But one for the hand wringers to keep in mind.

Ten days after D-Day, we had barely gotten off the Normandy beaches. Progress was being measured in yards, not tens of miles.

One of the things that the newly (and deservedly) jobless Peter Arnett said was that the US “misjudged the determination of the Iraqi forces.”

In fact, it’s more the other way around. The reason we are at war is because bin Laden, and Saddam (and sadly, at least for now, the Iraqi people), have misjudged the determination of the US to wage war on its enemies. Partly because of foreign policy mistakes in the past–in Iran in 1979, in Beirut in 1983, in Iraq in 1991, in Mogadishu in 1993–we demonstrated to them that we had no staying power, and they now think that they can win if they can simply hang on long enough. And of course, statements like Badhdad Peter’s simply reinforce that notion, and will cost many thousands more lives.

Peter “Lord Haw Haw” Arnett says it’s failing, on Iraqi television.

[Update at 3:44 PM PST]

Here’s a link to a related story.

[Update Monday morning]

And he’s outta there.

Maybe he can be a stringer for Al Jazeera.

It’s claimed that Iraqi commanders were circulating copies of the movie “Black Hawk Down” as a training film for their troops.

Idiots.

What was it that appealed to them more, the general carnage, or the high kill ratio?

They still don’t get it. They think that we’re not willing to take casualties, because their history lessons don’t extend further back than 1980. They’ve apparently never heard of Iwo Jima, or D-Day, or Cold Harbor, or any other battle in which we felt the nation was on the line.

Let’s hope that this presages what the rest of Iraq will start to look like in the coming weeks, as we slowly root out the venom of Saddam’s monstrous regime. From the Guardian, the people in the port of Umm Qasr start to show signs of security.

Still, many Iraqis said they were happy coalition troops were patrolling the streets.

“We don’t want Saddam Hussein. He doesn’t pay attention to our suffering,” said Ferras Mohammed, 30, who was walking through town with water jugs perched on the back of a battered bicycle. “We have been waiting for you to come. We feel good to have soldiers here.”

Wonder if they’re showing that on Al Jazeera?

Texas and Massachussetts are contemplating legislation that would essentially make firewalls, NAT, encryption and tunnelling illegal.

That’s what happens when you let political science majors make technology policy.

Just in case you thought that there was any chance that Ramsey Clark retained any vestiges of sanity or morality, we learn that he’s been claiming that Saddam is not brutal, and any reports of brutality in Iraq are simply “disinformation” and “propaganda.”

And to think that this creature was once a high US government official.

According to this article, Iraq has become a magnet for suicidal/homicidal jihadis. I don’t know whether or not it’s the case, at least in terms of it representing significant numbers, but if so, it’s actually good news. Once the regime falls, they won’t find the local environment as friendly as they did in Taliban Afghanistan, or southern Lebanon, or the West Bank. I suspect that there will be many inhabitants pleased to turn them in to the Americans.

It’s actually a good thing, because we have an opportunity to gather up many, if not all, of this life-hating and freedom-hating scum into one place and dispose of them there, rather than have to hunt them all over the world.

[Update at noon]

Now the ABC (the one Down Under) says that thousands of jihadis have arrived in Mosul from Syria.

Good, that means we can wipe them out now, and won’t have to fight them in Damascus later.

from Mark Steyn.

First he dismantles the media war reportage, then he goes after Michigan Fats.

Enjoy.

I dunno, and I’m not likely to find out–there are too many of them on the news channels right now.

What is the affinitive noun for them, anyway? How about this–a despair of wringing hands.