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Raid on Iraqi Militant Group Indicates Ties to al-Qaida but Leadership on the Run to Iran.
I am shocked and appalled! Inconceivable!
Eventually, everything evil and sinister about Iraq will come to light and the No Blood For Oil loudmouths can shrink back under the rocks from whence the came.
Not for nothing, but a 55 year old woman is really not quite efficient to guard a grain silo from a bomber.
I just know that if I was the child of a woman who went off to Iraq to guard our enemy's storage bins against certain destruction and my mother said she was prepared to die for the anti-war cause, I would say something like "Wow, what an idiotic and self-centered mother I have." And then I would say "Where's that good china you had in storage because I would love to take it before my sister tries to lay claim to it after you're dead."
But that's just me.
Yessssssssssssssss!
The Yankees are back on Cablevision.
They are winning 1-0.
It's finally spring.
UPDATE: $%#$%&%$#
to rock a rhyme
There are reports (as of yet no link) that Peter Arnett has been fired by NBC and National Geographic.
Which is interesting considering last night NBC had this to say about Arnett:
NBC, in a statement Sunday, praised Arnett's "outstanding" reporting from Iraq and said he was trying nothing more than to give an analytical response to an interviewer's questions.
And today, he's gone, giving no credence to the reports that Arnett might have had a gun to his head or been under "duress" when he made the offending statements.
I'm sure Iraqi TV has an opening for him.
Speaking of news, I will be posting from time to time at Connie Du Toit's new blog Keeping the home fires burning because even though I write about media bias, I am still a pro-war, pro-troops American kind of gal.
We are a group of ordinary people who wanted to do something to make it easy for our troops to find out how the vast majority of people feel about them. This website provides links to many of the great things that are being done to support our troops. The contributors to this site are listed in the upper right of every page. None of us are professional journalists. We're just ordinary folks, doing what we can to make life a little better for our troops, the families of our troops, and other ordinary folks who want to be counted.We are biased. We support our troops 100%. The people who post comments to this site share our bias.
I've disabled comments on this entry because I do not want anyone using this post to belittle Connie's great effort.
Much has been made about the flag-waving pro-war stance of Fox News. Although they call themselves "Fair and Balanced," most people think they are anything but.
In fact, Oliver Willis recently compared Fox to al Jazeera, while Laurence Simon pointed out the blatant jigoism of Fox.
The fact is, you will not be able to find a fair and balanced television news channel anywhere in the world during wartime.
I watch Fox News because I find it has the most interesting reports, the best view of Iraq and the most straight-forward war reporting. That is not to say it is even handed all the time. The cheerleading and pro-war ruminations exist often on Fox. One only has to listen to Sean Hannity or Neil Cavuto to see that.
There's not a lot of choice out there, despite the fact that there are a zillion news channels between cable tv and live streaming news on the internet. You're either going to get feel-good, rally around the U.S.A. and tie a yellow ribbon reporting, or you are going to get look at the carnage the U.S. and coalition forces are producing reporting.
Each view of the war exploits different things. al Jazeera exploits American casualties and death in general. Fox exploits the same thing, but in a different way. They want to tug at your red, white and blue heartstrings so you start seeing things through the same colored glasses as they do.
The war is everywhere. If you turn on your tv or radio or boot up your computer it is staring you in the face, be it with bombs or bodies or flags. The media is changing to fit itself into the war niche. Radio stations are either banning war related songs or urging listeners to go to pro-war rallies. Every local news station has already done a story on how the war is effecting children.
It's really not up to the media to decide what we see or how we perceive their views. It's up to us to make our own choices and to disseminate the information as best we can. Even if you watch a channel that seems to trasmit with a closed mind, it's up to us to watch with an open mind.
Yes, there is liberal media bias. And there is conservative media bias. And in this age of readily available information from all over the world, there is bias news to be found everywhere. Pro-Palestine and anti-Israel, pro-Iraq and anti-America, whatever bias you are looking for, it's out there.
If al Jazeera is not your cup of tea - and I imagine that most of us look at in to fuel our outrage - then make the choice to not watch it. If Fox News is too jingoistic for you, try CNN. If you are sick of the war at all, turn on your local news station where they are probably right now debating the merits of fertilizer. And you just know that someone is going to write into the station accusing them of being biased against the fertilizer industry.
Baseball season has started.
It's snowing.
There's an ice warning for tomorrow morning.
This is not spring, damn it. Don't those evil gnomes in charge of the weather know that it's not supposed to snow after the first pitch is thrown?
Well, they're obviously not paying attention because baseball season has not only officially started, it's being blogged, so those weather gnomes in their weather pods can't tell me they didn't know. I know for a fact they have a DSL line over at the weather making palace.
Get on the ball, guys. Stop the snow, break out the flowers and tree buds, give me Bob Shepherd's voice and then I'll believe it's spring.
Although the season won't really start until a) Roger Clemens beans someone and b) I make a snide Red Sox comment to Solonor.
Is anyone still reading this blog? Did you all desert me for blog stock trading and war news? Would it help if I became an embedded reporter in other blogs and I could tell you what color underwear Jim Treacher wears and if Robyn is wearing a bra or not?
It's just been so....lonely here lately.
I brushed my teeth. I put on deodorant. You can come back, now!
Peter Arnett is either:
A) Being held at gunpoint by Iraqis
or
B) A traitor and and flaming gasbag.
Either way, he is in deep, deep shit.
The bad thing about spring is the return of the ice cream man. I hate the ice cream man. I have evil fantasies about taking his jingly jangly bells and shoving them so far up his ass that his ears start ringing. It's not even one guy. We have the dueling trucks around here. They circle the block morning, noon and night, each one turning up their sound system louder on each pass down my street.
There's Mr. Softy, Doug's Truck o' Ice Cream and some ominous looking white truck that I swear plays the theme from "Rosemary's Baby" while it circles the block.
When I was a child, I thought of ice cream men as evil beings sent to earth by Satan to ply children with goodies into joining the force of the dark side. Those bells and happy recordings you heard on the speakers was just a mask for subliminal messages, meant to hypnotize into becoming one of the devil's minions, and then you would be put to work selling cigarettes to minors and selling Elvis albums to old ladies.
it turns out they aren't satan's helpers at all, just capitalists in action. They fight for our allegiance with specials and discounts and the coolest, trendiest ice cream ever. Twenty five flavors of gelato. Ice cream cones coated with peanut butter sauce. Yellow, gooey, Pikachu shaped pops.
One flavor is more disgusting than the next. The Rugrats ice pops leave purple and yellow stains on the sidewalk. The Flinstone push up pops taste like Triaminic.
And yet, the kids run to the ice cream as if he were the Pied Piper of Sweet Treats. They eat these disgusting, fake flavored, stain-inducing pops and beg for more.
I wonder what life on our block would be like during the summer if our only ice cream truck was driven by a man from Japan who imported all his goods from his home country.
Would the kids run for the truck every day to scoop up the Ox Tongue flavor ice cream? Would they beg us for money to purchase a scoop of eggplant? Would risk life and limb by running after the ice cream man just to get some squid flavored cones?
Where do they get these ideas from? Do people really buy chicken wing flavored dessert? Would anyone order a confection that was made with eels?
I wouldn't tempt fate by serving Japanese desserts, anyhow. The last time I gave some kids Japanese candy, it turned out the candy was recalled.
Natalie: Eww, did you fart, DJ?
DJ: No! I was just going to ask you that!
Natalie: Well it smells like someone let one out. Mom?
The very true story of how Easter eggs signify the onset of spring, over at Raising Hell.
Death to Smoochy:
Interesting concept. Mostly, ill-conceived. It could have been a great, dark comedy. Instead it was just...dark.
Also, I think I broke out in hives at one point, which I am prone to do when I am feeling uncomfortable enough to cringe at something.
So Death to Smoochy gets the rating of 3 tablespoons of Benadryl out of 4, which means it was not as uncomfortably horrible as say, See Spot Run, but it was worse than Billy Madison.
I guess you would have to live inside my head to understand my movie reviews, which is why I don't do movie reviews very often.
Plus, there's not a lot of room in there and I don't think you would enjoy living there very much anyhow.
Yes, I am quite overtired, thank you for asking.
So am I the only one asking the question "What ever happened to the Backstreet Boys?" I always knew they were destined for a Where Are They Now episode, but I didn't think it would be so soon.
Thankfully, the whole boy band plague seems to have come to its end, with just a few scratchy pock marks like Justin Timberlake hanging around as a reminder.
I wonder what the next phase or vanilla-flavored trend coated with sprinkles will be. Not just in music, but in pop-culture in general. If I could just learn to predict trends, or at least the coolness factor in fledgling products/ideas/music/shows, I would, of course, be rich.
Back many years ago - and yes I do go back so far as to remember a world without Shredder - I read in a magazine about a new show coming to the tube called Teenage Mutant Ninja Turltes. I scoffed at the name. I laughed at the idea. What kind of hip, with-it kid would admit to liking such an ill-conceived thing.
Did I mention that just last week I bought myself a Ninja Turtles Katana? Who knew that the Turtles would still be rockin' the sewer more than a decade later? Come on, there's no way you predicted their success, either.
When I try to predict future trends, I only come up with the thought that it's all been done before. Every cartoon and comic has been drawn already. There's not much difference between Yu Gi Oh! and Pokemon.
Every song has been written. The new punk bands are the old punk bands with less flare. Every Good Charlotte song has a Ramones song underneath it.
Every recreational fad is just the idea of the skateboard built a different way. How many ways can one fly off the ground using a wheel-driven object that will eventually obey gravity and leave you with life-long scars?
Allthe clothing trends are just rehashed fabrics from the 60's and 70's slapped with a "retro" tag. Retro is another way of saying "we're all out of ideas."
Is the trend dead? Just look at Christmas 2002, which went down in history as the year without a "must have" toy. No Tickle-Me Elmo or robotic pet or Playstation 2 for parents to fight over in the aisles of Toys-r-Us.
All the action movies and kung-fu movies and films with fake British accents have been done. If they make another white-guy/black-guy buddy movie, nobody will notice. They will think it's the same Martin Lawrence movie they saw the last time. Every disaster has been re-created for the big screen. There's nothing left.
Of course, the entertainment industry will prove me wrong. Months from now there will be a new fad, a new product to buy that will spawn twenty like products within a weeks time. There will be a new band with a new sound and fifty other bands will rush to the stuido to recreate the sound. All the kids will be wearing the same t-shirts or hats or shoes that they will discard for next year's cool shirts and hats and shoes.
I wouldn't mind the trends so much if I was just prescient enough to cash in on them. But as long as I didn't think of them I still reserve the right to label all future trends, fads, phases and genres as crap.
The usual Saturday morning/afternoon content portion of this blog has been pre-empted by life outside the house and the start of Little League season.
Enjoy your day and ASV will return tonight with the snide commentary, boobie shots, antagonistic war talk, troll baiting, nude pictures of Michael Moore and mindless drivel that you have come to expect.
Now get outside and enjoy the start of spring.
Also, if you have been looking for Davezilla the past day or so, please note that he is experiencing a major crisis of the Evil ISP sort and will be back eventually.
It's Friday. I've got the computer to myself.
What are you in the mood for?
UPDATE The Mother of All Headaches has stopped by for the evening. I'm going to try that thing they call sleep.
If it's war stuff you want, go hang out at Command-Post, which never sleeps.
If it's funny stuff you want (with some war thrown in) go read Treacher's postings for the past few days.
I think I slept with him in my dream last night. And Rick Leventhal was there.
Yea, I'm leaving.
The thought has entered my mind quite frequently that Charles Rangel just may be an incredibly thoughtless jerk.
There's that saying that goes something like - Better to have people question whether you are an ass or not than to open your diseased mouth and remove all doubt.
Yea, that was heavily paraphrased.
Obviously, Armed Forces bashing is the flavor of the week.
click for larger picture. image swiped from the asshat's website
Then again, this is old hat for Rall. I don't think he's had a fresh idea since September 2001.
UPDATE: Well, holy fuck. It just gets worse by the minute.
And they call this higher education.
At an anti-war "teach-in" this week, a Columbia University professor called for the defeat of American forces in Iraq and said he would like to see "a million Mogadishus" -- a reference to the Somali city where American soldiers were ambushed, with 18 killed, in 1993."The only true heroes are those who find ways that help defeat the U.S. military," Nicholas De Genova, assistant professor of anthropology at Columbia University told the audience at Low Library Wednesday night. "I personally would like to see a million Mogadishus."
Commentary later. I'm going to go bang my head against the wall a couple of times, first.
Putin calls for the war to be stopped.
Can you smell what the US is cooking?
That would be Putin's ass in that frying pan, sauteed with a couple of WMDs stamped "Made in Russia."
I can't believe I just used the phrase "what the U.S. is cooking."
Someone slap me.
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You can now buy shares of A Small Victory.
Sure, you won't be able to buy anything with the fake money you make off of me, but at least now when people call me a capitalist whore I can stand up proudly and say Yes, I am
The value of this blog is $17679.28, an outgoing link is worth $711.17. Your bill is in the mail.
I just bought five shares of Instapundit.
A group of Vermont teen-agers threw rocks at a uniformed female Vermont National Guard sergeant last week, in the latest example of a service member facing hostility in the United States.
The teens blocked the sergeant as she went into a store and again on the way out, yelling obscenities at her along the way, Roosevelt said. The group also threw small stones at her car as she drove away, he added.The sergeant said she believed the protesters had taken part in an anti-war demonstration in Montpelier that day. National Guard troops are often deployed to such events to help keep the peace.
"There were various profanities directed in her direction, along the line of '[expletive] murderer, [expletive] baby killer,'" Stirewalt said. "It culminated with some of the individuals throwing rocks at her, and as testament to her disciplined professionalism, she got in her car and left the area."
Murderer. Baby Killer.
This isn't just about the above low-life, ungrateful repugnant creatures who particpated in this display of idiocy. It's for all of you that think soldiers are baby killers. It's for all of you that call them murderers. It's for everyone who thinks that oil is the only reason we are in Iraq. It's for the cowards who hide behind placards and the loudmouths who degrade our armed forces while they enjoy the freedoms this country provides them. It's for everyone who thinks the United States Armed Forces are a group of bloodthirsty men and women hell bent on nothing but destruction and death and have no value for human life. It's for everyone who thinks we want to flatten Iraq without a care for the citizens of that country.
All images from this site; click for larger view
Here "an Iraqi child gestures to an American as other children look on, at a water distribution point in Umm Qasr, Iraq, Wednesday."
From left: Lt. Mark Day, Petty Officer Thomas Wagers, Cmdr. Robert Hinks, Lt. Cmdr. John Uecker, and Capt. John Perciballi work on an unidentifed, 2-year-old Iraqi boy, at Camp Viper, in southern Iraq on Wednesday.
A yound boy is all smiles after receiving water from US and British Civil Affairs troops in Umm Qsar, Iraq, on Wednesday. The water came from Kuwait in tankers.
The very same people who complain and cry that our soldiers are baby killers are never seen decrying Saddam Hussein as the same. There is no moral relativism at play here - Saddam and his army intentionally aim to kill and murder their own people, while we are there to rescue them from that madman. And yet, we are the killers. And our soldiers are degraded and insulted on their own soil.
Where do they learn the phrase "baby killer" from? Who teaches them these things? And who will they all turn to if war should ever come to our homes, on our land? Who will they turn to for protection and defense? The heroes of the left will not save them. They will be cowering under their beds like everyone else, waiting for one of our own baby killers and murderers to come save them.
They wanted to shut down New York City today, but only 500 showed up. But they certainly were a lively bunch.
What in the world was going on here?
And what is that furry thing being pulled out of her ass?
An anti-war protester with her mouth taped sits in the middle of New York's Fifth Avenue blocking traffic Thursday, March 27, 2003. Anti-war groups blocked busy intersections Thursday and staged a 'die-in' to protest media and corporate 'profiteering from the war.' (AP Photo/Radcliffe Roye)
That and Justin Timberlake.
Talk to me boy
No disrespect, I don't mean no harm
Talk to me boy
I can't wait to have you in my arms
Talk to me boy
Hurry up cause you're taking too long
Talk to me boy
Better have you naked by the end of this song
So what did you come for
I came to dance with you
And you know that you don't want to hit the floor
I came to romance with you
You're searching for love forever more
It's time to take a chance
If love is here on the floor, girl
I do not translate well into German.
But hey, I am a Foundress.
Net diaries, which concern themselves with the Iraq war, encounter
large interest. Among the largest "be Blogs COMMAND post office" "ranks". The
Netzeitung spoke with the initiatorin.
Sense and purpose of "COMMAND post office" are it to collect as much as
possible messages to the Iraq war at a place in the Web are called it in
"mission the statement" of the Weblogs. At present approximately 20
persons from all world work free of charge for the project.
Foundress Michele Catalano, law employee from the US Federal State New
York, spoke with the Netzeitung about truth and untruth in Weblogs and the
speed of the InterNet, which traditional media can hardly still follow.
Netzeitung: : Mrs. Catalano, why have you "COMMAND post office" based?
Michele Catalano : When the war broke last week off, I began to set
every ten minutes of updates on-line to my private side, while I looked at
several TV channels at the same time.
I noticed then that many Blogger did. I wrote then a comment that
nevertheless perhaps we should open a community Web log, in order to
unite all the Postings. Later my Web log friend Alan, it wrote me ten minutes
such a server would put on.
Netzeitung: : How successfully is "COMMAND post office" up to now?
Catalano: On the first day we had already 7000 hits. In the meantime we
are daily with 100.000 visitors. The numbers continue to rise.
Netzeitung: : Which advantages have Weblogs of their opinion to
opposite traditional intelligence services?
Catalano: There are no editorial restrictions, that is probably the
most important. Weblogs are also faster updated than the new services - if
CNN the newest from the Iraq finally on its side places, had we the same
history frequently 20 minutes before or still in former times. On COMMAND post
office we have at least 20 people from the whole world, those at each
time a Myriade of sources to sight and then News post.
Netzeitung: : Do you think that Weblogs can be truthful in the case of
the Iraq war as some professional message offer? Are they it?
Catalano: Definitely. We do not hold back anything. Weblogs do not have
to arouse the impression, them are independent. Although COMMAND post
office deviates from because it is a strict News collection. (we have however
also a comment side.) Weblogs altogether offer a more honest, rauere aspect
on current events.
Netzeitung: : The US television was criticized to censor information
about the war. Do the citizens use now the Weblogs, in order to get a better
picture?
Catalano: At least partly. They go generally more into the InterNet. If
you want to really see the pictures, the CNN or other Mainstream media
censored [ Catalano means in this case photographs dead and caught US soldiers, note D talks ], goes it simply on the homepage von Al Dschasira. Afterwards they come into the Weblogs, in order to catch up the most diverse opinions over it - and in this case also whole rage.
Netzeitung: : Which motivation do you and your fellow combatants have
to lead the recruiting log?
Catalano: We live in a time, in which the people want their message
fast. They do not want to wait no more. Particularly with this war, which
will transfer into real time in the television. Most do not have cable
television in the office, for it however InterNet. And if the Mainstream Newssites
is slow then and still the servers under the load of millions accesses
break down, a recruiting log brings such as COMMANDS the message to post
office faster.
Netzeitung: : Who are your authors?
Catalano: We can cover all time belts with our authors. The Web log
runs 24 hours with messages, which do not only come from the USA, but also from countries such as Australia, New Zealand, Great Britain, Kuwait and
Israel. We have professors, lawyers, housewives, teachers and student thereby, even arms specialist. We are not the media, we are the people.
Ben swan placed the questions
Keith says I owe him mad props and he's right.
In response to my challenge yesterday to make a playlist of happy songs, Keith wins hands down.
I will forward this list to the BBC so they can be sure to keep everyone shiny and happy and pretending that there isn't a war waging. Ostriches rule!
(Digging out my Saturday Morning Cartoon covers CD)
“Keep Fishin’” - Weezer
“Up All Night” - Unwritten Law
“Acquiesce” - Oasis
“A Praise Chorus” - Jimmy Eat World
“In This Diary” - The Ataris
“As Good As It Gets” - Grand Theft Audio
“Party Hard” - Andrew W.K.
“We’re Going to Be Friends” - White Stripes
“Girlfriend” - Matthew Sweet
“The Globe” - Big Audio Dynamite
And, in case you want to toss a few out of that list, here’s a couple of alternates:
“First Date” - Blink 182
“Short Skirt/Long Jacket” - Cake
“Fire Woman” - The Cult
“I Love You Period” - Dan Baird (admittedly more of a Southern rock song...)
“Hits From the Bong” - Cypress Hill (because pot is one HELL of a mood elevator)
“Love Rollercoaster” - the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ cover
“Walk This Way” - either Aerosmith or the version with Run-D.M.C.
“FNT” - Semisonic
“Go Speed Racer Go” - Sponge’s cover
“Panama” - Van Halen (admittedly, also not so much an alternative song...)
Here's a gift in return for my making you think of Mark Morford:
Small World: A Tiny Little Weblog in Words and Pictures.
Chris Muir's Day by Day
Guest Week at Achewood
Penny Arcade with the best payoff line ever.
Feel free to add your favorite online comics in the comments. Because we all need a little funny stuff in our lives.
UPDATE: How did I miss the Cumbrella yesterday? Jesus, that should have been my moment of Zen.
I almost missed Mark Morford while he was on vacation. He's back.
He spent some time off the coast of Hawaii watching humpback whales. And what did Mark take away from all this?
Well, of course. Bush is dumb, we are all dumb, everyone is going to die and civilization will lie in ruins because Rumsfeld's press conferences are using some kind of mystery laser beam to shrink our brain cells.
This last paragraph will go down in my own personal history as one of the most absurd things to ever appear in print:
They are a reminder. No matter how much we think we know, no matter how many die as a result of Shrub's vicious war, no matter what sort of self-righteous good we think we're ramming down everyone's throat, we are, quite simply, raging deeper into ignorance. We know nothing. And the worst part is, we seem to be learning less with every warhead, every Rummy press conference, every dust-choked reporter and dead soldier. The whales know this. Maybe they're just waving goodbye.
I think he just plaigarized some ten year old girl's school essay with those final two lines.
Oh, how I missed you, Mark. Welcome back.
I'm sorry for the lack of any real content here lately. I'm a bit overwhelmed at the moment.
I will, however, leave you with this.
When Patriotism goes bad:
That's just...wrong.
click for large
That's Carol, the co-founder of TroopTrax and her sons in the Worcester (MA) Telegraph & Gazette, posing for a picture after Carol was interviewed about TroopTrax.
How cute are those kids?
Oh, Carol is cute, too.
I need a moment of zen.
Happy, happy, happy. happy talk.
Sure, there's a war going on. But we must be happy! We must pretend the bombs don't exist and the explosions are a figment of our imagination.
At least that's what MTV and British radio stations propose.
Though images of war are dominating television screens, one channel is not having it. The day after the war in Iraq started, a memo was distributed through the offices of MTV Europe by its broadcast standards department.In the memo, Mark Sunderland, one of the department's managers, recommends that music videos depicting "war, soldiers, war planes, bombs, missiles, riots and social unrest, executions" and "other obviously sensitive material" not be shown on MTV in Britain and elsewhere in Europe until further notice.
And then there's this:
Commercial radio stations are playing inoffensive songs, so as not to upset listeners or drive away advertisers, and the BBC has told producers to play music with a “light, melodic” feel before and after news bulletins, especially when the reports are likely to detail coalition casualties.
Think happy thoughts, everyone.
Maybe if we all sing "I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing" rainbows will appear in the sky.
Maybe if we ban all references to the war from our lives, it will cease to exist.
Maybe not.
We are all doomed to a never-ending loop of REM's Shiny Happy People.
I dare you to come up with a listenable playlist of 10 happy, non-offensive songs that don't pertain in any way to war, soldiers, dying, bombs, explosions, aaron brown or dead animals.
Dave's got an... interesting perspective of the Gulf to share over on Acerbia.
Actually, two Public Service Announcements for the price of one:
1. If upon standing up after going to the bathroom you hear a clunking sound, it is wise to not flush the toilet bowl.
2. If you keep your cell phone in your back pocket, it is certain that at some point, it will fall into the toilet bowl.
They don't give you illustrations for that on ready.gov.
I have a few questions.
After seeing everything happening in Iraq right now, why would you still insist we should not be using force to take that regime out?
And why would you say that George Bush is the greatest threat to the world after seeing what Saddam is capable of?
Why would you protest against Bush and his administration for liberating the Iraqi people and not protest against the Iraq regime itself?
Even if, for argument sake, it was all about the oil, wouldn't the fact that we are bringing aid and liberation to the people of Iraq make this a good thing we are doing?
Do you think that the Bush, or any past president for that matter, would hide his cohorts in day care centers, hospitals and residential homes?
Do you think they would store ammunition in a hospital?
Do you think they would gleefully kill prisoners of war and put the tape on tv?
Do you think they would use women and children as shields?
Did you answer no to any of those questions?
Then why? Why would you protest so hard against this when it is obvious that the conditions the Iraqi people were living under are conditions you would not survive ten minutes in?
If you were living under that kind of vile, murderous dictatorship, would you not want someone to come in and save you?
How would you feel if this country were run like Iraq, if Saddam was your leader and when other countries came in to help you - even if it was with force - you heard that people from that country were protesting that action?
Do you honestly think - after seeing what is happening in Iraq right now - that the people of Iraq could really have staged their own uprising?
Do you really believe that everything the American media is showing you is a lie and everything you see on al Jazeera is the truth?
Do you not think the Iraqi regime is capable of propaganda?
What, to you, is the price of freedom? Or do you think freedom comes with no price at all?
Thanks to NC for pointing me towards The 50 Most Loathesome New Yorkers.
He doesn't quite make it to number one, but I think number two is quite an honor anyhow.
Congratulations, Ted Rall! You must be so proud, finishing ahead of Michael Moore like that.
Next year, I will start a campaign to get you to number one Ted. You deserve it.
Too bad there's no stipend or some kind of monetary award that goes with this. If so, we could have had the New York Press send it to Danny.
*Yes, that was intended as grade-school bathroom humor.
However:
I sense a rivalry in the making. The hell with that, I see a movie in the making.
Dolphins v. Monkeys. Think West Side Story with with explosions.
Someone get me casting!
Just a note to certain people:
When engaging in moral relativism, don't attempt to compare the prisoners at Gitmo to the POWs killed this past week in Iraq.
When you see a tape of an American soldier gleefully killing a Gitmo detainee, broadcast on American tv for all to see and applaud like some deranged call to arms, then talk to me.
Until then, shut it.
UPDATE: In response to some comments, The Truth About Gitmo from Damian Penny.
Gitmo is on its way to becoming an extension of Godwin's Law.
UPDATE (3/26):
Gitmo detainees speak:
''The conditions were even better than our homes. We were given three meals a day -- eggs in the morning and meat twice a day; facilities to wash, and if we didn't wash, they'd wash us; and there was even entertainment with video games,'' said Sirajuddin, 24, a taxi driver from Kandahar, the birthplace of the Taliban. He said he was forcibly conscripted by the militia and captured by a notorious warlord, General Abdul Rashid Dostum, who ''sold us to the US.''
Jim has all the Michael Moore news that's fit to print. He skewers him so well.
I will do my part to contribute to Michael Moore madness with this link, an interview with The Awful One after the Oscars. Watch if you must, but wear your Idiocy Shield.
link via Chris Pirillo, who has finally agreed to send me his wife in exchange for some Pokemon games
Did I say I was going on a full hiatus? No, I didn't. So stop looking at me like that.
Having a weblog means having a living, breathing record of your life. It differs from a diary in that I can look at what I wrote on a certain date and see who was here, who left a comment. I can immediately see who has come and gone from my life in the span between then and now.
I'll probably be doing a lot of repeat essays in the next few weeks as my energies are focused elsewhere.
One year ago today I wrote this piece. It still stands, perhaps even more so now.
summer of 12
12 then and 12 now are worlds apart.
12 then was blissful ignorance.
12 now is the weight of the world.
When I was 12 my summer days were spent barefoot in my backyard, alternating between the pool and the sprinkler and the blanket on the lawn. I left the backyard only when I heard the tinny ringing of the ice-cream truck. I would run out to the street, hopping like mad from one foot to the other in an effort to not feel the full scorch of the burning blacktop. Al the ice-cream man would hurry us along in a heavy accent. Sometimes we understood him and sometimes we didn't. And sometimes Al was in a talktative mood and he would show us the numbers tattooed on his arm. We would shrug, not really knowing what the story was. We couldn't understand his accent, and even if we did, it seemed like too heavy a story to carry with our melting cones.
Today, 12 means you have read at least three historical fiction stories about the Holocaust. 12 means you would know what the numbers on Al's arm were.
When I was 12 my summer nights were spent in the street, playing kickball with my cousins. Sometimes we played kick-the-can and we would run through the neighbors yards, hiding in their shrubbery and under their porches. We played until we were too tired to run, and then we would walk down to the candy store to buy soda and snacks.
Today, 12 means you can't play in the street because there are too many cars. 12 means your neighbor's lawn is off limits because it was just sprayed with some chemical to make their grass grow greener. 12 means you can't walk to the store at night, because there are too many strangers.
When I was 12 we went to the beach and for family drives and spent leisurely days at the park. We woke up late and watched morning tv in our pajamas until we were shooed outside. Our days were long and unstructured and lazy.
Today's 12 means summer camp or summer school and getting up with the birds. It is structure and bus rides just like the rest of the year. Family drives and trips to the beach are scheduled events. Time is managed. Soccer, baseball, dance, enrichment programs, swim lessons.
When I was 12 I wasn't afraid of the world. Current events in school meant local news, fluff stories, a few science-related pieces. Health lessons centered around hygiene and grooming. Drug education was non-existent. Learning about the environment meant paying attention to don't litter signs.
Today's 12 is frightening. Current events are happening in their own backyard. War and terrorism are part of the daily venacular. Health lessons include segments on AIDS and condoms and learning how to say no. Drug education is imperative. Today's 6th graders know about ozone layers and recycling and toxins in the water.
Today's 12 is better educated than I was. They are more informed. They are better prepared. But they are not the 12 of carefree childhood and innocence. They are somehow older, wiser and a bit more cynical than I ever knew at 12.
Perhaps today's 12 is more prepared to deal with the world than the 12 year olds of my day were. But I still have to lament that their childhood is almost over at an age when it should be in its prime.
Leave it to the New York Times.
They talk to me for half an hour, I give the woman some great observations on the media, the war and weblogs and when the story gets to print I come off like a bored housewife.
She didn't even put the URL to Command Post in.
My fifteen minutes of fame is more like ten seconds of bemusement.
I'll be taking a sort-of hiatus for the rest of the week or so, maybe longer. Not a full-on hiatus, just a maybe-post-once-a-day-instead-of-48-times-a-day hiatus. I mean, someone has to bitchslap Ted Rall and I refuse to give that job up.
Or maybe I'll just write how nice it is to be back in Little League season, with Saturdays spent at the field , or how the days are getting longer and warmer and my lungs ache for some of that fresh air.
You can still find me at Command Post (which is eating up most of my alloted online time) and Raising Hell.
See ya when I ping ya.
P.S. Hug the fuck out of 'em Phillipe!
P.P.S YAY ASPARAGIRL!! You go, girl!
People suck.
Please ignore Dave (see below), I don't know who let him out of his cage today, but it wasn't me. I think he ties with Laurence for "Most Likely to Leave a Weird Post in Your Blog" award.
I'm really not happy being without a tv or radio today.
I'm really not happy that for some reason two posts I previously made not only did not show up on the site, but completely disappeared from the edit screen.
I'm really not happy about the email I received from some loony leftist who promised me that there would be a terrorist attack in the NY/Long Island area before Thursday, perpetuated by our own government so they can impose martial law to stop the protesters from shutting down the city on Thursday. I wrote back one sentence: Don't flatter yourself.
I'm not happy for a lot of reasons, the least of which being I haven't had a good night's sleep in ages and part of it being that people are generally being great big assclowns in my comments and part of it because Chris turned down my offer of all my old Gameboy cartridges in exchange for his wife, Gretchen.
I want my Fox TV. Hell, I would even take Al Jazeera at this point.
Anyone know how to get past a media firewall?
