friday, june 30 2006
great rose images
Looking for rose photo, fine art prints to decorate your home or office. Check these out.
if you can't collect the dots, you can't connect the dots
peace and quiet
The Daily Kos lot received such a Niagara of ridicule for their meeting in Las Vegas (Alexander Cockburn's column in The Nation, available in a slightly different form on the Counterpunch site, making me almost feel sorry for them) that I now feel guilty for piling on. In particular, I feel that I ought to retract what I said on Hugh Hewitt's radio show last week, where I mentioned the self-important bloggers and Joseph Wilson-cultists in the same breath as those who are gathering—in quite another city—to indict the Bush administration for secretly sponsoring the assault of Sept. 11, 2001. Some comrades have rightly protested to me. I take the opportunity to say that, though there is some overlap between the two factions, this was a misuse of an amalgam on my part.
By way of restitution, may I propose some ways in which those who don't want to be associated with Michael Moore, George Galloway, Ramsey Clark, and the rest of the Zarqawi and Saddam apologists can make themselves plain? Here are four headings under which the anti-war types could disprove the charge of bad faith.
1) What about the land mines? A few years ago, a fairly broad consensus was achieved, to the effect that land mines should be regarded as an illegal and immoral method of warfare. Jody Williams and her group received a Nobel Peace Prize for their work on the question, and Princess Diana became an international star on the subject. The Clinton administration declined to sign the treaty, mainly on the grounds that a huge number of American land mines guard the so-called demilitarized (actually very highly militarized) zone that helps protect South Korea from a "dear leader" attack. But nobody is going to wander innocently into that zone. Whereas in Iraq and Afghanistan, every day dozens of these devices—sometimes known as "improvised explosive devices," or IEDs—are buried where anyone can step on them or be blown up by them. We have persuasive evidence that Iran and Syria have contributed some sophisticated explosives to the gruesome business. Would not now be the time to demand that the international community denounce land-mine atrocities and—especially the states that underwrite them? Anyone who has ever uttered the phrase "civilian casualties" has a particular obligation here.
Read it all.
german success in world cup has an american angle
...The chancellor, Angela Merkel, has praised him repeatedly, and his players have provided testimonials on how wonderful the team's preparation and spirit is.
It's largely product of Klinsmann's California connections. He lives in Huntington Beach with his Bay Area-born wife, Debbie, and their two children, has consulted for the Galaxy and Anschutz Entertainment Group - insisting Home Depot Center's construction include a roof, one of the stadium's chief characteristics - and has studied under former Galaxy coach Sigi Schmid and U.S. national team coach Bruce Arena.
"Living in the U.S. gives you a different perspective," Klinsmann, who has commuted between Southern California and DFB's Frankfurt headquarters, said before the World Cup.
The Germans always have been among soccer's elite, reaching 10 World Cup semifinals, playing in seven championship games and winning titles in 1954, '74 and, with Klinsmann, '90. Its talent pool seemed to dry up in the late 1990s - Michael Ballack is the only major player the country has developed in nearly a decade - and a surprise run the 2002 World Cup final only masked problems in the program.
He installed a team psychologist - unheard of in German soccer -and brought over Mark Verstegen, president and founder of Home Depot Center-based Athletes' Performance, as fitness coach.
He installed American training ideals, especially related to fitness, and changed the team's playing style, from slow and cautious to fearless and aggressive. And he welcomed young, mostly untested players into the team, broadening the talent pool with forward Lukas Podolski, midfielder Bastian Schweinsteiger, winger David Odonkor, defenders Philipp Lahm, Pet Mertesacker and Robert Huth, among others
scamming the scammer
A funny account of revenge against Nigerian email fraud.
the united states of mexico
by Burt Prelutsky
Sometimes, when I hear people objecting to illegal aliens on the grounds that they represent a security risk, I find myself shaking my head. To me, that sounds as if they wouldn’t have a problem with America’s porous southern border if only it weren’t for the tragic events of 9/11. The implication is that we wouldn’t object to all those millions of people sneaking into our country, except for those few bad apples who might be looking to level Los Angeles with a suitcase bomb.
These folks are entitled to their opinion, but they certainly don’t speak for me. My objection is based on the fact that I don’t like unwelcome guests. I don’t like them in my house and I don’t want them in my country.
Because we’re speaking, for the most part, about Mexicans, that opens me up to a charge of racism. So be it. In a society in which such repulsive characters as Barry Bonds, Cynthia McKinney, Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, Harry Belafonte, and O.J. Simpson, deflect all manner of criticism by attributing it to white racists, the word has lost virtually all meaning.
I happen to like Mexicans. Living here in the San Fernando Valley, I interact with them all the time. Several of them live on my block. I find them, by and large, to be a virtuous people. They tend to be hard- working, religious, family-oriented, and friendly. Although I’m not a big fan of refried beans and rice, I do like their music. Unlike the anti-social, unaesthetic, dreck that usually passes for music these days, most Mexican songs seem to be love ballads. What’s more, thanks to Church influence, their young people tend to get married and to raise their kids together. I do wish, however, that, as a group, the youngsters were as enthusiastic about attending classes as they are about ditching class to take part in public demonstrations.
All of that said, I am in favor of building a wall, digging a moat, doing whatever it takes to keep illegals out.
I understand that President Bush has a problem dealing with this problem. There are businesses, after all, that depend on a constant stream of unskilled workers. I say constant because we already have several million illegal aliens in America -- surely enough to pick our lettuce, bus our tables, wash our cars, and put the little mints on our hotel pillows. But this is the land of opportunity, and people don’t want to remain very long at the bottom of the food chain.
So George Bush promotes a worker program that is so idiotic, Republicans wish that a Democrat had come up with it, so they’d feel better about ridiculing it. Suggesting that after working in this country for a number of years, Mexicans will simply return to their country, and take their place at the back of the immigration line is perhaps the single stupidest, most naïve, notion I’ve ever heard. Even a four-year-old would recognize Bush’s brainstorm as amnesty in sheep’s clothing.
People who disagree with me on this issue point out that if I were a Mexican, I’d also do whatever I could to get into this country. And they’re right. Walk across the desert? You bet! To get to America, I’d walk across ground glass. But, so what? What I would or wouldn’t do is no basis upon which to form national policy.
It’s high time that the president stopped pandering to special interests, and, instead, started acting like a man who can afford to have principles. Otherwise, what’s the point of being a lame duck? It seems to me there should be some upside to never again having to worry about being re-elected.
If George Bush drew a line in the sand -- and then built a wall on that line -- I’m betting he’d even see his poll numbers bounce up. As a result of which, he might actually stop being a political liability as the GOP gears up for the congressional elections this November.
If Bush asked for my advice, I’d tell him it’s time he stopped listening to President Fox and started listening to the American people. And then I’d point out to him that no place in the Constitution does it say it’s his responsibility to cure Mexico’s crime and unemployment problems.
retaking the academy
The old Marxist strategy of “increasing the contradictions”—a strategy according to which the worse things get, the better they really are—is a license for thuggery. It excuses all manner of bad behavior for the sake of a revolution that will (so it is said) finally transform society when all the old allegiances have finally collapsed. If one or two tottering institutions require a little push to finish them off, so be it. Shove hard: You cannot, as comrade Stalin remarked, make an omelette without breaking eggs.
As with anything to which the word “Marxist” applies, there are at least eighty-seven things wrong with this strategy. Morally, it is completely irresponsible. Intellectually, it depends upon a fabricated “contradiction” to confer the illusion of inevitability. In real life, the only thing inevitable is the certainty of surprise.
Nevertheless, as one looks around at academic life these days, it is easy to conclude that corruption yields not only decay but also opportunities. Think of the public convulsion that surrounded the episode of Ward Churchill’s invitation to speak at Hamilton College earlier this year. The spectacle of a highly paid academic with a fabricated background comparing the victims of 9/11 to a Nazi bureaucrat was too much. Churchill’s fellow academics endeavored—they are still endeavoring—to rally round. But the public wasn’t buying it. Such episodes, as Victor Davis Hanson noted in National Review recently, were like “a torn scab revealing a festering sore beneath.”
Read it all.
wednesday, june 28 2006
viva kos vegas
Thank god for Iowahawk. Hilarious.
pick a fight with new york times
The battle of Midway Island was the turning point of the Pacific War. Victory at Midway was possible because the U.S. had broken the Japanese naval code. The Chicago Tribune spilled the beans in a story that ran under the headline: "NAVY HAD WORD OF JAP PLAN TO STRIKE AT SEA."
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt was furious. He knew that if the Japanese read the story, they'd suspect their codes were compromised, and change them.
The president "initially was disposed to send in the Marines to shut down Tribune tower," wrote Harry Evans. "He was talked out of that, then considered trying (Chicago Tribune publisher Robert) McCormick for treason, which carried a death penalty in wartime."
never pick a fight with ann coulter
An amusing interview.
tuesday, june 27 2006
why americans are not big soccer fans
Betsy's Page has a nice roundup.
hawaii trivia
During World War II, the US printed special bills with Hawaii across the back in case the Japanese conquered the islands.
World War II caused important changes in money for the United States, although they ended with the war. An example of the first change is in this case. It looks like an ordinary $10 Federal Reserve Note, except that it has the word “Hawaii” stenciled in brown on the back and on the front. These notes were issued to residents of Hawaii during World War II out of fear that the Jap nese would capture the islands, and the US currency there.
serendipity
We drove up to Waimea Canyon, the "grand canyon of the Pacific" and indeed it is grand. Kauai has many microclimates; one the wettest spot on earth, with some 455 inches of rainfall annually. Which means that the law of averages says you're going to get wet sooner or later if you spend much time here. Yesterday was our turn to get drenched, as a storm moved in around noon and poured buckets for four hours.
Just as it began, we went to the Kalalau lookout where 4000 foot cliffs have been carved over time. Except we saw nothing but a curtain of rain. Fortunately, we waited it out and returned around 6 p.m. As you can see, the clouds had parted and revealed an amazing sight, one that kept changing over time as the sun set and clouds reconfigured.
Only one person was there when we arrived. I struck up a conversation and learned that he was David Boynton, a 30 year resident of Kauai and one of its top photographers. We talked photography and other things, always keeping an eye on the scene below. He offered to shoot pictures of my wife, daughter and I. Had he not been there I never would have stayed for nearly two hours, and I would have missed scenes like you see above. The sun is nearly set and lighting up the clouds that are wisping like smoke.
Tourist photographers, regardless of skill, can never compete with the pros -- you never have enough time to be in the right place with the right light and the right conditions to capture those special images. Unless you get lucky. As the time wore on David would enthuse, "I come here a lot and this is rare."
So in one day I got very wet and very lucky.
sunday, june 25 2006
jackals
Patsy Ramsey, mother of murdered JonBenet Ramsey, died yesterday of ovarian cancer. May she rest in peace.
This site takes plenty of shots at the political bias of the news media -- it’s part of what keeps us sane. But there’s also a vicious streak to the press that we all know but rarely acknowledge, in part because we enable it. For the Ramseys, the ugliness of newspapers and television made a hellish event, the murder of their daughter, into an ongoing and undeserved hell.
Most everyone remembers seeing the video of the four year old girl dolled up with makeup and prancing on stage. Out of context it was creepy, calling up images of stage mothers pushing their daughters to compete in beauty pageants. We react with disgust to children being sexualized.
But context is everything. As it happens, both Patsy Ramsey and her sister were Miss West Virginia pageant winners. At a pageant reunion, various alumnae took the stage to perform for the group.
Young JonBenet watched and was star struck. Afterward, she begged her mother to let her enter a pageant. The family thought she was too young, but Patsy was being treated for deadly ovarian cancer, diagnosed in 1993. She thought she’d never live long enough to see her daughter be old enough. So she relented. Thus the footage shown over and over on TV. But instead of it being creepy and competitive, it was just a little girl reveling in dressing up and acting dramatic. Not creepy, cute.
The Barney Fifes of the Boulder police department bungled the case. The Susan Smith murdering mom story was fresh on people’s minds, so the finger of blame pointed at the family. Jackals smelled blood and cashed in with a media lynching, feeding and heeding the cries of the mob.
What most of us never heard was that the Ramsey house had been on a home tour two weeks before the murder, allowing anyone able to buy a ticket a chance to case the place. Or that businessman John Ramsey’s company had been the papers a week before, reporting big profits. There was plenty more, but it didn’t fit the template.
So John and Patsy Ramsey, struck by the tragic death of their daughter, endured public scorn and humiliation. It’s hard to fathom that kind of pain.
Patsy Ramsey was right. Cancer did kill her before JonBenet Ramsey would be old enough.
saturday, june 26 2006
assemble the firing squad
BY NOW IT'S UNDENIABLE: The New York Times is a national security threat. So drunk is it on its own power and so antagonistic to the Bush administration that it will expose every classified antiterror program it finds out about, no matter how legal the program, how carefully crafted to safeguard civil liberties, or how vital to protecting American lives.
The Times's latest revelation of a national security secret appeared on last Friday's front page--where no al Qaeda operative could possibly miss it. Under the deliberately sensational headline, "Bank Data Sifted in Secret by U.S. to Block Terror," the Times blows the cover on a highly targeted program to locate terrorist financing networks. According to the report, since 9/11, the Bush administration has obtained information about terror suspects' international financial transactions from a Belgian clearinghouse of international money transfers.
The procedure for obtaining that information could not be more solicitous of privacy and the rule of law: Agents are only allowed to seek information based on intelligence tying specific individuals to al Qaeda; they must document the intelligence behind every search request and maintain an electronic record of every search; and, in an inspired civil liberties innovation that would undoubtedly garner kudos from the Times had a Democratic administration devised it, a board of independent auditors from banks reviews the subpoena requests to make sure that only terror suspects' transactions are traced. Any use of the data for criminal investigations into drug trafficking, say, or tax fraud is banned. The administration briefed congressional leaders and the 9/11 Commission about the system.
There is nothing about this program that exudes even a whiff of illegality. The Supreme Court has squarely held that bank records are not constitutionally protected private information. The government may obtain them without seeking a warrant from a court, because the bank depositor has already revealed his transactions to his bank--or, in the case of the present program, to a whole slew of banks that participate in the complicated international wire transfers overseen by the Belgian clearinghouse known as the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, or Swift. To get specific information about individual terror suspects, intelligence agents prepare an administrative subpoena, which is issued after extensive internal agency review. The government does not monitor a terror suspect's international wire transfers in real time; the records of his transactions are delivered weeks later. And Americans' routine financial transactions, such as ATM withdrawals or domestic banking, lie completely outside of the Swift database.
The administration strongly urged the New York Times not to expose this classified program, and for good reason. According to the Times itself, the program has proven vital in hunting down international killers. The Indonesian terrorist Hambali, who orchestrated the Bali resort bombings in 2002, was captured through the Swift program; a Brooklyn man who laundered $200,000 for al Qaeda through a Karachi bank was tracked via the program. The Wall Street Journal adds that the July 7, 2005, London subway bombings were fruitfully investigated through the Swift initiative and that a facilitator of Iraqi terrorism has been apprehended because of it.
msm: wmd? bfd
Shrinkwrapped covers the big yawn that followed reports of Iraq WMD.
friday, june 23 2006
cultural awareness
Why calling someone "blue butt" is an insult in Japan. And ten gripes about India.
murtha's culture of corruption
Betsy Newmark notes this from Robert Novak:
Jack Murtha proves there are second acts in American politics. I had forgotten that federal prosecutors designated him an unindicted co-conspirator in the Abscam investigation 26 years ago. I was reminded of it after Murtha became a candidate for majority leader, not by a Republican hit man but a Democratic former colleague in the House. In a long political career, Murtha has made bitter enemies inside his party who are alarmed by his new stature.
aloha blogging
...from Kauai, also known as the "Garden Isle." It's a beautiful, wet mountainous garden with myna birds everywhere and, stop me if you already know this, wild chickens. Their Hawaiian name is moa. They're on the golf course, roadsides, marketplaces, as common as crows in California. These are the epitome of free range chickens.
For some reason, these vast numbers of large plump, gloriously appointed fowl grabbed my fancy. Oh yes, this island is gorgeous. Blindingly so. But those moa...
Perhaps, it's the wonder that they haven't appeared on someone's dinner table with a side of rice. After all, Kauai has a laid back, do-as-little-as-it-takes-to-get-along kind of attitude reminiscent of Key West. With a fishing pole and pellet gun, you could get fat off the land.
But no, the moa flourish and the roosters crow all day. Apparently they haven't seen the cartoons and know they're supposed to wait until dawn. But dawn is impressive. My first morning here began around 5 am, my body refusing to acknowledge the time change. I stood on my friends' porch, watching the moon and listening to the roosters crow from all sides.
If you've ever heard coyotes call to one another in the dark, imagine it with perhaps a dozen voices chiming in. Far from being bothersome, it had a musical quality, a fowl call and response. And maybe that's their secret. Who'd want to ruin such a concert?
More later. Or as the locals say, cock-a-doodle Aloha.
JB
thursday, june 22 2006
in honor of the world cup
Monty Python's international philosophy competition with Germany versus Greece.
pennsylvania's embarassment
Rep. Jack Murtha (D-Pa), imagines himself to be the scourge of the hawks in the Bush administration. Many journalists do, too, because they keep inviting him to appear on talk shows.
So why were the targets of Mr. Murtha's wrath doubled over with laughter during his appearance last Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press?" Rep. Murtha's newfound fame is a product of his call for immediate withdrawal from Iraq, or in the dishonest way he likes to phrase it, "redeployment" from Iraq.
wednesday, june 21 2006
german paper: bush bad for saving flipper
The kings of cynicism at Sueddeutsche Zeitung managed to spin a story about saving Flipper the dolphin into a diatribe against Guantanamo Bay. The article in question, "George W. Bush, Discoverer of the Oceans," blames Bush for reaching the decision to protect the ocean without consulting others. How rude! How insensitive! He didn't ask Congress or the European "friends" whether it was ok to save the whales! The opening passages and accompanying photo say it all:
"Acting alone, President Bush made the small Hawaiian islands into the world's largest protected area. But why? Did he want to do his wife a favor?
The kings of cynicism at Sueddeutsche Zeitung managed to spin a story about saving Flipper the dolphin into a diatribe against Guantanamo Bay. The article in question, "George W. Bush, Discoverer of the Oceans," blames Bush for reaching the decision to protect the ocean without consulting others. How rude! How insensitive! He didn't ask Congress or the European "friends" whether it was ok to save the whales! The opening passages and accompanying photo say it all:
"Acting alone, President Bush made the small Hawaiian islands into the world's largest protected area. But why? Did he want to do his wife a favor?
Of course! Bush wanted to please the First Lady. After all, he can't have genuinely wanted to do something good for the environment. Never mind that Kyoto was torpedoed by the US Senate 95-0 long before Bush ever came to office.
Never mind that the area in Alaska on which the Bush administration wants to drill comprises only 2,000 coastal acres in a natural preserve stretching over 19 million acres. Never mind that the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is not the only "pristine" land remaining in Alaska as author Reymer Kluever erroneously claims. No. Bush is bad baby. He hates the environment and makes decisions all by himself...and that is exactly how we got Gitmo..
enemies of the state
Every time some clue-challenged leftoid spouts some piece of logically indefensible drivel, rational people clutch whatever remains of their hair and mutter uselessly into the wind. We can vent, but we can't understand. And of course, many things might enter into a given idiocy; greed, stupidity and social pressure are mighty forces. There is one common denominator, however, and we must see it clearly and fight it tenaciously or more generations of Americans will be lost.
Education used to be about teaching children to think; that is, to examine assumptions, test theories, cross-check facts, probe the chain of evidence, carefully construct the rationales, justify the connections and reference the final product back against personal experience, classic wisdom and opposing ideas or beliefs.
In recent decades, education has morphed away from this time tested method of turning short immature heathen into men. Now we slot our young into the temple of an unholy triumvirate alien to Christianity, real science and classic liberalism alike. The new holy grails are these: learning to blame and ignore if not actively hate traditional European history, ideas, people and religions; acquiring superficial self-esteem and vaporous unsubstantiated but virtuous sounding beliefs; and accepting victimology as religion, lifestyle and narcotic.
Education has adopted Doublespeak as its native tongue and failure as its trump card. Socrates, Michelangelo, Newton, Webster, Shakespeare, Edison, all would be laughed out of a convention of today's educational apparatchiks. Discipline, order, method? Hierarchy and standards? Preposterous! Children tutored in such a way might succumb to the lure of achievement, profit and ownership. They will never become dependable Democratic voters.
People raised in the new order may pass unrecognized on easy days, but they are simple to spot when the going gets tough. Leftists regardless of age, wealth or status retreat behind ad hominem attacks when they are challenged. They also argue from invalid assumptions, set up and knock down straw men with great vigor and smugness, switch subjects early and often, and retreat from all these rhetorical losing stances into the ever-welcoming arms of "well, I FEEL strongly so I know I must be right."
Read it all.
running
Lately, it has become popular to recant on Iraq. When 2,500 Americans are lost, and when the improvised explosive device monopolizes the war coverage, it is easy to see why — especially with elections coming up in November, and presidential primaries not long after.
Pundits now daily equivocate in their understandable exasperation at the apparent lack of quantifiable progress. The ranks of public supporters have thinned as final victory seems elusive. It is hard to find any consistent public advocates of the American effort in Iraq other than the editors and writers here at National Review, the Wall Street Journal, Christopher Hitchens, Charles Krauthammer, Mark Steyn, Norman Podhoretz, and a very few principled others.But for all the despair, note all the problems for those who have triangulated throughout this war.
First, those who undergo the opportune conversion often fall prey to disingenuousness. Take John Kerry’s recent repudiation of his earlier vote for the war in Iraq. To cheers of Democratic activists, he now laments, “We were misled.”
Misled?
Putting aside the question of weapons of mass destruction and the use of the royal “we,” was the senator suggesting that Iraq did not violate the 1991 armistice accords?
Or that Saddam Hussein did not really gas and murder his own people?
Perhaps he was “misled” into thinking Iraqi agents did not really plan to murder former President George Bush?
Or postfacto have we learned that Saddam did not really shield terrorists?
tuesday, june 20 2006
old whine, new bottles
Democrats are so convinced of their certitude that when they lose elections it means either a) voters are stupid saps, b) the election was stolen or c) stupid saps stole the election. Political diary notes:
... liberals are still circulating bogus claims that the [2004] election was stolen by forces allied with President Bush. The Internet has become a transmission belt for the latest science-fiction version of this story: a Robert F. Kennedy Jr. cover story in Rolling Stone titled: "Was the 2004 election stolen? "
Leave aside the irony of a prominent Kennedy family member complaining about voter fraud given the documented examples of how such tactics benefited John F. Kennedy in the photo-finish 1960 election.
Plus Al Gore is uncorking his "I got more popular votes" whine from 2000. Next time you hear this from a Democrat, tell them this:
In 2003, the New York Yankees scored more runs in the World Series, but lost to the Florida Marlins.
Did George Steinbrenner bitch because his team
got more popular votesscored more runs? No, because the championship is a series of games. Just like presidential elections are a series of state elections.If baseball played by different rules, the games would be managed differently. In games where the team is way ahead, managers might keep players in longer to pad the score instead of resting them. Etc.
So it is with winner-take-all state elections. Bush never campaigned much in California because polls told him it was a waste of resources. Had he done so, he could have boosted his popular vote totals. Ditto Gore in red states.
Back where I came from applying different rules after losing a contest was the mark of a sore loser. It still is.
but is it art?
by Burt Prelutsky
In olden times, art was art, and other things weren’t. In the beginning, artists, who were the guys either too frightened or too lazy to go hunting or gathering, passed the time painting the walls of their caves. When the artist’s wife would tell him to go out and kill a mastodon for dinner, he’d throw his beret to the ground, and holler, “Philistine! Can’t you see I’m working?”
Then, one day, some smart cookie, realizing there might be money to be made if artists could come up with a way for other people to cover the cracks in their own walls, came up with the notion of canvas. That worked out very well, indeed. It not only provided these guys with a livelihood and eventually got them out of those drafty caves, but it provided them with a semi-legitimate excuse for asking strange women to take off their clothes.
But almost before you knew it, all sorts of people were going around claiming to be artists. Knit a shawl and you were an artist. Hang a mobile and you were an artist. Glue together a collage, take a class in macramé, nail two boards together and give it a title, and, voila, you were an artist.
The few remaining people who didn’t claim to be artists, themselves, went into business as critics, somehow managing to pass off crankiness as expertise. I guarantee if you announced that your particular art consisted of pasting chicken bones to bricks, by the end of the week ten guys would have set up shop as chicken bone critics, the New Yorker would be profiling you, and the NEA would be sending you an enormous grant.
What’s put me in this cynical frame of mind is a story that’s just come out of Orange County. In the past, this was an area south of Los Angeles best known for having a baseball team called, if you can believe it, the Anaheim Angels of Los Angeles. As if that’s not embarrassing enough, now it’s also the site of the Coin-Op Gallery.
It seems that a group of disgruntled artists has simply gotten fed up with people looking at their art for free. “This is artists poking back,” announced Sarah Greer. “You want to see my art? Give me a quarter.”
At first blush, the price seems reasonable enough. However, when you hear that the work on display includes a hollow TV with a sculpture where you might expect to see Jay Leno, a ballerina with a feminist message, and a screen on which President Bush delivers a one-minute speech, the quarter begins to seem a tad pricey. For me, the real deal breaker is that you have to fork over a quarter for each and every one of the exhibits.
At least artist Catherine Blanksby gives you something tangible for your twenty-five cents. Her objet d’art is a gumball machine filled with what she calls Flirt Kits. These are plastic bubbles that contain a breath mint for you, a flower for her, and pickup lines in five different languages.
The kits, according to Ms. Blanksby, play into her philosophy of fusing theater and art. “It’s thart,” she insists, “and I’m a thartist.”
And who are any of us to argue with her? The real problem, of course, is that when her parents brag about Cathy, their friends are wondering why on earth the Blanksbys have suddenly started lisping.
watching people change
In the spring and summer of 1984, Peter Feldstein used a red marker to make a sign announcing that he wanted to take free portraits of everyone in Oxford, Iowa (pop. 673). Like a kid at a lemonade stand, Peter set up shop on Augusta Street, Oxford's main street.
Twenty-one years later, Peter set up his camera again. Some of the original residents had died and some had moved away, but a surprising number still lived in Oxford. So he photographed them again.
See the photographs. Be sure to read Hunter Tandy's story -- he is sixth from the left.
connie chung makes you squirm
Trying to be funny? Snockered? Your guess is as good as mine.
Watch the video of Connie torch singing on the last broadcast of her cancelled MSNBC show.
And what's with the piano player? Is he too embarassed to tickle the ivories?
monday, june 19 2006
zell's message
Yesterday's post "Donkey Jihad" noted the loss of character of the present Democrat party.
No one put it better than Zell Miller at the Republican convention. Sue Gertson pointed us to this video which takes Zell's speech and adds moving images.
seafood bandage
A new powder made from shrimp stops serious bleeding—fast. From Popular Science.
drive by politics
We should never forget that there are three world-historical movements competing against each other in the world today.
There is Civilization, the culture of commerce and law in the city begun in Mesopotamia some 5,000 years ago.
There is Progressive Puritanism, libertine in sex but rigidly controlling in everything else, a recurring conceit of well-born adolescents.
And now there is Muslim Reaction, a movement that needs no introduction. (There is also the culture of lefty thug dictators, a sordid sideshow beneath our contempt.)
In the culture of Civilization—which means, let us never forget, citification—city, commerce, and law come together like ham and eggs and hash browns. The greatness of the city is founded on a simple fact. It does not grow its own food, so it must trade for it. Thus it must foster commerce, and as soon as commerce emerges there is a need for law, for businessmen need an efficient way of adjudicating their mistakes and their disputes without destroying the bottom line.
The aftertaste of this happy meal is prosperity and wealth, every time it is tried.
prius grows tail, gets 100 mpg
Ryan Fulcher was so intent on getting more than 100 miles a gallon that he drove his Toyota Prius overnight to a technology fair in California, changed the wiring, and installed an extra battery in the trunk.
He returned to Washington as the owner of a "plug-in," a car that consumes even less fuel than an ordinary hybrid.
The additional battery serves as a spare fuel tank, except it supplies electrons, not gasoline. Each night, Fulcher recharges it from a wall socket at his Federal Way home.
ayatollah's grandson: overthrow the mullahs
The grandson of Ayatollah Khomeini, the inspiration of Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution, has broken a three-year silence to back the United States military to overthrow the country's clerical regime.
Hossein Khomeini's call is all the more startling as he made it from Qom, the spiritual home of Iran's Shia strand of Islam, during an interview to mark the 17th anniversary of the ayatollah's death.
"My grandfather's revolution has devoured its children and has strayed from its course," he told Al-Arabiya, an Arabic-language television station. "I lived through the revolution and it called for freedom and democracy - but it has persecuted its leaders."
nude cyclists are peddling threadbare ideas
Perusing reports of this month's World Naked Bike Ride in San Francisco, I was impressed by the way the acres of sagging mottled flesh stayed ruthlessly on message: "RE-ELECT GORE" was the slogan on one man's bottom, as fetchingly dimpled as a Palm Beach chad, while beneath the "GORE" of his butt his upper thighs proudly proclaimed "NO WAR" (left leg) "FOR OIL" (right). "I'D RATHER HAVE THIS BUSH FOR PRESIDENT" read one lady's naked torso with an arrow pointing down to the presidential material in question.
What a bleak comment on the bitter divisions in our society that even so all-American a tradition as nude bicycling down Main Street should now be so nakedly partisan. It's as if the republic itself is now divided into a red buttock and a blue buttock permanently cleaved by the bicycle seat of war.
OK, this metaphor's jumped the bike path. Let me see if I can find some historical analogy. Ah, here we go: Back in 1559, devastated by the loss of her last continental possession, Mary Tudor, England's queen, said that when she died they would find "Calais" engraved on her heart. When the Democratic Party dies, you'll find "NO WAR FOR OIL" engraved on its upper thighs. Despite the Republicans' best efforts to self-destruct, I can't see the Democrats taking either the House or Senate this November. As I said a few months back, even a loser has to have someone to lose to, and the Dems refuse to fulfill even that minimum requirement.
sunday, june 18 2006
donkey jihad
The Democrat party was once home to men such as JFK, Henry "Scoop" Jackson and Daniel Moynihan. Today, one of the lone statesmanslike figures in the party is Sen. Joe Lieberman. But maybe not for long, as the leftwing attempts a purge over his support for the Iraq war.
...a Wall Street Journal op-ed piece Lieberman wrote last November endorsing the president's announced strategy to defeat the insurgency and establish a democratic government in Iraq. That article infuriated Lamont and launched his candidacy. "It was decisive," Lamont told me in an interview. "Lieberman suggested that the critics were undermining the credibility of the president. I thought he was wrong."
"My opponent says it broke Democratic unity," Lieberman said. "Well, dammit, I wasn't thinking about Democratic unity. It was a moment to put the national interest above partisan interest."
Alas, such diversity is disallowed.
"I know I'm taking a position that is not popular within the party," Lieberman said, "but that is a challenge for the party -- whether it will accept diversity of opinion or is on a kind of crusade or jihad of its own to have everybody toe the line. No successful political party has ever done that.".
Update:
Classic [Jonah Goldberg]
Al Gore refuses to endorse Joe Lieberman — his former running mate — in Lieberman's re-election fight. (Nod to Ezra Klein ). I guess Lierberman would have been good enough to run the government if something bad happened to Gore. But he's not obviously the best qualified to be the junior senator from Connecticut, even though he had the same job when Gore tapped him in 2000.
eine kleine mindset
Time's Joe Klein (aka Anonymous) weighs in on Iraq:
And so, a mystery: How is it possible—with 2,500 U.S. solders dead, no discernible progress on the ground and a solid majority of the public now agreeing that the war in Iraq was a mistake—for the Democrats to seem so bollixed about the war and for the President to seem so confident?
Progress is quite discernable: elections, slow-but-sure political maturation, a decimated Al Qaeda in Iraq. Nonmedia elitists understand the war is not just about costs (2500 dead) but also benefits.
Last week, in the opening salvo of the 2006 congressional elections, Bush and Rove were reminding voters that the choice would be between the Democratic strategy of "cut and run" and the Republican war against Islamic "fascists," as the President called them. It was clear, yet again, that Bush and Rove would surf the complexities of the conflict for their political advantage.
Well, "Bush lied" is certainly nuanced, right?
"See, Iraq is part of the global war on terror," the President said. "And if we fail in Iraq, it's going to embolden al-Qaeda types."
Bingo. Just as we embolded them by running out of Somalia, convincing Osama that the US was a paper tiger. And when we let the Beirut barracks bombing go unavenged. Etc.
Rove helpfully added in a New Hampshire speech that al-Zarqawi wouldn't have been nailed if we had pulled out of Iraq, as Representative John Murtha, a Pennsylvania Democrat, recommended last winter.
And don't forget that Murtha wants to fight the war on terror from Guam. UPDATE: Now he's offering Okinawa as a plan B, plan B.
Rove's assertion was scurrilous and inaccurate. Al-Zarqawi had been eliminated through terrific intelligence work and air power, neither of which required a substantial U.S. ground presence in Iraq.
This is laughable. None of the intelligence work and air power would have been possible without our presence on the ground. Instead, we'd be firing cruise missiles from long distance like Clinton in 1998.
The President's line of attack was accurate but lethally incomplete. His poorly planned invasion of Iraq created the atmosphere that enabled al-Qaeda—and the local sectarian conflicts—to flourish. Iraq had become, in small part, a war against al-Qaeda; for the most part, it is a local sectarian conflict—because of American incompetence. If the President had not allowed General Tommy Franks to "cut and run"—that is, to close his headquarters and begin drawing down the U.S. military presence on May 1, 2003, the very same day as Bush's first cockpit stunt—the U.S. forces might have had a better chance to contain the insurgency.
Well, of course, armchair generals have perfect hindsight. Prediction: in ten years Iraq will be a troubled, but functioning Democartic tent pole of freedom in the middle east.
And Joe Klein will be anonymous.
don't sleep in the subway, darling
Al-Qaeda terrorists came within 45 days of attacking the New York subway system with a lethal gas similar to that used in Nazi death camps. They were stopped not by any intelligence breakthrough, but by an order from Osama bin Laden's deputy, Ayman Zawahiri. And the U.S. learned of the plot from a CIA mole inside al-Qaeda. These are some of the more startling revelations by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Ron Suskind, whose new book The One Percent Doctrine is excerpted in the forthcoming issue of TIME. It will appear on Time.com early Sunday morning.
U.S. intelligence got its first inkling of the plot from the contents of a laptop computer belonging to a Bahraini jihadist captured in Saudi Arabia early in 2003. It contained plans for a gas-dispersal system dubbed "the mubtakkar" (Arabic for inventive).
Fearing that al-Qaeda's engineers had achieved the holy grail of terror R&D — a device to effectively distribute hydrogen-cyanide gas, which is deadly when inhaled — the CIA immediately set about building a prototype based on the captured design, which comprised two separate chambers for sodium cyanide and a stable source of hydrogen, such as hydrochloric acid. A seal between the two could be broken by a remote trigger, producing the gas for dispersal. The prototype confirmed their worst fears: "In the world of terrorist weaponry," writes Suskind, "this was the equivalent of splitting the atom. Obtain a few widely available chemicals, and you could construct it with a trip to Home Depot – and then kill everyone in the store."
The device was shown to President Bush and Vice President Cheney the following morning, prompting the President to order that alerts be sent through all levels of the U.S. government. Easily constructed and concealed, mass casualties were inevitable if it could be triggered in any enclosed public space.
home grown
The New York Times profiles two budding leaders of American Islam.
Mr. Yusuf lives on a cul-de-sac in Danville, a Northern California suburb, in a house with a three-car garage. The living room is spread with Persian rugs; it is mostly bare of furniture. He held a dinner with guests in traditional Arab style — on the floor, while the smallest of his five sons curled up in the rugs and fell asleep. His wife, Liliana, tired from a day of home-schooling and driving the boys to karate lessons, passed around take-out curry. She converted to Islam after meeting Mr. Yusuf in college, to the chagrin of her Catholic Hispanic parents. The couple married outdoors, in a redwood grove.
Mr. Yusuf received the Arabic title of sheik from his teachers in Mauritania, in West Africa. There the honorific is usually given to old men with a deep knowledge of Islam who serve their communities as wise oracles, but Mr. Yusuf was only 28. His given name was Mark Hanson, and he was raised Greek Orthodox in a bohemian but affluent part of Marin County, just north of San Francisco.
He converted to Islam after a near-fatal car accident in high school sent him on an existential journey. He said that the simplicity of "no God but Allah" made far more sense to him than the Trinity, and he found the five daily prayers a constant call to awe about everything from the sun to his capillaries.
Guess he never read "Pray without ceasing" from Thessalonians. Or read Franny and Zooey, which makes much of that line of scripture.
blame dad
Hysterical liberals are always having a conniption fit about something. Why aren't they having one about that most odious of illiberal holidays, Father’s Day? Why haven’t they banned this insensitive celebration of white male patriarchal values yet? Instead of going after Christmas or Columbus Day, it seems to me that they would be better served to make a frontal assault on the source of all the trouble: fathers, those individual embodiments of Male Privilege.
After all, it’s not as if these groups don’t try to hide their contempt for fatherhood. According to an analysis by one of the most influential liberal feel-tanks, N.O.W., "Underneath the facade of Christian religion are the workings of the radical religious right, mobilizing men against the rights of women, lesbians, and gays."
As we have had occasion to note before, contemporary left-liberalism is overwhelmingly a movement of unhinged or unbalanced (i.e., divorced from healthy male energy) female energy in various forms. Bear in mind that I’m not talking about all liberals. There are obviously some sane ones left, such as Joe Lieberman. It is surely no coincidence that he is the one person they are trying to purge from the party--not knaves such as Al Sharpton and William Jefferson, lunatics such as Howard Dean and Ted Kennedy, or unalloyed simpletons such as Barbara Boxer and Harry Reid.Nevertheless, if you consider the primary constituents of the Democratic Party, you immediately realize that they could not be a functioning party without all of their dysfunction. Let’s just consider the black vote. "Job one" of the Democratic Party and their marketing arm--the brick-and-mortar spin machine known as the MSM--is to foment racial hatred and division. This is because the Democrats would no longer be a viable party in something like 26 states without 90 percent of the black vote. While there is rough parity between the parties, blacks represent only 12 percent of the population, but something like 20-25% of the Democratic base. Therefore, it is necessary to cynically keep them angry, riled up, persecuted, and, most of all, victimized.
If you could snap your fingers and and make one change that would instantly transform black culture, what would it be? More quotas? A new government program? More black faces on TV? More black coaches in the NFL? More sensitivity to Cynthia McKinney's changing hairstyles? No, of course not. Any right-minded person knows that you would wish for more fathers.
...
“...[T]he correlation between social deviancy and fatherless homes is irrefutably linked.... According to the CDC, DoJ, DHHS and the Bureau of the Census, the 30 percent of children who live apart from their fathers will account for 63 percent of teen suicides, 70 percent of juveniles in state-operated institutions, 71 percent of high-school dropouts, 75 percent of children in chemical-abuse centers, 80 percent of rapists, 85 percent of youths in prison, and 85 percent of children who exhibit behavioral disorders. In addition, 90 percent of homeless and runaway children are from fatherless homes. In fact, children born to unwed mothers are 10 times more likely to live in poverty as children with fathers in the home.... '[The causal link between fatherless children and crime] is so strong that controlling for family configuration erases the relationship between race and crime and between low income and crime,' notes social researcher Barbara Whitehead."
low tech
Did it ever occur to you that your dog might have better health records than you do? While veterinarians routinely keep computerized records of their four-footed patients’ medications and vaccinations, human health care still relies heavily on pen, paper, phone and those little yellow Post-it notes that all too often come fluttering out of a patient’s file.
While most U.S. industries make superb use of information technology to collect, manage and distribute information, when it comes to healthcare, we lag far behind. In 2000, 90 percent of physicians in Sweden, 88 percent in the Netherlands, 62 percent in Denmark, 58 percent in the UK, 56 percent in Finland and 48 percent in Germany were using electronic medical records. Six years later, roughly 80 percent of U.S. physicians are still shuffling through manila folders.
Read on. It sounds like the free market needs a kick start from Uncle Sam.
saturday, june 17 2006
taliban leader renounces rebellion
KANDAHAR -- Rolled out in a wheelchair and surrounded by heavily-armed coalition soldiers, a visibly ill Mullah Mohammed Ibrahim shares his decision to support the Afghan government.
"I want all Afghans to abandon hostilities," he says, "and to unite for peace."
To have a senior Taliban commander lay down his arms is a major public relations coup for coalition forces, especially coming a day after insurgents killed 10 civilian contractors on their way to work at the Kandahar Airfield base.
marginal thinking
Today's entertainment section of the LA Daily News had a full-page diatribe from the New York Times Alessandra Stanley, basically upbraiding Jay Leno for not reaming Ann Coulter when she was a guest on his show.
She went on to say:
Ms. Coulter became a media star by portraying herself as a conservative gadfly tweaking the liberal hegemony, which is, of course, quite a revisionist feat. It may have been the case 30 years ago, but no conservative who came of age during the Reagan Revolution can credibly claim they are marginalized or unheard.
Not unheard, but outgunned. Did the NYT and other mainstream media get upset when:
- Alec Baldwin, upset about the upcoming impeachment of Bill Clinton said on Conan O'Brien: "if we were in another country... We would stone Henry Hyde to death and we would go to their homes and we’d kill their wives and their children. We would kill their families."
- When George Carlin (Leno's other guest that night) said: "Governor Bush, and I call him that because it's really the last thing he was elected to, ... when he reaches his Christian heaven I think he will have a lot to answer for." On Bill Maher, Carlin referreed to Barbara Bush, "The silver douche bag."
- When Whoopi Goldberg made coarse comments about Bush, using crude sexual comments at a John Kerry fundraiser.
- Randi Rhodes on Air America joked about assassinating President Bush
No. Which demonstrates just how conservative voices are marginalized.
OOPS, SHE SAID IT
Betsy Newmark notes Rep. Maxine Waters's unwitting, revealing remarks:
In the debate yesterday over the House Resolution on the Iraq War and battle against terrorism, Maxine Waters, always entertaining, revealed the real reason why the Democrats were so upset. (Thanks to Laura Ingraham for posting the audio.) She got up on the House floor and said that many Democrats were going to be "trapped" because they would have to vote on this resolution and they don't want to have to pick a side and vote on it.
"And so, many Democrats are going to get trapped. Because they claim that in their districts they have half of their constituents for it, this war and half against it and they don't know what to do."
Gee, isn't that what representatives are elected to do? Pick a side and take a stand. Even if they might have to tick off half of their constituents? What can be a more important issue than where you stand when the nation is at war? Representatives shouldn't just make vague statements of supporting the troops, criticizing the President, without making it clear what they think we should do.
Normally, I'm pretty scornful of these do-nothing resolutions, but I think this debate in both the House and the Senate over Kerry's withdrawl idea has been very illuminating. Read the text of the resolution and try to figure out which part of the resolution the Democrats are so furious about.
Resolved, That the House of Representatives--It must be the third statement against setting an arbitrary date for deployment or withdrawl. And isn't that a legitimate issue that members should have to take a stand on? Shouldn't constituents know before they go to the polls whether or not their representative wants to set a date for withdrawl or not? That's why these representatives feel "trapped." They have to show where they stand on a crucial issue for the country and they don't like having to take a stand.
(1) honors all those Americans who have taken an active part in the Global War on Terror, whether as first responders protecting the homeland, as servicemembers overseas, as diplomats and intelligence officers, or in other roles;
(2) honors the sacrifices of the United States Armed Forces and of partners in the Coalition, and of the Iraqis and Afghans who fight alongside them, especially those who have fallen or been wounded in the struggle, and honors as well the sacrifices of their families and of others who risk their lives to help defend freedom;
(3) declares that it is not in the national security interest of the United States to set an arbitrary date for the withdrawal or redeployment of United States Armed Forces from Iraq;
(4) declares that the United States is committed to the completion of the mission to create a sovereign, free, secure, and united Iraq;
(5) congratulates Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki and the Iraqi people on the courage they have shown by participating, in increasing millions, in the elections of 2005 and on the formation of the first government under Iraq's new constitution;
(6) calls upon the nations of the world to promote global peace and security by standing with the United States and other Coalition partners to support the efforts of the Iraqi and Afghan people to live in freedom; and
(7) declares that the United States will prevail in the Global War on Terror, the noble struggle to protect freedom from the terrorist adversary.
friday, june 16 2006
one less thing to feel guilty about
Mass Aztec deaths were not from European diseases:
...four centuries later, Acuña-Soto improbably decided to reopen the investigation. Some key pieces of information—details that had been sitting, ignored, in the archives—just didn't add up. His studies of ancient documents revealed that the Aztecs were familiar with smallpox, perhaps even before Cortés arrived.
They called it zahuatl. Spanish colonists wrote at the time that outbreaks of zahuatl occurred in 1520 and 1531 and, typical of smallpox, lasted about a year. As many as 8 million people died from those outbreaks.
But the epidemic that appeared in 1545, followed by another in 1576, seemed to be another disease altogether. The Aztecs called those outbreaks by a separate name, cocolitzli. "For them, cocolitzli was something completely different and far more virulent," Acuña-Soto says. "Cocolitzli brought incomparable devastation that passed readily from one region to the next and killed quickly."
After 12 years of research, Acuña-Soto has come to agree with the Aztecs: The cocolitzli plagues of the mid-16th century probably had nothing to do with smallpox. In fact, they probably had little to do with the Spanish invasion. But they probably did have an origin that is worth knowing about in 2006....
"This was certainly not smallpox," Acuña-Soto says. "If they described something real, then it appeared to be a hemorrhagic fever."
Hemorrhagic fevers are viral diseases with names that evoke justifiable dread—Ebola, Marburg, Lassa. They strike with sudden intensity, rarely respond to treatment, kill at high rates, then vanish as mysteriously as they came. They are called hemorrhagic because victims bleed, hemorrhaging in their capillaries, beneath the skin, often from the mouth, nose, and ears. The bleeding doesn't kill, but the breakdown of the nervous system does. At first there is fever, fatigue, and dizziness, but within a few days the person falls into delirium and finally a coma.
Read it all -- it's like nonfiction CSI.
HT: AlphaPatriot
holding hands
Seems like yesterday that Emily was a toddler. The last of our three children, she was the straggler, eleven years behind number two son.
From the beginning, she was independent--not defiant, but self-sufficient. If I offered to help her on with her coat, she'd demur and use her own technique, laying the coat flat on the floor and flopping onto her back and sliding into place, then bouncing to her feet with a satisfied smile.
On a trip to a Yosemite, we were descending steep stairs and I offered my hand. "I'll hold my own hand," she said, and proceeded to do just that. There's no point in arguing in with a child that refuses to be treated like a child.
On her first day of kindergarten, my hand became became her lifeline. Had her mitts been bigger, mine would have been crushed. Timid and uncertain, she insisted I remain until her class was called inside. Happy me.
The handholding continued the next day and the next, long after she was comfortable in school. Taking her to school, I could have pulled over and dropped her off, but I never wanted to. I always parked and walked her to class. And we held hands, well into fourth grade, maybe longer. All along I remember thinking, how lucky can I get?
Then came three years of middle school and the contact diminished. Each morning I drove her to her friend's house where she'd hook up with others and walk to school. No more hand holding, just me and my corny gags: hiding behind the door in my office when she came to get me, etc. At first my stunts earned groans, then eye-rolls, then sighs and then zilch.
Today is promotion day, where 8th graders march through a ceremony and get certificates. I will be there but I have no regard for celebrating such pseudo-milestones; after all, "an eighth-grade education" is a term we apply to an uneducated person.
Parents will jostle with camcorders and cameras, preserving yet another set-piece "Kodak moment." Photos of staged events have never resonated with me. Real moments, real memories are too delicate to be recorded in chips. They survive via remembrance and retelling.
Next year she begins high school, only four blocks away. No more rides. No more handholding. At least for another 15 years, when she may be offering her hand to me. Will I accept her gesture of help out of a chair or down a staircase, or insist on not being treated like a child?
I hope I'm wise enough to know I can't hold my own hand.
Jim Bass
land of the free, home of the brave new world
The Chinese want boys, and the Canadians want girls. If they have enough money, they come to the United States to choose the sex of their babies.
Well-off foreign couples are getting around laws banning sex selection in their home countries by coming to American soil — where it's legal — for medical procedures that can give them the boy, or girl, they want.
Opponents say this amounts to medical tourism for designer babies and should awaken lawmakers.
But one doctor who offers embryo selection for about $20,000 says he is serving the marketplace and helping Nature, not playing God. People will be less alarmed as sex selection becomes more routine, said Dr. Jeffrey Steinberg of the Fertility Institutes of Los Angeles and Las Vegas.
leftwing nostalgia dies hard
It has been a tough 10 days for those who see current events through the prisms of Vietnam and Watergate. First, the Democrats failed to win a breakthrough victory in the California 50th District special election--a breakthrough that would have summoned up memories of Democrats winning Gerald Ford's old congressional district in a special election in 1974. Instead the Democratic nominee got 45% of the vote, just 1% more than John Kerry did in the district in 2004.
Second, U.S. forces with a precision air strike killed Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, on the same day that Iraqis finished forming a government. Zarqawi will not be available to gloat over American setbacks or our allies' defeat, as the leaders of the Viet Cong and North Vietnam did.
Third, special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald announced that he would not seek an indictment of Karl Rove. The leftward blogosphere had Mr. Rove pegged for the role of Bob Haldeman and John Ehrlichman. Theories were spun about plea bargains that would implicate Vice President Dick Cheney. Talk of impeachment was in the air. But it turns out that history doesn't repeat itself. George W. Bush, whether you like it or not, is not a second Richard Nixon.
political, who us?
Just imagine the fit Democrats would have if the NRA received taxpayer dollars, and then promoted a slate of gun loving candidates for public office.
Well, Planned Parenthood gets taxpayer dollars and it announced plans to promote "progressive" candidates. Hmm, what party might they be from?
"We're going to channel our strength, our outreach, our power, and work with our pro-choice allies to help progressive voices win across America," said Cecile Richards, president of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. Richards, the daughter of former [Democrat] Texas Gov. Ann Richards, made the comments at the liberal "Take Back America" conference.
"freegans" always dine out
Some people seem put on earth just to amuse us.
Almost every week, Weissman organizes an event commonly referred to as “dumpster diving,” where he leads an open tour among the various trash heaps and dumpsters of Manhattan to gather discarded food.
The activity is part of a larger social movement known as freeganism, which views capitalism as the primary force in destroying the environment and avoids the capitalist structure through such practices as eating discarded food, squatting in abandoned buildings instead of paying rent and refusing to hold a job.
Capitalism generates the wealth that makes green living possible. Just compare the US to the commie cough-cough-wheez countries. Or to the Third World today.
In Dehli you'll find unwilling "freegans" cooking their begged vituals over dung fires. You can smell it in the air.
Just as vegans are vegetarians who avoid animal products, freegans subsist only on free food found in the garbage as consumer waste. In Manhattan, there is plenty to go around.
...Weissman has practiced freeganism in one form or another since he was 17. He is careful to point out that there is no “litmus test” for freeganism but rather a variety of lifestyle choices (such as dumpster diving) that are in alignment with the ethos of freeganism.
“Freeganism is an ideal, it’s a range of practices, it’s a commitment,” he said. There are many things one can do which are freegan but there is no standard by which someone has to meet a number of points to be a freegan.”
That being said, he does practice most of the movement’s ideals. He subsists solely on trash, or “recovered” food, and tries to acquire all of his possessions in a similar manner. For example, he owns a computer but acquired it in a decidedly freegan manner. An office building that was closing donated the hard drive. His friend gave him a monitor, and he found a keyboard in the trash. Found items do have their downside: He spent the majority of a recent afternoon on the phone with tech support because it stopped working.
Truly committed freegans would really help the planet via suicide -- just think of all the CO2 emissions that would save.
thursday, june 15 2006
"status quo" is working
A constant refrain from Democrats is that Bush keeps giving us "more of the status quo" about Iraq. Well, according to a document seized in the demise of Zarqawi, the status quo was working:
..."time is now beginning to be of service to the American forces and harmful to the resistance," the document said.
The document said the insurgency was being hurt by, among other things, the U.S. military's program to train Iraqi security forces, by massive arrests and seizures of weapons, by tightening the militants' financial outlets, and by creating divisions within its ranks.
"Generally speaking and despite the gloomy present situation, we find that the best solution in order to get out of this crisis is to involve the U.S. forces in waging a war against another country or any hostile groups," the document said, as quoted by al-Maliki's office.
So Al Qaeda's own assessment admitted they were losing.
pot declares kettle black
Democrats accused Republicans of playing election year politics with the Iraq war on Thursday, as the U.S. House of Representatives debated a resolution that wrapped the unpopular conflict into the overall war on terrorism.
On the day that the U.S. military death toll in Iraq reached 2,500, House Republicans put forward a resolution proclaiming that the United States would win the war on terror and declaring that it was not in the nation's security interest to set an "arbitrary date" to withdraw U.S. forces from Iraq.
"It is not enough for this House to say we support our troops," said House Speaker Dennis Hastert. "That statement rings hollow if we do not also say we support their mission."
House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said: "We know they are trying to politicize the war in Iraq. It's shameful, but they are."
No report on whether Pelosi burst into laughter after delivering those comments.
Democrats long ago determined that failure in Iraq would be good for them, and have done everything in their power to paint it black.
You want politics? How about Big John Murtha calling for an immediate withdrawal from Iraq, then voting against a measure to do just that. And then whining about having his bluff called?
journalists "being played"
J. D. Johannes, a former Marine Sergeant, became an embedded reporter for syndicated TV news reports in Iraq. Some highlights from an interview with TCS Daily:
War News Template
...from the perspective of local media, there's really only four templates for the Iraq story: unit leaves; unit comes home; someone's hurt really bad and dies; and a wife of a reservist or guard member who's getting screwed over by the mortgage lending company.But you never get to see the guys over there doing the work, risking their lives and performing great things on a daily basis. I figured I could go over there and I've worked in television for years in the past. I could go over with a camera, a laptop computer and I could syndicate television news reports back to local markets where the actual reservists were from.
Boredom of war
...As you watched on the news early on, all you saw was the bombing, shoot outs, and explosions. What you didn't see was the day in, day out boredom of the war.Where I was -- with this group of marines in 2005 around the Fallujah AO -- we (the unit) would spend days and weeks trying to get into a shoot out -- attempting to get into a shoot out. I know that sounds absolutely insane, but that's the only way that you can engage the enemy. And when you have an enemy that you have to work so hard to bait out into the open, you're not dealing with a very strong enemy. You're dealing with a very annoying enemy. A very deadly enemy. But not a very strong enemy.
CNN
...three days later, we're done with the operation and it was successful. The Marines had made it and killed several ID teams. We come back to the base and we're sitting in the chow hall and it's all over the news on CNN, and Fox News. "Abu Ghraib a hotbed of insurgent activities." "Is this a new turn in the war?" We were like "Wow. That was really big news, wasn't it?"...the media had heard about it after the fact. It was a pretty big shoot out, but it was an absolutely dismal failure on the part of the insurgency. Their goal was to break down a wall and free the prisoners. They didn't make it. A very few of them even made it to the wall. Most of the insurgents, however, were gunned down in the open field.
No Americans were killed; a few Americans were injured, obviously with shrapnel, but actually more inmates were injured -- by shrapnel from the insurgents. So all they succeeded in doing was creating a lot of martyrs for their own cause and injuring the people they wanted to free; an absolute failure militarily.
But in the media, the fact that they could even put together an 80-man force to attack that base - "that's a sign of strength of the insurgency, right?" Never mind that they got their asses handed to them.
Being played
...many journalists have not figured out that they're being targeted by the enemy on purpose to help shape the coverage of the war. The insurgents don't want the reporters out and about running around. They're completely satisfied with the "balcony" report and some video shot by a stringer of the daily car bomb. That's the message that the insurgents want to get out. They don't realize that warfare is both the kinetic and non-kinetic. And, therefore, they miss how they're being played by the insurgents. I wish more reporters realized that.
hyperpolarity, wikipedia and al-zarqawi
So what's the connection between Wikepedia, the nationalization of the Bolivian gas industry, the rise of Pentecostalism and the successful Iraqi insurgency?
According to Moises Naim, writing in this morning's Financial Times, these are all little guys "calling the shots." Naim, the editor-in-chief of Foreign Policy, argues that the old Cold War world has been replaced by a "hyperpolar world" in which "many large, powerful actors co-exist with myriad smaller power (not all of which are nation-states) that greatly limit the dominance of any single nation or institution."
Thus, according to Naim, Bolivia can get away with breaking its gas contract with Royal Dutch Shell. Thus, a "ragtag" militia in Iraq can stand up to the world's greatest military power. Thus, Pentecostal Christians in Latin America successfully compete with the Vatican. Thus, Wikipedia (founded in 2001) can take on the Encylopedia Britannica (founded in 1768) and, in five years, become 12 times larger.
spending smartly: kyoto versus copenhagen
Money is always an object, so when looking for ways to help the world's poor, it makes sense to spend wisely.
In May 2004, the first Copenhagen Consensus Conference (CC04) took place. Based on extensive background material prepared by 30 economic specialists, eight leading international economists (of which four are Nobel Prize winners) assessed and prioritized the best solutions to ten of the greatest global challenges.
“What would be the best ways of advancing global welfare, and particularly the welfare of developing countries, supposing that an additional $50 billion of resources were at governments' disposal?”
With the point of departure in the question above, the expert panel assessed that the best and most promising solutions were HIV/AIDS prevention, combating malnutrition, combating malaria, and free trade. The proposed solutions to climate change were ranked at the bottom of the list.
The Copenhagen Consensus 2006 begins tomorrow at Georgetown University.
those sophisticated europeans
Yesterday my husband Paul Belien, the editor of this website, was summoned to the police station and interrogated. He was told that the Belgian authorities are of the opinion that, as a homeschooler, he has not adequately educated his children and, hence, is neglecting his duty as a parent, which is a criminal offence. The Ministry of Education has asked the judiciary to press charges and the judiciary told the police to investigate and take down his statement.
It appears that the Belgian authorities are again considering prosecution – the second time in barely two months. This time the claim is not that my husband posted allegedly “racist” texts on this website but that he is failing his children.
My husband, a lawyer by training, and I, a former university lecturer, have homeschooled four of our five children through high school. These four have meanwhile moved on to university. Our youngest child is also being homeschooled, but she has yet to obtain her high school certificate, for which she is currently taking exams. Like her four siblings she takes these exams before the Central Examination Board (CEB), an institution run by the Ministry of Education. The Belgian Constitution, written in 1831, allows parents to homeschool. The CEB exists to enable people who have not attended or who have failed school to obtain an official high school certificate.
Another quirk about Belgium is that political parties must be licensed. In 2004, the country's largest party was ordered out of existence.
walter williams
...explains the economics of prices:
...Say you owned a small 10-pound inventory of coffee that you purchased for $3 a pound. Each week you'd sell me a pound for $3.25. Suppose a freeze in Brazil destroyed half of its coffee crop, causing the world price of coffee to immediately rise to $5 a pound.
You still have coffee that you purchased before the jump in prices. When I stop by to buy another pound of coffee from you, how much will you charge me? I'm betting that you're going to charge me at least $5 a pound. Why? Because that's today's cost to replace your inventory.
Historical costs do not determine prices; what economists call opportunity costs do. Of course, you'd have every right not to be a "price-gouger" and continue to charge me $3.25 a pound. I'd buy your entire inventory and sell it at today's price of $5 a pound and make a killing.
If you were really enthusiastic about not being a "price-gouger," I'd have another proposition. You might own a house that you purchased for $55,000 in 1960 that you put on the market for a half-million dollars. I'd simply accuse you of price-gouging and demand that you sell me the house for what you paid for it, maybe adding on a bit for inflation since 1960. I'm betting you'd say, "Williams, if I sold you my house for what I paid for it in 1960, how will I be able to pay today's prices for a house to live in?"
forward together
Well maybe this is our best chance to achieve some progress security-wise and there's a growing feeling (I won't say dominant but it's here and it's visible) that the new government has the real and serious desire to end this tragic chapter of Baghdad's history.
It seems that President Bush's visit to Baghdad has given more credibility for the operation; that at least was what I heard from people around me or read in Baghdad's papers today; the visit definitely left a positive impression that America is dead serious this time about finding solutions for Iraq especially when it comes to security and critical parts of reconstruction like electricity.
No one can predict how much time this new operation will take but time in this case is of little importance compared to accomplishing the objectives of the operation...In order to encourage the residents of Baghdad to report abuse by the ISF or send tips to the authorities, the government announced phone numbers and email addresses to facilitate contact. The government knows that large segments of the people (mostly Sunni) do not trust these lines and think they could be used to track them back through corrupt elements within the security forces, so the government is trying to deal with this mistrust and they announced numbers that people can use to directly contact the office of deputy PM Dr. Salam al-Zouba'i (who's originally from the Accord Front) apparently to persuade the Sunni residents of Baghdad to feel safe about contacting the authorities.
I don't want to bet on the citizens' cooperation in this regard but at the same time I can say that they won't give the militants a hand. The militants are getting more and more isolated by the day and this isolation is directly related to the increasing suffering and contempt of the citizens from this useless armed opposition especially that most of the once were opposition parties have joined the political process and became an integral part of the government and they smothered their tone and making their demands through political routes.
over the bend
Byron York reports on the Plameologists.
gore: global warming = nazi holocaust
Jonah Goldberg writes:
...In “An Inconvenient Truth” and in interviews, Gore sticks to his guns. He quotes Churchill’s warning about the gathering storm of fascism and declares: “The era of procrastination, of half-measures, of soothing and baffling expedients, of delays, is coming to a close. In its place we are entering a period of consequence.”
In interviews, Gore calls global warming skeptics “deniers” with an acid surely intended to conjure comparison to Holocaust deniers.
Sounds like stifling dissent, no?
Of course, Gore isn’t alone. The people of good will who raise relevant and sober-minded questions about global-warming scaremongering are subjected to vicious character assassination on a daily basis. Scott Pelley of “60 Minutes” recently asked why he should interview skeptics of the new environmental groupthink: “If I do an interview with Elie Wiesel, am I required as a journalist to find a Holocaust denier?”
giuliani goes nuclear
A small gathering in Mid town yesterday got a sneak peek at Rudy Giuliani's formula as he gears up for a likely 2008 presidential run. That formula: one-third leadership, one-third technocratic centrist and one-third radical conservative reformer.
There's a reason Giuliani outpolls Sen. John McCain regularly when it comes to who conservative Republicans prefer for the presidency - while also maintaining great popularity with centrists - and it was on full display in this Manhattan Institute-hosted talk on energy policy. (For the record, the ex-mayor's firm, Bracewell & Giuliani, does significant work for energy companies.)
The centrism came in the policy speech, which found the former mayor in full-on Ross Perot mode with a series of charts and graphs detailing 1) how U.S. energy demand has far outstripped domestic production since 1960 and 2) how countries like France and Belgium are far outstripping the United States in their use of nuclear power.
Drawing on his experience managing New York City's power problems, Giuliani spoke of the government red tape that makes it virtually impossible to build power plants, oil refineries and (especially) nuclear-power facilities.
Summing up U.S. energy policy since the 1970s, he was blunt: "We haven't done anything." We haven't drilled in Alaska. We haven't built oil refineries. We haven't ordered a nuclear power plant since 1978.
We need to start doing these things, he said, to diversify. Energy independence, he said, is simply the "wrong paradigm," despite the idea's popularity in quarters of both the Left and the Right. Instead, in a global economy, "We have to diversify, that's our strength . . . You can be independent by being diversified."
Read it all.
wednesday, june 14 2006
retiring corruption
Nancy Pelosi has officially retired the Democrats' "culture of corruption" slogan. Of course, it has nothing to do with various Democrats getting caught acting dirty. No, no.
It's because Democrats need to begin promoting their own vision of America.
“Now it’s time to talk about us. Enough of the Republicans. It’s time for us to talk about what are the priorities we’d like to see addressed, if we have the opportunity,” Pelosi said in an interview with The Hill on Wednesday.
Lemme guess: 1) cut 2) run 3) tax?
She outlined three areas where Democrats would seek to differentiate themselves from Republicans: integrity, civility and accountability. If Democrats were to take control of the House in November, their first actions would focus on promoting those values, she said.
Integrity: Pelosi plans to install a convicted criminal, Rep. Alcee Hastings, in a key intelligence committee position.
Civility: Howard Dean suggested that President Bush had advance knowledge of 9/11 and let it happen. Since 2000 virtually every leading Democrat, with the exception of Joe Lieberman, has had something ugly to say about President Bush.
Accountability: Democrats beat the drums of war against Iraq. Now that the war has taken longer than one election cycle, they hide from their own positions and claim "Bush lied." Just watch this video -- you'll need the Flash 8 plugin.
weird video
Japanese language instructors do, uh, hand aerobics to teach essential English phrases, such as, "Leave me alone" and "It's your fault this happened."
it was only a matter of time
For those who can't stand even one moment of silence. The iCrap?
minimum courage on minimum wage
Some Republicans in Congress are apparently worried about the midterm elections. They are so worried, they are starting to vote like Democrats.
rules in a knife fight?
By rote and by ritual most Americans to assert that they "Support our troops." But as we all know, yet seldom admit, America has more of the known reserves of the world's bullshit than the Saudis have oil. The truth of the matter is that far too many Americans are becoming far too interested in our troops behaving correctly than actually supporting and sustaining them. They blather support out of one orifice while spewing disdain from the other. We hear these clapped-out flatulators daily at work, on the street, and over the tube of the boobs. I don't know about you, but for me these hyperventilating hypocrites are beginning to gripe my hindquarters big time.
an iowahawk oldie but goodie
I was telling a friend about some of Iowahawk's older posts, and this one came to mind. For those who missed this the first time around, enjoy:
Blue State Blues as Coast