"with a concentration in war, revolution and the state."

I would like to see a list of qualifications for becoming editor of the Weekly Standard. I mean, a high level of education isn't required (just a senior paper, not a thesis or god forbid a dissertation), nor is life experience (though being a Princeton frat boy probably helps, and Nintendo skills), nor even a degree in journalism (to be an editor yet!).

Given the apparent lack of Weekly Standard standards, I think George Bush could become editor there.

(I could be way late with this on the forum, but don't have time to read all the posts)

According to the NYT, linked through my signature: "Mr. Obama also was poised to name Cass R. Sunstein, an American legal scholar, to an existing White House post as the administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. A transition official said late Wednesday that Mr. Sunstein would oversee government regulations and devise new approaches for government efficiencies."

Would these efficiencies include more efficient ways of warrantless spying on Americans, more cost-efficient ways to violate the Constitution and take away civil liberties? Yeah, I know, I'm being cynical. But really, aren't there lots of efficiency experts who don't favor immunity for corporations (not to mention government officials) who commit federal felonies?

I mean the IQ kind, like that which Kondracke displays when he writes, "the country was kept safe ever since 9/11. There has not been an attack. These people did what they did under orders and with patriotism. And Obama should make it clear that none of them is going to be held to account for what they did."

Two huge problems with this kind of thinking: He offers zero proof to connect the lack of an attack since 9/11 with anything the administration has done, legal or illegal. How could he? It's all secret. In these circumstances, the government could say anything - and there Kondracke would be, parroting away. Parrots are intelligent, no doubt, but in a bird-brain kind of way, and after all these years of journalistic disaster I have to wonder if a pundit is just some species of parrot.

The second, bigger problem is history and the failure of the pundits - the loudest chatterers of their class - to absorb its meaning. The language is certainly plain enough: "The fact that a person acted pursuant to order of his Government or of a superior does not relieve him from responsibility under international law, provided a moral choice was in fact possible to him." Exactly how clear does language have to be for a pundit-parrot to comprehend it?

Instead, Kondracke buys fully into Kit Bond's take on Nuremburg - that is, as if it had never happened. If the government tells you to do it, well, then, you do it. Even if, as Bond says, the government is wrong.

This is the kind of thinking intelligent minds produce? Well, my question is: How did such a bunch of literal and moral dummies ever come to run our government and news media? I don't watch them and I don't vote for them, and so I have to turn and ask that question of tens of millions of voters. The buck stops right in their living rooms and voting booths. In raising people like Kondracke, Bond and the rest of these subnormal thinkers to power and prominence, my fellow Americans have badly failed the country, the world, the Constitution, themselves, and their fellow citizens. And in doing so, they've rained untold horror, misery, destruction, and moral disaster on the entire planet.