Maybe, just maybe, I'm doing something right

I daily picket various sites along the coastline here in central California, displaying a sign that shows the numbers of dead and wounded US soldiers and Iraqi civilians in our outrageous war, and calling for our immediate withdrawal. Just as do these folks in the midwest, whose efforts are having a distinct effect. And I've just self-published a novel that got a fine, favorable mention in the Santa Barbara Independent, a plaudit on page 35 by Nick Welsh, the paper's editor no less. Here's what he said, under the caption, "What Writers Read":

Gaviota, by Erik O'Dowd

"A very cool idea: anchor a contemporary political thriller-chiller in the very real shelling of Ellwood Beach by a Japanese submarine back in 1941. The story revolves around political ambition, family secrets, and accusations of treason."

Good for me.

Gordon Brown for president!

Can you imagine Bush--better yet, Cheney--doing this?

Maybe if we wait long enough...

Republicans will just die off.

Be afraid, be very afraid

I've listened to tapes of Nixon and LBJ during their agonies in the White House. Nixon, combative and paranoid about Watergate; Johnson, pained and frustrated about VietNam. Both men had human, comprehensible reactions.

But Bush? At peace, serene, with his position and decisions? If that's not mentally/emotionally aberrant, I don't know what.

Eighteen months to go and, thank god, counting.

Well, whaddaya know!

A relatively mainstream media outlet, McClatchy News Service (formerly Knight-Ridder) is calling Bush on his bullshit. Finally. Finally. Maybe, just maybe, it'll catch on.

Whazzup wid dat?

At the midway point in the US Women's Open golf tournament, the last names of the top six are Park, Hung, Shin, Kim, Ahn, Granada and Mayorkas. Only one American among them. Wanna guess which one?

Summertime, summertime

I just read an article (can't find it now) about how determined Bush was to get his invasion of Iraq underway in March, 2003, so that US troops wouldn't have to endure the horrible summer heat.

Here's today's weather report for Baghdad.

What's in a name?

In this one list of the day's horror in Iraq, the US military is reported to have killed some "insurgents," some "al Qaeda operatives," some "al Qaeda militiants" and some "gunmen." I know it's cheeky of me to ask, but what's the basis, precisely, for these different labels? We know they don't wear uniforms, and I doubt they have differing dogtags or business cards. Is the distinction purely literary--a reporter tiring of using the same words throughout the article, or perhaps a worker in the bowels of the printshop who ran out of capital Q's?

Two new blogs from inside Iraq

The first one, "Last-of-Iraqis," has a lengthy story about the situation in Adhamiya (the latest Fallujah--recently walled off from the rest of Baghdad), as well a detailed history of Muqtada al-Sadr's rise to prominence. The second one, "Nabil's blog," also has information about Adhamiya, as well as a long list of blogs from inside Iraq and videos of the newly-created ghetto.

Must reading.

Hang on Ruth and the gang

In view of these recent Supreme Court decisions--all horrible retreats from good jurisprudence--we better pray the four "liberals" (they're not very liberal, really) remain in good health for at least 18 months, so that a Democratic president and Senate will replace them. And then we'd better hope for poor health (death, preferably) of a couple of the five monsters on the Right, to secure a moderate majority on the Court. Otherwise, at the rate the five are rippping away the fabric of our constitution, we'll be left with nothing but a shred of freedoms in a few years.

In a nutshell

Here's a snapshot of the status of an emerging post-surge military "victory" in a Sunni area of Iraq. What a waste, what a nightmare, what a predictable--predicted--outcome.

Even Tony Snow can't explain this development

It turns out that Iraq's oil ministry has agreed to revive a Saddam-era oil deal, to allow a foreign nation to extract its oil from a large field. It's the first deal made by the ministry--and it's with China!

Heckuva job, Bush.

I'm too pissed off to write

about this latest political ploy by Congress--re-convening the Iraq Study Group. I'm dumbfounded, too. So, I'll write about it anyway.

The ISG is supposed to "study" Iraq's conditions and report to Congress a month after Patraeus' report is due in September. Then, it's said, the reports will be melded and something--probably nothing meaningful--will arise from that process.

First, it's politicaly idiocy on the Democrats' part. This process will only delay and eventually legitimatize the Bush madness in Iraq. It will give Bush an "out" in the fall, by allowing him to escape the consequences of his years of misdeeds by following some of the ISG's recommendations, albeit belatedly, and hence to appear reasonable and "bipartisan" as the war enters the final year of his terms. By allowing this, the Democrats are defusing a critical facet of the anti-Republican sentiment that has grown up over the war, and in particular will be handing Republican Congressional candidates a vehicle for arguing that their continued (up to now) support for the war was well-founded.

Second, re-visiting the ISG will gain nothing in terms of saving lives and treasure in Iraq. The eventual report will, again, be a hodgepodge of observations and "approaches," none of them novel, none of them dramatic. It will be a same-old, same-old document that wastes time and effort, and merely allows the pols to delay decision-making and to be able to point to paperwork as justification.

Third, now that the "surge" is well underway, and is going nowhere, to ask the ISG to report again is absurdly naive. The surge has closed options that might have been available ten months ago when its first report was rendered. Now, what can the ISG say except to reiterate what it said originally, except, perhaps, with more urgency.

I am furious at the dumb, cowardly Congress that has chosen this path. It's an insult to me as an American. I deserve better from my representatives.

If you like Ray Charles...

check this out.

Al Qaeda Unleashed

This article in The Guardian should be required reading for anybody who supports our continuing presence in Iraq. The writer's assertions about the benefits to bin Laden--his dreams fulfilled--by reason of the US occupation of Iraq are succinctly and incisively set forth, as is his description of their recent radical manifestations in Palestine, which the writer identifies in the rise of Hamas and its battles with Fatah.


"When Osama bin Laden and his lieutenant Ayman al-Zawahiri issued their "Jihad against Jews and Crusaders" statement on February 28 1998, responses to their declaration varied from apathy to amusement. They were an obscure group lost in the faraway emirate of the Taliban, a pathetic remnant of the fight against the USSR during the cold war. Their role looked historically defunct and their discourse archaic.
Things could not be more different now. Al-Qaida has become an intensely complex global network, with a decentralised, flexible structure that enables it to spread in all directions, across the Arab world, Africa, Asia and Europe. Whether pursuing active cells or searching for sleeping ones, the security world is haunted by al-Qaida's ghost. Like bubbles, these cells are autonomous, bound together neither by hierarchy nor by a chain of command. It only takes a few individuals who subscribe to its ideology and terrorist methods for al-Qaida to extend its reach to a new part of the globe.
With the Middle East moving from one crisis to another, this small organisation saw itself miraculously transferred from periphery to centre. In its founding statement, al-Qaida defined its mission as a jihad aimed at cleansing the Arabian peninsula of the American "locusts, eating its riches and wiping out its plantations", and liberating Palestinian land from Zionist occupation. With the invasion of Iraq in 2003, al-Qaida was offered a firm foothold in the Middle East and the unique chance to implement its "resistance against Jews and crusaders" project.
The organisation's penetration of Palestinian politics is the climax of a long, still unfolding process. Rapidly expanding from one location to another, al-Qaida currently boasts branches throughout the Arab region."

Heckuva job, Bush/Cheney.

No more Mister Nice Guy

I don't get it. Bush's poll numbers are in the tank, his second term is waning (although he still has 17 months as president!) and his power is gone. So why is Henry Waxman's subcommittee not acting with courage, not to mention outrage, at Condi Rice's failure to abide by its subpeona compelling her to testify about the prewar intelligence on Iraq, in particular the inclusion of the infamous "16 words" about "uranium from Africa" in Bush's SOU speech? Why not proceed now to hold her in contempt to at least commence the predicted battle over the White House claim of "executive privilege" or whatever? I mean, why is Waxman, why is entire Congress--except for a few hearty souls--acting so meekly, acting as if Bush has any support anywhere? If the Democrats don't act now, when will they? Never? And if so, tell me, what shall we call our new political party?

Kicking the can

Here's a letter I wrote today to the editor of the SB News-Press.

Come September General Patraeus will report on the progress of Bush’s escalation of force in Iraq, and many mainstream pundits tell us the report will be definitive and will dictate America’s future course in that besieged nation. Don’t be fooled. Patraeus’ report will be similar to the scores official reports from Iraq that have preceded it: ambiguous, equivocal, essentially meaningless. It will contain enough “positives,” “negatives” and “needs improvements,” to give colorable support to the entire spectrum of decisions, from complete withdrawal, to redeployment to fixed bases, to continuing the surge.

As a result, any decision purportedly based on the report will be, as have been all previous decisions on Iraq, political, purely political. Indeed, many Americans recognize the report for what it really is: a cynical tactic that allows Bush to delay facing the reality that his invasion was wrong from inception and that the occupation is being monstrously maintained, and to buy time so he can hand off his disaster to the next president.

Meanwhile, our soldiers are being killed and maimed daily. John Kerry once asked, “How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?” Now we should be asking, “How do you ask a man or woman to be the last soldier to die while a delusional president kicks the can down the road?”

This could get ugly

With Bush's ratings in the polls at an all-time low, he keeps plugging away at the immigration bill that alienates his base and, now, with the firing of the Chief of Staff, Peter Pace, he's even being jumped on by Faux News.

I must be a true history buff

because while I'm bedridden, recovering from a stress fracture of my ankle, I've been listening to the Nixon tapes. Fascinating, absolutely fascinating. (If the tapes--which include everything from Nixon's Christmas greetings to Rockefeller to his congratulations to Rehnquist on his confirmation to talks with Kissinger about bombing Hanoi, to, of course, Watergate--make any references I'm not familiar with, I just Google the subject to stay abreast with the conversation. What a world we've created.)

Lieberman's Dukakis moment

Shop 'til you drop, Joe.

Another country heard from

on the question of a timetable for US withdrawal from Iraq: Iraq.

The final chapter

of Scooter Libby's sad tale will be, of course, that the sentencing judge will deny him bail pending appeal, and the day after Scooter begins to serve his thirty-month sentence, he'll be shot while trying to escape.

"The lunatics are running the asylum"

Or is it the idiots are running the TV station.

Andy, we hardly knew thee

You just gotta watch this video of Amherst's award of an honorary doctorate to Andrew Card, former Chief of Staff to George W. Bush. I wonder--could it be?--that such displays will confront any of the other Bush minions who might someday receive such honorariums? Wouldn't it be terrific, for example, to see Condi "get hers" from the University of Denver? (In case you didn't know, that's where she got her Ph.D. Yeah, no kidding: DU, which is pronounced, duh. I realize the previous makes me a Stanford/Georgetown/Harvard snob, but I really have trouble calling Condi Dr. Rice.)

The waiting game

According to Arianna Huffington (she's not a seasoned reporter, I know, but in this case her story is plausible) Senators Obama and Clinton were playing chicken with their respective votes on the Iraq-funding bill, each waiting until the other voted, but Obama gave in first, voting against the Bush-blank-check authority, followed quickly by Hillary, also voting No.

Arianna chastises the one senator, Clinton, for being a "finger-in-the-wind" politician, but I ask this: Wouldn't it be nice if at least one of the two had marched into the Senate chamber eager--demanding--to cast the first negative vote on the measure?

Just asking.

Saint Sheehan

Cindy, I understand--and I wish you well. And peace.

A week of carnage

During the period of 5/21 to 5/28, a total of 42 US troops have been killed in Iraq, the deadliest week since the occupation began.

What's worth a thousand words?

A graphic.

Don't bother

to read this report about our new plan to "win" in Iraq. It's a tediously written piece of propaganda, recycled concepts, mushy language, that leads to the same result: nothing but the same old, same old. The report, as well as the plan itself, has one admirable feature: a breathlessness, a childlike whizziness of exposition that makes everything seem new and fresh, when indeed it's old and failed.

And--to add fuel to my fire--nowhere in the piece do the reporters point out how old, how re-hashed, how failed, these suppposedly "new" approaches are. So once again and still, the MSM reports as news that which isn't, and spouts as doctrine that which is but cover.

(A personal aside: Back in the Watergate days, I, along with a huge segment of US youth, aspired to be journalists. Now, I sure don't value that profession much, and neither do many Americans. I wonder why?)

Whither Erik, whither Iraq?

I'm off for about a week, visiting with Stanford alums in the Lake Tahoe area. Meanwhile, check out this lengthy AP article about al Sadr's plans and prospects in Iraq. The result of our costly efforts in that country could well turn out to be the replacement of a secular dictator with a religious fanatic.

Wonderful.

I hate to say I told you so

...but...

Got a minute?

Or maybe an hour? Check out this pdf. item from the Government Accountability Office, a report to Congress about progress in Iraq. (To save you some minutes, I suggest you click to page 39, a chart showing the number of attacks on US troops, Iraqi troops and Iraqi civilians. The "surge" has reduced the number of attacks down to the level they were in the hellish days of last summer.) Good for you, W. You're a real winner.

A date that will live in irony

Congress is presently considering, and may soon pass, a bill to try to stem the tide of illegal aliens coming into our country, after decades of being unable to control our borders. Does anyone see the irony in our repeated demands that Iran and Syria "control their borders," much of which, like our southern border, consists of miles of open desert?

A new low

According to daily pollster Rasmussen Reports, Bush's approval rating today (5/19) has hit a new low for his presidency, 34%. This drop from the high thirties coincides with, and is caused by according to Rasmussen, Bush's plumping for an immigration bill that isn't just punitive. In other words, Bush's support erodes a few points every time he even feints in the direction of some kind of decency. (I think the "compromise" bill is a travesty, but that's fodder for a later post.)

Tells you a lot about the crazies who make up the "somewhat approve" bunch: They're obviously so far right that they drop away the minute Bush deviates one iota from their mean-spirited, ugly view of the world.

Uh oh...

You read it here first. Or maybe second.

Gaviota lives!

At long, long last I have in hand--physcially in my hand (except I've put it down in order to type this post)--Gaviota, the self-published novel that I started writing a decade ago. It has been a long journey, much of it trying to find an agent and bigtime publisher (spent a year with one agent, only to have the single offer of publication we received turn to naught after months of maybe's). So I decided, what the hell, self-publish. Save a tree, get a solid book in hand, worth more than two leafy manuscripts in the box. And so forth.

Sooo--Gaviota may be found at the publisher's website, http://www.iUniverse.com/bookstore, where (if you're so inclined) it may also be purchased in hard-copy trade paperback form or as an ebook. It's also available in hard-copy at www.Amazon.com.

My own website, www.erikodowd.com, which is presently under construction, will soon contain additional information about Gaviota.

This is kinda fun!

It Just Doesn't Matter

Iraq? Impeachment? The "war on terr'r"? Life, death, taxes? In view of the eventual fate of Earth, the Solar System--even our galaxy, The Milky Way, when it eventually collides with the "nearby" galaxy Andromeda--nothing temporal (by our human standards of time) seems to matter. We'll all be dead, long dead, as will all of our successors, as will every page of every history book, all videos and hard drives, everything. There'll be no trace of our existence.

My reaction? Relief. Yours?

Remember Dr. Strangelove?

In that movie, the civilian US president, played by Peter Sellers, was trying to constrain the crazies--military and intelligent types, played (also) by Sellers, George C. Scott and Sterling Hayden--from war with the USSR. Now, according to this alarming report about Bush/Cheney's war-mongering actions against Iran, it is the military, in the person of an admiral in the US navy, that's trying "to put the crazies back in the box." A must-read, and if verified, a must-impeach.

Heroes

This couple, by their tiny actions, are American heroes. I've lately found myself in positions of imminent arrest because of anti-war activities and I know how dry the mouth gets, how the pulse spikes, how drained is the blood from the limbs. It's scary, truly, to face arrest even for a small crime.

So these two Menonites? Hurrah.

Ouch!

At the end of this video clip (you may have to watch a brief ad first) an impassioned woman parliamentarian pleads with the US not to withdraw and abandon Iraq to its chaos, since, she says, we caused it by drawing al Qaida to Iraq. Her appeal not only has logical consistency, it tugged at my conscience, too. I hate when that happens.

Come September?

We're told that September is a make-or-break deadline for Bush's surge, but I think it may come earlier. If, as scheduled, the Iraqi parliament takes its two-month summer recess starting in July without resolving the "benchmark" legislative logjams over proposed constitutional amendments, power sharing and an "oil law," even US Republicans will jump off Bush's ship of state.

Corporate takeover of everything?

This article describes an emerging phenomenon: privatization of public infrastructure. The reasons for it--providing ready cash for strapped local governments, reducing costs of upkeep and labor and thus lowering local taxes--seem so attractive to governments that the trend feels irrestible. The results, however, are appalling, as detailed in the article. Once all highways and bridges are owned by GM or Burger King or by blind trusts of investors (including, likely, foreigners) can our colleges be far behind? UCLA renamed FedEx U (or UPSU?), the Washington Huskies becoming the Starbucks, the Berkeley campus changed to Nike U?

Just so you know...

I'm not a liberal party-liner on all issues. For example, although I understand that science has by now definitively established that our planet is growing warmer and (to a lesser degree of certainty) that an increase of "greenhouse gasses" contributes to the warming, I remain unconvinced that "human causes," such as emission of pollutants, destruction of forests, asphalting of cities, are significant factors in the process. A documentary that draws these distinctions may be found here. No slap at Al Gore intended: I'd like him to enter the presidential race at all events.

However, nothwithstanding my hesitancy to buy the entire "man-made warming" argument, I still believe we should stop ravaging the Amazon forest, stop driving fossil-fuel vehicles, stop many of the practices we've devoloped that render our planet less habitable and cause global conflict. I do so, however, not (yet, anyway) out of a founded fear of the effects of these actions on the temperature of Earth, but rather because I like the Earth the way it was, with abundant wildlife, clean water, clean air, open space--all that good stuff. Indeed, I believe a major contributor to the degradation of the planet is our exploding populations in the "third world"--which will be exacerbated by the imminent shift of many nations of that world from "third" to "second" or even "first," as countries become more industrialized.

So, I fret for our planet, just like a good liberal. But not for all the "right" (or is it "left"?) reasons.

This is sovereignty?

From the Iraqslogger:

"In other news, Az-Zaman reported that yesterday’s parliamentary session had to be postponed due to the absence of the speaker and the vice-chairs.
According to the newspaper, the deputies who came to attend had to suffer from the lack of air conditioning in the parliament hall, because US troops refused to allow the tankers carrying fuel for the parliament’s generators from entering the Green Zone -– where the parliament is located."

Interpreting the violence

In today's post, Professor Juan Cole attempts to explain the bases for the various acts of violence in Iraq: a carbombing in a Shiite city, another in a Sunni area, a third in Fallujah, plus the "smaller" attacks throughout the nation. He's an expert on the region but is the first to concede that his explanations are speculative. But even so, the varying reasons for the various attacks demonstrates how out of control the situation is throughout Iraq, and why leaving our troops there to umpire this madness is nuts.

Scary numbers

For a long time Bush's approval ratings in national polls have hovered in the mid-30's. This is lately being mirrored in the Rasmussen polls, which does a daily sampling and usually tracks a bit higher, in terms of Bush's approval, because it asks people if they "somewhat approve" as well as whether they "strongly approve" and then the poll combines the two percentages for the overall approval rating.

Rasmussen also asks respondents if they "somewhat disapprove" and if they "strongly disapprove," and here's where the numbers are shocking. While the "somewhat" level has remained relatively constant at about 15%, the "strongly disapprove" has lately soared, as of yesterday (5/7) reaching 46%. Now that's freaky. Almost a majority who find themselves urgently opposed to the nation's leader. Doesn't this mean that an attack on Iran is inevitable?

Dennis on YouTube

Here's Kucinich's spot on YouTube, apparently to appeal to young, hip voters. And you wonder why he's going nowhere? (And who's that lady behind him, towering over him, mugging at the camera? It's apparently his new wife, Elizabeth. So, why not introduce her and then move her a foot or two to the right?) And his quick, geeky speech: For christsakes, is this the best candidate the Left can put up?

Which adage applies?

This story about American troops' concern about Iraqi's army wholesale arresting and imprisoning of innocent Iraqis. Is it, "Pot calling the kettle black," or "Do as I say, not as I do"? Or is it simply, "Shut the fuck up, gringos, and get out of my country!"

Finally, Bush and al Qaida agree on something

Both are opposed to the Democrats' plan to withdraw US forces from Iraq.

Condi sucks

I need to vent. I'm tired of hearing about how Condi Rice is a "realist" in foreign policy, whose counsel to Bush (presumably like Colin Powell's) is akin to that of the advisers to Bush I, as opposed to the "hardliners" like Rumsfeld, Feith, Wolfie, and of course, Cheney. Here is a typical such reference in an article which raises the long-lingering and unanswered question of "whatever happened to those five Iranian officials that the U.S. grabbed in Iraq five months ago?" (As to which question, I ask: Can you imagine the uproar in our country if Iran grabbed five U.S. officials in Iraq and held them incommunicado for months?)

Anyhoo--About this notion that Condi is the moderating voice in foreign policy, whispering common-sense solutions to Bush but being overridden by Cheney. What's the evidence of that, other than White House pundits' assertions? I mean, Condi was the first to use the "mushroom cloud" metaphor. (Bush's speech to that effect came days later.) She's in the forefront of the push to further sanction Iran; to condemn the results of the Palestinian election of Hamas representatives; to call Iraqi insurgents "terrorists" at every press conference. She, in her public utterances, appears to be as much a hardliner as the rest of Bush's advisers. At best, she's like Colin Powell, or, as lately revealed, George Tenet: A Bush enabler, unwilling to do other than nudge him and mumble him toward sanity, but at all events to stay onboard the ship.

And yet, Condi seems to get a free pass. Check out these figures from Rasmussen about her "favorability rating" (57%) as compared to the much lower ratings of others in Bush's cabal, except of course Colin Powell. Certainly those ratings can't be based on her performance as, initally, National Security Adviser (whom both Richard Clarke and Tenet assert was deaf to their alarms about imminent al Qaida attacks in the U.S.), and lately as Secretary of State. I mean--pardon me for asking--what exactly has Condi done to warrant "favorability"? The answer: Absolutely nothing.

Now, it seems, Condi is about to force a showdown with the Congress, in the person of Representative Henry Waxman, over her testimony about the insertion of the infamous "16 words" in Bush's 2003 State of the Union address. Waxman has subpoenaed her and she's apparently resisting and, just yesterday, has apparently refused to allow her staff to testify about the Niger-yellowcake assertion. Let's hope we learn from this confrontation where she stands: Is she a moderating voice in this administration, or is she, like Powell and Tenet, just window-dressing for the evil forces within it?

Check out these numbers

of Americans who, according to a Rasmussen poll, believe Bush knew about the 9/11 attacks in advance. Okay, so the 22% who apparently so believe can be accounted for as the usual "lunatic fringe" set, what about the 22% who say they're not sure (and almost half of the Democrats polled are uncertain).

That such high percentages of people can believe their leader is capable of such a monstrously barbarian act as to allow the attacks to take place is alarming, isn't it?

As a service to my readers

I'm linking to this article describing the top twenty-five online skams and pranks. (My doing so may keep my email inbox free of some of the forwards of such items, too.)

P.S. Among the best on the list is number 14, a link to a website that purports to track the location of your, or anyone's, cellphone via satellite links by simply typing in its area code and number. Try it--it's clever. (Please note that I've not forwarded it to you by email.)

Who's in charge here?

Okay, so now, as predicted, the Democrats have backed down on their "withdrawal-timeline" funding bill after Bush's veto and, after a meeting with Bush, will offer some half-baked voluntary "benchmark" version. Bush will counter with some even weaker version, and in the next few weeks there will be news stories about the two sides trying to resolve differences, ending--just as Karl Rove had scripted--with some form of funding bill that both sides "can live with."

Guess what, you dumb fucking idiot Democrats: You've just made Bush's war your war too. Congratulations for removing the single most devastating issue Republicans face in 2008.

Update: Here's what's going on during the day following various meetings between members of Congress and White House representatives. Posturing and talking, with little accommodation by either side; all of which feels to me like the Democrats are trying to find a way to give in without appearing to, while Bush is allowed to play the role of stubbornly straighforward troop supporter.

A note, however: As much as I dislike her--and her candidacy--I do like Hillary's idea of a bill de-authorizing the Iraq war. It feels right, as a matter of legality and principle as well as tactics. If Bush/Cheney lied us into war, their authority to conduct it should be withdrawn. The bill won't pass, of course, but it's a sharp statement of disapproval of the invasion without being subject to the complaint that it restricts funds for our troops; and (wouldn't it be wonderful?) it would serve as a vehicle for hearings on the administration's prewar lies, since that question would be directly relevant to the subject of the pending legislation.

One exception to my iron-clad resistance to capital punishment

is for this judge.

In case you missed it

here's the video, in its entirety, of Bill Moyers' PBS show, "Buying the War," about the media's failure to report objectively in the run-up to the Iraq invasion.

Watch it and weep.

Odd man out

Over the last six years, since the 9/11 attacks, I've heard commentators use the words "everybody" and "all Americans" to describe the mass of us who supported George Bush in the wake of the attacks. Well, I didn't, and neither did a small percentage of Americans, about ten percent according to this chart.

My reaction to Bush's bullhorn speech and its sequels as he marched us to "war" in Afghanistan (not to mention Iraq) was at the time and has remained that the attacks were the work of a small bunch of crazies whom we should capture and punish, to be sure, but most importantly that we should react to their attacks with calm resolve to deal with the issues that underlay the fanatics's actions. I know that sounds wussy, but that's what I felt.

And now, six years later, as we've done precisely the opposite, it turns out I, and the small percent of decent folks who believed as I did, were right. Bush and his followers have succeeded, instead, in increasing the acts of terrorism around the world.

Now, wouldn't you think they'd listen to us about ending the madness in Iraq? Well, you'd be wrong.

MoDo Rocks!

Maureen Dowd's piece about Tenet's soon-to-be-published "tell-all" is as fun to read as Molly Ivins' columns were. Like Molly, she's taken to labeling her subjects--Tenet is "Slam-Dunk," Cheney is "Darth"--but does, probably out of deference for Molly--avoid "Shrub," using the more generic "Junior" instead.

Enjoy.

Weekend warriors

If there be any doubt about whether the "surge" is working, this report of Saturday's carnage in Iraq should provide the answer.

It's all my fault

If I hadn't made that offhand remark yesterday about Riverbend's failure to post to her blog of late, she wouldn't have decided to leave Iraq.

You want pathos, tragedy, outrage? Try reading her post.

Body counting

It now turns out that the Bush-touted "decline in sectarian violence in Baghdad" is based on skewed numbers. Not skewed, actually: fabricated. The number of bodies that are included in Bush's calculations don't take into account the major killer, namely, bombs carried by cars or suicides.

What won't this administration do to manipulate the public's perception of this awful war?

(I'll keep track to any MSM publication of this new outrage.)

Must see TV

Now that Riverbend has quit posting to her blog (at least lately), check out this video blog (vlog) by some Iraqi young folks. Often sad, always moving.

Look out below!

This site, Forex, tracks the major currencies. I've been following it for years, but lately have placed a fair-sized investment in the euro and so now I check the charts daily. (In order to see charts of the various currencies "against" each other, click on the countries' flags in the center of the frame.) The euro popped through an historic high ($1.36 dollars per euro) a few days ago and appears to have an upper limit constrained only by trade and governmental sanity returning to the US--and hence no barrier at all.

If you've got some spare dollars lying around, you might want to climb on the bandwagon.

The L word

What fun it is, finally, to hear the words "lies" and "liars" in connection with the Pat Tillman investigation being conducted by California Congressman Henry Waxman's committee. Pat's brother no only used those words but repeated them again and again, as to both the Army's explanation of what happened on that ridge in Afghanistan and its coverup by the Army brass.

What I believe...so far

Ideas such as this, speaking of a "unified field" or a "unified consciousness" appeal to me as a sound explanation of what is. They contain a comforting coalescence of mathematics and physics with Buddhist thought and even Jungian psychology. However, I depart from the author's analysis (because I find no imperical basis for it) in its presentation idea that this "field" is "love." Certainly one is free to believe that, or one is free to assume it and act in accordance with it, but I simply don't see anything in my experience or in the author's reasoning that makes it so.

So--I find it plausible that there's an elementary base force at work in all matter and energy that we know of, and that that force is likely not entirely random, but in some measure directed (for example, from organization to entropy). More than that, I know not, except that I can choose to make of that fact whatever I wish. If I wish to call it "love," I may do so, and act accordingly. If I wish to call it "horsefeathers," I may do that, and act accordingly. This, to me, better explains the presence in the universe of people like George Bush or Adolph Hitler, because their existence--and the power they've wielded--are inexplicable if the notion of "love" is imputed to the universal force. These people, and many too many others in human history, have proven to me the absence, not the presence, of any abiding concept of love in the universe.

I told you so

For weeks, I've contended that the Congressional Democrats' tinkering with war-funding legislation, by inserting various withdrawal benchmarks and the like, would eventually backfire, leaving Bush with the assertion that the Democrats are endangering the troops. Indeed, even in the face of a threatened veto, the Democrats are backing down on the pending legislation; and--as I've long argued--if Bush does veto any eventual bill, the Congress will sheepishly send him a bill without strings. Result: Bush will look "strong" and Congress will look like the dweebs they are.

I saw this coming. Why didn't they?

I'm not worried

because after mistakes like this, I'm sure software programs will never take over the art of writing.

(Or maybe I should be worried, in case they do.)

No way, Jose

There are few issues (well, maybe, not so few) where there's a black and a white. But here's one: a Senate bill that permits (doesn't even require) the Social Security Administration to bargain with drug makers over prices.

Who on Earth could vote against that? Well, apparently, enough Republicans to maintain a fillibuster. How mean-spirited, how obviously "bought and paid for" can a politician be?

Once again, Pat Buchanan is right on

I despised him during Watergate (he was an assistant to Nixon), but I gotta tell ya, his columns about the war in Iraq and the evil and corruption of the neocons are written as if by me, except that he's got loads of history, having lived much of it.

This essay about Wolfie is wonderful, all except the part about US cessation of foreign aid. I agree we should be more circumspect with such aid--we could save a couple of billions a year if we discontinued military aid to Israel, for example--but we need to continue to share our abundance with the underdeveloped nations.

But otherwise, I love watching the paleoconservatives (Buchanan's word) chew up the neoconservatives. If this keeps up, whoever gets the Democratic nomination for President will carry every state except those that seceded in 1860, and maybe even Florida. And the Congress will be so heavily Democratic that it may be able to right our ship of state.

Hurrah!

The district court judge in the AIPAC espionage trial has ruled that the evidence must be presented in public, not held secret as the US Attorney had argued. We may at last have coverage of the degree to which Israel has infiltrated our intelligence and government apparatus. At least we'll no longer be frozen out of the slightest inquiry into the conduct of our "ally." (This assumes that the US government proceeds to trial on this basis. I wouldn't be surprised at an interlocutory appeal to delay or reverse the trial court's ruling, or, for that matter, a dismissal of charges by the government on grounds of "national security.")

My favorite line of the judge's ruling: "Justice must not only be done; it must also be seen."

I wouldn't put it past them

So, the Senate has determined to delay Gonzales' appearance until Thursday on account of the shootings at Virginia Tech. The killer was apparently a Korean student, who committed suicide after his rampage. Am I crazy for wondering if somebody in the administration hired him, just to gain a brief respite from the ceaseless barrage of scandal, and two more days for Gonzales to rehearse?

Yeah, I thought so.

Gosh, I wonder why

we in the U.S. don't get al-Jazeera TV. Could it be "political pressure"? Never, not in the good ol' U S of A, where freedom reigns.

South America, anyone?

Chavez in Venezuela, Morales of Bolivia, Correa of Ecuador, Bachelet of Chile and to a lesser extent Lula of Brazil (not to mention Chavez of Nicaragua in Central America)--socialists/progressives all. And if the latest referendum in Bolivia is any indicator, they hold overwhelming popular support.

All my adult life the nations to the south of us (except, of course, Cuba) have been ruled by various American-backed dictators and regimes. There's a distinctly liberating feel to them now, that the populace is taking control of its destiny, its allegiances and its resources. Wouldn't it be wonderful if other nations south of the equator (in Africa, especially) would join them?

All you need to know

about everything is set forth here, more incisively and articulately than I could ever write it. Enjoy.

I don't know whether to applaud or cry

about this fabulous job of reporting by AP writers on a Pentagon coverup of a series of massacres of civilians by the US Army during the Korean War. It's 57 years too late to be helpful to those who were affected, and the Army is still denying any wrongdoing, but at least the truth is emerging. The story is written in direct prose, without those irritating qualifiers that so often fuzz over the reporting these days. The Army lied and is lying still, and may never cease lying, but these reporters, undaunted, are exposing the truth.

So--I suppose, on balance, I'm applauding.

Enough, already!

This Don Imus thing. What a waste of energy! There are so many evils, far more evil than Imus' remarks, that are disregarded by the media, while it flails away at this story. I've tried not to comment, but now find I must in order to maintain my sanity.

I used to listen to "Imus in the morning" regularly. About six years ago I quit, finding his commentary negative and inane. I also believed his project to build a "ranch" in New Mexico to host cancer-afflicted kids (using largely sponsors' funds for the construction so that the bunkhouse was named the American Express Bunkhouse, and so forth) was simply an excuse for him to return to the desert and have a toy to play with. Also, I found his interviews with newsmakers (which he touted as incisive and informative) were pap. I didn't really have trouble with the often-shaky references he made to various minorities, and even after seeing the lists of his remarks in various stories lately, I find many of them offensive but not incendiary, not more vulgar than what passes in many quarters these days for humor.

Of course, MSNBC can cut off its simulcast of his radio show, and others who carry his daily program can cease broadcasting it. That's their right (assuming they're not contractually bound to the contrary). But--and here's where my old ACLU instinct arises--he has a protected right to say what he says, and although it's not my cup of tea it may be somebody's. And--and here's my point--if it's nobody's then "market forces" will drive him off the air because nobody's forcing his listeners to listen.

Furthermore, I find the posturing and feigned outrage of many (especially politicians and media wags who've regularly appeared on his shows over the years, during which time he often used offensive words and references) to be beyond hypocritical, if there is such a state.

There, I've said my piece. Just as Imus has a right to say his.

Explain this to me

Over the years, I've seen (we've all seen) scores of photos of Iraqis holding dead or injured loved ones, wailing in outrage or sadness. Many of the dead were killed by U.S. troops, no doubt, which caused me even greater pain to see. But somehow this photo and its caption make me want to rise up and strike back at those in our nation who've caused this to happen. The man, beholding his wrecked pickup--probably his major asset, probably his means of livelihood--seems so anguished, in such helpless despair. And I can just imagine the hotheaded, frightened U.S. soldiers--teenagers, probably--who were driving the Bradley fighting vehicle, or whatever, that ran over his truck. They were likely afraid to wait for traffic to clear--they're sitting ducks in Baghdad--and so...this. A ruin of a man's life and livelihood.

For what?

One of the benefits of being older

is that I won't have to live in a world like this.

An old friend on film

Environmentalist, humanist Edward Abbey was a friend of mine, and a client. I met him in the mid-sixties when I represented his wife, Judith, who'd been arrested in an antiwar protest. (Judy, still in her thirties, died a few years later.)

Ed later moved to Tucson (my realtor brother, Charlie, found his home in the foothills of the Tucson Mountains), and we saw each other often, for legal stuff and social stuff.

Ed's books were reverent celebrations of the American west. Desert Solitaire, an early book, described his summer as a park ranger in Utah, and a later book, The Monkey Wrench Gang, decried the construction of the Glen Canyon Dam in northern Arizona, a huge project that dammed the Colorado River, flooding the Glen Canyon's fabulous terrain and monumental geological structures.

This video shows Ed in 1981 giving a speech on the top of Glen Canyon to a gathering that is said to have been the genesis of the environmental group, Earth First! It was good to see my old friend, alive and kicking. He died about ten years ago, and as with many things in his life, his death was shrouded in controversy. But that's another story.

Must see

I seldom demand that my vast readership follow my links, but here's one you gotta see.

Jon Stewart for President

Okay, so only 8% of those polled said they'd definitely vote for him, but the percent who'd definitely not vote for him was lower than the percent that definitely wouldn't vote for Newt or Hillary. What does that tell us? I don't have a clue.

Iraq Today

This site regularly lists military developments and acts of violence throughout Iraq. Several weeks into the "surge" the news from yesterday, April 5, doesn't look so good, does it? I wonder how long the U.S. public would stand for our continued presence in Iraq if a daily tally such as this were featured in a boxed article on page one of just a few MSM newspapers.

(No need to read each word of the day's accounts--but do scroll through the entire April 5 post to get a sense of the scope and variety of mad acts. The site was recently moved from here, a site that contains three years' worth of archives of previous daily postings to a similar effect, if you want to compare the present level of violence to earlier periods. Hint: No big difference, except in the increasing sophistication of forms of attacks.)

Holding my breath

The rumor of an imminent attack by the U.S. on Iran, due at four a.m. Iran time tomorrow (see my post below, "Whaddya Think?") has bounced around the web for a few days and I've even heard it discussed among some of my leftist friends, whose reaction is "I don't doubt it one bit."

Well, I do doubt it, frankly. But then I doubted Bush would attack Iraq in the months before the invasion; I doubted he'd nominate Bolton, Alito, Roberts, Gonzalez; I doubted he'd veto embryonic stem-cell funding. In fact, I've doubted scores more actions by this administration only to be proven wrong, and yet I still can't believe Bush is the monster he--it turns out--actually is.

So, having been wrong about Bush so many times in the past, I'm turning on my TV at eight this evening, hoping all's quiet in Persia.

BTW--Here's a fellow nonbeliever, but for a different reason.

Maybe there's hope for us, for the U.S.

I have long argued--including several times in this blog--that true conservatives and liberals agree on a fundamental tenet of constitutional law: a strict restraint on executive power over personal freedoms. Now, finally, we are seeing a rejuvenation of a conservative movement that represents that view--as opposed to the Anne Coulter wing of the right, that accedes to any presidential power that Bush seeks--and its joinder with the liberal left. (Note the membership list in the middle of the article.) Could it be that sanity, and constitutional law, will once again obtain in this republic?

Yeah, what about that?

Remember the "incident" back in January, where American forces grabbed five Iranians in a town in northern Iraq? The justification for it was that they were "Iranian agents" or something, and we've not heard a peep about their whereabouts or disposition since. Well, now it turns out that that act was apparently a blundered attempt by the US to snatch senior Iranian officials--highly-placed intelligence officers--who were in Iraq at the time.

So what's the difference between Iran's seizure of British sailors--even if they were in Iraqi waters--and America's seizure of Iran's officials on Iraqi soil? They're either both illegal, or neither is. But there's this difference: We know where the British sailors are.

You can't make this shit up

From the Washington Times:
"The head of a California company hired by the U.S. government to help build a fence along the Southwest border to curb the flow of illegal aliens into the United States has been sentenced on charges of hiring illegals for the job."

Radical?

He calls for an end to US occupation of Iraq, he calls for a day of protest, of hanging Iraqi flags throughout the nation. He lists the miserable conditions in Iraq since the US invasion.

Just once, I'd like to see al Sadr's name appear in an article without the adjective "radical." His words sound like those of any patriot whose nation is under occupation by a foreign power.

Whaddya think?

This report of an April 6 attack by the US on Iranian sites is awfully (literally) specific. Too specific to be true, or to be untrue?

Free speech?

Apparently not if you say that the US ought to move its embassy out of the heart of Baghdad.

I don't understand

I mean, I just don't get it. Who are those people who stand in line on the opening night of a movie's run, who crowd into the theater with hundreds of others who've paid full-boat ticket prices, to fulfill some need to see the film immediately after its release? What's the benefit from seeing a movie on day one as opposed to day four, or week four?

For that matter, who are those people who bought and installed Microsoft's new Vista system--millions did so in the first weeks of its release--only to learn that it has numerous kinks that cause difficulties with photo and audio peripherals and other applications? Everybody knows a new system will have wrinkles when it's first submitted to widespread use by the public, and the "old system"--Windows XP, which I have on my computer--ain't so bad. So what's the goddam hurry? Why not wait for a month or two or three until the system's been tried in the real world and some of the initial wrinkles ironed out. Really. I want to know.

Let them eat pizza

Given these numbers, where are the bread riots?

High stakes

With some form of troop-withdrawal legislation, tied to funding, apparently nearing the President's desk, and with Bush's vow to veto it, clear battle lines have been drawn. At this juncture, Congress looks to hold the upper hand, politically.

But after the veto, Congress will fail to override and there will be no funding forthcoming for the troops. Then what? Who will win the propaganda war that then ensues? From my perspective, Congress will then be forced to acquiesce in Bush's position to avoid allowing funding to languish, and Bush will have scored a political victory, given the influence of MSM spin and the stupidity of the American people.

We'll see.

Tell me what you think

of these two poems by a 19-year old Barack Obama.

If you wanna bring down the emperor

it doesn't get any better than this. Except maybe this. (And as to the latter, where, exactly, is John McCain's "straight talk express"? Oh he of military background and an asserted aversion to bureaucratic bullshit, evasion, CYA and prevarication. I'd love to see Jon Stewart pull the Tillman question out during one of McCain's cozy interviews, wouldn't you?)

What if the South had seceded?

It might have been a bit dicey for the black folks, but as this essay points out, the North might well have spent that last fifty years at peace.

In lieu of writing these thoughts myself

I link you an essay that says what I feel about Bush, better than I could ever express.

Surely there's a lesson to be learned

Within ten days, Annika Sorenstam loses in a playoff with an unheralded golfer in the MasterCard tournament; Roger Federer loses in an early round of a tennis tournament in California; Tiger Woods' game goes south--a duck hook, two or three water dunks, yanked putts--during the finish of Arnold Palmer's tournament at Bay Hill, Florida, and he drops from contender to undistinguished also-also-ran. Whaddup?

Could it be that these three monuments to their games are human? Is that too facile an explanation? Could it instead be that our expectations of them are inhuman? Are, for that matter, inhumane?

Sometimes statistics say a lot about a culture

Like this one.

The tar-baby syndrome

I've been laid low for the past several days by the flu, but today I managed to compose the following letter to the editor of the SB News Press. The idea that our continued presence in Iraq fuels the terrorists organizations that are the true threat to the West in its "war on terror" isn't new, but it's been lost in the debate about the "surge," with the result that no one seems to reflect on how the surge is actually Osama's briar patch.

"To the editor:


Among their arguments against withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq, Bush supporters contend that “if we pull our troops out of Iraq, we’ll be doing precisely what the terrorists want us to do.” While this may be true of some of Iraq’s disputing factions, it is not true of the terrorists who struck our soil on 9/11. That group, which, it is reported, now maintains affiliated cells inside Iraq and is growing in numbers throughout the world, has consistently said its goal is to destroy the world powers that it claims have long dominated and exploited the lands and people of Islam.

That group doesn't want the U.S. to leave Iraq, not at all. It wants to be able to continue to point to the violent U.S. occupation as proof of Western intent to dominate the region; to exploit U.S. troops’ transgressions there (murders, rapes, torture) to fuel their recruitment; and to bleed our nation’s fighting force and treasure. Osama bin Laden (from whatever cave he could be heard) was cheering Bush on as he announced the “surge” ten weeks ago.

If Bush’s “war on terror” is really that, why don't we pull of out Iraq so we can free ourselves to fight it, instead of feeding it?"

Smoke and mirrors

The real estate bubble has burst, the foreclosure rate of those easy-interest refinancings and home purchases is skyrocketing, the marginal-loan industry is reeling from defaults and both interest rates and inflation are on the rise. Bush's "improving economy" was never real. It was based upon historically low interest rates that allowed Americans to borrow on their credit cards and homes at unprecedented levels--causing personal savings to dip into negative figures for the first time since the Depression.
By the time the Bush administration is driven from power the United States will be in the worst shape ever, internationally and domestically. Let's just hope we learn from this experience: That we should think before we vote.

My worst nightmare

The US is now going to police the world? We're going to attack "terrorists" everywhere on the planet, no matter whom they threaten? Bangladesh? Ethiopia? Turkey?