The Dregs of Society....

My sentiment toward the stimulus bill has been what I might call optimistically credulous. That is, I'm pretending that the goal here is to actually stimulate the economy. Thus, my reaction to the inclusion (or removal) of sensible public policy proposals has been to ask, "How well does this fit with the purpose of a stimulus bill?" Sure, this involves overlooking some of the compromise that has already been made to put together a bill that's expected to pass. Sure, if you look closely at the bill, you can find other similar provisions that arguably should be eliminated on the same grounds, but don't happen to be controversial. Because thanks to the nature of our political system, with any sort of spending bill (massive or minor), you're not likely to get more than 2/3 of the way to ideological purity. But shouldn't you try?

Not according to Richard Cohen. To Cohen, it is a great sin to put forth a stimulus bill that doesn't attempt to reform... things. The idea that a stimulus bill should focus on short-term spending, "shovel-ready" projects, and programs that don't require sustained, increased government spending? The idea that this should be a bill that passes quickly rather than getting bogged down in endless debate and controversies? Lost on him. But okay... there are lots of issues that need reform. Perhaps you're thinking, "Cohen wants to restore funding for birth control." Or "Cohen wants to use the stimulus bill to lay a foundation for further reforms, such as a national health care program, a cleaner environment, sustainable energy...." nope. Cohen wants to tackle education reform.

The funny part, if you want to call it that: Cohen doesn't know anything about education reform. Thus, instead of concrete proposals, we get platitudinous statements like this:

But if the money is going to be offered, why not couple it with demands for reform? After all, without the extra cash, the likelihood is that teachers across the country will be laid off. That gives the president some leverage: Take my money, take my reforms. Maybe a deal could not be done. We won't know. We do know, though, that the teachers unions have an understandable aversion to some reforms. We also know that the unions supported Obama in his campaign.

You see? The most obvious reason that a federal stimulus bill doesn't micromanage education, something traditionally though of as a state issue, is that "unions supported Obama." It must be nice to live in a world that... simple.

Do your reading on education and you will find an emerging consensus. Abolish tenure.

That's right... stretching from the WSJ editorial page to its op/ed page, the emerging consensus is right there for you to see. I've spoken about this before, but I guess it bears repeating: If tenure were the real issue, the problems attributed to tenure would be seen in every school district. Getting legislatures to act against tenure wouldn't be an issue, because everybody with kids in public schools would be screaming for reform. The problem in schools like DC's is that between an unpleasant work environment and incompetent administrators, classrooms were filled with available applicants, steps weren't taken to weed out bad teachers before they got tenure, and the environment for teacher burnout is exceptional. As a consequence, no doubt, you have a lot of kids being taught by teachers who should never have obtained tenure or who are counting the days until they can retire. That happens in other school districts as well, but at nowhere near the same levels. Also, the good teachers from a district like DC? They can seek jobs in other districts where they will again get tenure - but without the controversy.

There are other ways to ensure that teachers are fairly treated without guaranteeing the jobs of the inept. (Cops don't have tenure, and neither do columnists.)

That's almost funny. Columnists don't have tenure, meaning they could be fired at will? No, as Cohen knows, name brand columnists work under contract. Now I'll grant, they don't have a CBA that will get them their job back if they're wrongfully terminated, but they will seek full compensation under their contracts.

Police officers? Come now, Richard. Tenure is a form of job protection that follows your probationary period. It doesn't mean "we can't fire you", and it certainly doesn't mean "we can't fire you for cause". It means that once you complete your probationary period you can (normally) only be fired for cause, and you may have to offer an employee improvement plan or follow an incremental disciplinary process. It could be said that any union employee past the probationary period has "tenure". And yes, that includes officers in unionized police departments (which is to say, most of them). Believe it or not, there's nothing talismanic about the term - you can find state legislation describing police officer tenure, and police disciplinary hearings may be described as "tenure hearings".

Let's look at Cohen's version of a "solution" - how do we "ensure that teachers are fairly treated without guaranteeing the jobs of the inept"?

Ensure that the best teachers teach at the most challenging schools and ensure also that they get paid lavishly for doing so.

It's one of the problems with the simple-minded union busting mantra, that somehow unions are to blame for everything that's wrong in the schools. Even giving due respect to Michelle Rhee's apparently unsustainable plan to provide teacher raises, the fact is that there's no popular will to give teachers more money. Cohen just got through telling us that things are so bad that states are looking at laying off needed teachers. Either Cohen's looking at the stimulus bill as the magic federal money tree - a gift that keeps on giving - or he's not considered that if you increase teacher pay, once funding levels return to normal you have to lay off even more needed teachers. Actually, it's probably both.

If Cohen were to venture out of his office and stop by some inner city private schools and religious schools, he would likely find that there are good teachers in many of those schools who have chosen to make less money in order to teach in a school environment that they find to be more secure, stable, and supported. That's an issue Rhee likes to sidestep, and people like Cohen don't even seem to know exists - there's more to a job than money. The focus of making individual classroom teachers responsible for the failures of parents, schools and school administrators kind of misses the point. Or perhaps it is the point - by placing the focus there, Rhee creates instant insulation against the failures of her own, substantive reforms (or lack thereof). Rhee, for example, favors mainstreaming - something that saves the school district money and... it's the teachers' fault if they can't deal with high numbers of emotionally disturbed or learning disabled kids mainstreamed into their classrooms, right?

Cohen likes solutions that "sound good" (to him), even if he has no concept of what they would mean:

How about extending the school day, maybe for an hour or so? How about extending the school year? How about tinkering with the No Child Left Behind law but insisting that testing - accountability - be maintained?

Because it's free to keep schools open for extra hours or days, we'll have already busted the teachers unions so they won't be able to object to an increased work day or year, and surely more classroom hours will automatically translate into more learning, right? That's why when you go to college you spend more time in classrooms than ever before. Personally, I do think that we should revisit the school year, the paring away of school days to save money, the structure of the school year around an agricultural calendar, etc. But I don't see it as a magic cure, as something that should be imposed on school districts as part of a stimulus bill, or as a legislative priority for preempting teachers' collective bargaining rights.

You want specifics, Cohen's got them - he's thought long and hard about "No Child Left Behind" and came up with the insightful solution that it can be improved by "tinkering". Um... Thanks. But it gets better:

How about doing something about the sad fact that teachers aren't what they used to be? Now that women and minorities have more opportunities in almost every field, the best of them have abandoned teaching.

Ah, the good old days when women and minorities didn't have good job opportunities other than teaching. Now everybody with a brain has moved on to better professions, and those that are left.... (Is it just me, or is Cohen's statement oh... just a wee bit sexist and racist? What does he have to say about white men who teach?) Mix that sentiment with the idea that the best way to keep the best of the remaining dregs happy is to force them to work in inner city schools, increase their workday and work year, and take away their job protections and... what more needs to be said?

One of these days, somebody will need to explain to Cohen that you can have a teacher who works wonders with suburban fifth grade students, but who would be stretched to (or beyond) the limits of her capacity trying to maintain order in an inner city fifth grade classroom. A teacher who is able to handle the most difficult classrooms is likely to be able to handle an easier classroom, but the opposite isn't always true. But to Cohen, teachers are apparently all dregs who can't get real jobs, so perhaps he sees 'em all as fungible.

Torture and Morality

Typical of his way of thinking, which is to say... poorly, Richard Cohen today argues that we can't prosecute Bush Administration officials for torture because we're all guilty.

"The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there." So goes an aphorism that needs to be applied to the current debate over whether those who authorized and used torture should be prosecuted. In the very different country called Sept. 11, 2001, the answer would be a resounding no.

Back then, a Post poll gave George W. Bush an approval rating of 92 percent, which meant that almost no one thought he was on the wrong course.

This shouldn't have to be explained, but then... it's Richard. No, the high approval rating for a President immediately after a moment of national crisis does not translate into equivalent approval for his policies, let alone each and every one of his policies. Nor could it. How smart do you have to be to recognize that Bush hadn't even stated his policies on torture on 9/11. He hadn't declared an intention to invade Iraq. It was Bush's bad policy choices (and their consequences) that caused his popularity to plummet.

What Cohen really means here is that after 9/11 he got climbed onto a "Bush can do no wrong to avenge this" bandwagon, and he saw nothing wrong with the use of torture to achieve Bush's objectives, stated and unstated. That's fine - he can put himself on the dock next to G.W. for his stupid, credulous, thoughtless acceptance of everything Bush did as being right. But please - leave the rest of us out of it.

At the same time, questions about the viability of torture were very much in the air. Alan Dershowitz was suggesting the creation of torture warrants -- permission from a court to, in effect, break some bones.

Dershowitz, mind you, was not in favor of torture but argued that if torture was going to be done, it was best that it be done legally.

Actually, I think the better argument is that Dershowitz is very much in favor of torture, but chooses to dance around the subject rather than approaching it honestly.

In a similar vein, the thoughtful Newsweek columnist Jonathan Alter mulled the legality, the morality and the efficacy of torture. In the end, Alter ruled it out -- although not sodium pentothal (truth serum) or offshoring terrorism suspects "to our less squeamish allies." In fact, the government was already sending suspects abroad to be interrogated.

So... an intellectually dishonest law school professor favored torture and a Newsweek columnist ended up endorsing extraordinary rendition... and this proves what, exactly? That when confronted with extraordinary circumstances, people like Dershowitz increase the volume of their calls for us to abandon our values, and people like Alter wonder if they're right? (While sheep like Cohen go, "Baaaaaah"?)

Around the same time, historian Jay Winik wrote about the usefulness of torture, how Philippine agents in 1995 got a certain Abdul Hakim Murad to reveal a plot to blow up 11 American airliners over the Pacific and send yet another plane, this one loaded with nerve gas, into CIA headquarters in Langley. After being beaten nearly to death, Murad was finally broken by the hollow threat to turn him over to Israel's Mossad.

The moral of this story being what? That the Mossad would have finished beating Murad to death, as opposed to beating him almost to death, and that fear caused him to reveal additional information? That the Bush Administration was correct to insist that nobody could possibly have conceived of a plan to crash airplanes into buildings? That if you torture somebody until they reveal a horrible terrorist plot, no matter how ludicrous, you will eventually get them to "confess" such a plot? Really... other than as an idea in Murad's mind, this notion of crashing a plane loaded with nerve gas into the CIA headquarters is supported by... what? There was a ton of documentary and physical evidence that Murad was planning to hijack and blow up airlines. Was there any to support this special new plot, or that any other person even knew of this supposed plot, learned of through the tactics Cohen approves?

According to journalists Marites Vitug and Glenda Gloria, authors of the book Under the Crescent Moon, agents hit him with a chair and long piece of wood when Murad did not talk. They forced water into his mouth, and crushed out lit cigarettes on his genitals. Murad's ribs were completely cracked. Agents were surprised that he survived.

To be clear, is Cohen in the Dershowitz, "Get a warrant before putting out your cigarettes on a prisoner's genitals" camp, or is he in the Alter "Send the prisoner to a foreign nation where somebody else's steel toed boots can get dirty while kicking in his rib cage" camp? If we're going to pretend Murad was a "ticking time bomb", what actionable evidence was obtained through his torture that prevented the fanciful "CIA nerve gas attack" from being carried out? And if we're not pretending that he was a "ticking time bomb", such that his torture did not provide us any information or evidence useful in preventing a future attack, let alone an imminent attack on Langley, what's Cohen's point?

Cohen continues with his insipid analysis:

The Philippine example was widely mentioned at the time, even by those who opposed the use of torture. The conventional wisdom that torture never works - so counterintuitive as to be an absurdity - was not yet doctrine.

No, Richard. The argument isn't that "torture never works". The argument is that evidence obtained through torture is not reliable. For example, I take Cohen prisoner, and he denies his association with al-Qaeda. After a few rounds of torture, he finally admits his affiliation. So now I ask him to identify his contacts. He denies having any contacts, or claims not to know their names. A few rounds of torture later, I have names. But none of that information is reliable.

Frankly, as a torturer, I probably don't care. If I let Richard Cohen live, return him to the streets hobbled, covered with cigarette burns, he serves first as a message of my ruthlessness - this is what I do do people who challenge state power. If Cohen's lucky it ends there. If not, he's treated as an informant - he wouldn't have been released, after all, had he not talked. Maybe I even put out the word that he talked, and my agents watch to see who takes revenge - that's actionable intelligence. Or I can whisper to the next person I pick up, "If you give me the information I want, right now, I can let you go and nobody will ever have to know you were in custody. (Or you can end up like Cohen.)" That could be true. It's more likely a lie, but it may scare some information out of the guy before the torture sessions begin.

Whatever information I get, I can act on it. I can pick up the friends Cohen named and start round two with them. Their confessions, with or without torture, will either confirm or refute Cohen's. It doesn't matter. Then round three, round four.... After I torture enough people, I'll have enough confirming information to have a pretty good idea of whether Cohen gave me real names. If he didn't and he's still alive, whether he's in custody or has to be picked up yet again, I can torture Cohen to find out why he lied. By that time I may think that Cohen was wrongly accused in the first place but, no matter. He lied during an official investigation, and that's a crime in and of itself. Besides, we're back to sending a message - and what message would an apology send?

Torture is very intimidating to dissidents - perhaps Cohen is too obtuse to have noticed that particular use of torture by oppressive regimes, but I'm sure they'll confirm that it "works". Also, if you're intent on getting information at any cost and are willing to act on the information you obtain no matter how dubious it may be, torture gets you lots of information you can act upon, usually faster and in much greater volume than would interrogation. Who's arguing that would be ineffective? The debate is over the measure you use for "effectiveness", and... silly things like American values and morality.

At the same time, we have to be respectful of those who were in that Sept. 11 frame of mind, who thought they were saving lives - and maybe were - and who, in any case, were doing what the nation and its leaders wanted. It is imperative that our intelligence agents not have to fear that a sincere effort will result in their being hauled before some congressional committee or a grand jury. We want the finest people in these jobs - not time-stampers who take no chances.

When we had the finest people in those jobs, we didn't need or use torture. When we had immoral, stupid, sociopathic people in those jobs, we got Abu Ghraib. There's a term that I've heard used for people who claim, "I was only following orders," when their on-the-job atrocities are challenged. Do you know that term, Richard?

The best suggestion for how to proceed comes from David Cole of Georgetown Law School. Writing in the Jan. 15 New York Review of Books, he proposed that either the president or Congress appoint a blue-ribbon commission, arm it with subpoena power, and turn it loose to find out what went wrong, what (if anything) went right and to report not only to Congress but to us.

"If anything"? Richard doesn't see any tension between his implication that nothing went right under Bush, and his blind endorsement of everything Bush did post-9/11?

We were the ones, remember, who just wanted to be kept safe.

It's quite reasonable for the citizens of a nation to ask that their government protect them from foreign enemies. That's part of the government's job. It's quite another for the government, or hacks like Richard Cohen, to read into that, "At all costs." Unlike Cohen, some of us were never ready to surrender our core values. But then, perhaps Cohen never had any.

Oh, Spare Me....

Richard Cohen is amazed that G.W. Bush is an avid reader. And he knows, for a fact that Bush is an avid reader because... Karl Rove told him. Seriously.

Still, the fact remains that Bush is a prodigious, industrial reader, and this does not conform at all to his critics' idea of who he is. They would prefer seeing him as a dolt, since that, as opposed to policy or ideological differences, is a briefer, more bloggish explanation of what went wrong. Still, in fairness to these critics (see Rove above), Bush himself has encouraged this approach. Aw shucks is an infuriating defense of a policy.

And Cohen knows this because he read what Bush critics have to say, or because that's what Karl Rove told him about Bush's critics?

Back Seat Driving the Campaign

Wait a minute - that's the job of bloggers, not columnists, isn't it? Or is that just wishful thinking.

To the tune of "Let's Go Crazy", David Brooks lectures the candidates,

If I were advising the candidates, I’d tell them to double down on weirdness. Obama needs to occasionally criticize his own side. If he can’t take on his own party hacks, he’ll never reclaim the mantle of systemic change. Specifically, he needs to attack the snobs who are savaging Sarah Palin’s faith and family. Many liberals claim to love working-class families, but the moment they glimpse a hunter with an uneven college record, they hop on chairs and call for disinfectant. Obama needs to attack Bill Maher for calling her a stewardess and the rest of the coastal condescenders.

If I were McCain, I’d make the divided government argument explicit. The Republicans are intellectually unfit to govern right now, but balancing with Democrats, they might be able to do some good. I’d have McCain tell the country that he looks forward to working with Congressional Democrats, that he is confident they can achieve great things together.

David Brooks assures us that "Weirdness wins," but (surprise) provides no examples of weirdness propelling anybody into the Presidency. Brooks doesn't even believe himself, and immediately after suggesting that McCain's decisions are "weird" redefines that weirdness as "maverickism — against the entrenched powers and party orthodoxies". Brooks seems to know that "weird" is not good, unless you transform it into mavericky goodness.

As for Obama, Brooks thinks it would be weird in a good way for him to attack a comedian for making a joke about Sarah Palin. I can see how that would help Bill Maher, but I don't see what it would do for either Obama or Palin. Beyond that, Brooks offers one of his insipid generalizations about liberals, but in fact seems to be describing himself. When do you suppose he last had a "hunter with an uneven college record" over for cocktails? (I'm not familiar with Dick Cheney's college record, but if it's uneven I perhaps spoke in haste.)

Meanwhile, Richard Cohen wants Obama to be scrappier. Not to take on Bill Maher, but perhaps to act more like him. Cohen resents that Obama responds to questions not by sharing a zinger, but by suggesting that the media do its job:

Stephanopoulos vainly tried for some genuine reaction. In choosing Palin, did John McCain get someone who met the minimum test of being "capable of being president"? Everyone in America knows the answer to that. They know McCain picked someone so unqualified she has been hiding from the media because a question to her is like kryptonite to what's-his-name. But did Obama say anything like that? Here are his exact words: "Well, you know, I'll let you ask John McCain when he's on ABC." Boy, Palin will never get over that.

Perhaps Cohen wasn't thinking about the follow-up questions - "If that doesn't qualify her, why does this qualify you?" It may not be scrappy to sidestep a trap, but it is savvy. And Obama's right - the media should be asking Palin and McCain to back up their claims about her qualifications.

Maybe he's worried about how America would receive an angry black man or maybe he's just too cool to ever get hot, but the result is that we have little insight into his passions: What, above all, does he care about?

And McCain's kept his trademark temper under control because he's worried about being seen as an "angry white man"? Would that idea even occur to a mainstream pundit?

Okay, so Brooks wants everybody to be weird, and Cohen's angry that Obama's not angry enough, but... what about the issues?

Columns We Won't See From Richard Cohen

The Richard Cohen line of thinking on Obama's choice of running mate is so... trite. And so easy. After describing Biden's good qualities - "Joe Biden is a gentleman", although "wrong on Iraq, he has been right on so much else", "he has been loyal - to his party and to his president," Cohen mind-reads Obama and tells us,

Biden's selection represents an implied admission by Obama that he lacks what Biden has: foreign policy credentials. In that sense, the Delaware senator does not make the ticket whole. Instead, he calls attention to what it lacks.

If you're going to trot out Republican Party talking points, at least have the honesty of doing so Kristol-style - just regurgitate them exactly as they were given to you:

McCain operatives were pleased by the Biden selection, which they considered, as one said to me, “a pick from weakness.”

The purpose of that talking point, lovingly embraced by Cohen, is to present any choice as being one that evidences weakness. Pick somebody whose strengths supplement your own, and your choice highlights your "weakness". Pick somebody without those strengths and the pick also only serves to highlight your "weakness". The best part is, it doesn't matter who you pick.

Let's run through some of Kristol's possible VP choices for McCain and imagine the columns Cohen won't be writing:

• Tim Pawlenty - "Pawlenty's selection represents an implied admission by McCain that he lacks what Pawlenty has: health, youth, vigor, charisma. In that sense, the Minnesota governor does not make the ticket whole. Instead, he calls attention to what it lacks."
  

• Mitt Romney - "Romney's selection represents an implied admission by McCain that he lacks what Romney has: an understanding of economics and the needs of business. In that sense, the former Massachusetts governor does not make the ticket whole. Instead, he calls attention to what it lacks."
  

• "A woman"¹ - "[A woman's] selection represents an implied admission by McCain that he lacks what [a woman] has: appeal to Hillary Clinton's supporters.² In that sense, [a woman] does not make the ticket whole. Instead, she calls attention to what it lacks."
  

• Joe Lieberman - "Lieberman's selection represents an implied admission by McCain that he lacks what Lieberman has: following his flip-flops and embrace of Bush's economic policies and the religious right, credibility with the political center. In that sense, the Connecticut senator does not make the ticket whole. Instead, he calls attention to what it lacks."

This is really quite easy - the sort of editorial you can phone in. But somehow I expect Cohen will be much more respectful of McCain's choice.
________
1. Kristol believes that women are fungible, and thus rolls "Meg Whitman, the former eBay C.E.O., Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, or Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska" into a single entry.

2. Kristol speaks of McCain's selecting "a woman, whose selection would presumably appeal to the aforementioned anguished Hillary supporters." If you take issue with the notion that all a woman could bring to McCain's campaign is appeal to Clinton's supporters, and you would be correct to take issue, you should take it up with Kristol.

What Happened in Georgia

At least insofar as the start of the conflict, it's anybody's guess. Well, anybody's except Saakashvili's and, perhaps, a few people in the U.S. government. For now, it's denial time:

During a private dinner on July 9, Ms. Rice’s aides say, she warned President Mikheil Saakashvili of Georgia not to get into a military conflict with Russia that Georgia could not win. “She told him, in no uncertain terms, that he had to put a non-use of force pledge on the table,” according to a senior administration official who accompanied Ms. Rice to the Georgian capital.

It's hard to imagine that Saakashvili would ignore such a direct warning. It's really hard to believe this:

“This caught us totally by surprise,” said one military officer who tracks events in the region, including the American-Georgian training effort. “It really knocked us off our chairs.”

There are some understandably skeptical responses to that claim:

If the Pentagon and CIA were also caught flat-footed by Russia's response, as the McClatchy Newspapers' crack Washington bureau is reporting, then we have to ask: Why are we spending $55 bllion a year on intelligence? What are we getting out of it?

* * *

As easy as it is to believe that the CIA, etc., blew another huge event, I find it impossible to accept that not one of the 127 Pentagon advisors in Georgia, including Special Forces and intelligence contractors, were clueless about Tblisi's intent -- and preparations - to move into South Ossetia.

Similarly,

It is very difficult to imagine that the Georgians launched their attack against U.S. wishes. The Georgians rely on the United States, and they were in no position to defy it. This leaves two possibilities. The first is a massive breakdown in intelligence, in which the United States either was unaware of the existence of Russian forces, or knew of the Russian forces but — along with the Georgians — miscalculated Russia’s intentions. The second is that the United States, along with other countries, has viewed Russia through the prism of the 1990s, when the Russian military was in shambles and the Russian government was paralyzed. The United States has not seen Russia make a decisive military move beyond its borders since the Afghan war of the 1970s-1980s. The Russians had systematically avoided such moves for years. The United States had assumed that the Russians would not risk the consequences of an invasion.

If this was the case, then it points to the central reality of this situation: The Russians had changed dramatically, along with the balance of power in the region. They welcomed the opportunity to drive home the new reality, which was that they could invade Georgia and the United States and Europe could not respond. As for risk, they did not view the invasion as risky. Militarily, there was no counter. Economically, Russia is an energy exporter doing quite well — indeed, the Europeans need Russian energy even more than the Russians need to sell it to them. Politically, as we shall see, the Americans needed the Russians more than the Russians needed the Americans. Moscow’s calculus was that this was the moment to strike. The Russians had been building up to it for months, as we have discussed, and they struck.

* * *

By invading Georgia as Russia did (competently if not brilliantly), Putin re-established the credibility of the Russian army. But far more importantly, by doing this Putin revealed an open secret: While the United States is tied down in the Middle East, American guarantees have no value. This lesson is not for American consumption. It is something that, from the Russian point of view, the Ukrainians, the Balts and the Central Asians need to digest. Indeed, it is a lesson Putin wants to transmit to Poland and the Czech Republic as well. The United States wants to place ballistic missile defense installations in those countries, and the Russians want them to understand that allowing this to happen increases their risk, not their security.

The Russians knew the United States would denounce their attack. This actually plays into Russian hands. The more vocal senior leaders are, the greater the contrast with their inaction, and the Russians wanted to drive home the idea that American guarantees are empty talk.

The article elaborates that Russia has the U.S. over a barrel, as the U.S. needs their cooperation in its conflicts in the Middle East, particulary in relation to Iran.

Meanwhile, McCain is talking loudly and waggling a tiny stick. He's prepared to move forward with NATO membership for Georgia... "at the right time", whenever that is. (He's implicitly stating the obvious - It's not right now, or even at any future time we can presently predict.) He wants to boot Russia out of the G-8, as if that's going to happen. He seems to be admitting that the Iraq war has left the U.S. impotent in the Caucasus: "We don't have, I think, right now, the ability to intervene in any way except in a humanitarian, economic way, and do what we can to help the Georgians".

What we do seem to be getting is a lot of really silly analysis. For example, in The Jerusalem Post:

After the war, the status quo ante in Abkhazia and South Ossetia is no longer tenable and the policy choices facing Russia in the region - official annexation or recognition of their independence - would not be accepted internationally. Moreover, Russian troops can no longer be perceived as an evenhanded peacekeeping force, and this may bring pressure for their replacement with either UN or some other more neutral peacekeeping troops.

Internationally, Russia's use of force could in the long run completely undermine Russian credibility when it speaks against the use of force in Iran or condemns potential future confrontation between Israel and Hizbullah (in 2006, Russia condemned in the harshest terms Israel's "excessive use of force").

Finally, as Israelis know well, bombing and invading small countries never looks good on TV in the West, however justified it might be. In the court of public opinion, Russia has already lost, something the independent Russian media was quick to acknowledge. Some in the US are already calling for a American boycott of the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, and that may perhaps be only the beginning.

In terms of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, it seems pretty clear that Russia is mostly interested in excluding Georgian troops from those territories, wants a commitment that Georgia won't again attempt to subdue them by force, and won't be inviting in international peacekeepers. Evenhandedness? Who thought Russia was evenhanded before this flare-up of the long-simmering conflict? And what does it really matter? Few countries view Israel as "evenhanded" in its administration of the West Bank; that doesn't mean international peacekeepers will ever take over that role.

And gee whiz... Russia won't have credibilty when it criticizes other nations for the excessive use of force? As if it did in the first place? And people around the world will think of Russia as being a bully against weak neighboring states? That'll be a first....

This piece seems mostly designed to fill column inches:

In the meantime, could it be that Russia, petro-confident and irredentist, seeking to reverse the record of the past two decades, is careering toward another 1989 or 1991? Will it heed the lessons of the Soviet era? What will happen if it does not? Will the North Caucasus break out of Moscow's grip? Will the Far East turn into a Chinese colony? Will the West once again confront the prospect of Moscow's former satrapies suddenly becoming major nuclear powers? Will the specter of Russian "loose nukes" keep haunting the West?

It's written like the ending of a 1950's serialized cliffhanger. And Russia, we're told, may be in for a "hard landing" if it doesn't learn from the lessons of history:

A decade [after the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan], there would be no more Warsaw Pact. Europe would be sending humanitarian aid to Russia. The Soviet military would be defeated in Afghanistan. What caused all that? We are still not quite sure.

I sure hope the Russians are taking notes.... (But if you really want silly analysis, turn to Richard Cohen, who apparently isn't even slightly interested in internal consistency. I'd do a "slash and burn" on it, but the pickin's are just too easy.)

Why Isn't Obama Soaring?

I don't ordinarily pay much attention to Maureen Dowd, but she raises an issue today that should be addressed, and is in fact addressed in part by her column. Why hasn't Obama been able to deliver an early knock-out punch to McCain?

When I say it's addressed in part in Dowd's column, I don't mean directly. I mean through her trademark clever rhetoric, backhanded compliments, and standard depiction of Democrats as effete. When she turns her sights on Obama, commenting on his recent international tour, she states,

Some news analyses of his trip wondered “Where’s the Bounce?” The old Hillary refrain - why can’t he close the deal against a supposedly flawed opponent - echoes.

Why would that refrain echo? It was only a few months ago that the Clinton campaign was arguing that Obama was the flawed candidate. Are we to forget who closed that deal?

Here we have Dowd personifying two of the problems Obama faces:

• Reporters and commentators who are more interested in the campaign itself than they are in the substantive issues underlying the race - the candidate's platforms, ideas, and proposals; and

• Reporters and commentators who want to make this a personality contest, but based upon their own prejudices and preconceptions as opposed to the actual personalities of the candidates. McCain's incredible gaffes on foreign policy issues are ignored, but the slightest misstep by Obama during his travels would have been seized upon as "proof" that he's unfit for the Presidency.

Yesterday's column by Richard Cohen also exemplifies these flaws in the coverage of the campaign. Cohen praises McCain for taking actions that typically helped him politically and were at worst neutral, while attacking Obama for having the happy coincidence that his braver political stances (like McCain's) happened to coincide with the views of his constituency. He's so wedded to the notion of McCain the "maverick" and "straight talker" that he implies McCain was pained by his need to flip-flop and pander. He accuses Obama of a lack of loyalty when a "position or person becomes a political liability. (Names available upon request.)" - this is supposed to be taken seriously? Of course we want the names. If there's any substance to this accusation, why is his column nothing but fluff?

Cohen's worst sin is the same as Dowd's - he won't look past the latest campaign ads or his own preconceptions of the candidates to state why one is better than the other. Is there some reason Cohen needs people to spoon feed him a list of Obama's accomplishments? If he wants to know what Obama stands for, is there some reason that he can't simply go to Obama's website and read his platform? Is that too much work? Is it not worth their time to be substantive? Is it that much more fun to be derisive? (Yes ,it's a two-way street; it just happens that McCain is getting the benefit of this right now - the "come from behind maverick" versus "the guy who can't close the deal.")

Another problem frequently gets raised by others. Hillary Clinton got some negative attention for it. Chris Matthews can't stop talking about it. Obama's "problem with white people". This can be taken in one of two ways - as a suggestion that, unlike others, white people are particularly perceptive, attuned to the issues, and able to see through the dross. This special awareness makes them better able to perceive the real differences between the candidates, and they aren't sold on Obama. The other way to look at it is that white people have a problem voting for a candidate who isn't white. If that's the case, Obama's going to have a tough time getting the "bounce" he needs because he isn't able to change his skin color.

If we are to be honest about this, we can concede that there is a block of voters that will not vote for Obama because of his race, period, end of story. There's also a block of voters predisposed against Obama because of his race, but that could be inspired to support him anyway based upon the issues. It would be nice if the media would start focusing on the issues that distinguish McCain from Obama, so voters are better able to pick a candidate based on those issues. But instead we get silly columns that ignore Obama's accomplishments in favor of the "we're gambling on the unknown" narrative, or ask why he can't "close the deal" with that group of undecided voters who don't even know what the deal involves. Oh, it's not that there isn't some truth to that narrative - if there weren't it wouldn't stick - but Cohen parrots it and twists the few facts he knows to fit his thesis, rather than making even a slight effort to uncover facts that might paint a different picture.

In a sense, this is the same thing we saw eight years ago, with the media selling us the nonsensical notion that there was no real difference between Bush and Gore, save perhaps that you would rather "have a beer with" Bush. Why not a column taking a hard look at the candidate's respective health policies? Their economic policies, and how they would deal with the massive (in my book inexcusable) fiscal irresponsibility of the Bush Administration? At energy policy? Jobs, education, or immigration? The nation's crumbling infrastructure?

So What's Cohen's Excuse

You can understand why David Brooks would develop amnesia about John McCain's flouting campaign finance laws, in order to attack Obama's decision to forego public financing. It's understandable why McCain backer Dan Schnur would have similar amnesia, even as he praises himself as "a long-time supporter of campaign finance reform". But what's Richard Cohen's excuse?

In some recent magazine articles, I and certain of my colleagues have been accused of being soft on McCain, forgiving him his flips, his flops and his mostly conservative ideology. I do not plead guilty to this charge, because, over the years, the man's imperfections have not escaped my keen eye. But, for the record, let's recapitulate: McCain has either reversed himself or significantly amended his positions on immigration, tax cuts for the wealthy, campaign spending (as it applies to use of his wife's corporate airplane) and, most recently, offshore drilling. In the more distant past, he has denounced then embraced certain ministers of medieval views and changed his mind about the Confederate flag, which flies by state sanction in South Carolina only, I suspect, to provide Republican candidates with a chance to choose tradition over common decency. There, I've said it all.

Well, no, Richard, you haven't.

But here is the difference between McCain and Obama -- and Obama had better pay attention. McCain is a known commodity. It's not just that he's been around a long time and staked out positions antithetical to those of his Republican base. It's also - and more important - that we know his bottom line. As his North Vietnamese captors found out, there is only so far he will go, and then his pride or his sense of honor takes over. This - not just his candor and nonstop verbosity on the Straight Talk Express - is what commends him to so many journalists.

Amazing. Cohen not only has amnesia about McCain's inability to "walk the walk" on campaign financing, his mention of Vietnam didn't even trigger memories of McCain's flip-flop on torture.

What does that paragraph really say? To me it says, "I've known McCain a long time, he gives me lots of access, and I like him, so I don't really care about his flip-flops. Obama hasn't paid me sufficient homage."