubtless is experiencing a time of gender-confusion, as he reveals his disturbing familiarity with something better left to the wearers of clogs and the readers of US Magazine.

Please ask your congregation to pray for this troubled young man during his moment of desperate need.

Vox Day
Readers Representative
The Fraters Libertas

You can hear the excuse-making revving up in Republican circles already:

The National Security Agency has been secretly collecting the phone call records of tens of millions of Americans, using data provided by AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth, people with direct knowledge of the arrangement told USA TODAY….

The NSA’s domestic program, as described by sources, is far more expansive than what the White House has acknowledged. Last year, Bush said he had authorized the NSA to eavesdrop — without warrants — on international calls and international e-mails of people suspected of having links to terrorists when one party to the communication is in the USA. Warrants have also not been used in the NSA’s efforts to create a national call database.

In defending the previously disclosed program, Bush insisted that the NSA was focused exclusively on international calls. “In other words,” Bush explained, “one end of the communication must be outside the United States.”

In other words, Bush was lying. Again. Impeach the deceitful bastard already. I suppose his defenders will argue that “it depends on what the meaning of ‘focused’ is”.

Now, it’s quite possible that this program is helping prevent terrorist attacks. But I have no doubt that it would be even more effective if the federal government simply locked every American citizen in a jail cell. Strange, isn’t it, how “to create a database of every call ever made within the nation’s borders” is possible, but somehow finding illegal aliens isn’t.

Ladies and gentlemen, with this latest revelation I believe we have just witnessed the election of your 2007 Democratic House and Senate. Sure, the Democrats will soon enact similar, perhaps even more superlative, abuses on the American people, but at this point, I’d rather vote Democrat than Republican myself.

Of course, none of this is exactly shocking to those who have known about ECHELON for years. Anyone still want to argue that it’s just a figment of a paranoid imagination?

UPDATE – No, I’m not saying I would vote Democrat. Never have, never will. But I have to say that I’ve never been less likely to vote Republican either. It’s like being forced to choose between Helen Thomas and the corpse of Betty Friedan. Actually, now that I consider it, I’d go for the corpse. It would probably smell better and talk less.

It is impossible, we are assured by Dear Jorge, for the United States to deport 12 million illegal aliens. Now, he’s the president, so I suppose we have to assume that he knows what he’s talking about. No can do. But if we consider that the Germans managed to rid themselves of six million Jews, many of whom who spoke German and were pretty well integrated into German society, in only four years, basic math indicates that America could eliminate its entire illegal alien problem in eight years.

Given the creativity and productivity of the American people, I bet the job could be done in six.

On the other hand, perhaps we’d better keep them around. I have a feeling that sitting on the Cherry Blossom Throne is going to give the Lizard Queen a voracious appetite.

The man who wrote this is no lunatic:

Mr. President, history tells us that repressive and cruel governments do not survive. God has entrusted the fate of man to them. The Almighty has not left the universe and humanity to their own devices. Many things have happened contrary to the wishes and plans of governments. These tell us that there is a higher power at work and all events are determined by Him.

Can one deny the signs of change in the world today?

Is this situation of the world today comparable to that of 10 years ago? Changes happen fast and come at a furious pace.

The people of the world are not happy with the status quo and pay little heed to the promises and comments made by a number of influential world leaders. Many people around the world feel insecure and oppose the spreading of insecurity and war and do not approve of and accept dubious policies.

The people are protesting the increasing gap between the haves and the have-nots and the rich and poor countries.

The people are disgusted with increasing corruption.

The people of many countries are angry about the attacks on their cultural foundations and the disintegration of families. They are equally dismayed with the fading of care and compassion.

The people of the world have no faith in international organizations, because their rights are not advocated by these organizations.

Liberalism and Western style democracy have not been able to help realize the ideals of humanity. Today these two concepts have failed. Those with insight can already hear the sounds of the shattering and fall of the ideology and thoughts of the liberal democratic systems.

That doesn’t mean that Ahmadi-Najad, the President of the Islamic Republic of Iran, isn’t going to prove an implacable enemy far more dangerous than the sock puppets of Al-Qaeda. But to call him insane and dismiss him would be a big mistake, if he is indeed the author of that letter.

He certainly appears to have a more rational picture of global realities than does President Bush or his cabal of World Demokratic Revolutionists, who insist that it is impossible to track down 12 million illegal aliens in our own country while simultaneously attempting to forcibly modify the religion and governance of one billion individuals living halfway around the world.

This is the first among an ESPN sportswriter’s recommendations for Augusta’s new chairman:

Women Members
We are a private club, but we are also a public golfing treasure. Outgoing chairman Hootie Johnson, and some of our more medieval members, never have fully understood that relationship. Hootie saw small picture (Martha Burk and bayonets) instead of big picture (it’s the right thing to do). So how about we join the 21st century and extend membership invitations to at least two women?

Dear Mr. Wojciechowski,

I fail to understand your crusade against men being able to belong to private clubs, but I certainly await with interest your forthcoming excoriation of women’s clubs such as Curves, as well as blatantly sexist women’s sporting organizations like the LPGA. I would encourage you to expand your anti-sexist campaign to the federal prison system, which also exhibits open sexism by refusing to practice gender equality in its cell assignments.

As was well established in Brown vs Board of Education, separate is not equal. I hope you will soon address this terrible injustice in our society.

Regards,
Vox