Links and Minifeatures 10 14 Friday

Looks like all kinds of stuff going on in Iraq: Baghdad Blackout Caused by Sabotage, Three Provinces Seen As Key in Iraq Vote, and of course, insurgents attack attack fellow Sunnis to avoid the election gaining more legitimacy.



Iraq the Model has a post about the differences in an election now as opposed to three years ago. If you can read this and be unmoved by the difference, please report to the mortuary. Yes, Saddam Hussein is a whacked out psycho who was a danger to the whole world. But we did a lot of good for the Iraqis, too, in removing him.

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They can have our illegals: Minister: Canada Needs More Immigrants.



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For those who think the Donkeys are going to win the next elections, Michael Barone has a wake-up. Their polarized base is pushing the moderate voters away, and they need the moderates worse than the Elephants do. About the only thing that would throw it into play, in my opinion, is the Elephant base pushing the moderates away even harder. Well, with Harriet Miers they are trying, but it's just not on the same level with "little Eichmans" and the International Freedom Center.



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this story about the Palestinians offing each other more often than the Israelis do puts my in mind of the classic William Tenn story "The Liberation of Earth." The situations aren't really parallel, but the last line of the story rings true: They have now been as thoroughly liberated as it is possible to be.



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Done with Mirrors has the best take on carpet bombing the smurfs that I've seen. He wants to see Jihad Smurf strap on a bomb and do the obvious.



(Mind you, I approve of carpet bombing the smurfs just on general principles)



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Dr, Sanity has a post worth reading on the real threat to science. Hint: it's not the religious right.



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Belmont Club has a good article on why not to be worried about the UN hijacking the internet away from the US: What the UN members who want to wrest control away want to do will render the internet useless. They want to control the information, like China, and prevent things that disagree with local pravda from being found out by their citizens.



The problem is that they might succeed in wresting control of the existing internet away from ICANN and the Department of Commerce. Now somebody would quickly create a replacement that does the same thing for everybody living in countries like the US. For those wresting control, this would be the victory they want, however. Their citizens get an internet, if not necessarily the best one, and the government can prevent them from using it to foment revolution. So I'm for doing whatever it takes and angering anybody we have to to keep control of the internet in the United States.