Friday, December 31, 2004
Great idea
I think this is a great idea -- Canada suspends debt for tsunami-hit countries. It is something Western governments can do immediately and directly, without even leaving their desks. Other countries should follow Canada's lead.
How stupid do they think people are?
Pretty stupid, I guess -- the Weekly Standard editorial, Negotiating with Himself thinks that Americans will accept Republican dismantling of Social Security as long as Republicans obscure the truth and don't tell anyone what they are actually doing, but rather "sell it" with feel-good phrases and focus-group-tested language. Will it work? Stay tuned.
Looking for a few good men
Bad day for Bonhomme Carnaval
"Journalists have been unable to . . . find out exactly what led to them forming a union."
My daughter worked as an advertising mascot on several occasions -- wandering around our exhibition in a Mario costume, if memory serves. She said it was hotter than hell in that suit, and she couldn't see where she was going, and 10-year-old boys would throw drinks at her and try to trip her.
No wonder the Bonhommes wanted a union. Mascots of the world, unite! You have nothing to lose but your latex heads.
"Journalists have been unable to . . . find out exactly what led to them forming a union."
My daughter worked as an advertising mascot on several occasions -- wandering around our exhibition in a Mario costume, if memory serves. She said it was hotter than hell in that suit, and she couldn't see where she was going, and 10-year-old boys would throw drinks at her and try to trip her.
No wonder the Bonhommes wanted a union. Mascots of the world, unite! You have nothing to lose but your latex heads.
Wondering if someone dropped the ball
Agency answers critics over no tsunami warning:
"Fifteen minutes after Sunday's quake near Sumatra, NOAA fired off a bulletin from Hawaii to 26 Pacific nations that now make up the International Coordination Group for the Tsunami Warning System, alerting them of the quake but saying they faced no threat of a tsunami. Fifty minutes later, the U.S. agency upgraded the severity of the quake and again said there was no tsunami threat in the Pacific, but identified the possibility of a tsunami near the quake's epicenter in the Indian Ocean. After nearly another half hour, NOAA contacted emergency officials in Australia as a backstop, knowing they would quickly contact their counterparts in Indonesia . . . 'The fact that the potential danger rose to the level of prompting a swift warning to two nations, while others could be faced with a potentially devastating impact, raises serious questions,' the Senate oceans subcommittee chair, Sen. Olympia Snowe, of Maine, said in a letter to Lautenbacher. Lautenbacher said there was only so much NOAA can do. "
Far be it for me to criticize, but I have wondered about this -- it took me less than five minutes to find the phone numbers for the US ambassadors to India, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, etc. in the CIA Factbook. Even on Christmas Day, I think someone likely would have answered the phone . . .
"Fifteen minutes after Sunday's quake near Sumatra, NOAA fired off a bulletin from Hawaii to 26 Pacific nations that now make up the International Coordination Group for the Tsunami Warning System, alerting them of the quake but saying they faced no threat of a tsunami. Fifty minutes later, the U.S. agency upgraded the severity of the quake and again said there was no tsunami threat in the Pacific, but identified the possibility of a tsunami near the quake's epicenter in the Indian Ocean. After nearly another half hour, NOAA contacted emergency officials in Australia as a backstop, knowing they would quickly contact their counterparts in Indonesia . . . 'The fact that the potential danger rose to the level of prompting a swift warning to two nations, while others could be faced with a potentially devastating impact, raises serious questions,' the Senate oceans subcommittee chair, Sen. Olympia Snowe, of Maine, said in a letter to Lautenbacher. Lautenbacher said there was only so much NOAA can do. "
Far be it for me to criticize, but I have wondered about this -- it took me less than five minutes to find the phone numbers for the US ambassadors to India, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, etc. in the CIA Factbook. Even on Christmas Day, I think someone likely would have answered the phone . . .
Thursday, December 30, 2004
Paging General Miller - you have an urgent message on the white courtesy phone!
Having turfed the Geneva Convention and OKd torture of prisoners a year ago, the US government has now officially changed its mind --Justice Expands 'Torture' Definition.
Of course, this pulls the rug out from under all the military police and CIA types who can now be prosecuted for war crimes for torturing people at Gitmo and Abu Gharib and other undisclosed locations for the last two years.
But they're just a peck of low-level bad apples anyway.
The important thing, as far as the Bush administration is concerned, is that now Gonzales can announce during the upcoming hearings on his Attorney General nomination that all questions about the August, 2003 memo are "inoperative" because these were merely "preliminary conclusions" and no one actually intended that they be acted on, oh goodness gracious no.
The most bizarre sentence in this bizarre article: "It could be that this is not just a cynical ploy but a real sign of change" as spoken by Clinton administration Justice official Michael Greenberger.
Oh goodness gracious, of course its sincere -- they've all got religion now, I guess.
Of course, this pulls the rug out from under all the military police and CIA types who can now be prosecuted for war crimes for torturing people at Gitmo and Abu Gharib and other undisclosed locations for the last two years.
But they're just a peck of low-level bad apples anyway.
The important thing, as far as the Bush administration is concerned, is that now Gonzales can announce during the upcoming hearings on his Attorney General nomination that all questions about the August, 2003 memo are "inoperative" because these were merely "preliminary conclusions" and no one actually intended that they be acted on, oh goodness gracious no.
The most bizarre sentence in this bizarre article: "It could be that this is not just a cynical ploy but a real sign of change" as spoken by Clinton administration Justice official Michael Greenberger.
Oh goodness gracious, of course its sincere -- they've all got religion now, I guess.
Some Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy Stuff
So I was poking through my favorite blogs yesterday and read All Spin's post about the recent spate of Christian Right attacks on education and universities. The All Spin Zone: Warning - Too Much Education Causes (gasp!) Liberalism! At the end, All Spin raises the issue: "What is lacking is a coordinated effort to investigate what and who is behind this 'movement' to undermine public education. "
So I did some Googling.
The Counterpunch article quoted by All Spin mentions the Students for Academic Freedom organization as ringleading protests criticizing professors for being too liberal. So I checked their website and found that David Horowitz is apparently its self-appointed founder and president. Googling David Horowitz leads to this Chronicle of Higher Education article, Patrolling Professors' Politics, which described David Horowitz as president of the Centre for the Study of Popular Culture, which publishes FrontPage Magazine , edited also by Horowitz. This is a magazine which just named Swiftboater John ONeill as its Man of the Year and is full of articles attacking George Soros and Theresa Heinz Kerry's philanthropy and the democratic party's "radical agendas" and is also very concerned about immigration and Middle East politics -- ah ha! Now we're getting to it, coming full circle, as a matter of fact. One of the "watchdog" organizations on the FrontPage website is Campus Watch, which says it "monitors Middle East Studies on campus". The monitoring seems to consist of criticizing universities which let their Islamic students muzzle pro-Israel speakers (remember the mess at York and at Concordia?) and also seems to imply that left-wing faculty at universities are actually some kind of pro-Islamic fifth column in America. Many of the articles listed for reference on the Campus Watch site were published in -- you guessed it -- FrontPage magazine.
I also meant to Google some of the Intelligent Design and Creationist stuff but I just couldn't stand it. Maybe later . . .
So I did some Googling.
The Counterpunch article quoted by All Spin mentions the Students for Academic Freedom organization as ringleading protests criticizing professors for being too liberal. So I checked their website and found that David Horowitz is apparently its self-appointed founder and president. Googling David Horowitz leads to this Chronicle of Higher Education article, Patrolling Professors' Politics, which described David Horowitz as president of the Centre for the Study of Popular Culture, which publishes FrontPage Magazine , edited also by Horowitz. This is a magazine which just named Swiftboater John ONeill as its Man of the Year and is full of articles attacking George Soros and Theresa Heinz Kerry's philanthropy and the democratic party's "radical agendas" and is also very concerned about immigration and Middle East politics -- ah ha! Now we're getting to it, coming full circle, as a matter of fact. One of the "watchdog" organizations on the FrontPage website is Campus Watch, which says it "monitors Middle East Studies on campus". The monitoring seems to consist of criticizing universities which let their Islamic students muzzle pro-Israel speakers (remember the mess at York and at Concordia?) and also seems to imply that left-wing faculty at universities are actually some kind of pro-Islamic fifth column in America. Many of the articles listed for reference on the Campus Watch site were published in -- you guessed it -- FrontPage magazine.
I also meant to Google some of the Intelligent Design and Creationist stuff but I just couldn't stand it. Maybe later . . .
Reaping the whirlwind
In Salon, Sidney Blumenthal describes recent personnel changes in the State Department - Neocons take complete control. He writes "Those Republican elders who warned of endless war are purged. And those who advised Bush that Saddam was building nuclear weapons, that with a light military force the operation would be a "cakewalk," that capturing Baghdad was a "mission accomplished," and that the Iraqi army should be disbanded, are rewarded."
Oh, isn't that just ducky? So much for the Pat Buchanan and Bob Novak diatribes before the election about how Bush was going to get rid of the neocons and get out of Iraq and return to true republican principles. Sure he was.
Particularly telling is Blumenthal's description of how the elder Bush supporters are now acting:
"Despite his belief that the younger Bush's policies were disastrous, Scowcroft publicly supported him for reelection mainly out of loyalty to the father . . . [but the administraion has now rejected both]Scowcroft and James Baker . . . In private, Baker is scathing about the current occupant of the White House. . . "
Well, well, well -- Scowcroft and Baker, a couple of true patriots. They could have spoken up during the election campaign, and helped send George and his neocon gang back to Texas, but no -- "loyalty" triumphs patriotism.
They will now reap what they have sowed.
I've been reading stuff on progressive blogs lately about whether Bush really has a "mandate" -- as if THAT would make any difference. Folks, stop living in the reality-based community -- Bush doesn't care, he simply believes he can do anything he likes and so do the 101st Fighting Keyboarders who blog support for his every flaw.
It doesn't matter what anybody else around Washington thinks, Dad included. George is not listening. Never has, never will. He just stuffs his fingers in his ears and chants "na-na-na-na-na" every time somebody is saying anything he doesn't want to hear.
Eventually, they just shut up.
Oh, isn't that just ducky? So much for the Pat Buchanan and Bob Novak diatribes before the election about how Bush was going to get rid of the neocons and get out of Iraq and return to true republican principles. Sure he was.
Particularly telling is Blumenthal's description of how the elder Bush supporters are now acting:
"Despite his belief that the younger Bush's policies were disastrous, Scowcroft publicly supported him for reelection mainly out of loyalty to the father . . . [but the administraion has now rejected both]Scowcroft and James Baker . . . In private, Baker is scathing about the current occupant of the White House. . . "
Well, well, well -- Scowcroft and Baker, a couple of true patriots. They could have spoken up during the election campaign, and helped send George and his neocon gang back to Texas, but no -- "loyalty" triumphs patriotism.
They will now reap what they have sowed.
I've been reading stuff on progressive blogs lately about whether Bush really has a "mandate" -- as if THAT would make any difference. Folks, stop living in the reality-based community -- Bush doesn't care, he simply believes he can do anything he likes and so do the 101st Fighting Keyboarders who blog support for his every flaw.
It doesn't matter what anybody else around Washington thinks, Dad included. George is not listening. Never has, never will. He just stuffs his fingers in his ears and chants "na-na-na-na-na" every time somebody is saying anything he doesn't want to hear.
Eventually, they just shut up.
No more excuses!
Well, I guess Canada can't be expected to just RESPOND to the Asia emergency by sending whatever we have on hand.
No, apparently that's not the Canadian way.
First we have to STUDY the issue. Then we have to CONSIDER what we could do, and CAREFULLY CRAFT the appropriately economical response. Then, AND ONLY THEN, should we actually send help.
And if, by then, another hundred thousand have died due to thirst, hunger and disease, well, them's the breaks.
I'm totally disgusted -- you see, Canada has this crack team of 200 soldiers, doctors and engineers called DART which was put together following the Rwanda cholera epidemic, specifically designed to be used for world-wide emergencies on 48-hour notice. And it has actually been used, twice, to great praise, in Honduras and in Turkey. But it costs $15 or $20 million to deploy it.
So since 1998, it hasn't been allowed off the ground.
The Globe, in reporting on Canadian tsunami aid - Canada commits $40 million for tsunami aid - notes in passing that we might send some or all of the DART team to Asia.
Or maybe not -- after all, DART can only be deployed, as Bill Graham qualifies it, "if it's going to be useful on the ground" -- it takes "four large planes" to move the whole team, he tells us.
First, apparently, we have to figure out how to make DART more "nimble". Now, we've had five years to study how to do this; regretfully, it apparently hasn't yet been done -- but hey, it was on someone's "to do" list, and its just too bad that no one actually got started on this until last fall.
Then we have to have an "advance reconnaissance team" to determine whether some parts of DART maybe could be sent to Asia.
The whole tone of Graham's reported remarks is that it just wouldn't DO, to act too hastily.
Well, knowing the way bureaucracies usually work, I suspect that the person who put DART together retired or quit about five years ago. And I suspect his successors, wanting to use the money for their own projects, have been trying to quietly kill it ever since.
But the people they're now killing are the people in Asia.
And DART could help, if the politicians and Ottawa military chiefs would just quit making excuses and SEND IT.
No, apparently that's not the Canadian way.
First we have to STUDY the issue. Then we have to CONSIDER what we could do, and CAREFULLY CRAFT the appropriately economical response. Then, AND ONLY THEN, should we actually send help.
And if, by then, another hundred thousand have died due to thirst, hunger and disease, well, them's the breaks.
I'm totally disgusted -- you see, Canada has this crack team of 200 soldiers, doctors and engineers called DART which was put together following the Rwanda cholera epidemic, specifically designed to be used for world-wide emergencies on 48-hour notice. And it has actually been used, twice, to great praise, in Honduras and in Turkey. But it costs $15 or $20 million to deploy it.
So since 1998, it hasn't been allowed off the ground.
The Globe, in reporting on Canadian tsunami aid - Canada commits $40 million for tsunami aid - notes in passing that we might send some or all of the DART team to Asia.
Or maybe not -- after all, DART can only be deployed, as Bill Graham qualifies it, "if it's going to be useful on the ground" -- it takes "four large planes" to move the whole team, he tells us.
First, apparently, we have to figure out how to make DART more "nimble". Now, we've had five years to study how to do this; regretfully, it apparently hasn't yet been done -- but hey, it was on someone's "to do" list, and its just too bad that no one actually got started on this until last fall.
Then we have to have an "advance reconnaissance team" to determine whether some parts of DART maybe could be sent to Asia.
The whole tone of Graham's reported remarks is that it just wouldn't DO, to act too hastily.
Well, knowing the way bureaucracies usually work, I suspect that the person who put DART together retired or quit about five years ago. And I suspect his successors, wanting to use the money for their own projects, have been trying to quietly kill it ever since.
But the people they're now killing are the people in Asia.
And DART could help, if the politicians and Ottawa military chiefs would just quit making excuses and SEND IT.
Tuesday, December 28, 2004
Monday, December 27, 2004
The night is coming?
Via Kos comes this article: Realists Rebuffed: A vulgarized neconservatism in the saddle Author Scott Campbell describes what is happening in America today --
"[We are] setting in full motion of an aggressive, reckless, militarized foreign policy, viewed as lawless by much of the world -- one whose almost inevitable outcome is nuclear war. While Pinochet and Franco and for most of his reign Stalin kept within their own borders, Bush has ambitions of global scope. Of course they are idealistic ambitions, beautiful ambitions. The spread of democracy -- especially if it springs up from a country's indigenous institutions and populace -- is a very good thing. But the Bushites now see democracy's spread as necessary for America's own survival. The world, particularly the Muslim world, must become democratic now, or we will perish. The neoconservatives in the administration believe that democracy will spread only if the president commits more and more troops to Iraq and topples the regimes in Tehran and Damascus. As alarming as the neoconservatism of Rumsfeld, Cheney, Perle, Wolfowitz, Feith, Danielle Pletka, and John Bolton is, more alarming is the spirit that has spread in its wake -- a kind of neoconservativism without a graduate degree. You see it on certain blogs and hear it in the rants of some of the most widely listened to right-wing talk-radio hosts. If the Arabs don't want to be democratic, we should nuke them. We have no choice but to nuke them for our own safety. It's a vulgarized neoconservatism -- no one from the American Enterprise Institute speaks like this (in public). But this talk is around in the heartland and growing, and it is wind in the sails of the new administration . . . How has the country changed? Two years ago, when National Review editor Rich Lowry said that an appropriate response to a WMD attack on the United States might be to nuke Mecca, there was a fair amount of outrage. But Lowry, recall, was imagining how the United States might respond to a massive terrorist attack. Now the American airwaves and blogosphere are rife calls to nuke those whom military invasion couldn’t turn into democrats."
I've noticed these horrifying comments on right-wing blogs, too, and didn't know what to make of them or how widespread this had become.
The same thing happened in Vietnam, if anyone can remember. I credit the Vietnam anti-nwar demonstrators, including John Kerry, for forcing an end to that unwinnable war before the US reached such a point of desperation that they would use nuclear weapons to try to win it -- there were also, in those days, some calls of "Nuke Hanoi" and "what else is the bomb for?" but the anti-war movement overwhelmed them.
If Iraq is Vietnam on crack, I am worried that we don't have enough time anymore to stop Bush.
Do not go gentle into that good night. Blog, blog against the dying of the light.
"[We are] setting in full motion of an aggressive, reckless, militarized foreign policy, viewed as lawless by much of the world -- one whose almost inevitable outcome is nuclear war. While Pinochet and Franco and for most of his reign Stalin kept within their own borders, Bush has ambitions of global scope. Of course they are idealistic ambitions, beautiful ambitions. The spread of democracy -- especially if it springs up from a country's indigenous institutions and populace -- is a very good thing. But the Bushites now see democracy's spread as necessary for America's own survival. The world, particularly the Muslim world, must become democratic now, or we will perish. The neoconservatives in the administration believe that democracy will spread only if the president commits more and more troops to Iraq and topples the regimes in Tehran and Damascus. As alarming as the neoconservatism of Rumsfeld, Cheney, Perle, Wolfowitz, Feith, Danielle Pletka, and John Bolton is, more alarming is the spirit that has spread in its wake -- a kind of neoconservativism without a graduate degree. You see it on certain blogs and hear it in the rants of some of the most widely listened to right-wing talk-radio hosts. If the Arabs don't want to be democratic, we should nuke them. We have no choice but to nuke them for our own safety. It's a vulgarized neoconservatism -- no one from the American Enterprise Institute speaks like this (in public). But this talk is around in the heartland and growing, and it is wind in the sails of the new administration . . . How has the country changed? Two years ago, when National Review editor Rich Lowry said that an appropriate response to a WMD attack on the United States might be to nuke Mecca, there was a fair amount of outrage. But Lowry, recall, was imagining how the United States might respond to a massive terrorist attack. Now the American airwaves and blogosphere are rife calls to nuke those whom military invasion couldn’t turn into democrats."
I've noticed these horrifying comments on right-wing blogs, too, and didn't know what to make of them or how widespread this had become.
The same thing happened in Vietnam, if anyone can remember. I credit the Vietnam anti-nwar demonstrators, including John Kerry, for forcing an end to that unwinnable war before the US reached such a point of desperation that they would use nuclear weapons to try to win it -- there were also, in those days, some calls of "Nuke Hanoi" and "what else is the bomb for?" but the anti-war movement overwhelmed them.
If Iraq is Vietnam on crack, I am worried that we don't have enough time anymore to stop Bush.
Do not go gentle into that good night. Blog, blog against the dying of the light.
2004 Canadian Blog Awards
2004 Canadian Blog Awards Vote for your favourite Canadian blog here (and no, I'm not listed -- oh well, maybe next year)
Its worth checking just to find out about some great blogs, whether you vote or not.
UPDATE: Sorry - the link above is the wrong site. Here is the correct one for voting: Canadian Blog Awards voting site.
Its worth checking just to find out about some great blogs, whether you vote or not.
UPDATE: Sorry - the link above is the wrong site. Here is the correct one for voting: Canadian Blog Awards voting site.
Sunday, December 26, 2004
Family disaster plan
The news from Asia is devastating - 14,000 dead now, and rising.
We owe it to ourselves and our families to have our own Family Disaster Plan. Now, Saskatoon is not a particularly disaster-prone area -- we almost never get summer or winter storms bad enough to even close the airport, for example, much less lose our electrical power, and we are far away from earthquake zones -- but its still worthwhile to consider possible problems and plan for them. The website I linked to above has a number of good ideas -- its more comprehensive than the Red Cross guide (pdf).
We owe it to ourselves and our families to have our own Family Disaster Plan. Now, Saskatoon is not a particularly disaster-prone area -- we almost never get summer or winter storms bad enough to even close the airport, for example, much less lose our electrical power, and we are far away from earthquake zones -- but its still worthwhile to consider possible problems and plan for them. The website I linked to above has a number of good ideas -- its more comprehensive than the Red Cross guide (pdf).
Saturday, December 25, 2004
On a lighter note
Check this one out -- The year in pictures
Lots of stuff for news junkies, cat bloggers, extreme weather junkies and everyone else.
Lots of stuff for news junkies, cat bloggers, extreme weather junkies and everyone else.
It's ba-a-a-ak!
Five killed by Vietnam War shell
And what do you think of this little factoid at the end of the story - "Since the U.S.-led Vietnam War ended, nearly 40,000 Vietnamese have been killed by leftover ordnance."
And what do you think of this little factoid at the end of the story - "Since the U.S.-led Vietnam War ended, nearly 40,000 Vietnamese have been killed by leftover ordnance."
It makes the world go 'round
Isn't this a sad start to Christmas -- Lottery Winner's Granddaughter Is Buried. And there was a story this week in the Saskatoon paper about a $3 million lottery winner in MooseJaw who is broke three years later.
Now I, on the other hand, would make an excellent lottery winner! I would know how to handle it all -- fame, success, money, and all that. So why haven't I ever won? Inquiring minds want to know.
Now I, on the other hand, would make an excellent lottery winner! I would know how to handle it all -- fame, success, money, and all that. So why haven't I ever won? Inquiring minds want to know.
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