Should Republicans go ahead and add Supreme Court Justices to head off Democrats

The hyena press

Thomas Sowell:

Two questions would destroy at least half the agenda of the political left: "Compared to what?" and "At what cost?"

A third question would wipe out most of the rest of the left's agenda and demolish the vision behind that agenda: "What hard evidence do you have?"

It is not just the left's agenda on economics, race or the environment that cannot withstand a serious examination in the light of these questions. The whole current endless carrying-on in the media about prison abuses in Iraq could not stand up under these questions.

No one defends the abuse of Iraqi prisoners or thinks that those who are guilty should get off without punishment. But compared to what?

Senator Ted Kennedy compares what happened in the prison to what happened under Saddam Hussein, suggesting that it is the same thing, just "under American management." People in Iraq don't seem to think so -- and they know from personal experience what it was like under Saddam.

The distinguished British magazine The Economist, despite its own editorial outrage, reports that Iraqis are not nearly as upset as Americans or Europeans, and are in fact somewhat puzzled at how we have gone ballistic over this episode.

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With a guerrilla and terrorist war going on in Iraq, nuclear weapons being made in North Korea, and American troops deployed in countries around the world, do those who are calling for Secretary Rumsfeld's head think that he should be trying to keep track of every sparrow's fall down at the level of individual privates and non-coms in the army?

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Why do we conduct trials if not to find out what happened? This is not some scandal covered up by the military and unearthed by the media. The military reported all of this months ago, and the media only went ballistic over it after photos became available.

The military hasn't even delayed a court martial. In the civilian world, Scott Peterson was arrested before all this happened in Iraq and his trial still has not yet begun, while the court martial of the Iraqi soldiers will begin this month.