Here's a look at the blogosphere's reactions to the work of the Times'
Opinion Manufacturing Division this week: The Real Clear World blog responds to Andrew Bacevich's op-ed on the White House's overlooking of strategy in Afghanistan and Iraq in favor of tactics: These commitments, and the expectations they produce both at home and
abroad, have successfully bound three post Cold War administrations and
look to be binding a fourth. They inherit a grand strategy by default.
Musings, a blog discussing culture, politics, and education, took offense at the Opinion L.A piece about Amnesty International's recent report that accused Israel of "wanton destruction" and Hamas of "war crimes" in the December conflict in the Gaza Strip. The writer disagreed with the post's assertion that both sides were blamed, saying that the report's full text put much more blame on Israel for the war. The Oy Vay blog, featuring the voice of a self-proclaimed Jewish conservative on various issues, liked Patt Morrison's post on her disgust with the cash-strapped city of Los Angeles' commitment to using taxpayer money to pay for the security detail for Michael Jackson's funeral. And the Opinion L.A. poll urging fans to boo Manny's return to Dodger Stadium on July 16 made it onto the Major League Baseball's Fanhouse blog: As for Manny, I'm sure there will be some Dodger fans who boo him when
he comes back to Los Angeles, but I'm pretty sure the vast majority of
them will welcome him with open arms. The fact of the matter is that
steroids and performance-enhancing drugs are just a part of what
baseball has become these days, and with all the players who have been
outed as "cheaters" in recent years, nobody is very shocked by it.
Pamela Geller's Atlas Shrugged blog praised John Bolton's op-ed piece that stated the only way to fix Iran is to institute regime change in the country: Back when sanity was in order, fine, decent men governed. Today they
stand on the sidelines, hoping against hope that free men will wake up
and heed their words of caution, much like Churchill when he too was
cast into the wilderness. John Bolton wrote such words yesterday in the
LA Times in his exceptional op-ed: The only answer for Iran is regime change.
The War Victims Monitor blog re-posted, sans comment, Ahmed Rashid's op-ed on Pakistan's more serious commitment to getting rid of the Taliban and its influences, and the need for strong international support to complete a successful campaign against the militants. Ron Radosh of Pajamas Media was not a fan of the L.A. Times' coverage of I.F. Stone, both in the op-ed section and the book reviews, implying that the paper overlooked the unsavory parts of the journalist and radical's past. The Los Angeles Times proved to be the most sycophantic. First, it ran an op-ed
by Guttenplan himself heralding Stone as one of America’s greatest
journalists and radicals. Guttenplan charges that the news that Stone
was a Soviet agent between 1936 and 1939 was based “on the flimsiest of
evidence” and that he has been a “hate figure to the far right.” To
those who understand the past, Guttenplan writes, “he remains a hero.” The Guardian UK's Haroon Siddique included Michael Carey's op-ed on the beginning of Sarah Palin's end in a wrap-up of skeptical articles regarding the Alaska governor's motives for resigning abruptly. Finally, a few blogs picked up on Jonah Goldberg's column about the Washington Post salon, which charged $25,000 a ticket for dinner at publisher Katharine Weymouth's home and promised networking with top Obama administration officials and the Post reporters who cover them. The Open Secrets blog linked to Goldberg's piece in their rehashing of the Post's response that claimed they would amend any business practices that weren't clear. And Chicago Boyz, a blog composed of many different voices, said the following about WaPo after linking to the column: This sort of thing is done all the time by newspapers with their foot in
the White House press room door. But this time around it was just a bit
too blatant to pass the smell test. The wage slaves in the WaPo’s very
own bullpen, the ink stained wretches that are never invited to any of
the best shindigs because they are “gray people”, screamed bloody
murder. No one had asked them, they claimed. HA! Like anyone who spends their days in a newspaper’s board room on the top floor would ask what a reporter thought when bucks were on the line!
 Today's memorial service for Michael Jackson at the privately owned Staples Center reminds The Times editorial board of a sad fact of life in Los Angeles: It's a city without a public square. Though the backers of LA Live once promised that the downtown entertainment mall would become L.A.'s version of Times Square, the fact remains that it's a private space whose owners can bar the public anytime they choose.
We also weigh in on President Obama's trip to Russia, which isn't expected to accomplish much -- but even a small thaw in relations between the two countries, and the modest improvement represented by the nuclear weapons pact concluded Monday, is better than the chilly status quo.
And we ponder the lessons to be learned from the example of former Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, who died Monday at 93. Though many see parallels between the mistakes made in Iraq and the mistakes made by McNamara in Vietnam, we think the larger lesson is that using yesterday's solutions to today's problems is often the pathway to failure.
Over on the opposite page, columnist Jonah Goldberg thinks all the sturm und drang over the canceled "salons" by the Washington Post, in which lobbyists were invited to pay heavily to attend get-togethers with the newspaper's journalists and top politicians, amounts to little more than posing. After all, many publications offer similar meet-and-greet opportunities, Goldberg says.
The hand-wringing over genetically modified foods, meanwhile, reminds author Tom Standage of another food-related hysteria from a few centuries ago -- over the potato. When the tubers were first discovered in the New World, Europeans feared they were a dangerous, unholy poison. They got over it, just as they'll probably eventually get over their irrational fears about improved crops.
And psychiatry professor Sander L. Gilman cautions against jumping to conclusions about Michael Jackson's cosmetic surgery. True, the King of Pop clearly was fond of surgical reshaping, but that doesn't necessarily indicate self-loathing.
* Illustration by Bob Daly / For the Times
 On the Op-Ed page today, Paul VanDevelder, author of "Savages and Scoundrels: The Untold Story of America's Road to Empire Through Indian Territory," discusses an impending ruling by U.S. District Judge James Redden in Oregon that may determine the fate of salmon in the Columbia and Snake rivers. VanDevelder argues that dam removal is the best option for the salmon's survival, but it's also the most politically turbulent:
The Columbia-Snake corridor is the salmon's only option for survival,
and Redden is probably their last hope. He is the one person in this
entire drama who is legally obligated to use science and the law to
protect the fish from extinction and from the whims of politicians. If
the law and science are unable to trump politics to save this fishery
-- a fishery that was the most productive in the world just two
generations ago -- how will we ever meet the towering challenges posed
by global climate change?
Read on »
Harsh words for former and current Republicans in today's Letters to the editor.
 First, La Verne's Mitchell Harris slams Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter for switching to the Democratic party. He writes:
Sen. Arlen Specter is becoming a Democrat because he can only win reelection as a Democrat.
Wow. Talk about raw moral courage. Remember John F. Kennedy's book, "Profiles in Courage"? It was about senators Kennedy admired because they did what they thought was right -- no matter the cost. Maybe somebody should send a copy to Specter.
Most of the Democrats I know are Democrats because they agree with the positions of the Democratic Party. Not Specter. Belief, conviction, ideals be damned. His party affiliation is based strictly on whatever advances his political power.
At least he's honest (or stupid) enough to admit he's unprincipled.
The Times also heard from dozens of readers who disliked the pairing, on Tuesday's Opinion pages, of pieces by conservatives Jonah Goldberg and James Kirchick. David Salahi, of Laguna Niguel, offers a typical sentiment:
Tuesday on the Op-Ed page, James Kirchick castigates President Obama for his "obsequious behavior" and Jonah Goldberg takes him to task for his "arrogance" and "hubris."
I never could understand the thinking of the far right. Now I'm beginning to wonder if they understand their own thinking.
In any case, Kirchick gets it wrong when he lambastes Obama for apologizing to countries around the world. The U.S. has a lot of apologizing to do for our numerous offenses under the Bush administration, including waging an unwarranted war and torture.
Obama needs to make a clear break with the blustering unilateralism of the previous administration to regain the support of other countries.
But a few readers liked the Op-Eds, including Mike MacDonald, of North Hills:
Is there a chance the Obama-hugging media can actually see what is going on?
The Obama administration's direction is appallingly anti-American. The apology tour was a disgrace. The appointment of tax evaders was pathetic. The hand in the management change at General Motors was socialism in America. The unbelievable spending will result in skyrocketing taxes for years and years.
Thank you, Times, for the two down-to-earth pieces. Let's get this Obama honeymoon over with. I've got to get back to work. There are taxes to pay.
Clearing the air about trucking, Pontiac's demise, and memories of Vietnam, too.
Photo: President Obama and Sen. Specter on Wednesday. Credit: Mannie Garcia/Bloomberg News.
 During the week ending April 25, The Times received 655 usable letters, 336 of which were in our Top Five Topics. Fallout from the Bush Administration torture memos dominated our mailbag, making up more than a quarter of the usable mail we received.
Torture: 169 letters, reacting to Times coverage of the CIA's harsh interrogation techniques;
Pirates: 54 letters, on the pirates off the coast of Africa;
Obama in Latin America: 47 letters, responding to this article and this article, as well as others, about Obama's travels the previous week;
Jews, genes, and IQ: 43 letters, reacting to this Column One story about the link between IQ and genetics in European Jews; and
Villaraigosa's budget: 23 letters, responding to this piece about the mayor's budget proposal. Many letter writers were bothered by the mayor's calling some veteran city employees "deadwood".
How the Top Five is tabulated: Each week, your letters maven receives thousands of e-mails, dozens of letters through the good old U.S. postal service, and even a few faxes here and there.
After she cuts out spam, obscene mail, letters addressed to more than one recipient, letters that seem to be the fruit of letter-writing campaigns and letters with attachments (which gum up our computer systems,) she is usually left with several hundred eligible items, represented in the Letters Top Five tally. From these, she selects the somewhere around 100 that get published in the newspaper. Faxes and snail mail are not reflected in the chart.
For more on The Times' letters process, visit our Letters FAQ online.
 The Obama administration has abandoned the "war on terror" -- semantically, that is -- and author Reza Aslan says good riddance. In a pointed Op-Ed, Aslan argues that the phrase was counterproductive:
By lumping together the disparate forces, movements, armies, ideas and grievances of the greater Muslim world, from Morocco to Malaysia; by placing them in a single category ("enemy"), assigning them a single identity ("terrorist"); and by countering them with a single strategy (war), the Bush administration seemed to be making a blatant statement that the war on terror was, in fact, "a war against Islam."
That is certainly how the conflict has been viewed by a majority in four major Muslim countries -- Egypt, Morocco, Pakistan and Indonesia -- in a worldpublicopinion.org poll in 2007. Nearly two-thirds of respondents said they believe that the purpose of the war on terror is to "spread Christianity in the region" of the Middle East.
Also on the Op-Ed page, former Justice Department attorney David B. Rivkin Jr. bemoans the U.S. Supreme Court's decision to examine a West Virginia Supreme Court judge's refusal to recuse himself from a case involving his largest campaign contributor, and columnist Tim Rutten calls on the Los Angeles Unified School District to entrust its over-budget and behind-schedule arts campus downtown to a competent charter-school company.
On the other side of the Opinion divide, the Times editorial board again urges Washington to push Iraqi's Shiite-led government to reconcile with former Sunni insurgents. It shows little sympathy for former Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), despite the prosecutorial misconduct that contributed to his defeat at the polls in November. And it calls on Sacramento to scrutinize why medical care costs in the workers' compensation system are rising so rapidly:
...[T]he mechanisms that insurers use to keep a lid on healthcare expenses are becoming increasingly expensive. And no wonder -- in the overhauled workers' comp system, more people are likely to review an injured worker's paperwork than his X-rays.
Credit: Anthony Russo For The Times
 The Times editorial page sums up President Obama's tour of Europe and Turkey as an impressive show that won the president accolades, but very little else; Obama's hopes for more stimulus spending by the G-20, more troops for Afghanistan and more condemnation of North Korea's nuclear ambitions went largely unrealized. We also find much to like in Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates' military budget proposal, which aims to shift the emphasis from fighting big conventional wars to taking on insurgencies like the ones in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Gates and Obama hardly aim to disarm America, but there's no question that they intend to buy less ammo. Given that the United States spends nearly as much on defense as every other country on Earth combined, that's not a bad plan.
Finally, The Times praises Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's efforts to wrest sacrifices from city employees, who must accept pay cuts in this tough economy if they want to avoid widescale layoffs that would only worsen local unemployment.
Over on the Op-Ed page, American Prospect associate editor Ezra Klein compares "nationalized" healthcare systems in Britain and Canada to the private health system in the U.S., and finds that both systems find ways to ration care. The choice comes down to occasional waiting times for elective surgery, or excluding many people from getting care at all:
So although Britain and Canada have decided that no one will go without, even if some must occasionally wait, the U.S. has decided that most of those who can't afford care simply won't get it.
Columnist Jonah Goldberg assails the Obama administration for opening its arms to the discredited United Nations Human Rights Council, a pack of nations that ignores rampant human rights abuses in places like Sudan and Cuba while taking every opportunity to condemn Israel. Rather than trying to change this reprehensible group from the inside, Obama should cut all ties and delegitimize it by ignoring it. And novelist Susan Straight finds that her husband's simple advice to the girls' basketball team he coaches applies as much to everyday life as it does to the court.
Editorial cartoon by Lisa Benson / Washington Post Writers Group
The editorial board continues to parse President Obama's budget intentions, noting that though his blueprint is indeed transparent about the costs of the Iraq war, it is less forthright about the probably near-term future of the economy. The board also bemoans fractured immigration policies that provide residency to some refugees but not others, and sides with a student who gave a religiously-based speech in class about his views against same-sex marriage, after which he allegedly was taken to task by the professor. As long as he was opposing same-sex marriage on religious grounds -- and not harassing individual students -- he was making an argument that figured prominently in the public debate about Proposition 8. It's not an argument this page finds persuasive, but we wouldn't try to suppress it. Neither should a college preparing students to live in a contentious democracy.
On the other side of the fold, political journalist Marc Cooper chides Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa for his fuzzy response to questions about whether he will commit to serving out a full second term if he is elected. Take a pass on running for governor and pay full attention to the city's tremendous needs, Cooper advises. And Joel Stein reflects on how everyone loves science, until it contradicts what they want to believe. People on the far right don't believe in evolution, global warming or doing stem cell research. Most of their opposition is rooted in the fact that these ideas challenge the Bible, which is the oldest book they know. I'm guessing Greek conservatives are OK with killing your dad and making love to your mom.
But since I moved to L.A., I've discovered that liberals hate science just as much as conservatives, and they talk about it a lot more. They'll reject any study that contradicts their Mother-Nature-is-perfect myth, which is oddly similar to the conservatives' thesis."
 Friday's Letters to the editor features responses to this column by Tim Rutten urging Barack Obama to authorize the release of photos of soldiers' coffins arriving at Dover Air Force Base.
Most correspondents think it's a bad idea. Ned Rice, of Marina Del Rey, cites politics: As usual, Tim Rutten's column is interesting, thoroughly researched, well written -- and totally wrong.
The government's ban on the release of photos or video of the remains of American soldiers was instituted in 1991 for one simple, compelling reason: The United States of America does not desecrate its war dead.
If President Obama lifts this ban, we can expect to see these sacred images in shrill, partisan attack ads, from both Rutten's side of the aisle and mine, that would exploit our fallen heroes -- their bodies, mind you -- for craven political purposes.
As Rutten observes, the American people are not infants. We do not require visual aids to understand the costs of war, nor cynical media campaigns to comprehend what is meant by the last full measure of devotion. Here's hoping that our new president, in his infinite wisdom, does not add the lifting of this ban to his already impressive list of blunders.
Gail Johnson-Roth, of Los Angeles, brings up more personal concerns: My survey of families of the fallen indicates that more than 90% say no to taking pictures of flag-covered coffins before families can have a private moment to welcome their hero home.
My son, Spc. Daniel P. Cagle, died in Iraq in May 2007. I want to remember how and why he lived, what he fought for and his bravery. Families deserve those first moments out of the public eye to say their final hellos and goodbyes.
Yes, people should remember that these young men and women sacrifice everything for us here at home -- but let us remember why they lived. Do not reduce their service to a flag-draped box. My son believed in what he was doing, and I believe in him.
Reacting to this Op-Ed by former Bush speechwriter Marc A. Thiessen, Sherman Oaks' William Seaton questions whether worrying much about Al Qaeda trying to bring down the U.S. financial system is the best target for American vigilance: After the subprime fiasco, Wall Street greed and deregulation gone amok, [Osama] Bin Laden will need several dozen nuclear-tipped missiles to do more damage than we have already inflicted on ourselves.
While we are trying to hunt down some robed fanatics in Afghanistan and Pakistan, we might want to spend a little more time keeping an eye on the financial terrorists at home who move from the boardroom to the trading floor to congressional chambers, wearing the clever disguise of a suit and a tie.
More on California's budget, antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and plans to run "green" transmission lines through the desert, too.
Photo: Coffins carrying U.S. military personnel arriving at Dover Air Force Base. Credit: Reuters.
Some of your employees are facing manslaughter charges. Your biggest customers just yanked your contracts.
How do you repair your image and your reputation?
Simple: change your name and cover your tracks.
The Outfit Formerly Known as Blackwater, the huge military contracting and consulting firm, made its bones and its less-than-salubrious name in Iraq. And now it wants to unmake its notoriety. It is changing its name to Xe.
Pronounced Z. Or maybe "zed," depending on what part of the world you're in.
In a memo to employees, Blackwater/Xe president Gary Jackson says the switch "reflects the change in company focus away from the business of providing private security." To providing what now, exactly? Frosted cupcakes?
Xe is on the periodic charts at atomic number 54; it stands for xenon, a "noble gas" like fellow elements krypton and neon.
The Outfit Formerly Known as Blackwater now joins the ranks of the rebranded, along with Altria, a bland, content-free name used to make people forget that its real name and mission was Philip Morris, cigarette maker.
Whatever they choose to call it, for an awful lot of people, here and in Iraq, Blackwater's name will always be mud.
Photo: April 4, 2004 file photo of Blackwater USA employees involved in a firefight in Najaf. Credit: AP Photo/Gervasio Sanchez
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