:: Bite The Wax Tadpole ::

:: Thursday, June 05, 2003 ::

"Send In Your Dead..."

The Guardian is collecting obituaries of people who died in Iraq for a "Memorial" page. I suggest that anyone who has stories about Saddam's pre-war victims send those in as well so the "memorial" isn't so one-sided.

I spent two hours arguing more-or-less this topic with four Europeans today (Spanish, German, Italian and Ukrainian - there just has to be a joke in there somewhere), and they seem to be constitutionally incapable of considering in any way, shape or form any harm that isn't caused by war. In their world, "Not War" is always better than war, even if "Not War" leads to far more death and suffering or even mass graves full of children.

It's a point of view I find incomprehensible and it was a disheartening experience -- these are genuinely nice, intelligent people who I like a lot, but they have blind spots you could sail an aircraft carrier through. Including Saddam's victims in the Guardian's "memorial" is one small way to make it harder for them to ignore the suffering caused by inaction.
:: Erik | 6/5/2003 01:23:56 PM | ::

Crime and Punishment

A 13-year old in Munich who lives in a home for troubled youth and is "well known to the police" stabbed a retiree with a "weaponized" kitchen fork so hard that it stuck in his skull. He was caught at the scene and has openly confessed, but (according to the Süddeutsche Zeitung) due to his age the police were forced to release him at the scene and he has absolutely nothing to fear from the courts. He is literally unpunishable due to his age.

Unbelievable.
:: Erik | 6/3/2003 01:56:56 PM | ::

Send The Marines!

This graphic (from last week's Focus magazine) summarizes the ca. 1500 pieces of artwork that have gone missing in the year 2002 in Austria alone. Clearly, there aren't enough US troops patrolling the streets of Vienna.

:: Erik | 6/3/2003 08:31:22 AM | ::

Is this one of the entrance criteria?

10 11 things I learned from the Eurovision Song Contest:

When picking sides for Eurovision, leave the lounge singers at home.

Germans still like Groenemeyer, even when he's Polish.

The world isn't ready for an Estonian-led 80's revival.

Sweden has not exhausted its supply of Abba.

Britney Spears has a twin in Romania.

The hills of Greece are a sight to behold.

The Multi-Culti has run through all existing cultures and has to invent new ones to promote.

Teeny-bopper lesbianism still sells. Even if the music sucks and they don't kiss.

Profound-seeming pseudo-multiculturalism sells even better than teeny-bopper lesbians. Go figure.

A Eurovision-style voting system (in which people can't vote for representatives of their own country) would be much better than any of the propsals for the new EU constitution.

The continent is still sore at the UK, but they're really sorry about that whole NATO/Turkey thing

:: Erik | 5/24/2003 03:18:08 PM | ::

Leading Indicator

Do you find it hard to stay ahead of the tin-hat crowd? Don't have the time to wade through DU or Indymedia to find the latest paranoid conspiracy? Don't have the stomach for Ted Rall? Have I got a blog for you!

Horst Prillinger (The Aardvark Speaks) seems like a smart enough guy who reads a lot and makes lots of connections (he is a librarian, after all). He also seems to have a blatantly paranoid anti-American streak.

What that means to you, dear reader, is that you now have a bellwether for the tin-hat crowd -- a resource who will comb through the news and the nonsense to find the most spinnable pieces, from which he constructs clever and interesting conspiracy theories.

When he isn't engaged in flights of fancy, he provides an interesting window into the kind of paranoid anti-Americanism that's being spoon-fed to the European public. When his imagination kicks in, you'll be treated to some of the more interesting and superficially plausible anti-American conspiracy theories on the web.
His track record for spotting the theories with legs is pretty good:

On April 16, Horst asserted that looting at the Baghdad Museum was instigated by American troops at the behest of a shadowy cabal of American art collectors that apparently controls the Pentagon. With that, he jumped straight to step seven of the logic chain predicted by Jaed at Bitter Sanity (sadly, she's apparently on hiatus).

A full month ago, he was pimping today's hot anti-American gossip item - that the rescue of Pfc Lynch was staged. He even alluded to the possibility a week earlier. Sadly, nobody picked up on this little gem at the time.

Unfortunately for Horst, his track record for theories that, say, correspond with reality is less than stellar. The looting of the Baghdad Museum turns out to have been much less serious than originally reported and was likely conducted by members of Saddam's people. The Pfc Lynch "Wag the Dog" smear campaign is a fantastic concoction even further from the facts than the Museum story was and will likely die a quick and painless death.

But not quite quick or painless enough. Blogosphere fact-checking can kill a story within days, but a prebuttal like Jaed's can spike it before it emerges. And that's one good reason that it's useful to monitor blogs like "The Aardvark Speaks."
:: Erik | 5/18/2003 11:51:36 PM | ::

It's nice to see that Germany is trying to patch things up, as predicted:

I expect that sanctions will be lifted quickly," said Schröder. "In the end, this is about the people of Iraq, who must be helped as soon as possible."

Schröder and company seem rather put out, though, that the administration isn't friendlier. They'll just have to get over that -- Bush won't take any substantive actions against Germany (base closings are sensible, not punitive), but he's not the kind to forgive and forget. Relations will remain proper but cool for as long as Schröder (and Bush) are in power. That said, Bush probably shouldn't be flirting quite so openly with the Union -- It's improper and it's likely to backfire.

Now we'll just have to see what France and Russia are up to. Russia is quietly belligerent but seems to be hinting that it will accept bribes. France is just freaking out, which could have several causes:

An attempt to preemptively discredit information they fear will be coming out of Iraq

An attempt to score sympathy points in preparation for a new round of strife at the security council

A sudden realization that the breach is serious and that Bush isn't going to kiss and make up ever any time soon.

Time (i.e. the next week or two) should tell.
:: Erik | 5/17/2003 12:38:16 AM | ::

North Korea has apparently invented Jolt.
:: Erik | 5/14/2003 12:59:14 AM | ::

Payback's a Bitch

It's perfectly appropriate for countries that opposed the war in Iraq to suffer some consequences now that the war is over, but it's extremely important that those consequences are reasonable and appropriate. Petty snubs or heavy-handed revenge would backfire badly.

I outlined some appropriate responses some time ago, but I have to confess that I never expected this (despite actually suggesting something similar).

It's perfect -- simultaneously unassailable and galling to the weasels, and it establishes Poland as a serious player in intra-European politics.
:: Erik | 5/9/2003 04:52:54 AM | ::