Wouter Bos (left) and Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende (right) For those who are interested in the Dutch elections: we’re on fire here as well. Our elections are not just for a couple of seats, but for all seats and about our entire government coalition. Our current coalition is one between the CDA and the VVD (my party). The polls show that the race between the largest opposition party PvdA (42 seats now) and the CDA, is too close to call. Of course the debates between the leaders of...

Both Democrats and Republicans are preparing for war by sending hundreds, even thousands of troops to the frontline: a legal war that is. In Pennsylvania, the Republican Party has opened a “recount account� and set aside $500,000 to pay lawyers who will answer telephones on Election Day and monitor polls to see whether officials demand proper voters’ identification. In Maryland, lawyers representing candidates for senator and governor from both parties met recently and swapped...

The New York Times reports that GOP candidates will – these last days of the campaign – focus on the economy. Their main message will be that the unemployment rate has dropped due to the tax cuts. There is, in my opinion, one major problem: the economy is not the main issue these US elections: it’s Iraq. The Bush administration has messed up everything about Iraq, it was only able to do so, because it had the support from a GOP-ruled Congress. Republican strategists should have...

Hariri’s widow White House spokesman Tony Snow said that the White House believes that Hizbullah, Iran and Syria are trying to ‘topple’ the democratically elected government of Lebanon. White House spokesman Tony Snow said the United States is “increasingly concerned by mounting evidence that the Syrian and Iranian governments, Hezbollah and their Lebanese allies are preparing plans to topple Lebanon’s democratically elected government.” Snow warned that any...

What many people are asking themselves is: will Kerry’s remarks have an impact on the coming elections in the US for Congress. I think that Joe and commenters here at TMV made some good points: it will – most likely – not have a great impact on independents but one of the other problems for the GOP is / was that it was not able to rally its base. John Kerry’s remarks, however, might provide the GOP with an opportunity of doing so. Personally, I do not consider that to be...

Muwhaha Now this is an episode of Oprah I like. Oprah Winfrey, who likes to lavish gifts on her studio audience — diamond-encrusted watches, Sony camcorders, Burberry coats, BlackBerrys, cashmere sweaters, iPods, wide-screen LCD televisions, washer-dryers, Pontiac G6s — yesterday gave approximately 300 audience members each $1,000. “I really do think that it’s the best gift I can give this audience, so thanks to our friends at Bank of America — they thought this was...

Annette Nijs That’s it, I’ve had it. RTL Nieuws did some interesting research: it seems that our members of Parliament miss, on average, 20% of all ‘meetings’ in 2003. 20%. The only days that they have these ‘meetings’ or ‘assemblies’ are on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. All the other days, they can do other things. Besides that, they have 16 weeks off from Parliament as well per year. Only in 2070 of 9281 instances members gave a reason for the...

Well, well, well, the New York Times reports that North Korea has agreed to resume the so-called six-nations talks. But Mr. Hill [the chief American envoy to North Korea] emphasized that the sanctions imposed by the United Nations Security Council after the nuclear test would remain in place, and he cautioned North Korea against conducting a second test. More: The statement by the Chinese foreign ministry said that the agreement followed a discussion among Mr. Hill and Chinese and North Korean...

A woman, convicted of murder, shouts before she is taken to be executed in Ghangzhou, April 11, 2001 © Reuters The New York Times has some encouraging information about China: China’s legislature on Tuesday barred all but the nation’s highest court from approving death sentences, a move that state media called the country’s biggest change to capital punishment in more than 20 years. China is believed to account for most of the world’s court-ordered executions, putting...

Americans earn more yet spend less according to the US Commerce Department: Instead, they put aside more of their income — or at least, borrowed less and drew down assets less. As a result, the personal savings rate in September, though still negative, was less so than it has been in a year and a half. The Commerce Department reported today that personal income in September rose at an annual rate of 0.5 percent, seasonally adjusted; the figure for August was 0.4 percent. Personal consumption...

The Pakistani army announced earlier today “that it had destroyed a religious school used for training militants in the Bajur tribal area, which straddles the border with Afghanistan. The attack killed at least 80 people, the military said, describing them as militants. The strike started at about 5 a.m. local time, when helicopter gunships fired missiles into the religious school, known as a madrassa, that was run by a local cleric, Maulvi Liaqut, according to military officials. Ground...

Total Donations: $2,092 Total Legal Fees: $2,500 John left a comment at Old War Dogs, once again drawing attention to the case of (now former) Liberty and Justice co-blogger Isaac Schrodinger. Here it is: “FOURTH DOWN, GOAL TO GO (The case of Isaac Schrödinger) I have posted before about Isaac Schrödinger here. He is now within what ought to be easy striking distance of his goal of $2500CAD for legal expenses to support his plea for refugee status in Canada. If my math is correct, fifteen...

One of the most insightful books I ever read dealing with broad array of topics like terrorism, China and Africa Approximately one week ago I received a wonderful book: Why Geography Matters written by Dutch-American Harm de Blij. I started reading and had – and continue to have (haven’t finished it yet) – great difficulty putting it down (which is quite problematic considering the fact that I have to turn in three essays within an incredibly short amount of time). The reason:...

The Washington Post conducted a poll in Maryland. In short: It will be very, very blue: A strong Democratic tide in Maryland threatens to swamp Republican Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr.’s reelection bid and bolsters the party’s efforts to retain control of an important U.S. Senate seat, according to a new Washington Post poll. Baltimore Mayor Martin O’Malley (D) held a 10 percentage point lead over Ehrlich, and Democratic Senate nominee Rep. Benjamin L. Cardin had a similar advantage...

you’re the weakest link… goodbye Jules Crittenden joins the conservatives calling for Rumsfeld and Cheney to resign. Personally, I don’t see how these two, albeit especially Rumsfeld, can stay on even another week. That being said, Jules seems to believe that the original goal for Iraq is still achievable: For the Middle East to retain any semblance of stability, Iraq must survive intact, with a free and democratic government, without the sectarian bloodbath that would make what...

NOTE: This was run yesterday and since an update was added later in the day we’ve redated this post to run it today out of its regular posting order. Crooks and Liars has a video up of David Letterman kicking O’Reilly’s behind. From the transcript: Letterman: Let me ask you a question — was there more heinous, more dangerous violence taking place before in Iraq, or is there more heinous, dangerous violence taking place now in Iraq? O’Reilly: Oh, stop it. Saddam Hussein...

The Sunday Times has an interesting article up: NEW study claims to have found “strong support� for the theory that too much television for small children may trigger autism. The study — which has sparked an angry debate in America, where it was carried out — found a correlation between the number of hours that children younger than three spend watching television and the rates of autism in a county-by-county analysis of four states. The study provides the latest controversial...

Joe Lieberman’s friends are helping him out. More specifically Mayor of New York Michael R. Bloomberg. In his battle for re-election to the United States Senate without the backing of the Democratic Party, Joseph I. Lieberman is deploying a secret weapon in the race’s closing days: a sophisticated operation to identify and turn out voters, courtesy of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg. The Bloomberg group includes several top-level operatives who played key roles in the mayor’s decisive...

Gold Corporate America seems to – finally – understand what just about every observer understood for a long time already: it’s quite possible that the Democrats will win the elections. As a result, Democratic candidates are suddenly receiving last minute donations by corporations. Though Democratic control of either chamber of Congress is far from certain, the prospect of a power shift is leading interest groups to begin rethinking well-established relationships, with business...

Michael Grunwald notices at the Washington Post that most political ads are extremely negative. Even for American standards that is. Please read the entire article. What I noticed was that it started off with 1 1/3 page about Republican ads, then just 2 short paragraphs about Democratic ads, accompanied by the words “Some Democrats are playing rough, too.” It’s almost like… ‘ah well.. boys will be boys’ when talking about the Democrats but condemning the Republican...

Perhaps it’s time for American conservatives to start listening (again) to William F. Buckley? A great article at CNN.com: Where the right went wrong. Fifty years ago, when a 29-year-old Yale graduate named William F. Buckley Jr. funded National Review magazine, conservatism was a small insurgency, fighting the dominant tide of liberalism that had governed the United States for a quarter century. Today, the right is politically dominant. The president is an avowed conservative; so are the...

The Cardinals took a 3-1 lead in this year’s World Series yesterday. I can’t believe it. It is, of course, too early to celebrate (it ain’t over til the fat lady sings) but we’re extremely close.

When everything else fails, re-focus on gay marriage: The divisive debate over gay marriage, which played a prominent role in 2004 campaigns but this year largely faded from view, erupted anew on Thursday as President Bush and Republicans across the country tried to use a court ruling in New Jersey to rally dispirited conservatives to the polls. Wednesday’s ruling, in which the New Jersey Supreme Court decided that gay couples are entitled to the same legal rights and financial benefits as...

State of Denial is Bob Woodward’s third book on the Bush administration. In it, Woodward tells the story of an administration in which no internal accountability exists and in which intellectual laziness rules the day. It is a history of weak military leadership, an incredibly dominant and undefined US Secretary of Defense and political leaders who conveniently ignore all bad news. In short, it’s the history of an utterly incompetent administration or at least when talking about the...

Women: you’d better dress like this… Sheik Taj Din al-Hilali has a wonderful message for fellow believers: if a woman gets raped, it really is her fault. In essence, so he reasoned, who can blame a man for raping a woman if she dresses like a prostitute? “But when it comes to adultery, it’s 90 per cent the women’s responsibility. Why? Because a woman possesses the weapon of seduction. It is she who takes off her clothes, shortens them, flirts, puts on make-up and powder...