Friday, August 19, 2005
Back to Baathists
Robert Dreyfuss, in an article at Tom Paine titled "First, Ignore the Neocons," suggests that an opportunity lies in wait for the US military to ally with former Baathist officials. Worth reading.
Trusting torturers
Both the US and UK are trying to clean up their abuse problems through an accelerated policy of rendition, otherwise known as "out of sight out of mind (until it is in our further interests)." Joanne Mariner writes,
"Trust but verify," Ronald Reagan once said, describing his approach to Soviet arms reduction efforts. The unspoken corollary to his admonition was that promises alone are worthless.
But even empty promises are tempting when the recipient wants to believe them. And so it is with the U.K. government, which has been making arrangements for the return of security suspects to countries that practice torture. Last week, the British signed an agreement with Jordan that affirmed that deportees to the latter country would not be mistreated. It is believed to be negotiating with nine other countries, including Egypt and Algeria, to obtain similar pledges.
Still reeling from recent terrorist attacks, the U.K. is seeking easy ways to deport foreigners perceived as security threats. But its zeal to be rid of unwanted guests should not blind it to the dangers of its current approach.
Thursday, August 18, 2005
Read it and weep
This report is going to appear in Foreign Affairs (alert via Doug Ireland). It'll be taken to be an important article, mark my words. But it's another "no-shit, Einstein" study on a par with "huh? this Iraq War ain't going so well." Read Amartya Sen, anyone who's ever ventured scholarly criticism of the World Bank and IMF, listen to lots of poor people around the planet, etc. And don't forget to include the US too. From the IHT yesterday:
Economic growth has traditionally been thought to promote democratization by making strategic coordination easier, as communications technology improves, news media become more diverse and the citizenry more educated. But in recent years some savvy regimes have learned how to cut the cord between growth and strategic coordination, allowing the former without having to worry about the latter.
Their trick is to ration carefully the subset of public goods that facilitate political coordination, while investing in others that are essential to economic growth. The "coordination goods" that they need to worry about consist of things such as political and civil rights, press freedom and access to higher education. "Standard public goods" include public transportation, primary and secondary education, and public health; all of which contribute to economic growth and pose relatively little threat to the regime.
Clinton vs. Bush
Clinton:
Perhaps that's the loveliest thing for Clinton about being released from public office: As a politician, he was a pragmatist, but as a civilian, he's an idealist again. Watching him in Africa, it's impossible to feel an ounce of cynicism about his motives. He's genuinely delighted that Kenya has abolished its school fees. He really does think that the AIDS crisis is a problem that can be solved. He could be playing golf right now. But he's not - he's in sweltering AIDS clinics in Zanzibar at four in the afternoon.Bush:
On Saturday, the current President Bush was pressed about how he could be taking five weeks to ride bikes and nap and fish and clear brush even though his occupation of Iraq had become a fiasco. "I think it's also important for me to go on with my life," W. said, "to keep a balanced life."
Pressed about how he could ride his bike while refusing to see a grieving mom of a dead soldier who's camped outside his ranch, he added: "So I'm mindful of what goes on around me. On the other hand, I'm also mindful that I've got a life to live and will do so."
Whatever perspective it takes
Eric Urmansky notices a slight difference in reporting:
From Agence-France Presse:
A group of Iraqi workers in Baghdad came under fire from US troops who mistook them for insurgents.
An interior ministry source said US troops fired on a crowd of workers in the central Baghdad neighbourhood of Alawi, while a defence ministry source reported an exchange of fire between suspected rebels and US forces in the area.
But a number of casualties lying in Al-Yarmouk hospital told AFP that a US helicopter fired at them as they were gathered outside a hotel.
"The electricity went out at around 0500 (0100 GMT), so we exited the hotel to the street to have breakfast in the fresh air. A helicopter then opened fire into the street," said Ali Mohammad, who sustained neck and leg injuries.
From the NYT:
The American military also said today that some Iraqi civilians were killed or wounded when American forces attacked suspected insurgents from the air in Baghdad early Tuesday. In the battle, American helicopters "tracked and engaged the terrorists," the military said in a statement. There was an unknown number of civilian casualties, and an investigation has begun into the incident, the military said.
Acid and arrests
The Sydney Morning Herald reports on the Gaza evacuation or eviction or whatever you're preferred term. Various reports suggest that many of the protestors have arrived from elsewhere. Some threw acid on the Israeli police. The acid incident tended to be downplayed, if mentioned at all, in US reports.
Now, I'm not an expert on the history of Palestine and Israel, but it seems to me that this was stolen territory. It's rough to be displaced from a place you've come to call home, but didn't "home" result from aggression in the first place? I have little sympathy for these people. Read the passage below, substitute "Arab" or "Muslim" for "West Bank settler," and then question the extent to which "terrorism" is a relativized, politicized term.
Now, I'm not an expert on the history of Palestine and Israel, but it seems to me that this was stolen territory. It's rough to be displaced from a place you've come to call home, but didn't "home" result from aggression in the first place? I have little sympathy for these people. Read the passage below, substitute "Arab" or "Muslim" for "West Bank settler," and then question the extent to which "terrorism" is a relativized, politicized term.
Meanwhile, a West Bank settler who gunned down four Palestinians on the first day of the forcible evacuation yesterday said he had no remorse, as thoughts turned to the future of Gaza after the withdrawal.
"I am not sorry for what I have done. I wanted to stop the pullout and I hope someone murders Sharon as well," Asher Weisgan told reporters as he was brought by police to a court near Tel Aviv.
Factsheet on Social Security
From the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
Here's one of the facts:
Here's one of the facts:
Fact #10: Social Security is an extremely efficient program, with administrative costs equaling only 0.6 percent of retirement and survivors benefits.
Administrative costs account for only 0.6 percent of total Social Security retirement and survivors benefit payments. According to the most optimistic estimates, even private accounts plans with very limited choices and services would have administrative costs more than ten times as high. The Office of the Chief Actuary of the Social Security Administration generally assumes that with private accounts that offer limited choices and services, administrative costs would ultimately consume about 0.3 percent of account assets each year. At that rate, administrative expenses would ultimately eat up about 7 percent of a worker's retirement benefit, more than ten times as much as the administrative costs under the current Social Security system.
Spatio-temporal causality suspension zone
To follow up on my earlier post about metaphysical extension and the nature of causality in upside-down land, here's a Bushism:
"You see, not only did the attacks help accelerate a recession, the attacks reminded us that we are at war." - Washington, D.C., June 8, 2005
"You see, not only did the attacks help accelerate a recession, the attacks reminded us that we are at war." - Washington, D.C., June 8, 2005
Torture photos and videos
The fight still goes on about the new Abu Ghraib photos that the government refuses to release. The latest reason is that their realease would cause "riots." (I can't find the damn link now, so trust me).
I was going to write more on this, but The Poorman does it well enough for me for now.
I was going to write more on this, but The Poorman does it well enough for me for now.
The ACLU has evidence that the torture taking place in US and affiliated facilities around the world has been approved directly by the imperial President, based on his supra-legal wartime powers. These photos depict illegal actions ordered by the government because we are at war. The government now believes that these photographs and videos need to be suppressed because we are at war. If they believe this strongly enough, and if the court - as seems almost certain - disagrees, they may for the first time publicly invoke that ability "inherent in the President" to set aside the law, which has previously only been invoked in private.
As I've said before, my personal preference would be not to release the photos. My personal preference would also be that these photos didn't exist, and that we had never invaded Iraq, and that I had a pony. As someone who pretty much got everything he could ever want once famously observed, "you can't always get what you want." We don't live in a world where potentially damaging images can be suppressed, because this is the only way (well, one of the only ways) to put an end to the infinitely more damaging policies which the images illustrate....
Tourist or traveler?
An article via Whirled View. It's actually a pretty nontrivial question. Are we responsible or not? Do we attempt to take up and understand others' positions or not?
I recently did an entry on "tourism" for the new Encyclopedia of Science, Technology, and Ethics. Here's a quickie excerpt, if you're interested.
I recently did an entry on "tourism" for the new Encyclopedia of Science, Technology, and Ethics. Here's a quickie excerpt, if you're interested.
...The paradox of the authenticity-seeking traveler is that the more tourists vacation in a given place, the more a tourism infrastructure is developed, and the more the place comes to resemble the tourist's home, causing local cultural (and environmental) deterioration. Pico Iyer (1989), among others, has written about the unusual juxtapositions and hybrids of different cultures one finds across the globe due to the forces of globalization and tourism. The paradox creates a dilemma regarding whether or not to visit a place or to tour at all. The question for anthropologists and environmentalists alike is whether it is appropriate to visit a fragile culture or a pristine environment for which one's visitation contributes to its alteration. Furthermore, as the tourist destination becomes more developed and attracts increasing numbers of visitors, many tourists may look elsewhere for less-traveled destinations. They may, as a consequence, continue the same cycle, and some of the overdeveloped areas may ultimately witness a decline in the number of visitors on which their economy depends. From the perspective of those welcoming tourists, the local tourist industry may provide much-needed income and infrastructure development, but the cycle of unmanaged tourism development ultimately places these economic benefits at risk. While income is generated locally from the industry (and for many countries tourism is the most important industry), distribution of benefits is notoriously uneven, and there may be severe damage to local cultures, other parts of local economies, and natural environments. Such considerations have generated anti-tourism and pro-tourism positions, with the former generally concerned with environmental and cultural impact and the latter with economic development....
Iraq and AIPAC
From Juan Cole:
[The second highest ranking US diplomat in Iraq, David Satterfield, has been implicated in the AIPAC spy case. Satterfield is not known for being lock step with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. But I minded two things about this article in the NYT. First, the two persons it quotes on Satterfield, Indyk and Ross, both have a long association with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, which was set up by AIPAC as a think tank to promote Israeli interests in Washington. No critic of AIPAC is quoted in the article; none. Second, the article does not stop and consider how Iraqis are going to feel about this news. I mean, he is the deputy chief of mission, as I understand the description given by the NYT. If he did leak classified information to an Israeli lobby from the US Government, wouldn't Iraqis be worried he was leaking to the Israelis from Baghdad? I mean, the US is always complaining that they are afraid anything they share with the Shiite-dominated Iraqi government goes straight to Iraq. I don't know if Satterfield is guilty of anything, but an article about this issue should at least have involved one interview with an independent Iraqi politician about the meaning of it for the latter's country.]
This is how Rome burns
Bob Herbert:
Yup.
You have to wonder whether reality ever comes knocking on George W. Bush's door. If it did, would the president with the unsettling demeanor of a boy king even bother to answer? Mr. Bush is the commander in chief who launched a savage war in Iraq and now spends his days happily riding his bicycle in Texas....
College kids in the U.S. are playing video games and looking forward to frat parties while their less fortunate peers are rattling around like moving targets in Baghdad and Mosul, trying to dodge improvised explosive devices and rocket-propelled grenades.
There is something very, very wrong with this picture.
Yup.
Syria is worried about the US
Good article in The Guardian today on Syria and the threat from the US and its Weapons of Mass Invasion.
'The Americans won't control their side of the border, accept our offers of collaboration, allow us the surveillance equipment we need - then accuse us of aiding a resistance that, they know, is basically Iraqi, even if some foreign fighters do get over our frontiers, which - they also know - cannot be sealed without investing resources way beyond our means." The Syrian commander who made this lament was deployed at Wadi Sawab, in a hilltop outpost only a few metres high, but sited in a desert landscape so flat and featureless that from it you could see deep into Iraq - across the berms, barbed wire, concrete blocks and observation posts manned by 7,000 soldiers that Syria has put up along this central and most desolate stretch of its 600km frontier.
It wasn't proof that Syria is doing its utmost to stop foreign jihadists (the place to prove that is inhabited regions to the north), but it was proof it was seriously doing something. However, from the diplomats who agreed to go on this unprecedented public relations tour, Americans were conspicuously absent. And that, for the Ba'athist regime, was yet another instance of America "not wanting to know".
Officially the US might say that all it wants is a change of Syrian behaviour; but, said a senior official, "we have concluded in recent months that they really want to bring us down". European diplomats tend to agree that an apparently systematic refusal to engage the regime at any level reflects the influence of neo-conservative hawks, for whom Syria is a prime candidate for regime change in the region. Even if George Bush isn't ready to embark openly on such a policy, the neocons are strong enough to block any inclination in the opposite direction.
Wednesday, August 17, 2005
Chavez and the power of South America
A post on NarcoSphere from a few days ago. It's extremely difficult to get a read on Venezuela and Hugo Chavez from the media distance of the US and through the haze of political rhetoric from the administration. The alternative view is a somewhat romanticized lefty one. The truth, of course, probably falls somewhere in between, though distrust of Bush pushes me towards the lefty side.
One thing is certain, the US has very dirty hands in South America. Rumsfeld's warning about external interference in the affairs of Bolivia elides the fact that the US, as in most South and Central American countries, has its own history of supporting nasty dictatorships and other forms of undemocracy in Bolivia. This is a major part of the history against which oppressed groups such as indigenous people are struggling. Hypocrisy! But also death and mayhem.
Chavez appears to be attempting to subvert and rewrite that history. It remains to be seen whether he's doing it in the interests of the broader populace or in the interests of a few.
By the way, if you've never read them, pick up copies of Eduardo Galeano's trilogy, Memory of Fire. An alternative history of the Americas and a fine piece of writing.
One thing is certain, the US has very dirty hands in South America. Rumsfeld's warning about external interference in the affairs of Bolivia elides the fact that the US, as in most South and Central American countries, has its own history of supporting nasty dictatorships and other forms of undemocracy in Bolivia. This is a major part of the history against which oppressed groups such as indigenous people are struggling. Hypocrisy! But also death and mayhem.
Chavez appears to be attempting to subvert and rewrite that history. It remains to be seen whether he's doing it in the interests of the broader populace or in the interests of a few.
By the way, if you've never read them, pick up copies of Eduardo Galeano's trilogy, Memory of Fire. An alternative history of the Americas and a fine piece of writing.
Dems and Indies sitting in a tree...
MyDD has some interesting stats on the closing ranks of Dems and Independents in every state in the US. Via Norwegianity's inbox. Beers on me, next time in DC, Norwegianity.
Hypocrisyaical
Kos (via Tbogg) does a run-down of some quotes from the schmucklewads talking about Clinton during the Bosnian War era. I really can't stand how most lefty and righty blogs spend their time pointing out the hypocrisies and changed views of the other side. Seems pointless to me as a genuinely political matter, an infuriating hall of mirrors. But, alas, that's much of what political blogland is about. And yet, and yet, I post this listing of bozo quotes for potential dinner party amusement. Call me a hypocrite. Or smarty-pants.
"You can support the troops but not the president."
--Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)"Well, I just think it's a bad idea. What's going to happen is they're going to be over there for 10, 15, maybe 20 years."
--Joe Scarborough (R-FL)"Explain to the mothers and fathers of American servicemen that may come home in body bags why their son or daughter have to give up their life?"
--Sean Hannity, Fox News, 4/6/99"[The] President . . . is once again releasing American military might on a foreign country with an ill-defined objective and no exit strategy. He has yet to tell the Congress how much this operation will cost. And he has not informed our nation's armed forces about how long they will be away from home. These strikes do not make for a sound foreign policy."
--Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA)"American foreign policy is now one huge big mystery. Simply put, the administration is trying to lead the world with a feel-good foreign policy."
--Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)"If we are going to commit American troops, we must be certain they have a clear mission, an achievable goal and an exit strategy."
--Karen Hughes, speaking on behalf of George W Bush"I had doubts about the bombing campaign from the beginning . . I didn't think we had done enough in the diplomatic area."
--Senator Trent Lott (R-MS)"I cannot support a failed foreign policy. History teaches us that it is often easier to make war than peace. This administration is just learning that lesson right now. The President began this mission with very vague objectives and lots of unanswered questions. A month later, these questions are still unanswered. There are no clarified rules of engagement. There is no timetable. There is no legitimate definition of victory. There is no contingency plan for mission creep. There is no clear funding program. There is no agenda to bolster our over-extended military. There is no explanation defining what vital national interests are at stake. There was no strategic plan for war when the President started this thing, and there still is no plan today"
--Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is."
--Governor George W. Bush (R-TX)
More fruit news
The BBC, channeling Phronesisaical, maintains that bright fruits can help prevent arthritis.
Have a kumquat.
Photo: Selvin Chance
Big old K Street
From The Hill, K Street grows and grows:
The distraction of a presidential campaign behind them and a host of far-reaching legislative initiatives in front, lobbyists appear on pace to set a new record for revenues this year, although some firms reported slight declines at midyear.
Healthcare, telecommunications, Social Security reform and homeland security, along with massive energy and highway bills passed just before recess, led clients to continue to seek K Street's counsel.
TV Eyeless in Gaza
There's always more than meets the TV Eye. Jennifer Loewenstein in Counterpunch:
A great charade is taking place in front of the world media in the Gaza Strip. It is the staged evacuation of 8000 Jewish settlers from their illegal settlement homes, and it has been carefully designed to create imagery to support Israel's US-backed takeover of the West Bank and cantonization of the Palestinians.
There was never the slightest reason for Israel to send in the army to remove these settlers. The entire operation could have been managed, without the melodrama necessary for a media frenzy, by providing them with a fixed date on which the IDF would withdraw from inside the Gaza Strip. A week before, all the settlers will quietly have left with no TV cameras, no weeping girls, no anguished soldiers, no commentators asking cloying questions of how Jews could remove other Jews from their homes, and no more trauma about their terrible suffering, the world's victims, who therefore have to be helped to kick the Palestinians out of the West Bank.
The settlers will relocate to other parts of Israel and in some cases to other illegal settlements in the West Bank handsomely compensated for their inconvenience. Indeed, each Jewish family leaving the Gaza Strip will receive between $140,000 and $400,000 just for the cost of the home they leave behind. But these details are rarely mentioned in the tempest of reporting on the "great confrontation" and "historical moment" brought to us by Sharon and the thieving, murderous settler-culture he helped create.
Emotional colon
Edmund Morris, Reagan biographer, writes that our poor presidents are really sweethearts (except for Clinton, of course, and probably also Carter) who must avoid emotionality in order to do their job. "Emotional predators" such as Sheehan and the other parents of dead soldiers ought to stay out of Bush's way.
Maybe one day some such document will reveal what President Bush really feels about his own "honored dead." For the meantime, he is our elected president, with the business of a nation to run. Ms. Sheehan has gotten more time with him than most grieving mothers, and if she felt, during those unsatisfactory minutes, that there was a glass wall around him, it unfortunately comes with the job. A president has to protect himself from emotional predators, or he'd be sucked dry within a week of taking office.I get the idiotic point that presidents have a job to do. But they also ought not to run for president if they're so emotionally fragile as to worry about the emotionality of a mother with a dead son. Assholes.
Bombs in Bangladesh
This has hardly made a dent in the US news because, well, it's Bangladesh. But it should.
More than 100 homemade bombs planted by suspected Islamic militants exploded nearly simultaneously across Bangladesh on Wednesday, killing two people, including a young boy, and wounding at least 125.
About 50 people were arrested, a state-run news agency reported. There was no claim of responsibility, but leaflets from a banned group seeking the imposition of Islamic law were found at many scenes.
Finally, progress
Finally, some progress in Iraq. It's at long last starting to look a bit more like Texas.
President Jalal Talabani has paved the way for the first legal execution in Iraq since the 2003 fall of Saddam Hussein, the presidential office said Wednesday. The case involves three men sentenced to hang for murdering three policemen.
Any death sentence must be approved by the three-member presidential council headed by Talabani, who has voiced opposition to capital punishment in the past. He still refuses to sign the authorization document, but his office said he had authorized one of his vice presidents, Adil Abdul-Mahdi, to do so instead.
Abdul-Mahdi signed the order but it was unclear if the sentence had been carried out. Executions in Iraq are by hanging.
World university rankings
A list compiled by Shanghai Jiao Tong University which is now widely quoted as a measure in the academic world.
Shanghai Jiao Tong's top 50 universities (last year's ranking in brackets):
1 (1) Harvard University USA
2 (3) University Cambridge UK
3 (2) Stanford University USA
4 (4) University California - Berkeley USA
5 (5) Massachusetts Inst Tech (MIT) USA
6 (6) California Inst Tech USA
7 (9) Columbia University USA
8 (7) Princeton University USA
9 (10) University Chicago USA
10 (8) University of Oxford UK
11 (11) Yale University USA
12 (12) Cornell University USA
13 (13) University California - San Diego USA
14 (16) University California - Los Angeles USA
15 (15) University Pennsylvania USA
16 (18) University Wisconsin - Madison USA
17 (20) University Washington - Seattle USA
18 (17) University California - San Francisco USA
19 (22) Johns Hopkins University USA
20 (14) Tokyo University Asia/Pac
21 (19) University Michigan - Ann Arbor USA
22 (21) Kyoto University Asia/Pac
23 (23) Imperial Coll London UK
24 (24) University Toronto USA
25 (25) University Illinois - Urbana Champaign USA
26 (25) University Coll London UK
27 (27) Swiss Fed Inst Tech - Zurich Switzerland
28 (28) Washington University - St. Louis USA
29 (32) New York University USA
30 (29) Rockefeller University USA
31 (30) Northwestern University USA
32 (31) Duke University USA
32 (33) University Minnesota - Twin Cities USA
34 (35) University California - Santa Barbara USA
35 (34) University Colorado - Boulder USA
36 (40) University Texas - Austin USA
37 (36) University British Columbia Canada
38 (36) University Texas Southwestern Med Center USA
39 (43) Pennsylvania State University - University Park USA
39 (38) Vanderbilt University USA
41 (42) University California - Davis USA
41 (39) University Utrecht Netherlands
43 (44) Rutgers State University - New Brunswick USA
43 (48) University Pittsburgh - Pittsburgh USA
45 (46) Karolinska Inst Stockholm Sweden
46 (41) University Paris 06 Europe
47 (55) University California - Irvine USA
47 (47) University Edinburgh Europe
47 (57) University Maryland - Coll Park USA
UPDATE (17 August, 4:44pm):
As always, university rankings should be taken with a grain of salt. Indeed, the Guardian article from which this list is taken points out that the Shanghai Jiao Tong rankings tend to focus on schools strong in the sciences. Further, excellent individual departments, faculty, and students can be located in mediocre universities and excellent universities can have mediocre individual departments, faculty, and students.
Assault
20+ more dead in Baghdad today. Seymour Hersh, on The Daily Show last night, said that intelligence is showing the insurgents gearing up for what Hersh referred to as an Iraqi Tet Offensive, that the big attack is on its way and will include assaulting the rich and famous lifestyles of the Green Zone.
Axis of Non- US friends
Time for some repackaging or "rebranding" as the marketing kids say. I'm not fond of my bulky and puerile ANUS acronym in the title, but would be happy to consider others. Axis of Evil But Only Evil When it Serves Fear-Mongering Purposes?
UPDATE:
The Royal British Society of Acronymizers writes in to announce that the currently favored rebranding coming from the work of their highly secretive Giggles Romper Room is "The World Axis of Tomfoolery."
U.S. Policy on 'Axis of Evil' Suffers Spate Of Setbacks.
As the conflict drags on, some analysts predict that resolution will elude the president who vowed not to wait nearly a full term ago.
"I think in five years we'll be in the same stalemate we are now at best," said Clifford Kupchan, who studies Iran at the Eurasia Group. "Neither Pyongyang nor Tehran wants to pick a fight with the 800-pound gorilla because they'll lose. On the other hand, the 800-pound gorilla doesn't have a lot of options right now, either."
UPDATE:
The Royal British Society of Acronymizers writes in to announce that the currently favored rebranding coming from the work of their highly secretive Giggles Romper Room is "The World Axis of Tomfoolery."
Afghanistan opium
A Schizophrenic War: Peace in Afghanistan Is a Boon for Drug Lords, from Spiegel Online.
McCain and Biden want more troops
"The day that I can land at the airport in Baghdad and ride in an unarmed car down the highway to the green zone is the day that I'll start considering withdrawals from Iraq," the Arizona Republican told "Fox News Sunday."
Conservative intellectuals get thumped
Harold Meyerson, Washington Monthly, does us a service by rounding up the conservative intellectuals betrayal of intellect. The list, alas, is much much longer than this if we drop the "intellectual" qualifier.
The delusions for which they were apologizing weren't only the administration's; they were their own as well. There was an odd sort of integrity to their dishonesty; they believed (most of them did) all the theories that justified the war. But they didn't present these theories as theories. They presented them -- misrepresented them -- as facts.
Yet by some curious code of Beltway etiquette, the war hawks are still sought out for their judgments on war and peace, geopolitics, and military and political strategy. They are, in varying degrees, the journalistic equivalents of Donald Rumsfeld -- authors of disaster, spared from accountability, still bewilderingly in place. Herewith, five of the top offenders....
Tuesday, August 16, 2005
Move along
While I'm on the link-a-thon, Atrios had next to nothing to say today except "wanker." Lots of the usual threadbots, though.
Sheehan and accountability
More on Cindy Sheehan, this one from David Neiwert of Orcinus. Good take -- accountability is the point.
Reversal backflip double-axel anti-semitism
Max Sawicky writes on some of the incessant attacks on Cindy Sheehan,
As far as I can tell, the only source for the accusations that Cindy Sheehan is an anti-semite are the following words:
"Am I emotional? Yes, my first born was murdered. Am I angry? Yes, he was killed for lies and for a PNAC Neo-Con agenda to benefit Israel. My son joined the Army to protect America, not Israel."
The descriptions in question:
Christopher Hitchens: ". . . announcing that he [Casey Sheehan] was killed in a war for a Jewish cabal? (A claim that has brought David Duke flying to Ms. Sheehan's side.)"
Israpundit: "[S]he believes that a dark cabal of Jews is running the US government"
So the veracity of Hitchens and Israpundit should be clear.
Time to invade Iran
Oil prices taking effect:
Inflation surged last month, the government reported yesterday, as the long rise in energy prices finally seemed to be pinching the American economy. After absorbing the burden of oil at $40 a barrel, then at $50 and beyond, consumers have started to react as prices have risen above $60 in recent weeks.
Wal-Mart blamed high oil prices yesterday as it reported that in the recent quarter its profits rose at their slowest rate in four years. The chief executive, H. Lee Scott Jr., told investors that expensive oil was worrying him because it seemed to be erasing recent income gains for many customers.
Airlines have already felt the sting of increasing jet fuel costs. Last week, Delta, United and Continental raised domestic fares in their latest attempt to stem losses; Delta is struggling to avoid bankruptcy. United Parcel Service recently reminded its drivers not to leave truck engines running while they deliver packages.
Nearly all of the jump in inflation last month came from energy. Overall prices rose 0.5 percent in July - and 3.2 percent over the last year - after having been flat in June.
Across the country, families are trying to figure out where to cut corners so they can afford gas that now averages $2.55 a gallon nationwide after posting the biggest weekly jump in at least 15 years, according to the latest government statistics.
Marshall on Abramoff
Josh Marshall has been doing a bang-up job of following the Abramoff/Delay/et al scandals. Here's the latest:
But pay attention to the big picture rather than just his personal enrichment or particular bad acts.
This is a huge sum of money Abramoff was sitting on. There was lots of money to keep Grover Norquist rolling in cash, lots of spare cash to fund Ralph Reed's transition from Christian Coalition sachem to power lobbyist, money for skyboxes to use to raise more money without the in-kind donation of the use of the skybox, millions of dollars pushed through front organizations then passed on to others.
This isn't just a crooked lobbyist. This is someone managing a slush-fund. The sort of unregulated, unwatched pile of money patronage-based political machines always need to keep running.
So who is he running it for?
Oh, so that's the story
Here's the recent clarification on the London tube shooting of Brazilian electrician, Jean Charles de Menezes (via Norwegianity). Remember? Shot by police seven times in the head and once in the chest? Was running away from police wearing a suspiciously heavy overcoat in the middle of summer?
But wait a minute, Rush, before we go killing everyone with brown skin:
But wait a minute, Rush, before we go killing everyone with brown skin:
Surveillance officers wrongly believed he could have been Hussain Osman, one of the prime suspects, or another terrorist suspect. By 10am that morning, elite firearms officers were provided with what they describe as "positive identification" and shot De Menezes eight times in the head and upper body.The documents and photographs confirm that Jean Charles was not carrying any bags, and was wearing a denim jacket, not a bulky winter coat, as had previously been claimed.
He was behaving normally, and did not vault the barriers, even stopping to pick up a free newspaper.He started running when we saw a tube at the platform. Police had agreed they would shoot a suspect if he ran.
A document describes CCTV footage, which shows Mr de Menezes entered Stockwell station at a "normal walking pace" and descended slowly on an escalator.
The document said: "At some point near the bottom he is seen to run across the concourse and enter the carriage before sitting in an available seat. "Almost simultaneously armed officers were provided with positive identification."
Blind spot on Iran
Robert Scheer in the LA Times:
Bush's Iran policy is rife with contradictions and idiocies. What, for example, is the point of publicly threatening Iran when doing so immeasurably strengthens the hand of hard-line nationalists and religious fundamentalists in Tehran? These are the people who, for more than a century, have secured much of their appeal by posturing as the protectors of the Muslim populace against Western imperialism.
And the reality is that we are in a much, much weaker position vis-a-vis Iran than we should be because of our invasion and disastrous occupation of neighboring Iraq.
Iran now holds some high cards in this poker match. It is closely allied with the most powerful force in post-Hussein Iraq: Shiite religious leaders. Any invasion of Iran might break our already strained military machine. If Iran were to send its fanatical revolutionary guards into Iraq as saboteurs, they could make the current carnage seem like a walk in the park.
And finally, Iran is one of the world's biggest oil exporters. At a time when oil prices are soaring, much of the rest of the world would be hesitant to back the United States in any adventure that could cut off the flow.
As German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder put it accurately on Sunday in response to Bush's comments: "Let's take the military option off the table. We have seen it doesn't work."
Burned morale
That sucks:
A fire Saturday in Iraq that engulfed two big tents and sent a thick column of black smoke into the desert sky destroyed a bunch of recreation equipment used by the 29th Support Battalion of the Hawai'i National Guard.
The morale, welfare and recreation tents at Logistical Support Area Anaconda about 50 miles north of Baghdad housed a TV room/karaoke parlor, fitness machines and weight room, library, pool table and kitchen.
Dewey speaks
Light posting today as I'll be hunkered down at the DC DMV, one of the very worst places in the country. I'll leave you with a passage from Dewey's Freedom and Culture, published in 1939.
If we want individuals to be free we must see to it that suitable conditions exist: -- a truism which at least indicates the direction in which to look and move.
It tells us among other things to get rid of the ideas that lead us to believe that democratic conditions automatically maintain themselves, or that they can be identified with fulfillment of prescriptions laid down in a constitution. Beliefs of this sort merely divert attention from what is going on, just as the patter of the prestidigitator enables him to do things that are not noticed by those whom he is engaged in fooling. For what is actually going on may be the formation of conditions that are hostile to any kind of democratic liberties. This would be too trite to repeat were it not that so many persons in the high places of business talk as if they believed or could get others to believe that the observance of formulae that have become ritualistic are effective safeguards of our democratic heritage.
Monday, August 15, 2005
Rushdie and Islam
I was asked by a reader to comment further on the Rushdie excerpt from a previous post. I had mentioned there that I didn't entirely agree with his argument.
In the original Washington Post article, Rushdie said,
So, some interrelated thoughts:
First, okay, shake up tradition. But towards what? Rushdie uses metaphors -- "throwing open the windows," etc. -- but apart from this simply says Islam ought to go "modern." It's not clear what he means here. Individualism? Liberal marketeerism? Naturalism? Education... but in what? I'm all for a naturalistic account, and think people like Thoreau and Emerson and Dewey were pretty much right on (see Dewey's A Common Faith) -- but all theistic religions are essentially supernaturalist. A lot of Muslims are non-traditional as opposed to Rushdie's fanaticist sense of traditional. A lot of non-Muslims are supernaturalists (e.g. depending on the source, 60-80% of non-Muslim Americans).
Second, in the US there are plenty of rightist Christian groups who hold what we "moderns" would call extremist ideas who nonetheless cause no harm to others. We tend not to worry too much about them, even when some of their members do commit violent acts in the name of their God. And there exist other non-modern religions/cultures such as the Amish or Shakers -- we can call them extremist in their traditionalism. Yet, we worry about traditionalist Muslim groups, even when they do not commit violent acts and preach against violence. Of course, this is not to say that we shouldn't do something about any group that preaches hatred of others and takes their beliefs so far as to kill others -- in this case, whichever ostensive religion it comes from doesn't matter at all.
The double-standard, however, is in the call for Islam to modernize. It is a complex double-standard because, although race and certain kinds of extremist beliefs don't overlap entirely, there is still often a racial element to the distinction between traditionalist, extremist Christian groups and traditionalist, extremist Muslim groups. If nothing else, this is the public and political perception. Many of the beliefs of American conservatives ought to be brought up to more modern snuff. They ought to throw open the windows too. But the question remains, towards what? In my view, those beliefs I think are more thoughtful, appropriate, fecund, pragmatic, etc. But try telling that to an American conservative extremist or even many of our daily media figures.
Third, Rushdie is basically making a demand for the liberalization of a religious tradition. Liberal modernization for many of us moderns seems like a pretty good thing, even if we often don't live up to its more noble principles. But there's also a loss many moderns bemoan in modernization and liberalization -- the "loss" of tradition, community, values, and so on. Modernity has been rejected by many. Much of 20th-Century philosophy took this direction in very sophisticated ways. Many cultures today worry about the ravaging effects of liberal modernization on the very things that give those cultures and their members' lives meaning. And there is good reason to be concerned. But, also, culturally, this worry is ever-present at the margins of American public dialogue and public consciousness. It can be found in different variations and degrees: in some anti-globalization thought and activism, much of the American Christian right's anxieties about values, progressives' worries about the destructive properties of capital, concerns about the global loss of languages, and so on.
Fourth, as roughly a liberal myself I generally think that openness, genuine choice, individual rights, avoidance of dogma, experiment, transparency, accountability, freedom of thought and speech and worship or non-worship, pluralism, human rights, "a healthy respect for the opinions of mankind," are things worth pursuing for a society and/or culture, including religious ones. But these are values that my upbringing instiled in me and that my education developed. Now that I've been teaching and writing for some time and have lived around the globe learning other languages and cultures, I know how much these liberal values are fraught with nuances, vagaries, and contradictions, as well as how both abstract thought and lived context matter and provide content for what are otherwise empty rhetorical, philosophical, or regulative shells. Like any values worth their salt, these liberal ones require an investment or meaning through lived, historically funded experience in order to have meaningful content. That is the communitarian's point. But the same goes for more traditional values -- they can often be built out of a history of pragmatism and thoughtful experiment but also out of ostensive revelation, mindless repetition, and brute authority. They help to invest lives with meaning, but they can also serve to stultify and oppress. Fundamentalist Islam hasn't cornered the market on the latter. The US has its own Taliban arising from or perhaps involved in a historical struggle against modern liberal society.
Again, I'm not saying all values are relative (blah, blah, blah, go the rightist anti-academics). Human beings have to live with each other, and increasingly with very different others. That's what the fundamentalist often can't handle because he or she is absolutist, regardless of cultural and religious background. But the modern also ought not to make the mistake of automatically thinking that a failure on the fundamentalist's part to live up to the modern's ideal of healthy values and ways of life entails anything other than the modern's failure to live up to his own ideals (of experiment, openness, pluralism, etc.). Not everything goes. Violence and torture and oppression can't be tolerated. But "throwing open the windows" just isn't enough of an answer for a subculture that, in some ways, has earned the right to be pissed off. In a globalizing era, we moderns also can't run away from the devastation upon which modernity has been built, and that includes all of our Janus-faced beliefs and those which have turned away from shining modernity towards darker medieval terrain.
I don't have an answer about fundamentalism and I think it's one of the toughest questions liberal moderns face. But I do know that saying the answer is that fundamentalists ought not to be fundamentalists and we liberal moderns ought to do our best to make sure they become more like us is simplistic and ultimately antagonistic. It's neither realistic in regard to the nature of fundamentalist beliefs -- indeed, it's blind -- nor mindful of the experimentalist ideas of liberalism.
In the original Washington Post article, Rushdie said,
"The deeper alienations that lead to terrorism may have their roots in these young men's objections to events in Iraq or elsewhere, but the closed communities of some traditional Western Muslims are places in which young men's alienations can easily deepen. What is needed is a move beyond tradition -- nothing less than a reform movement to bring the core concepts of Islam into the modern age, a Muslim Reformation to combat not only the jihadist ideologues but also the dusty, stifling seminaries of the traditionalists, throwing open the windows to let in much-needed fresh air.This seems to be the gist of Rushdie's claim -- that the problem with much of Islamic culture is that it is traditionalist, anti-liberal, and based in a supernaturalistic Islamic religion. His political point is that Tony Blair ought not to cozy up to radical Muslim leaders in Britain, but rather force their hand: they ought to become modern Britons.
It would be good to see governments and community leaders inside the Muslim world as well as outside it throwing their weight behind this idea, because creating and sustaining such a reform movement will require above all a new educational impetus whose results may take a generation to be felt, a new scholarship to replace the literalist diktats and narrow dogmatisms that plague present-day Muslim thinking."
So, some interrelated thoughts:
First, okay, shake up tradition. But towards what? Rushdie uses metaphors -- "throwing open the windows," etc. -- but apart from this simply says Islam ought to go "modern." It's not clear what he means here. Individualism? Liberal marketeerism? Naturalism? Education... but in what? I'm all for a naturalistic account, and think people like Thoreau and Emerson and Dewey were pretty much right on (see Dewey's A Common Faith) -- but all theistic religions are essentially supernaturalist. A lot of Muslims are non-traditional as opposed to Rushdie's fanaticist sense of traditional. A lot of non-Muslims are supernaturalists (e.g. depending on the source, 60-80% of non-Muslim Americans).
Second, in the US there are plenty of rightist Christian groups who hold what we "moderns" would call extremist ideas who nonetheless cause no harm to others. We tend not to worry too much about them, even when some of their members do commit violent acts in the name of their God. And there exist other non-modern religions/cultures such as the Amish or Shakers -- we can call them extremist in their traditionalism. Yet, we worry about traditionalist Muslim groups, even when they do not commit violent acts and preach against violence. Of course, this is not to say that we shouldn't do something about any group that preaches hatred of others and takes their beliefs so far as to kill others -- in this case, whichever ostensive religion it comes from doesn't matter at all.
The double-standard, however, is in the call for Islam to modernize. It is a complex double-standard because, although race and certain kinds of extremist beliefs don't overlap entirely, there is still often a racial element to the distinction between traditionalist, extremist Christian groups and traditionalist, extremist Muslim groups. If nothing else, this is the public and political perception. Many of the beliefs of American conservatives ought to be brought up to more modern snuff. They ought to throw open the windows too. But the question remains, towards what? In my view, those beliefs I think are more thoughtful, appropriate, fecund, pragmatic, etc. But try telling that to an American conservative extremist or even many of our daily media figures.
Third, Rushdie is basically making a demand for the liberalization of a religious tradition. Liberal modernization for many of us moderns seems like a pretty good thing, even if we often don't live up to its more noble principles. But there's also a loss many moderns bemoan in modernization and liberalization -- the "loss" of tradition, community, values, and so on. Modernity has been rejected by many. Much of 20th-Century philosophy took this direction in very sophisticated ways. Many cultures today worry about the ravaging effects of liberal modernization on the very things that give those cultures and their members' lives meaning. And there is good reason to be concerned. But, also, culturally, this worry is ever-present at the margins of American public dialogue and public consciousness. It can be found in different variations and degrees: in some anti-globalization thought and activism, much of the American Christian right's anxieties about values, progressives' worries about the destructive properties of capital, concerns about the global loss of languages, and so on.
Fourth, as roughly a liberal myself I generally think that openness, genuine choice, individual rights, avoidance of dogma, experiment, transparency, accountability, freedom of thought and speech and worship or non-worship, pluralism, human rights, "a healthy respect for the opinions of mankind," are things worth pursuing for a society and/or culture, including religious ones. But these are values that my upbringing instiled in me and that my education developed. Now that I've been teaching and writing for some time and have lived around the globe learning other languages and cultures, I know how much these liberal values are fraught with nuances, vagaries, and contradictions, as well as how both abstract thought and lived context matter and provide content for what are otherwise empty rhetorical, philosophical, or regulative shells. Like any values worth their salt, these liberal ones require an investment or meaning through lived, historically funded experience in order to have meaningful content. That is the communitarian's point. But the same goes for more traditional values -- they can often be built out of a history of pragmatism and thoughtful experiment but also out of ostensive revelation, mindless repetition, and brute authority. They help to invest lives with meaning, but they can also serve to stultify and oppress. Fundamentalist Islam hasn't cornered the market on the latter. The US has its own Taliban arising from or perhaps involved in a historical struggle against modern liberal society.
Again, I'm not saying all values are relative (blah, blah, blah, go the rightist anti-academics). Human beings have to live with each other, and increasingly with very different others. That's what the fundamentalist often can't handle because he or she is absolutist, regardless of cultural and religious background. But the modern also ought not to make the mistake of automatically thinking that a failure on the fundamentalist's part to live up to the modern's ideal of healthy values and ways of life entails anything other than the modern's failure to live up to his own ideals (of experiment, openness, pluralism, etc.). Not everything goes. Violence and torture and oppression can't be tolerated. But "throwing open the windows" just isn't enough of an answer for a subculture that, in some ways, has earned the right to be pissed off. In a globalizing era, we moderns also can't run away from the devastation upon which modernity has been built, and that includes all of our Janus-faced beliefs and those which have turned away from shining modernity towards darker medieval terrain.
I don't have an answer about fundamentalism and I think it's one of the toughest questions liberal moderns face. But I do know that saying the answer is that fundamentalists ought not to be fundamentalists and we liberal moderns ought to do our best to make sure they become more like us is simplistic and ultimately antagonistic. It's neither realistic in regard to the nature of fundamentalist beliefs -- indeed, it's blind -- nor mindful of the experimentalist ideas of liberalism.
Helen Keller / Cindy Sheehan
From Mickey Z. of Press Action, via Cursor:
In a textbook example of whitewashing, if today's America knows Helen Keller (1880-1968) at all, it's the easy-to-digest image portrayed in the 1962 film, "The Miracle Worker." Brave deaf and blind girl "overcomes" all obstacles to inspire everyone she meets. "The Helen Keller with whom most people are familiar is a stereotypical sexless paragon who was able to overcome deaf-blindness and work tirelessly to promote charities and organizations associated with other blind and deaf-blind individuals," writes Sally Rosenthal in Ragged Edge.But, in 1909, Helen Keller became a socialist. Soon after, she emerged as a vocal supporter of the working class and traveled the nation to voice her opposition to war. "How can our rulers claim they are fighting to make the world safe for democracy," she asked, "while here in the U.S. Negroes may be massacred and their property burned?" Of course, as a woman with disabilities, she was patronized by the same mainstream media that previously championed her as a heroine. The editors of the Brooklyn Eagle wrote: "Her mistakes spring out of the manifest limitations of her development."
Keller minced no words in her responses... one of which appeared in newspapers across America: "So long as I confine my activities to social services and the blind, the newspapers compliment me extravagantly, calling me an 'arch-priest of the sightless' and 'wonder woman'. But when I discuss poverty and the industrial system under which we live that is a different matter."
Bombs over Tehran
The Guardian has an article on a possible attack on Iran that supplements my post below. I forgot my own name for the famous Bush policy option -- the Anarchize Your Country approach or Iraqization. Still, I don't think the option described in this article works, materially, strategically, and ethically (with the caveat that this hasn't stopped them in the past).
A plausible spin could be that America and Britain must act where the international community has failed, and that their action is the responsible alternative to an Israeli attack. The conventional wisdom is that, even if diplomacy fails, the US is so bogged down in Iraq that it could not take on Iran. However, this misunderstands the capabilities and intentions of the Bush administration.
America's devastating air power is not committed in Iraq. Just 120 B52, B1 and B2 bombers could hit 5,000 targets in a single mission. Thousands of other warplanes and missiles are available. The army and marines are heavily committed in Iraq, but enough forces could be found to secure coastal oilfields and to conduct raids into Iran.
A US attack is unlikely to be confined to the suspected WMD locations or to involve a ground invasion to occupy the country. The strikes would probably be intended to destroy military, political and (oil excepted) economic infrastructure. A disabled Iran could be further paralysed by civil war. Tehran alleges US support for separatists in the large Azeri population of the north-west, and fighting is increasing in Iranian Kurdistan.
Sunday, August 14, 2005
Chicken Little
Frederick Pohl's first novel (I believe it's his first -- 1952) was titled The Space Merchants. I read it long ago and can't remember the story. But one thing from that book stood out -- the future society represented in the story received its protein from a giant throbbing mass of featureless flesh grown in a laboratory, mined, and packaged for human consumption. The giant flesh mass was called "Chicken Little." See the BBC report, Year 2005.
Four mangoes
Damn, there's nothing like a whole batch of different varieties of mango for celebrating a working Internet Explorer browser.Photo: Ian Maguire
IE finally working
Thanks to a commenter at Blog Forum (see his sports blog: http://www.haveyoumettony.com/) for help getting the IE version of this blog in order. Everything should now appear as it should whether you're using IE or Firefox (but download Firefox now!).
Soursop
Photo: Selvin Chance
Thanks also to Selvin Chance of Hawaii for permission to use his fruit photographs. See his work at PBase.
Upside-down land is spatial and temporal
Continuing in the vein of Balkin's note below, you should have noticed by now that the administration's upside-down land, the possible world it has created, has both spatial and temporal dimensions. Validity functions in this possible world in causal reverse. Let's remind ourselves of the scorecard.
First, there is the irony about WMDs in the Washington Post report today pointed out by Balkin.
Second, there is the rise of Iraq as a center for terrorism post-invasion, something that didn't exist prior to the war.
Third, there is the move towards Islamism and alliance with Iran, something contrary to the rhetoric about building a stable liberal democracy in the early days of the occupation. The Green Zone in Baghdad is another way of showing just what is actually meant by "laboratory of democracy."
Fourth, there is the insistence on a lower troop level than necessary, most adamantly made by Rumsfeld pre-war and post-invasion.
Fifth, there is greater potential today for terrorist attacks in the US and Europe than there was prior to the war. We've seen them in Spain and Britain. No telling where the next ones will be.
Sixth, there was the claim that the invasion would boost human rights in Iraq. Women's rights are human rights. They're about to go out the window.
Seventh, there are right-wing bloggers and commentators who maintain that American soldiers' deaths in Iraq are due to the soldiers not being attentive enough to the risks of their situation. So, troops sent to Iraq to support an illegal invasion that has created anarchy and insurgent and terrorist violence are themselves responsible for dying at the hands of insurgents and terrorists.
We could go on. But anyone can see that this war is not only a failure, it is lost. Perhaps the only thing that is true is the pre-war administration claim that the US would have to side with unsavory characters such as Uzebekistan and Pakistan in the "war on terror." But the striking element that arises from all the points above is that any truth to them has come from the administration's own creation. Thus, it now also claims that events and facts created ex post facto by the invasion and occupation can serve as justifications for the invasion and occupation.
Barry Blitt, cartoonist for the NY Times, gets it right below. If I could draw, I'd try to add the temporal element.
First, there is the irony about WMDs in the Washington Post report today pointed out by Balkin.
Second, there is the rise of Iraq as a center for terrorism post-invasion, something that didn't exist prior to the war.
Third, there is the move towards Islamism and alliance with Iran, something contrary to the rhetoric about building a stable liberal democracy in the early days of the occupation. The Green Zone in Baghdad is another way of showing just what is actually meant by "laboratory of democracy."
Fourth, there is the insistence on a lower troop level than necessary, most adamantly made by Rumsfeld pre-war and post-invasion.
Fifth, there is greater potential today for terrorist attacks in the US and Europe than there was prior to the war. We've seen them in Spain and Britain. No telling where the next ones will be.
Sixth, there was the claim that the invasion would boost human rights in Iraq. Women's rights are human rights. They're about to go out the window.
Seventh, there are right-wing bloggers and commentators who maintain that American soldiers' deaths in Iraq are due to the soldiers not being attentive enough to the risks of their situation. So, troops sent to Iraq to support an illegal invasion that has created anarchy and insurgent and terrorist violence are themselves responsible for dying at the hands of insurgents and terrorists.
We could go on. But anyone can see that this war is not only a failure, it is lost. Perhaps the only thing that is true is the pre-war administration claim that the US would have to side with unsavory characters such as Uzebekistan and Pakistan in the "war on terror." But the striking element that arises from all the points above is that any truth to them has come from the administration's own creation. Thus, it now also claims that events and facts created ex post facto by the invasion and occupation can serve as justifications for the invasion and occupation.
Barry Blitt, cartoonist for the NY Times, gets it right below. If I could draw, I'd try to add the temporal element.
Creating the reasons for war, post-war
Regarding today's Washington Post report that a chemical weapons lab has been discivered in Iraq, James Balkin at Balkinization notes the tragic irony,
In one of the ironies of history, it now turns out that although U.S. troops found no biological and chemical weapons in Iraq when we overthrew Saddam in March 2003, there is evidence that insurgent groups began production of chemical and biological weapons after the invasion to attack U.S. forces there. Thus, we may have inadvertently chosen a policy that led to the production of the very WMD's we fought the war to destroy.
Lost war, part 2
Frank Rich, NY Times this morning:
But just as politics are a bad motive for choosing a war, so they can be a doomed engine for running a war. In an interview with Tim Russert early last year, Mr. Bush said, "The thing about the Vietnam War that troubles me, as I look back, was it was a political war," adding that the "essential" lesson he learned from Vietnam was to not have "politicians making military decisions." But by then Mr. Bush had disastrously ignored that very lesson; he had let Mr. Rumsfeld publicly rebuke the Army's chief of staff, Eric Shinseki, after the general dared tell the truth: that several hundred thousand troops would be required to secure Iraq. To this day it's our failure to provide that security that has turned the country into the terrorist haven it hadn't been before 9/11 - "the central front in the war on terror," as Mr. Bush keeps reminding us, as if that might make us forget he's the one who recklessly created it....
...Thus the president's claim on Thursday that "no decision has been made yet" about withdrawing troops from Iraq can be taken exactly as seriously as the vice president's preceding fantasy that the insurgency is in its "last throes." The country has already made the decision for Mr. Bush. We're outta there. Now comes the hard task of identifying the leaders who can pick up the pieces of the fiasco that has made us more vulnerable, not less, to the terrorists who struck us four years ago next month.
Abu Ghraib photos
WASHINGTON: The Pentagon has moved forcefully to block the release of new video evidence of prisoner abuse at Iraq's ill-fated Abu Ghraib prison, arguing it would help recruit new Islamist insurgents and endanger American lives.In the interest of accountability and transparency, no comment.
Saturday, August 13, 2005
Force or farce?
Josh Marshall writes,
There are only three ways I can see that Bush could back up the hypothetical threat of force (and the perception of that threat is what is crucial here): 1) limited air-only strikes; 2) nukes; and 3) invading the country and screwing it up so badly that Iranians would all suffer (let's call the latter the Anarchize Your Country threat or, synonymously, Iraqization). Numbers 2 and 3 are nuts. Of course, number 2 has its proxy version in an Israeli strike on Iran. I think we can be significantly worried about this administration giving the go-ahead for the proxy strike. The already damaged international standing of the US would have the final stake driven through its heart in even the proxy case, and all bets would be off in terms of global non-proliferation.
But, really, air or cruise missile strikes are the only option. So we have to think through the implications of such strikes. There are a number of possibilities one of which is the risk of a broader war in the region. Even if Iran can't fend off cruise missiles, it can at least make things much worse in Iraq in the name of self defense. The US simply can't fight that war. It doesn't have the capability, as the Iraq occupation has shown.
The farce is that there is any credibility to the Bush threat. Of course, the guy may be stupid enough to try any of the three options above. Yet, any real threat may ultimately be based in what logicians call the Argument from Utter Stupidity.
First time as farce, second time as farce too?On the Bush threat of violence as a last resort, the farce is not in the obvious fact that war is pretty close to being Bush's first resort. The real farce is that the administration has blown its credibility of being able to back up its talk of attacks with an actual winnable war. Everyone on the planet knows that invading Iran would be insane, including Iran. Of course, the UN says Iran doesn't have nuclear weapon capability and many estimates say such a capability is a decade or away. For analysis of this see Arms Control Wonk. But let's assume something urgent has to be done about Iran.With President Bush again stating that force is still on the table against Iran, albeit only as the last resort, German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder has kicked off his uphill reelection drive with an attack on President Bush's Middle Eastern belligerence.
All of this, of course, provides an uncanny replay of the build up to the US invasion of Iraq with the German Chancellor leveraging reelection on the axis of President Bush's warmongering.
(ed.note: My literary powers failed me when I tried to come up with a joke suitably humorous and grim to fully capture the ridiculousness of President Bush's continued insistence that he is willing to use force but only as a last resort. Perhaps someone out there can help?)
There are only three ways I can see that Bush could back up the hypothetical threat of force (and the perception of that threat is what is crucial here): 1) limited air-only strikes; 2) nukes; and 3) invading the country and screwing it up so badly that Iranians would all suffer (let's call the latter the Anarchize Your Country threat or, synonymously, Iraqization). Numbers 2 and 3 are nuts. Of course, number 2 has its proxy version in an Israeli strike on Iran. I think we can be significantly worried about this administration giving the go-ahead for the proxy strike. The already damaged international standing of the US would have the final stake driven through its heart in even the proxy case, and all bets would be off in terms of global non-proliferation.
But, really, air or cruise missile strikes are the only option. So we have to think through the implications of such strikes. There are a number of possibilities one of which is the risk of a broader war in the region. Even if Iran can't fend off cruise missiles, it can at least make things much worse in Iraq in the name of self defense. The US simply can't fight that war. It doesn't have the capability, as the Iraq occupation has shown.
The farce is that there is any credibility to the Bush threat. Of course, the guy may be stupid enough to try any of the three options above. Yet, any real threat may ultimately be based in what logicians call the Argument from Utter Stupidity.
Enframing the new Campaign Against Violent Extremism
This Washington Post article has to be read: US Lowers Sights on What Can Be Achieved in Iraq. It's just too precious. Infuriating, rather. "Oops, sorry everybody got killed and wounded and fraternity hazed and all that." But at least they're unstupidizing a little bit. (And, by the way, the war was not justified to the American people as a humanitarian war of liberation).
The Bush administration is significantly lowering expectations of what can be achieved in Iraq, recognizing that the United States will have to settle for far less progress than originally envisioned during the transition due to end in four months, according to U.S. officials in Washington and Baghdad.
The United States no longer expects to see a model new democracy, a self-supporting oil industry or a society in which the majority of people are free from serious security or economic challenges, U.S. officials say.
"What we expected to achieve was never realistic given the timetable or what unfolded on the ground," said a senior official involved in policy since the 2003 invasion. "We are in a process of absorbing the factors of the situation we're in and shedding the unreality that dominated at the beginning."
Second cd
Here are the contents of the second cd. Sorry about the self-indulgence (the nature of blogs). I'll have two lengthy posts coming up in the next couple of days. One is further commentary on the Salman Rushdie post below, and the other is on international legitimacy. I'll smugly mock them both.
1. Chris Connor - I Hear the Music Now
2. Anita O'Day and Jimmy Giuffre - The Way You Look Tonight
3. Ben Webster - Pennies from Heaven
4. Illinois Jacquet - How High the Moon
5. Fats Waller - Just as Long as the World Goes Round and Round
6. Django Reinhardt - I Can't Give You Anything But Love
7. Coralie Clement - Samba de Mon Coeur Qui Bat
8. Nicola Conte - Bossa Perdue
9. Marc Moulin - It's to Say
10. Chris Connor - From This Moment On
11. Louis Armstrong - The Circle of Your Arms
12. Helen Merrill - S'Wonderful
13. Lou Donaldson - Love Power
14. Cal Tjader - Soul Burst
15. Sabu Martinez - Otra Vez / Flamenco Ain't Bad
16. Harold Land - So in Love
17. Frank Sinatra and Paula Kelly - Sunshine Cake
18. Billie Holiday - The Very Thought of You
19. Howard Roberts - Li'l Darlin'
1. Chris Connor - I Hear the Music Now
2. Anita O'Day and Jimmy Giuffre - The Way You Look Tonight
3. Ben Webster - Pennies from Heaven
4. Illinois Jacquet - How High the Moon
5. Fats Waller - Just as Long as the World Goes Round and Round
6. Django Reinhardt - I Can't Give You Anything But Love
7. Coralie Clement - Samba de Mon Coeur Qui Bat
8. Nicola Conte - Bossa Perdue
9. Marc Moulin - It's to Say
10. Chris Connor - From This Moment On
11. Louis Armstrong - The Circle of Your Arms
12. Helen Merrill - S'Wonderful
13. Lou Donaldson - Love Power
14. Cal Tjader - Soul Burst
15. Sabu Martinez - Otra Vez / Flamenco Ain't Bad
16. Harold Land - So in Love
17. Frank Sinatra and Paula Kelly - Sunshine Cake
18. Billie Holiday - The Very Thought of You
19. Howard Roberts - Li'l Darlin'
London bombers were local, independent
The suicide cell that killed 52 people on 7 July is not linked to those alleged to be behind the second London attacks on 21 July, according to the initial findings of the biggest anti-terrorist investigation held in Britain.
An investigation into the four suicide bombers from the first attacks and the people alleged to be behind the July 21 plot has found no evidence of any al-Qa'ida "mastermind" or senior organiser. The inquiry involved MI5, MI6, the listening centre at GCHQ, and the police.
The disclosure that the July 7 team were working in isolation - and were radicalised by Mohammad Sidique Khan, the oldest man - has caused concern among anti-terrorist officers.
Police and MI5 fear it increases the chance that more "self-sufficient" units similar to the July 7 suicide cell are hiding in Britain. Anti-terrorist officers are worried by the evidence that previously unknown "clean skin" terror cells are forming in Britain with little or no help from abroad.
UN: Iran, no bomb
From The Independent:
The UN nuclear watchdog is preparing to publish evidence that Iran is not engaged in a nuclear weapons programme, undermining a warning of possible military action from President George Bush.
The US President told Israeli television that "all options are on the table" if Iran fails to comply with international calls to halt its nuclear programme. Both the US and Israel - the Middle East's only nuclear-armed power - were "united in our objective to make sure Iran does not have a weapon", he said.
Light posting
Sorry, very light posting today. I have a ton of work and am trying to make a couple of compilation cds of upbeat jazz from my lps for a friend's wedding dinner.
If you'd like some Saturday reading, take a look at John Dewey's Freedom and Culture, chapter 1:
As for the first cd, here's the running playlist, if you're interested (they wanted some funky stuff, but much of the funk fusion is bluesy and doesn't quite work for the occasion):
1. Pink Martini - Amado Mio
2. Nicola Conte - Bohemian's Dilemma
3. Cannonball Adderley and Milt Jackson - Groovin' High
4. Charlie Shavers Quartet - Lover
5. Horace Silver - Song for My Father
6. Gordon Beck & Helen Merrill - I Got It Good
7. Cal Tjader - Aleluia
8. Stan Getz & Charlie Byrd - O Pato
9. Grant Green - Hey, Western Union Man
10. Lou Donaldson - The Scorpion
11. Jimmy Rushing - I'm Walking Through Heaven With You
12. Carmen McRae - Them There Eyes
13. Dave Pike - Jet Set
If you'd like some Saturday reading, take a look at John Dewey's Freedom and Culture, chapter 1:
"... to escape collective delusion - that totalitarianism rests upon external coercion alone."
As for the first cd, here's the running playlist, if you're interested (they wanted some funky stuff, but much of the funk fusion is bluesy and doesn't quite work for the occasion):
1. Pink Martini - Amado Mio
2. Nicola Conte - Bohemian's Dilemma
3. Cannonball Adderley and Milt Jackson - Groovin' High
4. Charlie Shavers Quartet - Lover
5. Horace Silver - Song for My Father
6. Gordon Beck & Helen Merrill - I Got It Good
7. Cal Tjader - Aleluia
8. Stan Getz & Charlie Byrd - O Pato
9. Grant Green - Hey, Western Union Man
10. Lou Donaldson - The Scorpion
11. Jimmy Rushing - I'm Walking Through Heaven With You
12. Carmen McRae - Them There Eyes
13. Dave Pike - Jet Set
Fisk again
How can the US ever win when Iraqi children die like this?
..."The Americans came back with an officer two days later," Selim al-Sammerai continues. "They offered us compensation. I refused. I lost my son, I told the officer. 'I don't want the money - I don't think the money will bring back my son.' That's what I told the American." There is a long silence in the room. But Selim, who is still crying, insists on speaking again."I told the American officer: 'You have killed the innocent and such things will lead the people to destroy you and the people will make a revolution against you. You said you had come to liberate us from the previous regime. But you are destroying our walls and doors.'"
I suddenly realise that Selim al-Sammerai has straightened up on his seat and his voice is rising in strength. "Do you know what the American said to me? He said, 'This is fate.' I looked at him and I said, 'I am very faithful in the fate of God - but not in the fate of which you speak.'"
Then one of Yassin's brothers says that he took a photograph of the dead boy as he lay on the ground, a picture taken on his mobile phone, and he printed a picture of it and when the Americans returned on the second day they asked to see it. "They asked me why I had taken the picture and I said it was so people here could see what the Americans had done to my brother. They asked if they could borrow it and bring it back. I gave it to them but they didn't bring it back. But I still kept the image on my mobile and I was able to print another." And suddenly it is in my hands, an obscene and terrible snapshot of Yassin's head crushed flat as if an elephant had stood upon it, blood pouring from what had been the back of his brains. "So now, you see," the brother explains, "the people can still see what the Americans have done."....
Friday, August 12, 2005
Iggy
Damn, I thought jackfruit would help us on our way into the weekend. But Dan does me one or two better by sending me this link to WFMU's (NJ/NY) blog. Click on the Iggy in Cincinnati, 1970 link to download -- that'll get you going, and don't forget the peanut butter. And extra damn! They've got tropical fruit on the main page!
The Russians have finally arrived
Moscow joins the ranks of DC, Phillie, and NYC. Congratulations and welcome.
The grand estate tax battle
I've been keeping an eye on this epic struggle of this great democracy from the nosebleed seats -- or, rather, I stood in line for over three decades for a bleacher ticket but they were sold out -- or rather, I decided to buy a hot dog instead but only had two dollars rather than seven -- or rather, I tried to tune in the game on the car radio, but my car is a donkey -- or rather, I tried to pay attention but I lost my estate when I dropped a quarter in a subway grate -- or rather, I tried to watch but amoebae only have vacuoles....
The very rich and the merely rich are fighting over the fate of the estate tax.
So far, the very rich are winning.
Small-business owners -- the merely rich -- want to exempt from taxation inheritances of up to $10 million. The very rich -- people whose estates are worth tens of millions or even billions of dollars -- want instead to reduce the tax rate on assets passed on at death. A $10 million exemption isn't nearly enough for them.
To the pleasure of the very rich, the leading compromise in the Senate would drastically lower the top rate on inherited assets -- to 15 percent from 47 percent. But, to the chagrin of the merely rich, the exemption wouldn't come close to their demands.
Iranian nukes
Good post over at Arms Control Wonk on the Iranian newkyewler program. Next theoretical decade, chucklemonkeys....
Gaza pullout, East Jersualem settlement
From Sobaka Newswire:
As Jewish settlements pop up all over East Jerusalem, the forced removal of Jewish settlers from Gaza won't allay anyone in Hamas. Those new settlements are going to provoke violence, and that violence will keep the settlers right where they are. The US props up the Israeli military with over $12 billion annually, in spite of the fact that Israel has more nuclear weapons in its arsenal than Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan, Burma, Zimbabwe, Cuba, Syria, Armenia, Argentina, Sudan, and North Korea - combined! Seriously, they've got more nukes than Pakistan, but the US cuts Pakistan a lot of slack, too, so maybe that's not a good comparison. Still, the US will keep Israel going no matter what Israel does. Therefore, the only people the hardcore Zionists in Israel's government has to win over are its own citizens who favor disengagement. If those moderates can be radicalized by a failed Gaza pullout, the hard-liners win politically.
Happy birthday, Musharraf
Pakistan successfully test-fired its first cruise missile on the 62nd birthday of President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who hailed Thursday's launch as a move toward '"military balance"' in the region.
Hunger in Africa - more bad news
A report from the International Food Policy Research Institute says,
The number of hungry children in Africa will increase by 3.3 million by 2025 if current policy and investment trends continue, according to a new report from the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).The report, Looking Ahead: Long-Term Prospects for Africa's Agricultural Development and Food Security, projects that child malnutrition in Africa will escalate over the next two decades and the continent will fail to meet the Millennium Development Goal to cut child malnutrition in half by 2015 unless more aggressive measures are taken now.
"Child malnutrition is on the rise in Africa. By 2025, hunger could be a daily reality for nearly 42 million children," said Joachim von Braun, director general of IFPRI. "But it doesn't have to be this way. With significant changes in policy and investment priorities starting now, Africa could sharply reduce child malnutrition and come close to achieving the Millennium Development Goal on time."
If current trends continue, child malnutrition in Africa is expected to grow from 38.6 million to 41.9 million by 2025. Sub-Saharan Africa, particularly Burkina Faso, Niger, Somalia, and Sudan, will account for the sharpest increase, but West Asia and North Africa will actually see a decline of 2.3 million hungry children.
Climate change news
Dan alerts me to this article in the NY Times on climate change research.
Some scientists who question whether human-caused global warming poses a threat have long pointed to records that showed the atmosphere's lowest layer, the troposphere, had not warmed over the last two decades and had cooled in the tropics.Now two independent studies have found errors in the complicated calculations used to generate the old temperature records, which involved stitching together data from thousands of weather balloons lofted around the world and a series of short-lived weather satellites.
A third study shows that when the errors are taken into account, the troposphere actually got warmer. Moreover, that warming trend largely agrees with the warmer surface temperatures that have been recorded and conforms to predictions in recent computer models....
Thanks for all the fruit
I need to give some thanks to four photographers who have kindly allowed me to use their tropical fruit photos on this blog. Please take a peek at their sites. Thanks to all.
Jim Richter, Razzle Dazzle, personal homepage
Ian Maguire, University of Florida / IFAS Tropical Research and Education Center
Oscar Jaitt, Fruit Lover's Nursery, Pahoa, Hawaii
Dave, Dave's Travel Corner
Jim Richter, Razzle Dazzle, personal homepage
Ian Maguire, University of Florida / IFAS Tropical Research and Education Center
Oscar Jaitt, Fruit Lover's Nursery, Pahoa, Hawaii
Dave, Dave's Travel Corner
Favorite Iraqi joke
As told by Iraqis:
"The Americans brought electricity to my ass before they brought it to my house."
"The Americans brought electricity to my ass before they brought it to my house."
What does al Qaida want?
The seven stages of the Islamic caliphate. An attempt to sort out The Plan.
Fisk write, you read
The latest from Robert Fisk in the air and on the ground in Iraq. With Patrick Coburn and a smattering of others, Fisk is one of the few real journalists in Iraq.
Campaign
BBC News on the radio this afternoon discussed the administration's name::policy rigamarole of the global war or struggle or whatever on terrorism, GWOT, GSAVE, or whatever. BBC Radio referred to the language of "campaign," as in "Global Campaign Against Violent Extremism." Snickers all around in the chambers of the Royal British Society of Acronymizers.
Signals
"Pulling the troops out would send a terrible signal to the enemy," the president told reporters between meetings with his military and foreign affairs advisers.And that signal is what? Clarification would be nice because there's a lot riding on it, and we might get a clue as to what the administration is up to now. The signal appears to be that we can't handle the fire, that we don't have staying power, that we're giving up on those few Iraqis that still want the US to remain. Or that we've lost. But here's the problem: we are losing, we have perhaps even lost (if only we knew of a goal that didn't look like losing), and the longer this goes on, the greater the loss will be. "Withdraw the troops now"? That's too simple. But worrying about a "terrible signal to the enemy"? That's insane.
Thursday, August 11, 2005
Intelligent design, parasite edition
An article on new discoveries about the behavior of plasmodium, the malaria-causing parasite that lives in mosquitoes, including one of my favorite examples of manipulative parasitic behavior:
But here's what the Kenyan and French researchers have discovered about mosquitoes and plasmodium:
Many parasites that need to live inside two different hosts during their life cycles also manipulate their hosts. A single-celled parasite called toxoplasma lives inside cats and then inside their prey, like rats. Research shows that infection with toxoplasma makes rats lose their fear of the odor of cats. "It's amazing how much manipulation is going on in parasites," Koella said.Rats eat the cat poop with toxoplasma, thus causing them to be less afraid of cats, thus leading to their denouement as more cat poop containing toxoplasma.
But here's what the Kenyan and French researchers have discovered about mosquitoes and plasmodium:
In the late '90s, Koella documented how plasmodium, the cause of malaria, manipulated its mosquito host. When the mosquitoes first take up plasmodium in human blood, they become more cautious about finding another victim, making them less likely to be killed.Applying these results to the question of whether plasmodium manipulate human hosts, they found that,
At this stage in the life cycle the parasite needs time to develop in the mosquito before it can be transmitted.
The mosquito's behavior changes when the parasite is ready to move on to a human. Koella found that mosquitoes carrying infective plasmodium become twice as likely to bite more than one person in a night, and they spend more time on each host drinking blood.
The parasite - a single-cell creature, plasmodium, carried by mosquitoes - makes infected humans smell more attractive to mosquitoes....Fascinating. We're microscopically and macroscopically manipulated beings.
After the plasmodium enters the human body, it needs time to develop in the liver. The parasites then produce offspring that can invade blood cells, and eventually a few of these give rise to offspring, known as gametocytes, that can be taken up by a mosquito and survive....
After studying 12 sets of children, the scientists discovered a striking pattern. "Gametocyte-infected children attracted about twice as many mosquitoes as either uninfected ones or ones infected with non-transmissible stages," Koella said. "The results really jump out."
Out in the South Texas town of Laredo
The NY Times does an interesting piece on drug violence in the sister border towns of Laredo, Texas and Nuevo Laredo, Mexico. Recall also Sean's piece below.
Damn fire ants
Remember that Cindy Sheehan post below? About William Pitt giving live local coverage. I like this post from 10:55. For the Texas friends....
t r u t h o u t | One Mother's Stand
By William Rivers PittThursday 11 August 2005
I walked in the grass and my feet got attacked by fire ants. I am hating Texas right now.
10:55 AM
The world is circular
Remember this little law? Now it goes to work. The prescience....
WASHINGTON - A little-noticed order issued by President Bush almost four years ago gives White House lawyers the right to block the release of memos written by Supreme Court nominee John G. Roberts Jr. when he worked for President Reagan.
The order, signed by Bush in November 2001, said the "incumbent president" had the right to approve the release of papers from the presidential libraries of his father, George H.W. Bush, and Ronald Reagan.
It set off a furor at the time among historians, archivists and librarians. They said it all but repealed the Presidential Records Act, a 1978 law that decreed a president's records were public property, not the private property of the former president. Under this law, a former president's papers were to be opened to the public 12 years after he left office. Exceptions could be made for national security reasons.
Bush's executive order added a new check. It said the "incumbent president may assert any constitutionally based privilege" after the 12 years had lapsed to block the release of files. Included among these many privileges were "records that reflect... legal advice or legal work."
You Freedom Walk
More on the "America Supports You Freedom Walk" (which sounds grammatically challenged):
...here's the part that caught my attention: to participate in the "Freedom Walk," you'll need to register with the Department of Defense.Participants are encouraged to arrive at the Pentagon South parking lot between 7 a.m. and 8 a.m. for screening to avoid long lines. The first 1,000 to arrive for screening at the Pentagon on September 11, will receive the official America Supports You campaign lapel pin.
And while I'm certain it's a handsome lapel pin, what, exactly, does "screening" mean?
Indeed, the event's organizers (Rumsfeld's Defense Department) have set up an online registration form that explains, "The Freedom Walk is free and open to anyone who registers.... You MUST have your registration number to check-in!"
That's right, in order to participate in a government-sponsored "Freedom Walk" on public streets past public monuments, from one outdoor public landmark to another, you have to give your name address, phone number, and email address to the Pentagon.
Interesting development on the Korean peninsula
After years of getting the shaft from the Bush Administration, South Korea says screw it.
South Korea objected Thursday to a vital American stance in deadlocked nuclear disarmament talks on North Korea, saying that the North should be allowed to run a nuclear program so long as it is for peaceful use.
The South Korean view defies Washington's insistence that North Korea end all of its nuclear programs without exception and creates a breach in U.S. efforts to insure that South Korea, Japan, China and Russia stand united behind the United States when six-nation talks on ending the North's nuclear weapons ambitions resume in Beijing in the week of Aug. 29.
Big climate change news from Siberia
THE world's largest frozen peat bog is melting. An area stretching for a million square kilometres across the permafrost of western Siberia is turning into a mass of shallow lakes as the ground melts, according to Russian researchers just back from the region.
The sudden melting of a bog the size of France and Germany combined could unleash billions of tonnes of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, into the atmosphere.
Bush's Islamic Republic
Peter Galbraith writes in the New York Review of Books,
There are two central problems in today's Iraq: the first is the insurgency and the second is an Iranian takeover. The insurgency, for all its violence, is a finite problem. The insurgents may not be defeated but they cannot win. This, of course, raises a question about what a prolonged US military presence in Iraq can accomplish, since there is no military solution to the problem of Sunni Arab rejection of Shiite rule, which is now integral to the insurgency.
Iraq's Shiites endured decades of brutal repression, to which the United States was mostly indifferent. Iran, by contrast, was a good friend and committed supporter of the Shiites. By bringing freedom to Iraq, the Bush administration has allowed Iraq's Shiites to vote for pro-Iranian religious parties that seek to create - and are creating - an Islamic state. This is not ideal but it is the result of a democratic process.
Cindy Sheehan
Cindy Sheehan is supposed to be arrested today. Follow along with William Pitt here. You've got to admire her.
Quagmire
Ehsan Ahrari in the Asian Times on the quagmireanical story for the US of of the Iraqi insurgency.
Whitey's on the moon
When it touched down safely at Edwards Air Force base, California, there were no ululations in this part of the world to congratulate the astronauts on proving once more that human beings can conquer space any time they wish.
No, they were more concerned about mundane things like the starvation, disease and poverty that have consigned them to the status of hewers of (fast dwindling) wood all their lives.
Meanwhile in Somalia
This article is on the political situation in Somalia. There was a report after last year's Indian Ocean tsunami, which also reached the shores of East Africa, on the amount of waste washed onto Somalian shores. The lack of a Somalian state meant also no regulation over its waters. It has become a dumping ground for ships carrying toxic and medical waste.
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