Handpicked on the pumpkin patch and carved yesterday morning, there's nothing better than creating your own stuff. That by the way includes this photo, the first one to be uploaded to Peaktalk, ever.

UPDATE: Actually, I am still a relative newcomer to this tradition; here's what I wrote about it last year. The one thing that I have always wondered about is how Halloween could co-exist with other religious traditions. Marginal Revolution today unveils that they don't always do and this year in a number of locations Halloween festivities have actually been banned.

Yasser Arafat not only defined the Palestinian struggle, he became a symbol of it and as long as he’s alive he will to continue to have a hold onto power that may last well beyond his death. Yet the Palestinians have suffered enormously under his disastrous tenure and almost all opportunities to improve the lives of ordinary citizens on the West Bank and in Gaza have been botched by this Palestinian leader. From that perspective he is very similar to China’s Mao Zedong, brute totalitarian force unified the cause but things got better only once he had been dead for a while. You don’t eradicate such a legacy that easily and I expect the same to happen in the Palestinian Territories. There will be a struggle within Arafat’s Fatah movement with Hamas playing an important role on the side as the Economist pointed out yesterday. We can only hope that Arafat’s forced departure will herald a new area but whatever the outcome, like Mao, Arafat will even in death remain a powerful player in Palestinian politics. Be prepared for tomorrow’s reformers to insist on keeping the Arafat legacy alive, we will be stuck with his face for generations to come.

Looked at Osama bin-Laden’s well-timed re-appearance and there’s something in there for everyone. Yes, you could construe it as a peace offer but it will equally help reinforce the arguments made by the War on Terror crowd. Both camps will interpret and use the tape in a way that’s beneficial to their cause and both will have candidate in the election this Tuesday. And while some believe that it will benefit Bush, I tend to see the net effect of it as being negligible. No impact either way and that’s something OBL must have calculated himself before he went on air. He’s waging a war and whoever occupies the White House is irrelevant to his cause.

But here’s the underlying issue. A major attack on the US would have had exactly the same impact: reinforcing the case for Bush while Kerry could argue that America was less safe than ever. OBL however has not been able to launch such an attack; again underlining that his capabilities to do so are severely hampered. He has to resort to video-taped messages and farming out his war to smaller spin-off operations around the globe with al-Zarqawi in Iraq being the most lethal and prominent outfit to have emerged to date. The risk of a lethal attack has not diminished, with many smaller franchises around the world it has actually increased. It’s therefore odd that OBL did not use the opportunity of a media broadcast to rally his followers around the globe or directly threaten further attacks. Instead he narrowed his interest down very specifically (why did no one else pick this up?) by going back to his original strategic focus:

We fought with you because we are free, and we don't put up with transgressions. We want to reclaim our nation. As you spoil our security, we will do so to you.

Pay attention House of Saud, you may be by far the most important target for OBL and his loosely organized troops.

William Sjostrom earlier this week uncovered some facts that give a new twist to the oft debated discrepancy between the American and European work ethic. I discussed these in the past and described it as Hedonist Europe in response to an interesting analysis from Donald Sensing. While I looked at the socio-cultural aspect of that phenomenon, it appears that there is a far more simple logic behind it: taxes. The more taxes you pay, the less inclined you are to put in more work.

I have always believed there’s a sound interaction between economic and social dynamics. People work less in Europe because there’s no direct benefit in working more and earning more: painful progressive taxation is the disincentive which in turn has allowed governments to fund generous programs that serve as a safety net for many working and non-working Europeans. As a result the incentive to hoard for a rainy day is less; there is a nice blanket that ensures one’s security in case work derived revenues dry up. Now I know that drastic cuts are being implemented in some European countries, but it’s not too hard to note the huge divergence between US and European entitlements. This economic phenomenon has spawned a culture that has:

(a) created a workforce that has grown accustomed to a certain level of wealth which can be attained with a reasonable but not excessive amount of work;
(b) allowed a culture wherein individual gratification is far more focused on leisure activities and not work (the infamous 35-hour workweek);
(c) made it easier to abandon religion as a spiritual guide which is now more easily achieved by the individual who is economically secure and free to pursue whatever interests he or she has.

Interestingly, Americans have very individualistic origins but these were not the result of a state-offered route to self-realization, it was rather the rejection of the helping hand and the struggle with the elements that shaped its unique and different destiny. Needless to say, there’s more room for God in such a setting than in the pre-ordained cradle-to-grave-journey offered in the old world.

On a side note, Canada as I have argued before has an odd position right between the US and Europe. Polls often found that a majority of its citizens were comfortable with current taxation levels (somewhere in between US and European tax rates) if that meant preserving government entitlements. So even if the option of lower taxes is flagged, many are unwilling to bite because it poses a risk of losing state delivered benefits and as a consequence: more work. From direct experience I can confirm that the hardest workers in Canada often are those that are self-employed or those that stand to gain from above normal efforts such as employees in starting companies whose low salary is compensated by an equity allocation or commission-based remuneration package. In the US you can attain a certain measure of wealth as an employee; the irony is that Canada’s universal health plan allows many to pursue an entrepreneurial track without having to worry about medical insurance.

So economics is the dominant factor in explaining differences in work ethic, but its socio-cultural impacts are deep and may in turn hamper a rapid return to the survival through hard-work ethic.

Serious content from my side will have to wait until later in the weekend. In the meantime I encourage you to visit some of the latest additions to the Peaktalk blogroll:

Firstly there are two conservatives in the Pacific Northwest, Jay Currie in Vancouver and Matt Rosenberg with his Rosenblog in Seattle.

On the other side of the Atlantic Ocean we find Johan Norberg, a great proponent of freedom and globalization and Fistful of Euros which given the exchange rate movements really has become a truckload full of dollars. In Ireland, American conservative William Sjostrom and his AtlanticBlog which has been around for a while covering economics, politics and Irish affairs.

The Evangelical Outpost is a most necessary addition in the department of social affairs or in their own words: culture, politics, and religion from an evangelical worldview.

In the regional blogging department I have added The Argus, a very interesting group blog focused on an area that is traditionally underreported: Central Asia and the Caucasus. In Hong Kong, my old love, it ‘s Phil and his Flying Chair that are worth a regular visit.

I have also added Ann Althouse, Matt Yglesias, Tim Blair and Hugh Hewitt none of whom requires any further introduction I think. The same applies to Donald Sensing who it seems has returned from his blogging break and if you want to read quality stuff that pretty much ignores the election you should go and check him out. Another returnee is Andrew Coyne.

And finally, if I am not blogging or spending time with my family I actually work. With hi-tech start-ups and Venturpreneur is a great launchpad for those with an interest in the entrepreneurial spirit, the law and ... cheese.

Sorry, missed it last night as I had an office party. Apparently, it was a good episode, head over to the Yin Blog whose creators never miss an episode.

Michael Totten’s assessment of being Glenn Reynolds doesn’t give us anything that we didn’t already know or suspected about the professor from Tennessee, but it is a great read and I urge you to read his comments. Be sure to click through to Ann Althouse and learn what Glenn’s inbox looks like, not surprising yet still revealing. It’s a miracle the man provided six e-mail induced links to me since starting this blog.

Aspects of American reality tend to interfere with the delusional sense of peaceful well-being that the majority of Canadians have bestowed upon themselves. It’s a sad reflection of the state of affairs that politicians desperate to salvage the status-quo play into these sentiments, but thankfully there are ordinary Canadian citizens who are willing - at their own peril - to show some common sense. A fairly long piece in yesterday’s Vancouver Sun (subscriber link only) by one Marilyn Baker outlines her frustrations with the embarrassing expressions of uninformed bias. Her analysis is razor sharp:

Anti-Americanism and anti-Semitism grow from the same roots. Both fulfill the need to vent a visceral hatred of success. And both are fueled by envy.

Spot on. She goes on to argue convincingly that claiming to hate of Bush and Republicans is hardly an exonerating argument: they were voted into office by the American people. That’s why I hope that Bush can come out with some decent numbers next week, it will not silence America bashers but it will enable some of us to hit them with a great counter-argument. Her conclusion is equally on the mark:

The next time you hear someone bash Americans, ask them which race, sex, religion or creed they hate the most. Ask them if their pension plan invests in good old American know-how: Microsoft, GM, Gilette, Intel, Coca-Cola, Wal-Mart, IBM come to mind. Ask them if they know any Americans personally. My bet is that they will fluster and blubber and get even angrier.

As for me, I‘m happy to bear witness to the American election. No matter who wins, I’m glad that, through the accident of birth, I’m lucky enough to be their neighbor.

Someone give this woman a column in the Globe and Mail and put her on CBC. Please.

"I hope the USA would lose the war in Iraq, it would teach them a lesson"
Chrissy Hynde - Feb 2003

This and more enlightenment compiled by a relatively new blogger, Varifrank, here. Check it out.

Lots of speculation over Arafat, his health, and the imminent succession battle. The punditry points to the likelihood that his death and the ensuing power struggle will further delay an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement. That may be true, but that deal has never been realistic option with him alive. If he dies as a result of his current illness maybe one of the surest obstacles to an agreement will have been removed in a very peaceful way.

Meryl weighs in with her endorsement:

I disagree with nearly every single part of George Bush's domestic policies. I am pro-gay rights, pro-choice, pro-stem cell research, against huge tax cuts for big business, not a strict constructionist regarding Supreme Court Justices. I am in favor of unions (or at least, what unions were supposed to be), affirmative action, and most of the rest of the liberal agenda.

But the war trumps everything.

Clear enough, I think. From the various endorsements I have seen so far there's roughly an equal number of liberals crossing over to Bush as there are disgruntled conservatives throwing their support behind Kerry. No decisive trend either way: the center is confused.

A reader takes me to task for my comment yesterday that George Bush has failed to unite the nation behind him and argues that Bush really has accomplished a unique feat by uniting the Republican Party behind the Bush Doctrine:

The New York Republican National Convention of 2004 was a hugely significant event. That was the lock-in. Liberal Republican after liberal Republican stood up and effectively took the pledge for victory in the Global War on Terror. Nobody can walk away from this now. And a Democrat was a key speaker on the war, and a liberal non-Republican activist was also an important speaker.

This is a huge deal for America's chances in a struggle against terror (or more bluntly jihad) that may be decades long. It means one of the two great parties is now locked in to this, as once it was locked in to anti-Communism. That stands for staying power.

With that I can agree but we should note that it still doesn’t address the fact as to why there’s a 50/50 split in the nation. For all the Zell Millers there appears to be an equal number of Dan Drezners. If you can capture liberal Republicans then surely you should be able to get the support of conservative Democrats? My reader goes on to say that:

Think of how many Republicans use Ronald Reagan practically as a proof text for what the party is supposed to be about. I think in decades to come George W. Bush may have the same standing, if not for the party as a whole, then for a significant fraction of it: the religious conservatives with whom he has such an affinity.

Well, the proof of that will be on Tuesday but the numbers to date do not indicate a 1984-style routing of the Democratic candidate, on the contrary. Bush may well deserve recognition for defining the War on Terror but as long as he hasn’t been able to bring a majority of Americans behind him on this issue any comparison to Ronald Reagan is doubtful at best. But my reader has a point about the Democrats as well:

And how was George W. Bush supposed to build his genuine Republican consensus on winning the war on terror, and get his lock-in, while accommodating the oh-so-sensible demands of the Fahrenheit 9/11 crowd?

To me, this is unreasonable. Fundamentally you have to decide who you are talking to. It is not possible to go half-way with Michael Moore for the sake of bipartisanship, and at the same time command the respect of everyone George W. Bush had to line up in his own party and its constituencies.

Well, the Fahrenheit 9/11 crowd is on the fringe of the Democratic Party; Kerry has stayed well clear of Michael Moore as far as I can see. Republicans will never be able to accommodate these people and that is precisely the point; the centrist Democrats could just as well cast their vote for Bush (as they did for Reagan) but it’s not likely they will do so this time. Is that their fault? Or are they alienated from the Republican Party precisely because Bush has been able to unite the Republicans by playing to the tune of the social conservative base? Karl Rove’s strategy of winning in a 50/50 situation by shoring up the conservative base may work but you have to wonder why they haven’t tried to throw a few bones to the social conservative base and make some serious inroads into Democratic territory. That’s what Reagan did.

Here’s another point: What about the economy? Didn’t Bush cut taxes and avoided a hard landing after the stock market bubble burst? True, the economy is not in as great a shape as it was a number of years ago, but interest rates are still low, the housing and job markets are in reasonable shape. So if you have a war on your hands that resulted from a direct attack on America and you are presiding over a pretty decent economy, how on earth is it possible that you can stay ahead only marginally if at all? Look at it this way: if the Democrats had been able to launch the 2004 campaign with a credible and compelling anti-terror candidate Bush would not have had a chance. My reader is right about Bush’s capabilities and record, but for now he is facing the judgment of the ballot box and not that of history books.

My sense is that Bush should have been uniter from day one. In the Florida aftermath he could have scored some valuable points in the center and 9/11 would have proven to be an even bigger boost for Bush than it turned out to be. A more intelligent message delivery would have helped sell the justified approach to Iraq and resonated with centrist Democrats, the Michael Moore crowd will never be pleased whatever you do. If Bush scores a decisive victory based on defending America and boosting the economy he will indeed be far more a uniter than a divider, but today’s numbers do not support that scenario.

OTB TJ Entry

Today I submittted my numbers to Norm for his Pundit Event. Okay, I will likely be taken to task for this if it all pans out differently next week, but I am projecting a Bush win, capturing the electoral college 290-248. My take on the major battlegrounds: Ohio and Florida will be red, Pennsylvania, Minnesota and Wisconsin blue.

SOME HISTORY: As a kid in Holland I ran a similar pundit event in the neighborhood getting participants to bet money on the outcome of Dutch national elections. The system of proportional representation meant that for Dutch parliament around ten parties would end up with representatives and the participant in my poll that came closest to projecting parliament’s composition after the election would win the entire proceeds of the bet. It must have been in the late 1970s that no one got even close, apart from our neighbour who had projected that the Communists - up to then a steady player in Dutch politics with a standard 8% of the popular vote - would be trounced. Our neighbour won a sizeable chunk of cash and he either gambled or somehow foresaw what was coming in the 1980s: the end of Communism as a force in mainstream European politics. Moral of the story: if you want to win contests like this, come up with something unusual.

The French journalists: still not a word but negotiations have reached a final stage it seems. There are no negotiations underway to secure the release of Margaret Hassan, but at least some ordinary Iraqis have decided to stand up for her by protesting for her release earlier this week. Yet, protests, negotiations, none of it is likely to sway the abductors, but this could be an important change:

Mrs Hassan, who is a Muslim and married to an Iraqi, has been the subject of a wave of sympathy across the Islamic world, with many websites filled with messages deploring her kidnapping.

The jihadist hostage-takers may have overplayed their hand by kidnapping the Iraqi-British CARE worker, providing a glimmer of hope for the kidnapped and the Iraq people.

Today’s is busy so little blogging. One thing deserves some comment and that is Andrew Sullivan’s endorsement of John Kerry. I tend to agree with much of his analysis although his end conclusion favors Kerry, mine favors Bush.

There’s one criticism of Bush that I have wanted to highlight for quite a while and that is the fact that after a terrorist attack a major war effort facing the nation that very nation is split right down the middle. Sullivan highlights the Bush failure to unite America as follows:

The greatest weakness of the war effort so far has been the way it has become a partisan affair. This is the fault of both sides: the Rove-like opportunists on the right and the Moore-like haters on the left. But in wartime, a president bears the greater responsibility for keeping the country united. And this president has fundamentally failed in this respect. I want this war to be as bipartisan as the cold war, to bring both parties to the supreme task in front of us, to offer differing tactics and arguments and personnel in pursuit of the same cause. This is not, should not be, and one day cannot be, Bush's war. And the more it is, the more America loses, and our enemies gain.

Whoever wins on November 2, re-uniting the nation will be the number one priority.

It's hard to believe but there is good news from Iraq, as usual Arthur Chrenkoff is the counterweight to the endless stream of dreadful and unpleasant tidings.

First off, if there’s ever an interesting confluence between politics and markets it’s here: Sinclair Broadcasting Corp’s share price has been taking a beating following the turmoil over their intention to broadcast the anti-Kerry documentary Stolen Honor. They eventually pulled it and you can now see it all over the web, I saw it here. There are a number of points to make, let me go through them step by step.

First of all we should reject all the attempts that were made to stop Sinclair from broadcasting this. Stifling free-speech is an abhorrent practice and if the pro-Kerry camp believes that Stolen Honor is a provocative partisan piece of work they should at the very least be able to let American audiences make that judgment for themselves.

Next there’s the documentary itself. It’s a short forty-two minutes and doesn’t dig very deep but makes its point very clear. And while I agree with the basic premise, I worried over its attempt to rewrite Vietnam history in its entirety, at two instances the content and production of Apocalypse Now – one of my favorite movies – was questioned which I found a little disingenuous. That movie sought to depict the absolute horrors of wars of which Vietnam is but one example. The basic argument of how appalling it is to disown your servicemen should not be confused with the critical assessment of the merits of the Vietnam War and the way in which it was conducted. That is a crucial distinction.

It must indeed have been galling for those captured and suffering in the Hanoi Hilton to see and hear how the likes of Jane Fonda and Tom Hayden became tools for the North Vietnamese propaganda machine. And any psychological damage incurred in captivity – not to mention the physical scars - was no doubt compounded upon the return of these soldiers back in America where they were looked upon as parasites by their fellow countrymen who had mistaken their dislike of a particular war with a renunciation of drafted servicemen. Debbye argues after watching Stolen Honor:

I want to believe that the American people learned a critical lesson from Vietnam: breaking faith with those who serve is a heinous, unforgiveable crime.

Yes. A similar conclusion is reached by Roger Simon who still isn’t sure about his final verdict on the Vietnam War but is convinced that Kerry should at least have apologized for the comments he made when he returned from Vietnam:

Still, I suppose I could forgive Kerry if he had apologized for this in full as the recklessness of youth. But until now he hasn't. The Democratic Party knows this too. That's why they also want us to look away. It is over thirty years ago and therefore, they wish us to believe, beyond the statute of electoral limitations. No it's not.

For Kerry to walk away from the comments he made thirty years ago would be equal to George Bush making a u-turn on his faith based initiatives : you can’t alienate the base, especially not this late in the game. We should not underestimate the fact that Kerry has come this far without disavowing any of these comments and his campaign has probably reached the position that it’s not an issue that will play with swing voters which makes you wonder why they were hyperventilating about Stolen Honor in the first place.

As I have argued before, the presidential campaign should be about the issues of tomorrow, not yesterday’s battles. If facts from the past can shed light on a candidate’s character fine, bring on the documentary, but if the content was to derail Kerry’s shot at the White House we probably would have seen it much earlier. John McCain has earlier pointed to his disappointment over Kerry's comments and throwing away his medals, but it hasn't affected their friendship as colleagues in the Senate. That should tell you where to position Stolen Honor: its impact will not be on Kerry's chances next week. It will rather be on the essence of the freedom of the press, the ability of ordinary citizens to make up their own minds and on re-emphasizing the importance of the bond between the military and those they defend.

In what will be a first on many online polls, John Hawkins checked out 85 right-of-center bloggers - me being one of them - and asked them what the battlefield would like on the morning of November 3. The results are here.

Via in NPR I found this factoid. The only American President to have spoken a different language in the White House was apparently Martin Van Buren (1837-41) who spoke Dutch with his family most of the time. Traces of Dutch history are always of interest to me and I have some pride that in addition to Van Buren two other Presidents can claim Dutch ancestry: the Roosevelts.

In what he describes as a small act of nastiness Professor Bainbridge reports that Ann Coulter was almost “pied” the other day at the University of Arizona, evidence of the escalating debate between the left and the right.

The days that pie throwing were considered to be clownish acts of protest are long over. It was shortly after Pim Fortuyn was murdered in the Netherlands a few years ago that those who had pied him at a book presentation shortly before his death were apprehended. They spent a considerable amount of time in detention and although they were cleared of any links to the actual assassin it had become clear that pie-ing in effect puts the spotlight on a person as a potential target. That message was heard in Canada not to long ago when the man who pied Alberta Premier Ralph Klein got a 30-day jail sentence. It will be interesting to see what will happen to the Arizona pie-throwers but it should be evident that you only need one nut to throw more than just a pie and things will get really ugly. Throwing pies, a slippery slope.

Yes, advocating a tax on excessive consumption. It's not a new idea but it hardly ever has been argued by a conservative to my knowledge. Although a tax construed as a user fee is preferable to a blanket income tax to fund health issues I am bothered by the fact that Frum overlooks personal responsibility as the tool of choice to get people to manage their health. And there's another issue: if a penny tax on sodas as Frum proposes gets traction, all food and beverages will be fair game, the Atkins crowd will surely lobby for a tax on bread and pasta. Let's put some more thinking into this.

A mediocre episode I think, the most interesting part being the reshuffle of the teams. It will set the stage for the remaining episodes and it put into focus the players that will be facing most of the competitive pressure going forward: Maria, Stacy, Sandy, Andy and Raj. The assignment was unexciting – providing dog care in New York’s parks – and was geared more towards hard work rather than strategic thinking.

Both teams had to scrape the barrel to come up with a trivial amount of money and maybe it’s because I don’t like dogs but I just could not get excited about it. What it did however was unmasking those that are not prepared to get their hands dirty and Maria was lucky to have the exempt status going into the boardroom because she was, as Carolyn suggested, marketing herself rather than the business. Stacy’s lucky run came to an end and was rightly fired, Trump was getting exasperated and waiting for the right moment which presented itself last night.

UPDATE: Donald Trump confirmed earlier this week that a third season is now being filmed.

The discussion over Pat Robertson’s comments that Bush told him there would be no US casualties in Iraq has been getting a lot of attention over the past few days. It may be that Bush was mistaken about the location of the casualty-free war; pre-emptive action against Canada would almost certainly yield no casualties whatsoever. It may be a far-fetched idea but Americans are rightly concerned over the potential use of Canada as a launching pad for a terrorist attack in the US. Earlier this week US Ambassador Paul Cellucci, hardly a diplomat in the traditional sense, underlined the gravity of the situation:

“I have to tell you this co-operation is now more important than ever. Another attack could be catastrophic to our economic relations. The threat has not receded. The threat is real," he said.

Another attack with roots north of the border would prompt the US to seal the borders and that indeed would hit both economies hard, for Canada however it would be devastating whereas for the US it would merely be uncomfortable. The core of the issue remains the extent to which Canada is prepared to secure itself for such eventualities as well as its willingness to work closely with the Pentagon and Homeland Security. That’s why Cellucci keeps hammering on the simple truth:

"Our shared geography alone makes it inevitable that the terrorists will consider using Canada as a potential launching pad into the United States. ... For us, the simple fact is that we cannot defend our homeland without Canada's help."

To the Bush opponents this may be interpreted as a prelude to yet another grab for oil (and there’s lots of it in Alberta, the place where US troops would probably be quite welcome) and for the conservative crowd it’s yet another valid reminder that Canada needs to take its security obligations seriously. A North American security perimeter is a no-brainer and while it’s absolutely ridiculous that it’s still up for discussion, we should note that political thinking in Canada is still dictated from the left. The same political stream that continues to rally against free trade and that would be perfectly welcome the US closing the borders: a northern autarky has always been their preferred model.

The problem is not only that the left influences this debate: it is not well framed to begin with so that most Canadians either fail to get the importance or conveniently ignore it. It’s either labeled as a US-issue in which case the potential impact on the Canadian economy is hugely underplayed, or it’s cast in such a way as to suggest that the only casualties would be American which is ludicrous. Canada has long been on the al-Qaeda hit list and the country is also an established recruiting ground for terrorist organizations precisely because security is lax. In essence, the current administration in Ottawa is Clintonesque (or Kerryesque if you like) in its approach: let’s downplay the danger and let’s pray that we are not going to be in the line of fire, and if we are, we’re happy to use the time-tested concepts of pre 9/11 foreign policy. As long as that attitude prevails, which by the way is lauded by the Canadian public at large as it hates to be woken up from its self-delusional sense of well-being, it will be impossible to credibly deal with the issues that Cellucci has put on the table. Sooner or later a Canadian leader will have to stand-up for North American security and we can only hope that it will be early enough to thwart a terrorist attack on either side of the border. A US invasion of Canada is implausible today, but if it turns out that a nuclear dirty bomb finds its origins in Vancouver or Montreal than even the most moderate US leaders will rapidly start to lose their sense of humor.

UPDATE I: Here's some good background reading on Cellucci. Question: will he get a senior appointment in Bush II ?

UPDATE II: Yes, the Southern border is equally problematic, as noted by Michelle today.

UPDATE III: Entered in OTB's Traffic Jam.

And while we are discussing the beauty of cross-border relations, in the string of endorsements it was only a matter of time before members of Canada’s Liberal government started to make themselves heard with their views:

"It's Kerry," Environment Minister Stephane Dion told Globe and Mail columnist Lawrence Martin. "Intellectually, I'm attracted to Kerry," said Human Resources Minister Joe Volpe.

So there’s not only an unwillingness to intelligently frame a cross-border discussion, government ministers themselves – banking on a Kerry win – are more than willing to frustrate any dialogue with their neighbors. I am sorry for Paul Martin that he has to keep a bunch of unruly pseudo-intellectuals in line, but then he himself has cobbled this group together without ever really substantiating his claim to improve US-Canadian relations. His credibility as a leader to ever do that has suffered yet another blow.

Of a holocaust victim was found this week in the Netherlands, shortly after Anne Frank captured the headlines a few weeks ago. (hat tip: Kate)

Last night I built my own Electoral College spreadsheet and while doing that I realized I might as well build in a function to project the new composition of the US Senate. The exercise was prompted by Norman Geras who is one of the first ones in the sphere to have opened up a contest by inviting everyone to submit their predictions for November 2. It’s not just picking Bush or Kerry, Norm wants to see some numbers, hence the spreadsheet.

If you need more help Real Clear Politics is a great source but also make sure to check out Daly Thoughts and his ECB projector as well the regular updates per state on his blog. Have fun, I know I will.

It’s a time-tested practice for many media outlets to formally endorse one of the two candidates shortly before the ballots are cast. And it’s not restricted to that; sovereign entities like Iran are starting to pitch in. I believe it’s a pointless exercise and we are way past the point for these things to become really meaningful, if you haven’t made up your mind by now what do you need to make a choice, Arafat’s recommendation? Well reasoned endorsements however are worth reading and help shape our thoughts around the issue. Personally, I find the Economist usually instructive in that process as they pretty often reinforce my initial instincts: Clinton to step down after Lewinsky, Bush for President in 2000 and Rumsfeld to go home after Abu Ghraib.

The world is probably not waiting for my formal endorsement since anyone who has been reading this blog knows that I would throw my weight behind the incumbent. And yes, it’s tempting to play around with tickets that one would have liked; Cheney/Edwards, Lieberman/Cheney, Giuliani/McCain etc. but these options are not available and even if they were a healthy dose of reality would tell us that McCain would equally struggle with Iraq and that Lieberman would have a hard time juggling the numbers and try to erase the ballooning deficit.

In a nutshell, the case for Bush is built around the notion that his foreign policy instincts are sound compared to those of John Kerry who deals with the new world using outdated models. The War on Terror unleashed by Bush is bold and unconventional but the nature of our enemy compels us to abandon the concepts for managing international conflict that were prevalent during much of the 20th century. Fine, but as Andrew Sullivan pointed out yesterday when assessing Bush:

The issue is: even if they see the world the right way, are they capable of pursuing their policies competently? I cannot believe that anyone fairly reviewing the shambles that is the Iraq occupation can have any real confidence in this administration's ability to meet logistical means to ideological ends.

My response to Andrew is: they will have to, unless Bush intends to go down in history the way his opponents see him: the clueless man in the cocoon. Furthermore by arguing that Iraq is a shambles he conveniently glosses over the successes in Afghanistan, the absence of attacks on the homeland since for well over three years and the things that did go well in Iraq. Can we truly dismiss the battlefield achievements of Tommy Franks? Whatever the grand schemes originating from the White House, the experts on the ground have done a phenomenal job and there’s no indication that that track record has now reached its end point.

So from my perspective there are two things that can support a vote for the Bush approach, one deals with the expectation of solid execution, the other with history making. The first one is partly factual the other is speculation on my part. David Adesnik argues in his, must read, decision to go for Kerry that speculation is an integral part of picking a candidate:

Moreover, I do not believe that it is possible to make a decision in this election that doesn't rest on a considerable degree of speculation. In our political system, as in most, running for office entails strategic position-hiding as much as it does strategic position-taking.

This not only makes the case for speculation, it also tells us that a lot of what we hear from both sides is strictly driven by electoral objectives. We are not hearing everything we should hear and I sense that the Bush team is very much driven by the “stay-on-message-to-November-2” compulsion; we will hear a completely different approach to reality once this election is over. If you follow that logic it is possible to build an equally credibly case for Kerry which is what David did. I followed a similar approach and came out for George Bush.

Indonesia's new president, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono was sworn in today. This is probably the end of the post-Suharto interregnum, and while the world will be looking at SBY's capabilites to deal with terror, I would like to see how he deals with the economy and corruption first.

Seriously, I thought this expression of support was a joke when I read the headline, but it’s true:

“Historically, Democrats have harmed Iran more than Republicans”, said Hasan Rowhani, head of the Supreme National Security Council, Iran's top security decision-making body. "We haven't seen anything good from Democrats," Rowhani told state-run television in remarks that, for the first time in recent decades, saw Iran openly supporting one U.S. presidential candidate over another. Though Iran generally does not publicly wade into U.S. presidential politics, it has a history of preferring Republicans over Democrats, who tend to press human rights issues.

Of course, it’s better to bank on the guy that doesn’t raise human issues with you, especially when he has just wiped your neighbour off the map under the banner of freedom. On the other hand, Bush has indeed done precious little about Iran’s nuclear activities and the power vacuum next door and the extent to which it has pinned down US forces may well play to Iran’s benefit in the near term. Still, like all other endorsements from the Muslim fringe I don’t think they care that much either way, although Arafat’s life under Kerry would arguably be easier.

Since most western hostages have now either been killed or released, the question remains: what happened to those two French journalists? After initially admitting that the attempts to free them failed, the French government somehow has been able to kick start the negotiations with whomever they are talking with:

The French government announced last week that it believed the hostages were still alive and added that indirect contacts had been resumed with the kidnappers. According to an expert on Sunni Arab militant groups who did not wish to be identified, the captors are "under considerable pressure" to release the pair, but want to find a way to free them without losing face.

Again, it's totally within the rights of any government to secure the release of captured citizens although we can question the long-term wisdom of working out an arrangement with jihadists and their partners. It's galling to note however that the objective now appears to be to avoid a loss of face for the terrorists while American and British hostages have literally lost theirs.

Remember that in January I reported on a member of the Dutch contingent in Iraq who got into to trouble after he shot and killed an Iraqi civilian during a riot and was dragged in front of a Dutch judge by an overzealous prosecutor? Suspicions at the time where that some in the district attorney’s office were less than supportive of the Dutch being part of the Coalition, but also that the Dutch military hadn’t really graduated into post 9/11 style warfare: overseas deployments are no longer policing efforts.

Yesterday, after a lengthy procedure the marine officer was cleared of all counts against him. An unfortunate chapter was closed but it remains to be seen how this will affect the Dutch perception of waging war in the new century.

Kevin Drum wonders where the al-Qaeda endorsement is, some have argued they would prefer Kerry, others believe Bush is their man. The truth is that they are waging a war against the West in its broadest sense; you can bomb buildings and fly planes into offices regardless of who is in charge. That also explains that the often predicted major attack during the campaign in order to influence the outcome of the US election has failed to materialize. Either the group is incapacitated to such an extent that they are no longer able to undertake such an effort, or their plans are totally independent of the electoral cycle. For now both would seem to be valid assumptions.

UPDATE: Conrad has a good endorsement round-up.

This will make your day: the terrifying faces of forgiveness Part 1 and Part 2 with a surpise appearance by Dennis Kucinich.

Some common sense from Dean Esmay on blogging after November 2 ...

Arthur Chrenkoff has another editon of Good News from Afghanistan up. As a nascent democracy that is slowly but steadily leaving its bloody past behind Afghanistan is more than just good news, it's evidence that with a strong commitment from the outside world things can be fixed. To me it's also clear that for this ambitious project to succeed we need to stay involved and engaged for the long-term. The elections last week were just a starting point in what is probably going to be an effort of years to help rebulid Afghanistan from the ruins of over 25 years of armed conflict.

Kerry’s geopolitical concepts are built on outdated models and assumptions says Greg Djererian who is voting for Bush. He has written a must-read comprehensive piece on why we should favor Bush over Kerry, here’s an excerpt that pretty much sums it up:

Kerry has hinted (often without realizing it), and too often in my view, that he would go back to the days that terrorism was treated as basically a law enforcement issue. He and his supporters will vehemently dispute this, of course. But, if you read between the lines, there's a lot there to make you strongly suspect that to be the case. In my view, that's just not acceptable in a post 9/11 world. And, more important, it shows a fundamental misunderstanding about the existential stakes at play given the long-term nature of the struggle we face against radical Islam.

This has been one of my arguments for a long time. With Kerry we would find ourselves struggling with the tools of the 1990s and we would tell the enemy and our detractors at home: Bush was wrong; we will try and fix things with less radical concepts. In other words, an unmitigated boost for the al-Zarqawis abroad and the Moores at home.

The problem is that it would negate both the sacrifices and the successes in Afghanistan and Iraq and it would leave us with a big question mark on how the war against the radical strains of Islam would be conducted and how Iraq should be stabilized. In a way, the “anything-but-Bush” vote is an uninformed one and a dangerous gamble at that. Even Bush detractors who believe that this administration has created a quagmire should at least consider the option to force the team that had created it to clean it up. There’s no evidence for this but the incentive to make things work is far more compelling for Bush and his place in history, a Johnson-like slot in the pantheon of past-Presidents would surely be a blot on the entire Bush dynasty.

UPDATE: Similar sentiments from Mark Steyn on Kerry and the choice for Bush:

So, for all that Bush is accused of being ''stubborn,'' it's Kerry who refuses to change. He reckons that Americans are worn out by the wild ride of the Bush years and really do long to ''get back to where they were'' -- back to Sept. 10, to the summer of shark attacks and missing congressional interns. All that going back to Sept. 10 means is that you'll have to learn the lessons of the morning after all over again: I do believe that, if clueless, complacent Kerry won, more Americans -- and Britons and Canadians and Australians and Europeans -- will die in terrorist ''nuisances.''

But he won't win. Because enough Americans understand that going back to where we were means a return to polite fictions and dangerous illusions. That world is broken and you can't put that world back together.

Whatever you want to read in the polls and in the various projections for battleground states, a majority of Americans has probably come to that conclusion by applying realism and common sense to their November 2 decision.

Or less, depending on how you look at it. The official Soros website has now removed the letter from Davids Medienkritik as well as George Soros’ initial reply, shortly after the story got Instalinked. I never found the Soros campaign against Bush very credible and was actually quite disappointed about the light intellectual underpinnings of it given where it was coming from. If Soros is now ducking a real debate then not only the credibility of his effort to unseat Bush has been damaged, his reputation will have suffered as well. That’s a pity, as I point out below Soros does have some interesting insights that are particicularly useful in the post 9/11 world.

Yes, after more than twenty-five years of anti-Semitic chants during soccer matches, the tide of zero-tolerance in Holland is now sweeping the soccer pitch. A referee this weekend ended a first division match after he could no longer bear the content of what the crowd was hurling at him and the players.

To put this in context: over the years there has been very little effort to do anything about this phenomenon. It was only recently when such chants during an Ajax match compared the spouse of one of the players to a whore that calls for action were made.