ConservativePublisher.com

New blog address

2009-09-25T00:15:00.000-07:00

Please visit my new blog at http://ericmjackson.wordpress.com/.

"Ride the Thunder" debuts

2009-07-13T11:49:00.000-07:00

Today the Washington Times published a book review by Rear Admiral Jeremiah Denton on Ride the Thunder: A Vietnam War Story of Honor and Triumph.

Written by former Marine infantry officer Richard Botkin, Ride the Thunder is the latest release from WND Books. Botkin will be appearing on the "G. Gordon Liddy Show" today to discuss this provocative new loook at the Vietnam War and the heroic warriors who fought it.

Sanford book, "Rye" sequel quashed

2009-07-06T17:06:00.000-07:00

A couple of high profile upcoming releases have just been axed. Sentinel canceled Mark Sanford's book deal in the wake of his scandal, and last week a judge granted a preliminary injunction against an unauthorized sequel to Catcher in the Rye.

Schumer lauds Fairness Doctrine 2.0 on election day

2008-11-04T10:17:00.000-08:00

It's election day and the Democrats seem destined for a clean sweep. In a move of giddy candor, Sen. Chuck Schumer told Fox News that he's all for the return of the Fairness Doctrine. Read the Hill's article here. Evidently Schumer equates free political speech with pornography.

At least liberals are being forthright about their intentions. Look for the battle over government censorship of the press to begin early next year. And let me tell you this, Senator, regardless of your majorities on Capital Hill, those of us who believe in freedom of the press are not going to let you tear up the First Amendment without a fight.

86% of publishing industry plans to vote for Obama

2008-10-10T15:55:00.000-07:00

A survey of professionals in the publishing industry reveals that a whopping 86% of respondents intend to vote for Barack Obama. This is stunning. While Obama has emerged as the undeniable front-runner during this financial crisis, according to Real Clear Politics he averages 49.4% support among likely voters nationwide.

Limbaugh lauds WND Books author O'Leary

2008-10-03T15:24:00.001-07:00

On his #1 rated radio show today, Rush Limbaugh discussed research done by Brad O'Leary, author of The Audacity of Deceit from WND Books. Limbaugh quoted from O'Leary's recent Investor's Business Daily editorial, in which he discusses the polling research that he did with Zogby on the 30% of Americans who pay no federal income taxes. In his editorial (which you can find here), O'Leary notes that this voting block has very different preferences from taxpayers:

I found that 60% of likely voters among nontaxpaying Americans favor Obama for president, whereas only 31% favor John McCain. In addition, a majority of the 30% of Americans who don't pay federal income taxes agree with Obama's $65 billion plan to institute taxpayer-funded, universal health coverage.

On the other side, a majority of the 70% of Americans who pay federal income taxes (i.e., the folks who would have to foot the bill for this boondoggle) are opposed to Obama's health care plan.

Blame game for the financial crisis

2008-09-22T12:27:00.000-07:00

David Blake at FT indicts Alan Greenspan's Federal Reserve for creating the housing bubble. While I would disagree with Blake's assertion that the Fed did not keep interest rates artificially low in the early 00's, his fundamental conclusion is sound. Greenspan's activist Fed, in a quest to manage the macro-economy (instead of just fighting inflation), helped create two massive asset bubbles (tech and housing) that subsequently deflated and hit the U.S. economy hard over the past 8 years.

Meanwhile, Kevin Hassert, a McCain economic advisor, blames the Democrats in a Bloomberg op-ed piece. He contends that Fannie and Freddie directly created the sub-prime mortgage market, which contained risks that remained hidden as long as home prices rose. But when prices fell, the systematic risk created by the securitization of this debt walloped the entire financial industry. Hassert blames Senate Democrats for holding up reform bills during 2005-2007, and calls out Obama for receiving $125,000 in campaign contributions from various Fannie and Freddie sources.

Putting aside the partisan blame (and I don't follow Congress enough to comment on the validity of Hassert's charge), these viewpoints seem like two sides of the same coin. We know from history that markets are susceptible to occasional asset bubbles; it can be difficult to establish prices for certain types of assets, especially in the face of new technologies or changing economic conditions. But this susceptibility didn't cause the crisis. Structural flaws in the housing market, created by Fannie and Freddie's efforts to separate the risk of sub-prime lending from the lenders themselves, were the underlying problem. And the Greenspan liquidity bubble fueled this dangerous habit, so much so that these dangerous securities, which were sold as "risk free," flooded the financial markets and created the systematic danger that has engulfed Wall Street in recent weeks.

Wall Street surely deserves some blame in this mess, but from where we now stand, it appears that Greenspan, Congress, Fannie, and Freddie are the culprits who distorted the market and added fuel to the fire.

What's really scary about this financial crisis...

2008-09-18T10:03:00.000-07:00

What to say about the unfolding crisis on Wall Street? In the past two weeks, Lehman Brothers has gone bankrupt, and Morgan Stanley is looking for a buyer. But more earth-shaking is the fact that the feds have nationalized the mortgage market (Fannie and Freddie) and the nation's largest insurer (AIG). This quote from an article in Der Spiegel entitled "The World As We Know It Is Going Down" sadly says it all:

"I fear the government has passed the point of no return," financial historian Ron Chernow told the New York Times. "We have the irony of a free-market administration doing things that the most liberal Democratic administration would never have been doing in its wildest dreams."

Google to move its data out to sea?

2008-09-15T12:34:00.000-07:00

Google may move its data centers to offshore barges. While ostensibly this would be a cost-saving measure, it could also place the control of their service beyond the jurisdiction of any government. Readers of Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson -- or my book, for that matter -- will experience a sense of déjà vu.

Much of world blames U.S. government for 9/11

2008-09-11T17:17:00.001-07:00

Today is the 7th anniversary of nearly 3,000 Americans being murdered by Islamofascists.

Reuters reports that a global poll found that majorities in only 9 of 17 countries believe that al Qaeda was behind the attacks. While one would expect this kind of reaction in the Middle East (where the antisemitic screed The Protocols of the Elders of Zion still sells briskly), the data out of Europe was depressing:

In Europe, al Qaeda was cited by 56 percent of Britons and Italians, 63 percent of French and 64 percent of Germans. The U.S. government was to blame, according to 23 percent of Germans and 15 percent of Italians.

Of the 17 nations in the survey, the "only countries with overwhelming majorities blaming al Qaeda were Kenya with 77 percent and Nigeria with 71 percent."

Penguin unveils new Greenspan epilogue as e-book

2008-09-08T16:01:00.000-07:00

PW reports that Penguin is releasing a standalone e-book version of the epilogue to Alan Greenspan's The Age of Turbulence. The epilogue -- which features up-to-date commentary on current market turmoil -- also appeared in the paperback edition of the book, but for those who either own the hardcover or don't want to purchase the book, they can buy the downloadable version for $5.

(Shameless plug: Readers of my book, The PayPal Wars, will recall that it dresses down Greenspan for his own roll in creating a previous financial crisis. It's available in both paperback and Kindle e-book editions.)

Why tyrants hate free markets

2008-08-04T17:12:00.001-07:00

The Club for Growth's Andrew Roth quotes my book, The PayPal Wars, in his blog post today. Roth makes a point that I strongly believe: "Tyrants should be deeply concerned. Capitalism will one day destroy them."

Interview recounts public school horror stories

2008-08-04T16:49:00.000-07:00

FrontPageMag features an interview with Steve Baldwin and Karen Holgate, the authors of our new book From Crayons to Condoms: The Ugly Truth about America's Public Schools. They mentioned one of the many examples documented in the book of what passes for education in today's schools:

We’ve all heard stories about teachers and students not being allowed to pray in schools or bring their Bibles to school. But unfortunately, when it comes to Islam there is a new standard... One teacher reported that while she was substitute teaching she was instructed to leave the classroom for an hour while another school employee came to the classroom to lead the students in their prayers to Allah. Certainly the ACLU would file a lawsuit if a public school led children in prayers to God.

Stein looks at future of conservative publishing

2008-08-04T16:19:00.000-07:00

Harry Stein looks at the "future of conservative books" in an interesting article in the City Journal. He suggests that printing right-of-center books has largely been an experiment for the big NYC publishers, and one that they'll probably drift away from in future years.

Dem leader Hoyer backs Fairness Doctrine 2.0

2008-07-31T09:53:00.000-07:00

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer is the latest politician to come out in support of reviving the Fairness Doctrine:

“There is a real concern about the monopoly of information and the skewering of information that the American public gets,” said Hoyer. “First, is to the monopoly.

“Obviously, if one group, or a large group, controls information and only allows one perspective to be presented, that’s not good for democracy. That is not good for the American public. That is, of course, what the Fairness Doctrine is directed at, and it can have great merit. But there are obviously complications involved in that as well,” he said.

What a sober, measured approach to censorship! As long as you're mindful of the "complications," government regulators can improve upon the information available to the American people by censoring radio broadcasts.

No doubt heads are nodding approvingly in Beijing, Mr. Hoyer.

China will censor media's Web access during Olympics

2008-07-30T10:01:00.000-07:00

The AFP reports that "China will censor the Internet used by foreign media during the Olympics, an organising committee official confirmed Wednesday, reversing a pledge to offer complete media freedom at the games."

Does this surprise anyone? The fascists in Beijing have censored the Web for years (see here, here, and here), and they've had help from a number of Silicon Valley companies. Let's hope that the media assembled in China takes a hint from this and spends some time reporting on the lack of freedom enjoyed by the Chinese people. From Beijing's oppression of religion to government mandated abortions, from media censorship to Internet cafe spy cams, there is much the rest of the world should know.

Freedom of speech weaker outside U.S.

2008-06-11T16:58:00.000-07:00

The IHT has a good article comparing America's freedom of speech to the rest of the West. Compared to Canada and Europe, the U.S. enjoys much stronger freedom of speech laws. A Canadian lawyer notes: "We don't subscribe to a marketplace of ideas. Americans as a whole are more tough-minded and more prepared for verbal combat."

While the article spends a lot of time on protections given to reprehensible Nazi and KKK-style hate speech, it doesn't spend much time exploring the negative societal impact of limiting speech. As Mark Steyn -- whose book, America Alone, was excerpted in the Canadian magazine Maclean's and triggered a hate crimes litigation -- puts it: "Western governments are becoming increasingly comfortable with the regulation of opinion. The First Amendment really does distinguish the U.S., not just from Canada but from the rest of the Western world."

Many qualities distinguish the U.S. from other countries, but it's unfortunate that freedom of speech is one of them. How can liberty be preserved for future generations in the West if this most basic of freedoms is not protected? I doubt that it can. We owe a debt of gratitude to the Founders for enshrining this protection in the Constitution.

On-demand book releases soar

2008-05-29T10:29:00.000-07:00

Publishing information management service R.R. Bowker reports that a stunning total of 411,422 titles were released in the U.S. last year, a 39% increase over 2006. That is simply amazing. Print-on-demand and other short print-run releases fueled nearly all of the growth:

Bowker is projecting that U.S. title output in 2007 increased slightly to 276,649 new titles and editions, up from the 274,416 that were published in 2006.

While traditional book publishing was basically flat last year, there was a staggering rise in the reported number of “On Demand” and short-run books to 134,773, pushing the grand total for projected 2007 U.S. book output to 411,422 books.

Technology, by lowering barriers to entry, has made the publishing marketplace even more competitive. While there will always be big hits and bestsellers, this proliferation of content can only mean lower average sales and a greater focus on niches for publishers.

Murdoch predicts big win for Obama

2008-05-29T10:09:00.000-07:00

News Corp chairman Rupert Murdoch expects Barack Obama to win in a landslide this November, and also gave what appeared to be a presumptive endorsement to the likely Democratic nominee. According to Yahoo Finance: "Murdoch even nonchalantly owned up to influencing the New York Post to back Obama in the New York primary."

So much for claims that Murdoch is an ideologue. Whether this is an opportunistic move on his part to cozy up to the next administration, or a reflection of his own political beliefs, it demonstrates that the mogul is not the arch-conservative many have claimed him to be. Of course, that's not exactly news. Murdoch helped Hillary Clinton fund raise during her 2006 Senate campaign, and he also backed Tony Blair's Labor Party in Britain.

In the video interview accompanying the article, Kara Swisher discusses her interview with Murdoch and puts forward the argument that he should make the WSJ's online content available for free in order to be more relevant. I recall that Murdoch hinted that he might do this before acquiring Dow Jones, but he has yet to take any action along these lines.

B&N exploring acquisition of Borders

2008-05-22T16:49:00.000-07:00

According to the WSJ: "Barnes & Noble Inc., the nation's largest book chain by sales, has assembled a team of executives and advisers to study the possibility of acquiring No. 2 chain Borders Group Inc., according to a person familiar with the situation." Click here to read the rest of the article.

This would be a very dramatic development for the book retail industry. The same article estimates that B&N does about 20-22% of retail sales, compared to 10-12% for Borders and 15% for Amazon.

While it's probably a longshot, it wouldn't surprise me if a deal happens. There's a lot of pressure on retailers right now, and online shopping is changing consumers' buying habits.

Book teaches kids about affirmative action

2008-05-22T16:16:00.000-07:00

Take a look at this interview with Tony Robles, the author our new bilingual children's book, Joey Gonzalez, Great American. As one of the first kid's books to be published in both English and Spanish, this illustrated story teaches young people not to judge others by their race, a realization that Joey and his friends come to when their teacher puts affirmative action into practice.

As Robles passionately says in the interview, "...[A]ffirmative action tends to teach our kids that their ancestry is a weakness that needs to be overcome, and affirmative action teaches that they need to rely on special preferences to succeed. I don’t believe that. Affirmative action steals your dignity."

Death toll in Burma could top 100,000

2008-05-07T15:54:00.000-07:00

The top U.S. diplomat in Burma says 100,000 people could die as conditions worsen following last weekend's cyclone. Disease outbreaks could worsen this catastrophic tragedy. The country's dictatorship is not helping matters:

The U.S. military has put people and airplanes into position to work on any relief effort, as officials awaited word on whether the Asian nation would accept American help...

[U.S. charge d'affaires Shari ] Villarosa did not sound optimistic... She said lower reaches of the Myanmar regime appear to recognize the magnitude of the problem, but the senior leadership is isolated and has not yet announced a final decision on how to handle outside aid.

Egyptians using Facebook to protest government

2008-05-06T15:17:00.000-07:00

The WSJ reports that dissidents in Egypt are attempting to organize a nationwide strike using Facebook. The article says this is part of a larger trend across the Mid East:

The activism on Facebook is part of larger efforts by youths across the Arab world to use technology -- from blogs to cellphone text messages to YouTube -- to challenge their governments and push the envelope on dissent in ways older generations didn't know. In parts of the Middle East such as Beirut and Tehran, local governments immediately jam cellphones if there is civil unrest, to prevent it from spreading. ...

Egyptian officials have taken notice. Tech-savvy Interior Ministry officers browse the social-networking site to keep an eye on anything they may deem a security threat.

This excerpt really captures the double-edged sword of technology. While overall the Internet clearly promotes freedom (a main theme in my book, The PayPal Wars), technology can also be used by oppressive regimes trying to promote their own interests.

Blocking content is an obvious example, and a favorite tactic of dictators. Recall China's recent efforts to block access to YouTube during the uprising in Tibet, or Iran's crackdown on Web access back in 2006. But dictators are also pretty inventive in their efforts to twist tech to their benefit. In this particular case, Egypt is monitoring Facebook to identify dissenters. Similarly, China has convinced many Silicon Valley companies such as Google and Yahoo to cooperate with it by restricting content available to Chinese citizens.

Let us pray that the advocates of freedom -- empowered by technology created through the free market -- stay two steps ahead.

Tragedy in Burma

2008-05-06T14:32:00.000-07:00

Early reports suggest there could be 50,000 deaths from the cyclone that hit Burma this past weekend, making it the worst natural disaster since the tsunami in 2004. No doubt the scale and scope of this tragedy has been made worse by the military dictatorship. According to the Times of London:

Burma's junta refused foreign aid after the 2004 tsunami, in which between 60 and 600 of its citizens are reported to have died, but this time the sheer scale of the slowly emerging disaster seems to have forced it to change its mind. "We will welcome help . . . from other countries because our people are in difficulty," said Nyah Win, the Burmese Foreign Minister, in a rare television appearance....

Today private frustration was growing among aid organisations, however, that although the junta has publicly invited assistance, bureaucracy is impeding the granting of visas to allow foreign workers into the country. As delays drag on, living conditions for the victims is getting worse.

Let's hope this topic gets coverage in the mainstream media (especially with the Democratic primaries today). The American people are extremely kind-hearted and generous, and no doubt they will be willing to provide assistance once informed of what appears to be a disaster of epic proportions.

"Why We Left Islam" editors respond to CAIR's attack

2008-04-29T15:06:00.000-07:00

Joel Richardson and Susan Crimp -- the editors who collected the amazing stories in our new book, Why We Left Islam -- fired back at the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) for the organization's critical comments about their book.

"Even though CAIR wants to convince people that it's a moderate organization, the facts say otherwise," asserts Richardson, who writes using a pseudonym because of previous death threats from Islamic radicals. "The federal government named CAIR an unindicted co-conspirator in an alleged scheme to funnel $12 million to Hamas, and Representative Sue Myrick, R-NY, said evidence suggests CAIR is a front group for the Muslim Brotherhood."

"Evidently, CAIR's ties to Islamic extremists run deep," adds Richardson, who noted that a recent WorldNetDaily investigative report linked 14 CAIR officials to terror investigations. Richardson said that he and Crimp -- who is a noted journalist and author of books on Mother Teresa and the Kennedys -- knew from the start of their collaboration that radical Muslims would go to great lengths to discredit Why We Left Islam, so CAIR's attack came as no surprise.

We've known all along that radical groups like CAIR would attack this book because of the threat to Islam's credibility it poses. You cannot read these powerful personal accounts and be unmoved. Nor can you read this book and persist in believing that human flourishing is possible in an Islamist society.

Assoc. of American Publishers fights law protecting minors from porn

2008-04-29T10:09:00.000-07:00

PW reports that the Association of American Publishers has joined with the ACLU, Planned Parenthood, and several Oregon bookstores in contesting a state law that "the dissemination of sexually explicit material to anyone under age 13, or the dissemination to anyone under age 18 of any material with the intent to sexually arouse the recipient or the provider." The reason? They allege the statue “burdens the exercise of free expression and creates a chilling effect on the sale, display, and dissemination of constitutionally protected speech.”

A press release from the Oregon chapter of the ACLU contains numerous objections to what they cede is a "well-intentioned effort to target sexual predators." They say the law is overly broad and could catch numerous innocent parties in its web. Such as a Planned Parenthood Peer Educator, or the Cascade AIDS Project for handing out safe sex materials to teenagers. Or grandma, who is now evidently going to be targeted by eager prosecutors for giving her grand kids a book about the birds and the bees.

All of this seems a little far fetched. Does the ACLU really think granny will go to the big house over a law intended to stop predators from luring kids? It seems like fear mongering to me. And it's also a PR effort to claim the moral high ground and distract from the participation of groups such as Planned Parenthood that think they have a constitutional right to have unfettered access to foist their views on children.

I'm disappointed that the Association of American Publishers and the Oregon booksellers got into bed with this cadre. If there are practical issues where the retailers need clarification or were being hit with an excessive compliance burden, they could have sought clarification through other means (or possibly a separate suit) without joining these left-wing groups who are pushing their own agenda. But, then again, the AAP is headed by the outspoken liberal and super-genius Pat Schroeder, so it comes as no surprise...

CAIR attacks our new Islam book

2008-04-22T12:00:00.000-07:00

Speaking to the NY Daily News last week, Ibrahim Hooper, spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, attacked our upcoming book, Why We Left Islam: Former Muslims Speak Out. According to Hooper:

This book is put out by WND Publishing, which promotes hate every day on its extremist anti-Muslim hate site... The editor is a guy who suggested air-dropping pig's blood over Afghanistan. There are 7 million American Muslims and over a billion worldwide who love Islam and practice it peaceably on a daily basis.

Never mind the fact that our company is WND Books, those are some bold claims by CAIR. But before addressing them, I'll quote a couple the description of the book from the article:

WND Books has emblazoned a picture of the prophet Muhammed torn in half across the front of the book, written by British journalist Susan Crimp and Islam expert Joel Richardson, using a pseudonym because he already has a fatwa out against him... Islamists might not be too happy with the book's contents, either. It's filled with first-person stories of former radicals who began to question the Koran, Islam's holy book, and who have changed their lives.

As for CAIR's absurd accusations about pig's blood, Joseph Farah rebuts them in an article on WND today.

A holy Earth Day to you

2008-04-22T10:57:00.001-07:00

My apologies for my brief absence from my blog. I was traveling last week and have been under the weather the past couple of days, but it's good to be back home and ensconced behind my keyboard. And just in time for the holiest day on the calendar for millions of Americans.

No, I'm not talking about Passover or Orthodox Easter, days that are set aside by pious believers to worship God and recall His actions to intervene in human history. Rather, I mean a day set aside to worship creation and advocate the suppression of human freedom in the name of a greater good. Or, as most of us call it, Earth Day.

Everyone in the publishing industry (except WND Books, it would seem) is observing the solemn day with proper piety. Publishers Weekly dedicated their daily newsletter to the topic and treated us to important stories such as "Random Reviews its Green Progress" and "Penguin Classics Goes Green With Nature Conservancy." Of course, there is a certain degree of irony for a business built around the destruction of trees to call itself green, but it's also an industry that tilts to the left, so no doubt these enviro-efforts are more penance than PR.

Since the Pope has gone back home to the Vatican, allow me to be your guide to some of the sacred Earth Day observances from around the Web:

We're treated to a special Google holiday logo for this sacred day. Only very important days, such as Alexander Graham Bell's Birthday on March 3, make the list of holiday logos. (Pedestrian events like Easter need not apply.)

Major League Baseball boasts a number of Earth Day observances, including the Seattle Mariners' decision to stage "the first carbon neutral game in MLB history." Fans attending the Reds-Dodgers game in Cincy will receive free night lights. (If this will help the batters in Torre's lineup who are hitting under .200 to see the ball, then I support it.)

The U.S. government has an official Earth Day website. The Feds may not be able to guard our borders, but they do provide us with an indispensable eco-liturgy such as "use the microwave to cook small meals" and "sweep outside instead of using a hose." Thank you, Saint George.

In other news, there is no word how Al Gore and his penguin army intend to spend the holy day.

Publishing venture aims to end retailer returns

2008-04-03T16:02:00.000-07:00

HarperCollins is launching a new publishing unit that will aim to move from traditional author royalties and advances to more of a profit-sharing structure where authors get a piece of the bottom line. While innovative for a conglomerate, some independent publishers are already experimenting with this approach. But what's more interesting is that HC says this unit will also attempt to eliminate returns from retailers.

If successful, this could bring about some big changes in the publishing industry. Returns of unsold inventory have been a fact of life for publishers since the Depression era. While giving retailers the right to return unsold inventory for credit surely grants retailers more flexibility in some cases, it also puts a lot of financial risk on publishers. According to a respected industry overview (Publishing for Profit by Thomas Woll), in the 1990s returns of trade hardcover books averaged over 31% of all copies. This makes it very difficult to forecast how well a book will do, and it forces publishers to keep reserves against authors' royalties as a result.

If a conglomerate like HC is able to make headway in developing a no-return model, other publishers would surely seek to follow their lead. This would give the big brick-and-mortar retailers a strong incentive to collaborate on moving away from the current system. I think this would be a winner for many publishers and authors. It could even help retailers, as well. The article notes that "several years ago, Steve Riggio, CEO of Barnes & Noble, said in an interview that he would like to be able to mark down books rather than returning them." This would give retailers more pricing flexibility to maximize cashflow, something they currently lack -- and of course discounted books would benefit consumers.

Only time will tell if this idea is to gain any traction in the publishing industry. I think it has potential, though.

Willey account praised

2008-03-28T12:10:00.000-07:00

Michael New reviews Kathleen Willey's book, Target: Caught in the Crosshairs of Bill and Hillary Clinton, in today's edition of FrontPage. As he points out, it is not just a rehashing of past events, but rather a story with significance for the current presidential election.

Thoughts on the Fed trying to clean up its own mess

2008-03-28T11:38:00.000-07:00

David Wessel of the WSJ has an excellent column today entitled "Ten Days that Changed Capitalism" that explains the significance of the recent steps undertaken by the Federal Reserve and Bush Administration to address the current financial crisis. To sum it up, Wessel quotes economist Ed Yardeni: "The Government of Last Resort is working with the Lender of Last Resort to shore up the housing and credit markets to avoid Great Depression II."

Wessel certainly makes some good points. It may be too early to tell how all of this will play out. While government involvement in the economy via the central bank or Treasury is generally undesirable and will most certainly have long-run unanticipated consequences, I am sympathetic to Fed Chair Ben Bernanke in one regard. He inherited a mess that his predecessor, Alan Greenspan, played a large role in creating. Greenspan's manipulation of interest rates following 9/11 caused a distortion in the free market, injecting excess liquidity that largely made its way into real estate and set the stage for a bubble.

In a way, it's deja vu all over again. As I wrote in my book The PayPal Wars, we saw the same drama play out eight years ago in Silicon Valley. Currency market "contagion" in the late '90s had been the catalyst for Greenspan's interest rate roller coaster, and tech stocks were the asset class that was taken along for the ride. That bubble burst as rates were rapidly jacked up by the Fed after it had concluded a period of aggressive cutting. Sound familiar?

Wessel makes the point that capitalism might be profoundly changed by this current crisis. And that seems possible. But can the Fed's policy of using interest rates in Keynesian fashion -- to "stimulate" the economy -- really be called a form of capitalism? It seems more like central planning than the Invisible Hand. But I doubt that any of the presidential candidates, and certainly not Hillary or Obama, will cite this crisis as a reason for less government meddling in the economy.

Americans oppose mortgage bailouts

2008-03-27T16:51:00.000-07:00

A majority of Americans oppose federal assistance to homeowners who borrowed more than they can afford. A Rassmussen Reports survey indicated that 53% disapprove of Washington taking action, while 29% support it. Also, contrary to the liberal stereotype that conservatives favor big business, the poll suggests Republicans are more likely than Democrats (by 68% to 53%) to oppose bailing out the banks who made bad loans.

It will be interesting to see if this skepticism of federal handouts holds up should the mortgage crisis worsen. Over the past week, investment banks have averaged $32.9 billion per day in borrowing from the Federal Reserve's new emergency lending facility. No doubt Hillary and Obama will be ratcheting up their calls for command economy solutions to address the problem, but hopefully the American people will remain skeptical.

Making our nation proud

2008-03-21T11:03:00.000-07:00

Three cheers to the soldiers at Fort Hood for making a sick child's wish come true. You guys are amazing.

A Good Friday meditation

2008-03-21T00:34:00.000-07:00

He was despised and rejected by men,
a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering.
Like one from whom men hide their faces
he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

Surely he took up our infirmities
and carried our sorrows,
yet we considered him stricken by God,
smitten by him, and afflicted.

But he was pierced for our transgressions,
he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was upon him,
and by his wounds we are healed.

We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
each of us has turned to his own way;
and the LORD has laid on him
the iniquity of us all. (Isaiah 53: 3-6)

As the economy stumbles and terrorists bray new threats, take heart, my friends. The world is broken and evil is most real, yet the endgame is in motion. We are actors in this grand drama, but the script has already been written. And the Author penned for Himself the most shocking, unsettling, and important role in the entire story.

China blocks YouTube -- how will Google respond?

2008-03-17T12:30:00.001-07:00

In the wake of the uprising in Tibet, reports indicate that China is blocking its citizens from accessing YouTube. According to the AP:

Access to YouTube.com, usually readily available in China, was blocked after videos appeared on the site Saturday showing foreign news reports about the Lhasa demonstrations, montages of photos and scenes from Tibet-related protests abroad.

How will Google, YouTube's parent company, respond? Readers of my blog will recall that I've previously criticized Google and other Silicon Valley companies for assisting Chinese censorship by restricting search results (see here and here). Now that one of Google's most valuable web properties is being blocked, will it stand up to the dictators in Beijing or seek to accommodate them by removing the related videos?

Audacity of hate: Obama and his spiritual mentor

2008-03-14T14:59:00.000-07:00

WND reports more disturbing news about Barak Obama's spiritual mentor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr:

The Chicago minister ... said in a January 2006 sermon at his alma mater, Howard University, "America is still the No. 1 killer in the world. … We are deeply involved in the importing of drugs, the exporting of guns and the training of professional killers."

Speaking at the Washington, D.C., school's Andrew Rankin Memorial Chapel, Wright said, "We started the AIDS virus. … We are only able to maintain our level of living by making sure that Third World people live in grinding poverty."

And apparently this is not the only instance in which Wright has blamed the United States for manufacturing the AIDS virus. This comes on the heels of yesterday's revelation that in a 2003 sermon Wright urged his congregation to say "God damn America." Wright has also drawn fire for giving a humanitarian award to Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, and for saying that America brought the 9-11 terror attacks upon itself.

When asked about Wright's "G-damn" sermon yesterday, Obama rebutted, "...I think it's important to judge me on what I've said in the past and what I believe." Which, of course, is true. Obama's beliefs are what matter. But Obama is a candidate who is trying to remain a tabula rasa upon which American voters should project their own hopes and aspirations; we cannot say for certain what all of his beliefs are. This begs the question: to what degree to Wright and Obama see eye to eye on this issue? Does Obama share his pastor's apparent disdain for the country he now seeks to govern?

Only God knows what is in Obama's heart, but his ties to Wright are worth considering as we attempt to learn more about this political newcomer and presidential front-runner. Rev. Wright has been Obama's pastor and spiritual mentor for two decades. He married Barack and Michelle, and baptized their daughters. Obama's second book, The Audacity of Hope, was inspired by Wright, and Obama himself told the Chicago Tribune last year that Wright was his "sounding board." And Wright has a formal role on Obama's campaign. Politico's Ben Smith reports that Wright serves on the campaign's African American Religious Leadership Committee.

Without a doubt, Wright is an influential part of Obama's life, both private and public. Even if Obama does not agree with his mentor that the U.S. is "the No. 1 killer in the world," creator of the AIDS virus, and deserving of damnation, he obviously must not consider Wright's worldview to be too offensive. How else can one explain the role he's given Wright in his life? It's not ignorance. It's incomprehensible to assert that glimmers of Wright's worldview were not visible to Obama over the past 20 years. (One doesn't choose a "sounding board" because he stays silent, and the reverend is not exactly hesitant about voicing his politics from the pulpit.) So even if he did not directly hear Wright drop "G-damns" on America, Obama surely heard him voice the beliefs that served as the basis for those condemnations. To assert otherwise, you'd have to assume that Obama is either lying about his ties to Wright, or he has no idea of the beliefs of his advisors.

So Obama must've been at least aware of Wright's extreme and hateful beliefs, yet he did not consider them problematic. And Obama's defense that Wright is like "an old uncle who sometimes will say things that I don't agree with" rings hollow. If President Bush had ever mused about appointing someone like David Duke to his campaign, surely the outcry would have been rightfully deafening, and it would've been the end of Bush's political career. Or consider a real-life example from earlier this week. Geraldine Ferraro had to quit Hillary Clinton's campaign because of her assertion that Obama's ethnicity benefited him at the polls. No one has made a convincing argument that Ferraro herself is a racist, but the Obama campaign charged that the comment was. The ensuing fracas compelled Ferraro to step down.

Obama may very well conclude that he needs to have Rev. Wright follow Ferraro's lead, but such a public repudiation seemingly would just be for show, given that Obama has sought counsel in private from an extremist for 20 years.

Not that Rev. Wright's opinions sound dissimilar to Michelle Obama's. It was widely reported that last month the candidate's wife proclaimed to a Milwaukee audience that "for the first time in my adult life I am proud of my country because it feels like hope is finally making a comeback." Later that day she told a Madison crowd, "For the first time in my adult lifetime, I’m really proud of my country … not just because Barack has done well, but because I think people are hungry for change." These repeated statements prompted Peggy Noonan to ask, "Are the Obamas, at bottom, snobs? Do they understand America? Are they of it? Did anyone at their Ivy League universities school them in why one should love America? Do they confuse patriotism with nationalism, or nativism?"

The questions still stand, Senator Obama. We, the people, await your response.

"The campaign of soft jihad"

2008-03-04T17:14:00.000-08:00

FrontPage ran an important article yesterday calling out the danger of Islamofascists abusing multiculturalism to bring about "sharia creep" or "soft jihad" into Western institutions. The game plan is that Muslims push for seemingly harmless ad hoc rule changes to accommodate their religious practices at places such as universities, hospitals, and swimming pools. But as Richard Kimble of The New Criterion is quoted as explaining, this tactic is not about tolerance: "Traditional jihad is waged with scimitars and their contemporary equivalents, e.g., stolen Boeing 767s, which make handy instruments of mass homicide. Soft jihad is a quieter affair: it uses and abuses the language and the principles of democratic liberalism not to secure the institutions and attitudes that make freedom possible but, on the contrary, to undermine that freedom and pave the way for self-righteous, theocratic intolerance.”

WFB, you will be missed

2008-02-27T10:35:00.000-08:00

William F. Buckley, founder of the National Review, has died at the age of 82.

His numerous accomplishments ("Firing Line," Young Americans for Freedom, New York's Conservative Party, the many bestsellers including God and Man at Yale) defy eulogy. But his legacy is much bigger than his curriculum vitæ .

Buckley was the first post-New Deal articulate voice of mainstream conservatism. Decades before conservatism won its first national election in 1980, Buckley had the vision to "stand athwart history, yelling 'Stop' at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who urge it."

While I never had the pleasure of meeting him, I am sure that I would not have founded World Ahead Media, much less now be a part of WorldNetDaily, without the inspiration of this man.

Thank you, sir. Godspeed.

Pro-choice...on light bulbs

2008-02-26T10:53:00.000-08:00

Joseph Farah's column today calls on Americans to resist the effort by Congress to rob us of our right to choose incandescent light bulbs. Few people know it, but late last year Congress passed an energy bill banning the sale of inexpensive and safe bulbs starting in 2012. After that point we will have no choice but to purchase compact fluorescent bulbs, which cost about 6X as much and contain small amounts of toxic mercury. In response to this nanny state measure, Farah unveiled a magnetic bumper sticker to drive the point home:

Trail Thoughts

2008-02-25T18:20:00.001-08:00

I wanted to recommend a new daily devotional that I'm enjoying. It is called Trail Thoughts: A Daily Companion for Your Journey of Faith, and it's written by Eric Kampmann, who runs our distribution partner Midpoint. Unlike most devotionals, this one isn't sappy or cheesy. It's thought-provoking and makes no effort to wrap up the Bible into a small package with a cute little bow. Instead, Kampmann focuses on the big picture of Scripture while challenging readers to examine their place in God's world. He chooses a very apropos verse for the introduction:

This is what the LORD says: Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls. (Jeremiah 6:16)

That's what Trail Thoughts is all about -- finding that ancient path as revealed by God. If you prefer some happy fluff to end your day or want straightforward "how to" advice, this book probably isn't for you. But if you're looking to be challenged and exposed to a wide array of topics with a biblical perspective, you will enjoy it.

We feel your pain

2008-02-21T17:24:00.000-08:00

I don't like listening to her, either.

Sights from CPAC

2008-02-14T12:35:00.000-08:00

Here are some photos I took at last week's annual Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, DC.

WorldNetDaily CEO and Stop the Presses! author Joseph Farah speaking on the Fairness Doctrine.

Kathleen Willey, author of Target: Caught in the Crosshairs of Bill and Hillary Clinton, and former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA).

Jerome Corsi autographs copies of his NYT bestseller The Late Great USA.

What do Hillary and the UN have in common?

2008-02-14T12:27:00.000-08:00

Time has a new article which asks "Is It Too Late for Hillary?" Besides providing a decent recap of how Team Clinton has surprisingly squandered its front-runner status to Obama, it also contains a Freudian slip of a typo:

Clinton has shaken up a campaign team whose top rung often seemed to function like the permanent membership of the U.N. Insecurity [sic] Council, with each of its often feuding members holding veto power over any move that diverged from his or her plan.

WND to acquire World Ahead

2008-01-22T23:13:00.000-08:00

I'm pleased to announce that my company, World Ahead Media, is going to be acquired by WorldNetDaily, our partners on the WND Books imprint. The company's name will be changed to WND Books, and I will stay on as CEO. I'll also be joining the parent company's executive team as part of the transaction. This is an exciting development that will bring together two talented, complimentary teams and in the process create a dynamic New Media company.

Q&A with author of anti-global warming kid's book

2008-01-22T19:24:00.000-08:00

Townhall's Bill Steigerwald recently interviewed Holly Fretwell, author of our Kids Ahead book The Sky's Not Falling: Why It's OK to Chill about Global Warming. Steigerwald calls Fretwell's book "a good, reasoned, 115-page antidote to the Chicken Little hysteria and propaganda found in the mainstream media and in places like Laurie David’s kids book The Down-to-Earth Guide to Global Warming."

eBay CEO stepping down

2008-01-22T10:50:00.000-08:00

News reports indicate that eBay CEO Meg Whitman plans to step down later this year, with auction division head John Donahoe being the lead candidate to replace her. Donahoe was the managing director for the consultancy Bain & Co. before joining eBay.

If true, Whitman departs with a mixed record. She oversaw the company's IPO and ascension to the top e-commerce site, and in 2002 made the very wise acquisition of PayPal, which has been the growth engine for the company in recent years. But as I noted in my book, The PayPal Wars, she ushered in a very corporate mindset that has made it difficult for eBay to innovate as its dominance has been eroded by the advent of Google AdWords and a trend towards decentralized online shopping. And many of her other acquisitions have either failed to deliver their anticipated value (Skype, Half.com) or completely bombed (Billpoint, Butterfields).

Holiday book sales report card

2008-01-11T10:16:00.000-08:00

Book sales at Barnes & Noble appear to have done OK over the holidays. Excluding music (which is shifting online to MP3 downloads), same store sales were up just about 1% in Nov-Dec. Online sales were up 11%.

Borders' rebound under new CEO George Jones continues. Same store sales were up 2.4% for Borders, and their Waldenbooks chain posted a 0.2% gain. However, discounting is keeping profits down for the company.

I haven't seen details for Amazon yet, but it was the most visited retail website on Cyber Monday (which follows Black Friday), so one would hope their numbers for the entire holiday period would be strong.

If Obama is an ex-Muslim, will liberals vote for him?

2008-01-09T17:24:00.000-08:00

Daniel Pipes writes that Barack Obama was raised as a Muslim and would therefore be considered an apostate under Islamic law. Pipes notes that Obama "is now what Islamic law calls a murtadd (apostate), an ex-Muslim converted to another religion who must be executed. Were he elected president of the United States, this status, clearly, would have large potential implications for his relationship with the Muslim world."

Personally, I do not care. America need not take a poll of the Muslim world when selecting her commander-in-chief. However, the liberals who bemoan the country's standing abroad and Bush's reputation as a "crusader" on the Arab street should be very interested in this point raised by Pipes. By their own logic, Obama should be disqualified because of his conversion from Islam to Christianity.

Hillary's campaign in freefall

2008-01-07T15:26:00.000-08:00

Since Barack Obama's surprise victory in Iowa, the wheels seem to have come off of Hillary Clinton's campaign. RealClearPolitics projects Obama with an average 8% lead in New Hampshire, and Rasmussen estimates that her national lead over the Illinois senator has shrunk from 17% down to just 4%. The Drudge Report is even quoting a Clinton campaign insider as saying she may drop out of the race, explaining: "If she gets too badly embarrassed, it will really harm her. She doesn't want the Clinton brand to be damaged with back-to-back-to-back defeats."

I don't see Hillary pulling out immediately, even if she loses tomorrow's primary. The Clinton brand is synonymous with a lust for power. If you don't believe me, read Kathleen Willey's excellent book Target, which we published in November, and see to what lengths these people would go to crush someone for political gain. Read Thomas Kuiper's quote book I've Always Been a Yankees Fan, and see what kind of profile of this woman emerges from dozens and dozens of sources.

Hillary Clinton will stand down only if it becomes evident that her own party doesn't want the Clintons back in the White House. But before that happens, you better believe that the bag of dirty tricks will be opened and she will go down swinging.

Did Nazis help create Muslim world's anti-Semitism?

2008-01-07T15:08:00.000-08:00

Jeffrey Goldberg has a fascinating review of Matthias Küntzel's book, Jihad and Jew-Hatred, which traces a connection between the anti-Semitism espoused throughout the Muslim world with the propaganda of Nazi Germany. As Goldberg notes in his review: "The notion of the Jew as malevolently omnipotent is not a traditional Muslim notion. Jews do not come off well in the Koran — they connive and scheme and reject the message of the Prophet Muhammad — but they are shown to be, above all else, defeated... the dissemination of European models of anti-Semitism among Muslims was not haphazard, but an actual project of the Nazi Party, meant to turn Muslims against Jews and Zionism. He says that in the years before World War II, two Muslim leaders in particular willingly and knowingly carried Nazi ideology directly to the Muslim masses."

He notes that Küntzel shows that the Nazis helped fund the Muslim Brotherhood's establishment of a printing plant, which they used to circulate Arabic versions of Mein Kampf and The Protocols of Zion, a disgusting fraud of a book that's generally regarded as authentic in the Arab world today.

Goldberg correctly points out that Nazism alone cannot be blamed for the Islamic world's hatred of Jews. The religion itself and the leaders in the region (who are eager to use Israel as a scapegoat for their own problems) are obvious factors -- the seeds of Nazi hatred were sewn into fertile ground. But nonetheless, Küntzel seems to have established an interesting connection, and he rightly points to Hitler's fear-mongering of Jews as similar in type to the vitriol spewed in madrassas and by state-owned media today.

Huckabee reverses course with Bush criticism

2007-12-21T09:58:00.000-08:00

Condi Rice fired back at GOP presidential candidate Mike Huckabee's recent jabs against Bush's foreign policy. Last weekend Huckabee made headlines with his characterization of the "Bush administration’s arrogant bunker mentality." In addition to criticizing tactical mistakes in Iraq (which Bush has begun to correct with the surge), the candidate asserted: "American foreign policy needs to change its tone and attitude, open up, and reach out."

I was surprised by Huckabee's comments primarily because the former governor contributed a chapter to an anthology that World Ahead published in 2004 titled Thank You, President Bush. His chapter was called "The Character of the President," and he seemed to endorse Bush's approach. He wrote that it was framed around "American Exceptionalism" and a "God-centered worldview" that "doesn't see everything in shades of gray." For example:

President Bush came into office in January 2001 as a firm believer in the words of British writer G.K. Chesteron, who said, "America is the only nation in the world that is founded on a creed." Other nations find their identity in ethnicity, geography, cultural traditions or partisan ideology. The United States is an exception. It was and is the product of ideas--ideas about social responsibility, human dignity, and freedom. The French politician and historian Alexis de Tocqueville called this "American Exceptionalism." (p. 10)

President Bush also has a God-centered worldview that led him into public service late in life after a highly successful career in the private sector. He also recognizes God's ultimate authority. Since the day he took office, his critics have tried to use that against him. They claim he is a man who sees the world in black and white rather than shades of gray... I'm thankful to have a President who doesn't see everything in shades of gray. (p. 12)

Huckabee also went so far as to compare Bush favorably with Reagan:

But I believe that his adherence to a God-centered worldview is why George W. Bush will go down with Ronald Reagan as one of the most important Presidents of the past 100 years. (pp. 13-14)

Obviously public officials are allowed to change their minds, and they should when new evidence or changing circumstances demand it. A lot has happened in the world over the past 3 years, so perhaps Huckabee's recent criticisms indicate that he no longer believes that Bush's approach is the right one. But I don't perceive the Bush Administration's foreign policy as having gone more towards a bunker mentality during that time. If anything, my sense with Iran (allowing the Europeans to take the lead), North Korea (insisting on six party talks), and the Middle East (encouraging multi-party talks) is that Bush's team has become more multilateral in its approach since 2004. So it is hard to understand why Huckabee's position has changed as it has.

Hollywood recycles old myth in "Charlie Wilson"

2007-12-21T09:52:00.000-08:00

Former Reagan Administration officials are expressing disdain that the movie "Charlie Wilson's War" recycles the old anti-American myth that the CIA helped create and fund Osama Bin Laden by promoting the Afghan insurgency against the Soviets back in the '80s. The flick's screenwriter is Aaron Sorkin, the liberal creator of "The West Wing."

Snuff out Hanukkah candles for global warming?

2007-12-04T11:33:00.000-08:00

A group of Israeli environmentalists is calling on Jews worldwide to leave one candle unlit on menorahs this Hanukkah in order to fight global warming.

The campaign's cofounder explained their rationale thus: "Global warming is a milestone in human evolution that requires us to rethink how we live our lives, and one of the main paradigms of that is religion and how it fits into the current situation."

Or, to cut to the chase, global warming is a more important religion than Judaism. (So much for the First Commandment.)

Kids now being protected from...Sesame Street?

2007-11-20T16:21:00.000-08:00

Following yesterday's item regarding kid's books being edited to omit references that could be seen as dangerous, the NYT reports that DVDs of the original seasons of Sesame Street will carry warnings that the shows are "intended for grown-ups, and may not suit the needs of today’s preschool child." Evidently the show's dingy masonry, trusting relationships between adults and children, and comic outbursts by Oscar the Grouch are considered inappropriate for today's preschool set.

Other problematic themes cited in the article include the skepticism showed by the adult cast members over the existence of Big Bird's giant, hairy, and unseen friend Snuffleupagus, as well as the dietary habits of the sweet toothed muppet Cookie Monster. And these are just the episodes from the early '70s, well before the real trouble erupted when Burt joined the jihad.

Wash Times, The Hill report on Willey's book

2007-11-20T13:47:00.000-08:00

Today's Washington Times features a profile on Target, our new book by former Democratic activist Kathleen Willey. And The Hill also published a 20 questions feature with the author.

Amazon launches Kindle e-book reader

2007-11-19T14:10:00.000-08:00

The battle for e-books to gain mass acceptance took an interesting turn today as Amazon unveiled its version of a portable e-book reader. Named Kindle (a great pun if ever there were), the slim device will download books wirelessly from Amazon using the Sprint's cellular network. New releases will average $9.99 per download, and users can also subscribe to newspapers and magazines. The reader itself will cost $399, a fee which includes access to the cellular network. Kindle costs $100 more than Sony's competing product.

Kid's books being "purged of risks"

2007-11-19T13:08:00.000-08:00

The Telegraph reports that children's books in the UK are increasingly being "purged of risks" in an effort by publishers and editors to shield themselves from parental criticism. Walking alone, carrying a sharp object, and climbing a ladder are mentioned as examples of specific edits that were requested to make sure books don't "[go] against health and safety."

Pugnacious, not dastardly

2007-11-16T11:09:00.000-08:00

That's how Stanford Magazine describes World Ahead in an article profiling our publishing company, complete with a quirky photo of co-founder Norman Book and yours truly.

Kathleen Willey discusses Bill and Hillary Clinton's intimidation campaign

2007-11-08T10:32:00.000-08:00

Our new book Target: Caught in the Crosshairs of Bill and Hillary Clinton, written by Kathleen Willey, arrives in bookstores this week. The book breaks Kathleen's prolonged silence about not only Bill Clinton's assault of her in the Oval Office, but even more importantly about the terror campaign waged by Hillary and Bill's "secret police" to scare her into silence.

Kathleen gave her first interview yesterday to "Hannity & Colmes," which they have posted on their website in two clips (part one and part two). In other coverage, Art Moore at WND investigates the alleged involvement of a PI in the Clinton intimidation team as recounted in the book, and the Daily Mail speculates about the book's possible impact on Hillary's presidential campaign. And, of course, the predictable Clintonites at Media Matters flailed away, except they really don't have anything to say (except declaring their eternal love for Hillary).

Take a couple of minutes to watch Kathleen's interview. She makes an excellent point that everyone needs to know: "This is not about what happened in the oval office, this isn't about something that happened to me twelve years ago, this is about what’s happening today. This is about what Hillary Clinton is doing to women like me so that she can attain the presidency."

Terrorists love Tinseltown

2007-11-05T12:50:00.000-08:00

Terrorists continue to heap praise on Hollywood celebrities. The latest recipient of their affection is Naomi Campbell, who went to hang out with Hugo Chavez last week, an act of anti-Bush defiance that warmed terrorists' hearts according to Schmoozing with Terrorists author Aaron Klein. Rush & Malloy and TMZ (which has an audio file) chronicled this love fest.

UPI also ran a short piece on Aaron's interviews with jihadists about Hollywood, politics, and the media, a topic which Aaron discussed on the O'Reilly Factor last Friday.

Media's political bias quantified by new study

2007-11-05T12:37:00.000-08:00

A new study from the Project for Excellence in Journalism and Harvard's Joan Shorenstein Center finds that the mainstream media overwhelmingly favors Democrats. This graphic from an excellent Investor's Business Daily editorial on the subject neatly summarizes the results:

As IBD wryly notes, Harvard is "hardly a bastion of conservative orthodoxy," but I'm sure these findings aren't enough to convince leading Dems to abandon calls for a Fairness Doctrine 2.0.

Schmoozing makes the rounds

2007-11-01T17:07:00.001-07:00

FrontPageMag has a great interview with Aaron Klein, author of Schmoozing with Terrorists, and the Huffington Post picked up on the topic of terrorists endorsing Hillary.

Sen. Inhofe lauds global warming kid's book

2007-10-26T17:26:00.001-07:00

Sen. James Inhofe praised our children's book The Sky's Not Falling: Why It's OK to Chill about Global Warming in a speech on the Senate floor today. He also used a blow-up of the book's front cover as a backdrop for his remarks:

A video of Sen. Inhofe's speech is embedded below. His comments on the book begin around the 6:30 mark.

You can also read his press release for further quotes and links to additional excerpts.

Random wins Tony Blair's memoir

2007-10-26T10:49:00.000-07:00

Random House's Knopf won the bidding war for North American rights to the former PM's memoirs. Knopf also published Bill Clinton's megalomaniacal My Life a few years back. The price tag for Blair's worldwide rights was a hefty $9 million advance. Random's Hutchison imprint will simultaneously publish the book in the UK. No pub date has been set.

California wildfires rage on, trigger political debate

2007-10-24T13:08:00.000-07:00

The sky over Los Angeles is a smokey haze, and the noontime sunlight filtering through it has the orange glow of dusk. World Ahead's offices, located in LA's "South Bay" area, are far from any of the encircling fires, but the smoke from them has covered the entire basin.

As is the case with any natural disaster, it was only a matter of time before politics came into play. Harry Reid blames global warming for the fires. Newsweek lauds the Governator for "avoiding another Katrina." And "Brownie" is taking a shot at the White House for the federal response.

Meanwhile, our local NBC affiliate reports that over 1 million residents have been displaced by the 16 wildfires now burning around the Southland. Please remember to keep these people and our firefighters and National Guard troops in prayer.

Army instructors accidentally schmoozing with terrorists?

2007-10-24T12:43:00.000-07:00

Schmoozing with Terrorists author Aaron Klein reports that U.S. Army instructors have unwittingly exchanged emails with members of major Palestinian terror groups. Says Klein:

"To highlight how ridiculous the state of things are and how clueless are our U.S. security coordinators, they are keeping in touch with former students who are carrying out regular attacks against our ally Israel, including shootings and bombings. Some of their former students are on Israel's wanted list of terrorists."

This is disturbing indeed -- and it's not the only such revelation in Klein's book. Let's hope that this report prompts some much needed security changes.

Arizona Republic covers controversy over NAU

2007-10-24T12:36:00.000-07:00

The Arizona Republic is the latest publication to pick up on the debate started by author Jerome Corsi, whose NYT bestseller The Late Great U.S.A. charges that efforts to initiate an EU-type "North American Union" are afoot. The Republic's article is one of the most comprehensive on the issue to date. It points out that former Mexican President Vicente Fox recently told Larry King that a single American currency was also a goal of the effort.

Google searches by country

2007-10-17T15:29:00.000-07:00

Reuters reports on Google search terms by nation. I guess it says something about what's on a country's mind. (Morocco = jihad; Egypt = sex; Iran = IAEA; Germany = Nazi; Ireland = hangover; U.S. = burrito)

Vicente Fox repeats his call for NAU

2007-10-12T17:17:00.000-07:00

Just a couple days after coming clean on Larry King Live, the former president of Mexico has repeated his call for a regional government in a candid NPR interview.

Jerome Corsi on BookTV this weekend

2007-10-12T16:00:00.000-07:00

On Sunday at 8:00 PM, BookTV will broadcast Jerome Corsi's speech to the Eagle Council in which he discusses this NYT bestseller, The Late Great USA. Click here for more details.

AFP picks up on politics and kid's books

2007-10-10T16:14:00.000-07:00

Agence France-Presse just published an article on children's political books that quotes me and mentions our books The Sky's Not Falling and Liberals Under My Bed. I've blogged on the issue of kids and political books before (see here and here), so I won't belabor the subject now.

However, I will say that the Alice Walker book it mentions (Why War is Never a Good Idea) is a real piece of work. I'm seldom at a loss for words, but words escape me when it comes to this book.

Vicente Fox says NAU, Amero are "long term" vision

2007-10-09T14:52:00.000-07:00

Former Mexican President Vicente Fox revealed to interviewer Larry King last night that he had been working on a North American Union during his term. According to WND:

...King, near the end of the broadcast, asked Fox a question e-mailed from a listener, a Ms. Gonzalez from Elizabeth, N.J.: "Mr. Fox, I would like to know how you feel about the possibility of having a Latin America united with one currency?"

Fox answered in the affirmative, admitting he and President Bush had agreed to pursue the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas – a free-trade zone extending throughout the Western Hemisphere – and that part of the plan was to institute a regional currency from Canada to the tip of South America.

Here is a YouTube video of the exchange. Note how King rephrases the question to clarify what Fox is saying after he goes off on a tangent about Hugo Chavez:

This looks like further vindication of Jerome Corsi, author of our NYT bestseller The Late Great USA: The Coming Merger with Mexico and Canada. Back in August, President Bush derided NAU objections as the product of "conspiracy theorists," but his ex-counterpart from Mexico is proving that Corsi was on the right track.

By the way, after searching on YouTube I came across a clip from my friends at the Daily Show which also featured Fox as a guest, and he specifically says that he supports an NAU with the U.S. and Canada. Fast forward to the 2:02 mark of this video and see for yourself:

Hillary proposes 71% death tax to fund 401(k) takeover

2007-10-09T10:49:00.000-07:00

Still riding high after her endorsement by jihadists, Hillary Clinton has decided to have the federal government get into the 401(k) business -- all it's going to take is a 71% death tax to bankroll it.

Letting the federal government take a big step towards nationalizing a private sector function that currently contains $2.7 trillion in savings is terrifying. Even more terrifying is the prospect of Uncle Sam robbing American families blind to pay for this scheme. Here's how the AP describes Hillary's new government-funded retirement account plan:

Every citizen could get a 401(k) retirement account and up to $1,000 in annual matching funds from the government... She said that for every $7 million estate that gets taxed, at least 5,000 families would receive the matching funds.

Let's do the math. First, in Washington speak, "up to $1,000" means "$1,000." Next, we plug in the parameters that Hillary is proposing. Then we can see what she means in terms of taxation:

$1,000 "matching funds" x 5,000 families = $5 million outlay = $5 million in taxes
$5 million in taxes / $7 million estate = 71.4% tax rate

That's right, a 71% tax rate upon death. Deathtax.com calculates that inheritance of a family-owned businesses can trigger a tax of up to 47%.

Forget about the cost of living going up under President Hillary. No one will be able to afford to die.

Jihadists endorse Hillary Clinton for President

2007-10-07T23:27:00.000-07:00

Schmoozing with Terrorists author Aaron Klein reports that terrorists leaders throughout the West Bank have come out in support of Hillary Clinton's candidacy to become president. Here are a pair of the many endorsements that Klein recorded:

Nasser Abu Aziz, the West Bank deputy commander of the Al Aqsa Brigades, declared it is "very good" there are "voices like Hillary and others who are now attacking the Iraq invasion."

"All Americans must vote Democrat," stated Jihad Jaara, an exiled member of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terror group and the infamous leader of the 2002 siege of Bethlehem's Church of the Nativity.

There's no word yet if Hillary's campaign will be accepting contributions from Al Aqsa-affiliated donors. But I'd guess that's a Hsu in.

Rosie rejects terrorist invite

2007-10-05T10:42:00.000-07:00

Rosie O'Donnell has declined a generous invitation by jihadists for the former daytime talk show host to visit their base of operations in the West Bank.

Evidently the terrorists had been touched by Rosie's willingness to defend them on national TV with comments like: "Don't fear the terrorists. They're mothers and fathers." She also denounced Guantanamo Bay, claiming that our military tortured the terrorists there "on a daily basis," and complained that 9/11 planner Khalid Sheikh Mohammed wasn't given a lawyer following his capture. So it's no wonder she has an Islamofascist following.

The invite to their fellow traveler Rosie was first relayed by WND's Jerusalem bureau chief Aaron Klein, the author of our new book Schmoozing with Terrorists.

My appearance on the Daily Show

2007-10-04T11:42:00.000-07:00

Last night I appeared on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart. And, yes, I'm a Comedy Central fan, so I knew what I was getting myself into.

In case anyone's interested, we didn't make an offer for any of John Oliver's book ideas. (But we are trying to sign the white rabbit to a multi-book deal.)

Scholastic global warming book comes up short

2007-10-02T15:11:00.000-07:00

Steven Milloy has an editorial on FoxNews that compares Laurie David's Down-to-Earth Guide to Global Warming with Holly Fretwell's The Sky's Not Falling. According to Milloy:

While Scholastic may want to risk its reputation with the David-Gordon book, parents who want their children to have the correct information about the pivotal relationship between atmospheric carbon dioxide and global temperature may want to check out Fretwell's "The Sky's Not Falling."

While Fretwell's book does not come close to matching the number and visual quality of distract-from-the text illustrations that the David-Gordon books contains, Fretwell's strength is that her text is easy to read and, most importantly, is scientifically accurate.

Why liberals should love Blackwater -- but don't

2007-10-02T13:50:00.000-07:00

House liberals seem to be targeting private contractor Blackwater as a proxy for criticizing the war in Iraq. Henry Waxman's committee majority is determined to try to smear the security firm as a bunch of "cowboys" who are out of control, and it's also attacking the State Department for using them to protect VIPs. According to the Int'l Herald Tribune:

Representative Henry Waxman, the California Democrat who is chairman of a House committee that is studying the record of the firm in Iraq, said that companies like Blackwater amounted to an inadequately controlled private military force.

"If we don't have enough troops to do the job, then we need to get more troops," Waxman said at a hearing Tuesday of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Privatizing security services was "causing us problems with the Iraqi people," he said.

Democrats have also been quick to point out that Blackwater has been involved in more combat incidents than the two other private security companies employed by the government to work in Iraq, although it also has over twice as many employees on the ground as the other two combined.

While Blackwater's employees aren't perfect, Waxman's sweeping generalizations are misguided. Contractors have always played an important role in supporting America's military. (Ever heard of Lafayette, Mr. Chairman?) Blackwater's employees in Iraq are facing the same sorts of threats aimed at our soldiers. The AP quotes CEO Erik Prince as making this strong rebuttal to Waxman:

Throughout the hearing, Prince defended his staff as courageously defending U.S. diplomats overseas. He said 30 Blackwater contractors have been killed in action and no Americans have died while in its protection.

"We're the targets of the same ruthless enemies that have killed more than 3,800 American military personnel and thousands of innocent Iraqis," he said, sitting alone at the witness table.

If liberal criticism of the war was really based on concern for our soldiers, then Democrats should rejoice that private citizens employed by Blackwater are willing to take jobs that would otherwise require more servicemen to step into harm's way. Liberals claim that the current volunteer military is unfair to racial minorities and the poor, who enlist at disproportionate rates due to lack of economic opportunities caused by capitalism and societal racism. For example, consider this 2003 statement from Rep. Charles Rangel:

The disproportionately high representation of the poor and minorities in the enlisted ranks is well documented. Minorities comprise 35 percent of the military and Blacks 20 percent, well above their proportion of the general population. They, along with poor and rural Whites do more than their fair share of service in our ground forces.

While Rangel's interpretation of military demographic data has been called into question, his claim does essentially represent liberal orthodoxy on the subject. As a professor from the Univ. of Maryland framed it, "The playing field outside the military is not level. Life structures you into certain choices, and you wind up in the military." This belief was also behind the NAACP's opposition to the Iraq war.

So given the liberal belief that society's poor and downtrodden are forced into the military, why is Waxman saying "we need to get more troops"? By their own logic, liberals should be happy that contractors like Blackwater are willing to fight alongside our brave soldiers.

Terrorist leader invites Rosie O'Donnell to join team

2007-09-27T10:41:00.000-07:00

It must be an ego blow that ratings for "The View" have gone up since she's left, but a new chapter in Rosie O'Donnell's post-Barbara Walters life may be about to begin. According to Aaron Klein, a senior terrorist invited O'Donnell to join them in the Middle East as a fellow traveler:

"I agree with what this O'Donnell says. ...We welcome Rosie O'Donnell to stay among us and to get to know the truth from being here, like many American peace activists are doing," said Ala Senakreh, West Bank chief of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terrorist organization.

And Rosie isn't the only Hollywood celebrity that terrorists love. Klein, the author of our new book Schmoozing with Terrorists: From Hollywood to the Holy Land, Jihadists Reveal Their Global Plans--to a Jew!, is scheduled to name more names when he appears on Bill O'Reilly's show tonight.

LA Times bashes our global warming kid's book

2007-09-24T11:06:00.000-07:00

The L.A. Times published a book review of several global warming books, including Laurie David's Down to Earth Guide and our own The Sky's Not Falling. Reviewer Sonja Bolle liked David's "easy-to-read blocks" and lauded her desire "to raise awareness and persuade children to consider the environment in the choices they make in daily life." Ours? Well, not so much. I think author Holly Fretwell lost Bolle with the "Chicken Little" analogy.

Which is fine by me. The reviewer's political bias is what I would expect from the L.A. Times, and at least Bolle is upfront about it. She actually interrupts her review to advocate environmental regulation, so her activist viewpoint is clearly labeled. (Why her editor would let her go off topic in the midst of a book review is another question.)

Unfortunately, Bolle let bias get in the way of asking some tough questions about this book that David wants to get into the hands of kids. As I previously noted on this blog, David spends little time defending the science behind her left-wing beliefs, and what little effort she makes is largely based around a deceptively labeled graph. David has also clearly stated that her goal is to manipulate children on global warming in order to influence their parents.

I did notice one instance in her review where Bolle didn't trip over ideology, though. She does concede that schoolmarmish Al Gore could only write in a "dignified and elegant" tone with "many revisions."

Has the other Hsu dropped for Hillary?

2007-09-24T10:40:00.000-07:00

The guys over at Suitably Flip have tracked down a lot of data detailing Norman Hsu's campaign finance contributions, and -- surprise, surprise! -- much of it winds up in Hillary Clinton's pockets. How much? According to the spreadsheet they compiled, Hillary received $850,000 of the $1.97 million in donations funneled to individual candidates. She received 10 times as much as the second luckiest recipient, Andrew Cuomo.

Of course Hillary insists she knew nothing about Hsu's activities. Is it any wonder that Kathleen Willey's manuscript was stolen, the Clinton Library won't honor FOIA requests, and Hillary was so quick to embrace Fairness Doctrine 2.0?

Terrorists say they love liberals

2007-09-20T13:50:00.000-07:00

That's the conclusion of Aaron Klein, author of Schmoozing with Terrorists, who asked senior terrorist leaders for their feedback on American political figures.

Laurie David's weak defense of her global warming kid's book

2007-09-19T17:54:00.000-07:00

Laurie David, writing in her Huffington Post column, defends her new left-wing kid's book, The Down to Earth Guide to Global Warming. The Hollywood producer turned children's author is attacking a recent study for catching that a graph used as in her book mislabeled CO2 and temperature in an advantageous way. She writes:

It turns out one of the illustrations in the book was accidentally mislabeled. This has got the gang at the at the Science and Public Policy Instituted up in arms -- or at least pretending to be -- no doubt hoping to ride our coattails, create some controversy, and promote their own new book.

First of all, The Sky's Not Falling: Why It's OK to Chill about Global Warming , written by Prof. Holly Fretwell, is not SPPI's book -- it is ours. David is falsely impugning SPPI's motives.

Second, the error that SPPI caught is not minor. I have read David's book, and she and Cami Gordon do not make much of an effort to prove that mankind's activities are causing global warming, or that the current trend of temperature change is abnormal when compared to prior cycles. Instead, she takes this for granted and offers a passing reference to a graph with CO2 atmospheric concentration and temperature (p. 18) as proof that economic activity threatens to wipe out penguins and polar bears.

Perhaps David was in too much of a hurry to give kids directions on becoming little activists to spend time proving her hypothesis. I guess science isn't as much fun as suggesting that kids mail out petitions to their mayor (p. 71), play "count the hybrids" on road trips to annoy their parents into buying a green car (p. 86), or watch her movie "An Inconvenient Truth" at school assemblies (p. 84). Of course, since David has previously stated that the goal of her book is to manipulate children, we shouldn't be surprised that the entire second half is comprised of nothing but tips like this.

I'd like to request that Laurie David read chapter 2 of The Sky's Not Falling, entitled "Global Temperatures Go Up and Down -- Naturally," for a more careful treatment of the facts that she butchered and omitted from her own book. I'd be happy to send her a copy.

Video about Kathleen Willey manuscript theft

2007-09-19T11:51:00.001-07:00

We've recently posted several new videos on World Ahead's YouTube channel, including this clip of Brit Hume discussing the recent theft of Kathleen Willey's manuscript. (Note: The picture identified as Willey is actually Julie Steele. Fox News' graphics department must have gotten confused.)

O.J. robbery boosts confessional book

2007-09-19T10:42:00.000-07:00

PW reports that our friend Eric Kampmann of Beaufort Books is printing another 50,000 copies of the O.J. Simpson book, If I Did It. Earlier this summer, Kampmann acquired the manuscript rights from Ron Goldman, who was awarded them by the courts, and the two agreed to repackage it into a confessional tome that would condemn the killer.

O.J. evidently gave the book an unintentional PR boost by committing armed robbery and kidnapping to coincide with the book's launch. If I Did It is currently #3 on Amazon and #2 on B&N, and the murderer just had his bail set at $125,000 by a Nevada court.

Britney and Madonna terror targets

2007-09-14T15:48:00.000-07:00

Jerusalem-based reporter Aaron Klein -- author of our upcoming book Schmoozing with Terrorists -- discussed the terrorist death threat against Madonna and Britney Spears with Fox News Channel's Neil Cavuto.

Hoffa warns against NAU

2007-09-14T15:30:00.000-07:00

Teamsters president James P. Hoffa has become the latest public figure to endorse the North American Union (NAU) hypothesis put forward in The Late Great U.S.A., Jerome R. Corsi's latest NYT bestseller. In an interview conducted by Corsi for WND, Hoffa states:

I think the Bush administration has a master plan to erase all borders and to have a super-government in North America. There's talk about mega-ports down in Mexico and superhighway toll roads built with foreign money right into the heart of America.

Eagle Forum, Phyllis Schlafly's organization, has also created an NAU page on its website.

You can't touch this

2007-09-13T10:33:00.000-07:00

The NY Sun reports that Hillary Clinton's archived records might be eligible for Freedom of Information Act requests by year's end, although that doesn't necessarily mean that anyone will be able to see them. According to the Sun:

Since the Clinton Library's records became available for public request last year, only four requests have been completed and released to the public. Three of those consist only of photographs...

[M]ore than 10 million pages of records are awaiting processing in response to 266 pending requests. It appears that it will take years or perhaps even decades to clear the 10 million-page backlog.

Maybe all that redacting caused a shortage of markers throughout the southeast, thus creating the backlog?

Terrorists say the darndest things

2007-09-11T18:36:00.000-07:00

TMZ has a post entitled "Terrorists Threaten to Kill Britney and Madonna?!" that features a brief audio clip of Aaron Klein (author of our upcoming book Schmoozing with Terrorists)interviewing an Islamofascist about his plans for the pop singers.

Aaron also recently visited several representatives from Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade to learn more about the suicide bomber's hope of 72 virgins in the afterlife. This animated slide show captures some of that riveting conversation.

Never Forget

2007-09-11T11:51:00.000-07:00

Supply-siders and the Mexican truck debate

2007-09-11T10:22:00.000-07:00

Last week Mexican trucks began rolling across the U.S. border in a program authorized by the Dept. of Transportation, and this came in spite of the opposition of an eclectic coalition of Teamsters, environmentalists, and national sovereignty advocates. According to a recent NewsMax article, "Canadian trucks have free passage throughout the U.S. but the DOT has never certified Mexican trucks, until now, in response to a 2000 demand from a NAFTA tribunal which upheld Mexican complaints."

Jerome Corsi, author of our NYT bestseller The Late Great U.S.A.: The Coming Merger with Mexico and Canada, told NewsMax: "The White House lobbied the Senate Transportation Committee to not hold hearings on the Senate version of the bill."Corsi went on to add:

The DEA constantly finds Mexican trucks smuggling drugs, human beings and who knows what kind of contraband. There is massive organized criminal smuggling activity going on at the border. If al-Qaida gets into this mix, we will have a nightmare. You could have nuclear weapons, dirty bombs or terrorists in those trucks, and no one would ever know.

Since today is Sept. 11, I will simply note that Corsi raises a valid concern. The abdication of sovereignty to a North American Union (NAU) that he discusses in his book is indeed a massive security risk.

But rather than dwell on the national security implications of this issue, I'm going to shift gears and briefly comment on the economics. It seems like the specific issues surrounding the NAU debate such as Mexican trucks are often being framed as an argument between pro-growth supply-siders (who support free trade) and paleo-conservatives (who favor protecting domestic industries). This strikes me as the wrong way to think about the issue. In my opinion, the entire conservative movement ought to be of a single mind on issues relating to the NAU and it has little to do with trade policy.

Being pro-growth doesn't mean mean being pro-NAU. As a supply-sider myself, I support free trade for the simple reason that tariffs are a tax on our own consumers. They also lead to a misallocation of resources by effectively subsidizing inefficient industries. But there is no reason that national sovereignty needs to be thrown away for the sake of lowering tariffs. America can lower its trade barriers through bilateral and multilateral negotiations (and, heck, unilaterally if we want to!) without the oversight of any super-national entity.

In fact, any such regulatory body would surely undermine the free trade benefits that came along with it. If you build a super-state and stock it with bureaucrats whose job is to regulate, they will regulate! Look at Brussels. The net effect is a less free, less productive economy. So in a sense the debate over Mexican trucks seems to me to be a proxy for a far more monumental issue: the question of whether Washington (like Europe before it) is gradually ceding sovereignty to a patchwork of regulatory bodies that could some day morph into an NAU. And on this issue, conservatives of all flavors should be in agreement.

Kathleen Willey manuscript stolen, blames Clinton operatives

2007-09-10T11:26:00.000-07:00

As most of you have probably heard, a week ago World Ahead author Kathleen Willey's home was broken into, and the thief stole a copy of her manuscript while leaving electronics and other valuables untouched. The burglary has eerie similarities to the intimidation campaign aimed at Kathleen a decade ago, prompting her to assert that operatives working for Bill and Hillary Clinton were likely behind it.

News of the break-in was first reported by WND reporter Art Moore, and subsequent articles ran in the NY Post, Fox News, Kansas City Star, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, and Richmond Style. The timing of the robbery raised eyebrows, given that it happened just a few days after the book resurfaced in the media (which I blogged last week), including another item in the Post that alluded to "campaign-finance violations."

Earlier today WND ran an update by Moore revealing that David Schippers, the chief counsel for impeachment, was targeted with multiple break-ins of his house in 2000 while he was writing his book, Sellout. While no valuables were taken, the thief nabbed Schippers's manuscript notes, and he believes someone tried to hack into his computer. Shippers also tells Moore that authors Jayna Davis and Gary Aldrich found themselves in similar circumstances.

Author to moderate Republican presidential debate

2007-09-05T14:28:00.000-07:00

Joseph Farah, author of our book Stop the Presses!: The Inside Story of the New Media Revolution and founder of WorldNetDaily, has been asked to moderate the GOP presidential debate in Florida on Sept. 17. Farah and debate organizers will be including questions from a host of conservative thought leaders as well as the public:

Questions will also come from 40 of America's leaders including: Paul Weyrich, founder and president of the Free Congress Foundation; Phyllis Schlafly, founder and president of Eagle Forum; Don Wildmon, founder and chairman of the American Family Association; Judge Roy Moore, a WND columnist with the Foundation for Moral Law; Rick Scarborough of Vision America; and Mat Staver of Liberty Council.

In addition, the group is soliciting questions in advance from the public. It has an e-mail address where they can be sent directly.

Kathleen Willey book has Hillary Clinton in sites

2007-09-04T12:25:00.000-07:00

Last week a couple of media outlets reported on our upcoming book by Kathleen Willey, Target: Caught in the Crosshairs of Bill and Hillary Clinton. The book will be available on Nov. 27 (Amazon has the wrong pub date) and it will include some shocking new disclosures about the war of intimidation that the Clintons and their surrogates waged against Willey.

US News & World Report's Washington Whispers first broke the news that Target will hit bookstores this fall, and the NY Daily News also notes that the book includes revelations about threats and shady campaign finance dealings.

This is not a book that simply recounts Bill's sexual assault of Kathleen. It contains important information that links Hillary to the campaign to silence Willey, and it will no doubt be much discussed as the presidential primaries draw near. (I'm sure that Hillary has "plumbers" already hard at work.)

5th anniversary of WND Books

2007-09-04T12:18:00.000-07:00

Congratulations to our friends at WorldNetDaily on the 5th anniversary of WND Books. As the article I've linked to notes, WND Books has published many bestsellers and influential titles during its first half-decade in existence. World Ahead is proud to be WorldNetDaily's exclusive partner on this imprint.

Greenpeace co-founder says use more trees, not less

2007-08-29T16:50:00.000-07:00

The Vancouver Sun has a fascinating editorial by Patrick Moore, the co-founder of Greenpeace, who argues that environmentalists concerned about global warming should advocate growth of the timber industry:

...Rather than cutting fewer trees and using less wood, DiCaprio and Berman ought to promote the growth of more trees and the use of more wood.
Trees are the most powerful concentrators of carbon on Earth. Through photosynthesis, they absorb CO2 from the atmosphere and store it in their wood, which is nearly 50 per cent carbon by weight...

To address climate change, we must use more wood, not less. Using wood sends a signal to the marketplace to grow more trees and to produce more wood. That means we can then use less concrete, steel and plastic -- heavy carbon emitters through their production. Trees are the only abundant, biodegradable and renewable global resource.

In other words, trees trap in carbon. By cutting down trees and using the wood in buildings and furniture, we're trapping carbon in a solid form. Moore also notes that young forests remove more carbon dioxide from the air than old growth forests. (So that means it's a good thing that we're going to print our global warming kid's book, The Sky's Not Falling, on non-recycled paper.)

Moore also mentioned another fact that is worth calling out:

North Americans are the world's largest per-capita wood consumers and yet our forests cover approximately the same area of land as they did 100 years ago.
According to the United Nations, our forests have expanded nearly 100 million acres over the past decade.

Bush says "conspiracy theorists" behind Late Great USA

2007-08-21T19:37:00.000-07:00

President Bush, at a summit with his counterparts from Mexico and Canada, dismissed the idea that a North American Union (NAU) could be in the works. A reporter from Fox News asked him to categorically deny that plans for an NAU or a NAFTA superhighway were underway. The transcript of Bush's reply shows that he side-stepped the issue and gave an indirect response.

Meanwhile, the 3rd printing of the NYT bestseller The Late Great U.S.A. -- the book by Jerome Corsi that first shined the light of day on the NAU concept -- has just shipped from the printer. It is showing up as "in stock" once again at both Amazon and B&N.com, and plenty of copies are currently in route to bookstores across the country.

Pat Schroeder wrong to claim conservatives don't read

2007-08-21T16:45:00.000-07:00

Former congresswoman and still-liberal Pat Schroeder -- who holds the position of president of the American Association of Publishers -- claims that liberals read more books than conservatives because the latter "just wants a couple slogans: 'No, don't raise my taxes, no new taxes'...on every page." Schroeder was commenting on an AP-Ipsos poll that "found people who consider themselves liberals are more prodigious book readers than conservatives."

This strikes me as an ill-advised statement by Schroeder given that she's the head of a non-partisan trade organization that should not be alienating one-third of the country's population, especially since overall industry sales numbers remain flat. Of course, since liberals face the ever-present imperative of establishing their own intellectual superiority lest their belief system die,* it's easy to understand why Schroeder shot off her mouth over this poll. But when one takes a moment to study the poll, problems with her flippant interpretation become apparent. To quote the AP again:

Among those who had read at least one book, liberals typically read nine books in the year, with half reading more than that and half less. Conservatives typically read eight, moderates five.
By slightly wider margins, Democrats tended to read more books than Republicans and independents. There were no differences by political party in the percentage of those who said they had not read at least one book.

When you break down these statements, it becomes apparent that Schroeder's claim is full of sound and fury but signifying nothing. To wit:

Self-identified Republicans are just as likely to be book readers as self-identified Democrats.
The average self-identified conservative book reader consumes about the same number of books per year (eight) as the self-identified liberal (nine). Given the poll's sample size, I doubt there is much statistical difference in these averages, and plus the averages don't control for page length, difficulty, etc.
The breakdown Schroeder cites doesn't control for children. Parents are more likely to be conservative than adults who don't have children, and raising kids cuts into reading time. Controlling for this key variable would be necessary if we're to arrive at statistically accurate comparisons across groups.
Similarly, the poll's breakdown doesn't control for religion. A second AP article on the poll noted "those who said they never attend religious services read nearly twice as many as those who attend frequently." But that doesn't mean that religious people (who are disproportionately conservative) don't read. To the contrary, the same article notes that the "Bible and religious works were read by two-thirds in the survey, more than all other categories." Religious people read, but they're reading the Bible. And frequent Bible reading is going to bring down the average quantity of books consumed per year.
The poll can't surmise cause and effect. Liberals surely consume more indie art-house flicks, watch more hours of CNN, and are more likely to subscribe to the NYT. But these media convey a left-wing editorial perspective. Likewise, if the big New York publishers crank out a disproportionate number of liberal books, doesn't it follow that liberals will disproportionately buy them?

Simply put, the poll results Schroeder cites simply don't support the clumsy conclusion she is advancing. How ironic.

* To quote Thomas Sowell, "The welfare state is not really about the welfare of the masses. It is about the egos of the elites." Liberalism calls for top-down management of society by self-declared elites who desire to manage the lives of the ignorant little people who cannot take care of themselves and therefore tend to fall prey to the greedy, duplicitous "rich." But in order to make the case for being entrusted with lordship of society through centralization, elites must constantly assert their own intellectual superiority -- not just to advocate liberalism over competing ideas, but also to establish their bona fides.

Father denounces Islamic symbolism in Flight 93 memorial

2007-08-20T18:29:00.000-07:00

The Associated Press reports that the father of one of the heroes of Flight 93 is now calling for his son's name to be withheld from the memorial being planned at the crash site. According to the article:

Tom Burnett Sr. served on a jury that picked the winning design, originally named "Crescent of Embrace," and said the request was "something I'd rather not do, but I can't get anyone to listen."...

Burnett, of Northfield, Minn., said he is looking for is a "thorough, honest investigation" of the design and the elements discussed by Alec Rawls, a conservative blogger from Palo Alto, Calif. Burnett said many of his concerns were based on Rawls' theories.

Rawls says the planned memorial faces toward Mecca, Islam's holiest city, and contends that a planned 93-foot tower with wind chimes would act as an Islamic sundial.

I summarized Rawls's disturbing hypothesis about the Flight 93 memorial in a blog post last month. World Ahead is planning to release a book by Rawls entitled Crescent of Betrayal: Dishonoring the Heroes of Flight 93 this fall.

Terrorist book lands in gossip column

2007-08-17T18:29:00.000-07:00

Cindy Adams at the NY Post takes note of WND Books' upcoming release, Schmoozing with Terrorists, in her column. Why would a current events book attract the attention of a gossip columnist? To quote Adams:

Our sworn enemies tell Mideast-based, 20-something U.S. journalist Aaron Klein who they'd like in the White House, kvetch over showbiz types like Madonna, Britney, Spielberg, Mel Gibson, bigmouths Jane Fonda and Sean Penn and conservative talkers Limbaugh and Hannity, plus Richard Gere, who did a commercial urging Palestinians to vote. Well, they did. And elected Hamas.