So, like all good lefty bloggers, I’m reading Eric Alterman‘s What Liberal Media?. (Buy the book here and support the great work of TalkLeft.)

I’m enjoying Chapter 6 and his dissection of the conservative punditocracy, especially his eviscerating of Charles Murray’s The Bell Curve. (No, I haven’t read the book — and I won’t link to it. Nor have I read the “Protocols of the Elders…”, which Timothy McVeigh found so enlightening. That doesn’t mean I have no right to regard it as a bad book — even if Alterman hadn’t made clear how bad it is.)

Anyway, on page 102, in his criticism of Dinesh D’Souza’s The End of Racism (won’t link there, either), he mentions how D’Souza’s history is

For their own safety. Amazing how racists like Coble and D’Souza and so many others are always committing their evil acts with the good of others in their hearts.

He still doesn’t get it. A week after he declared his support for Japanese-American internment during World War II, Representative Howard Coble (R-NC) still hasn’t apologized for his remarks. (Unless you consider one of those “I regret you found my words offensive” statements an apology — I don’t.)

Neither does Professor Eric Muller, whose “IsThatLegal?” blog has been staying on top of the story. Coble claimed he would apologize if he were shown proof that the internment was not for the Japanese-Americans’ own safety. Muller faxed him the proof and has posted a number of scanned copies of documents relating to the internment which definitely show that it wasn’t for the internees’ own safety. No word from Coble.

Orcinus, the website of journalist David Neiwert, is another great source of info on the Coble affair, including strong refutation of the claim that the Magic cables (intercepted Japanese diplomatic communication from before the attack on Pearl Harbor) had anything to do with the decision to inter the 120,000 Japanese-Americans (as well as 15,000 German-Americans and Italian-Americans, as reported in this article.) He also reinforces the Monkey Media Report‘s discussion of FDR’s personal racism and the general prejudices against Asian-Americans of the time.

Moving from stupidity to stupidity, Coble has also refused to meet with Rep. Mike Honda, D-CA, Rep. Robert Matsui, D-CA, and Rep. David Wu, D-OR to discuss with him their “…concerns for the appropriate balance of homeland security and constitutional civil rights…” This is an appropriate topic for discussion with the newly appointed chairman of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security.

The criticisms of Coble and petitions for his removal are coming from all over the map, and it is a testament to the seriousness of this issue that we find the Arab-American Institute and the Jewish Anti-Defamation League on the same side of the debate. However, as several commentators have pointed out, not a word of Coble criticism has come from the leadership of the Republican party. Their feeling must be, “Lott’s gone, let’s move on.”

One last frightening note: there are probably some good people in North Carolina, but they’re being very quiet. Coble’s office reports “…80 percent to 90 percent of e-mails and letters Coble received were either supportive of his position or believed he was being unfairly criticized.” Now what state did Jesse Helms hail from?

Okay, it’s not really a game, as the author, Dermot O’Connor says:

It’s actually a very funny — and scary — scenario of what could happen in a Second Gulf War, taking into account nearly all the players, including Kurds, Turks, Taliban, Pakistani and Saudi Islamists, Egyptians, Hamas, Palestinians, Israelis and Brits. (The one significant group it does leave out is Europe, but maybe that scenario will show up in Gulf War 3.)

The artwork is really good and the caricatures of the Bushistas are spot-on. (While you’re there, check out his “Ashcroft Online (AOL)” movie, for a glimpse of the newest ISP.)

Dermot’s getting tons of email about the game since CNN and other media started pointing it out, (but since the game is only a 97K Flash file, the load doesn’t seem to be delaying the site access.) He shares some of the mail on his homepage and it’s pretty enlightening itself. (I found my way there via The Register.)