Posted 11:01 PM

ah

Thank God for CSPAN. Of course that wasn't my only thought watching the Reagan funeral procession. But I watched it all on CSPAN, so none of that inane commentary. Just reality unfolding as reality. The silence and the reserve, it all reached a Zenith as Nancy stood before the coffin. ahh jesus why was I wincing? my eyes expanded and focused. Lovingly touching the flag, and thus the coffin too -- the frame of eternal symbols. He was a great life and this a great moment of love. Nobody was talking and they all were watching.

© by Matt Scofield

---

Posted 12:46 PM

Ear Wax

Bill Cosby's recent comments regarding the shitty state of life for lower-economic level blacks have generated a stir among many people. As such I enjoyed very much Tavis Smiley's interview with the man where he could further explain himself. Cosby's main point, the need for better parenting, seems to have been lost because of the inability of some people to shed politics and realize that this is human nature we are dealing with here. People are suffering, families are broken and here comes a man who is calling them out on it -- and it is only the folks in the elite who have a problem with it.

An interesting point was brought up in the interview:

Cornel West: And there's no doubt in my mind, when you look at who Cosby is, where he comes from in Philadelphia, that he's speaking out of great compassion and trying to get folk to get on the right track, 'cause we've got some brothers and sisters who are not doing the right things, just like in times in our own lives, we don't do the right thing. We need to be corrected lovingly. He is trying to speak honestly and freely and lovingly, and I think that's a very positive thing. We know Bill Cosby's not on the right wing. He's not Clarence Thomas, he's not Ward Connelly. We know him to be someone who, over 50 years, his 40 years in his artistic career, to be in deep solidarity with the black people's struggle, and people's struggle as a whole.

Now what the hell is this crap that a Ivy-league professor (and B-level actor) is trying to pull? Only Cosby can say what he said because he's "authentic"? Because he's black, or should I say, "black enough"? Or is it because Cosby tends to be liberal -- in which case why is it assumed that anyone who is a conservative is against civil rights? It is vicious smear that purposefully obscures the necessary debate that needs to be happening in all of our communities, as Cosby said:

Cosby: I think it's clear that I'm not talking about all people. And I think people who are looking at elitists have the wrong attitude, and they must be talking about themselves. Because I don't deal that way. But I am saying, “Stop it.” ... Let's weigh and measure how many the cops killed and how many our drug dealers killed. Let's weigh and measure the outrage, which is deserved, against the policeman and what happens when the drug dealer shoots a 12-year-old child? Where is it?

Tavis: Let me ask you about, back to this notion of Cornel's point that you have done this in the spirit of love and that you have earned the right to criticize or to check or to say whatever you want to say in the best interests of black people.

Cosby: I don't have to--to really show these people anything...I have an attitude--not towards you. No, no, not towards you. My attitude is here, is who I am. I am saying to the people, “Hey, man, the bridge is out. The bridge is out.” You can drive over there. You can get angry with me if you want to.

Whether I deserve to, whether I have the right to, I'm saying that I see many things. I see those people who did Brown vs. the Board of Education in the room to make whatever it was--separate but equal or to equal, or to show the children--Ken Clark and his wife with the dolls to show that children felt inferior, too. I'm looking at Nashville and the march where people are trying to sit at a counter, and we say, OK, all of that was done for…this! And then here it is--50% dropout. You can't just blame white people for this, man. You can't. Whether I'm right-wing or left, some people are not parenting.

Of course, being a liberal Cosby also holds out some blame for the "right-wing":

Tavis: But there are a lot of folk who say that, because Cosby said it, the right wing is gonna take it and use it as ammunition--

Cosby: I don't give me a blank about those right-wing white people! They can't do any more to us than they've already started with. They can't try to throw us back any farther than they've tried to throw us back. And they're doing a very good job of it.

...when in reality the modern day conservative moment poses no threat to equal rights & opportunity for all. In fact with its belief in serious education reform, tax cuts and less dependency on government the modern conservative movement holds much hope for the plight of the lower class. But as I said at the beginning, this should all transcend politics. It's simply about talking to your friends, family and neighbors and taking pride in your community: whether it be the cookie-cutter suburbs or a barrio in east L.A. Cosby sums it up:

But by the same token, for God's sake, turn around and let's have some meetings and say, “Brother, um, let me explain to you. You're the father of so-forth and so-on. Brother, you gotta rein them in, man. You gotta go talk to 'em.” “Oh, what do I do, man? I got a son, he won't listen to me, but--” “Well, hey, brother, that's your son.”

© by Matt Scofield

---

Posted 6:27 PM

"Boss" city of American

Rudyard Kipling writes of Chicago:

I HAVE struck a city—a real city—and they call it Chicago...This place is the first American city I have encountered. It holds rather more than a million of people with bodies, and stands on the same sort of soil as Calcutta. Having seen it, I urgently desire never to see it again. It is inhabited by savages. Its water is the water of the Hooghly, and its air is dirt.

Hmm, well I will still try to enjoy myself this weekend nonetheless, get to see some old friends, have some chicago dogs, some pizza, a nice steak or two and beer. Have fun doing whatever you're doing -- there's a Scottish festival in Arlington, and if you don't think you should go well then read this and you'll be in the car in no time. And now, some more from Kipling re: Chicago

The East is not the West, and these men must continue to deal with the machinery of life, and to call it progress. Their very preachers dare not rebuke them. They gloss over the hunting for money and the thrice-sharpened bitterness of Adam’s curse, by saying that such things dower a man with a larger range of thoughts and higher aspirations. They do not say, “Free yourselves from your own slavery,” but rather, “If you can possibly manage it, do not set quite so much store on the things of this world.”

And they do not know what the things of this world are!

© by Matt Scofield

---

Posted 12:25 PM

Hell, meet your handbasket

WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH SPORTS OWNERS? Do you have to be a certifiable moron to own a sports team?? Just the thought of it...I mean, I may never recover...good thing I'll be able to go to Wrigley on Friday to catch mascot-free baseball.

© by Matt Scofield

---

Posted 11:38 AM

Because they like me! They really like me!

John Kerry will build alliances and make the world more peaceful -- how exactly? Because he's John Kerry and in today's crazy world apparently that's good enough. If you look closely at Kerry's recent foreign policy speech he's not going to do anything fundamentally different from Bush -- except that it'll be John Kerry doing it.

"He's focused on the idea that somehow Bush, the person, is the problem. Kerry thinks that by sheer force of his personality, he'll get foreign gov'ts to go, 'never mind!'"

That really is the crux of his foreign policy: he's not foolish enough to do anything different (cede important American objectives just to make nice with others) so all he is going to do is just grovel for the cameras -- is that something you want out of your President? Someone who'll be flying all over the world apologizing because some in the world have an irrational fear of the country that is trying to help people live free and prosperous lives?

© by Matt Scofield

---

Posted 2:18 PM

eh, Drama

The Lakers’ victory last night removed any doubt that they are indeed the best thing ever to happen to humanity since Prometheus stole fire from Zeus. That or penicillin. Either way such an outlandish statement could practically be the case given the coverage and attention the game received. Random shots of “our celebrities” watching the game along with millions of us. The athleticism, strategy, bravado and camaraderie. The stirring music, loudly repeated clichés and misunderstood exclamations enhanced the entertainment to provide what the TV host TNT advertised: Drama. But this drama is transparent, the inspiration it gives is fleeting, the significance muted by the thousands of other choices which lay before us.

Now to compete is a trait common to American life and often great competitors make our great heroes. This trait is exhibited perhaps most tellingly, at present, in the game of basketball. Take it as a metaphor for life: groups of men trying to act freely in competition to do something trivial – and the folks who screw up the fun by trying to enforce, always imperfectly, the rules. Those damn refs can be likened of course to the busy bodies in life: whether they be nosy, self-righteous goody-too-shoes or gov’t bureaucrats who just can’t wait to find something unsafe or unfair about your activities. The players resemble us working for the limelight, doing something trifling to earn something petty. To not only be famous but be watched and talked about by the famous as well. The pride of it all; professional sports would be bereft of drama without selfish pride. I wonder if sports could even be played without individual pride, amateurism being the closest condition to achieving any such state of affairs.

All this is to say that basketball as a metaphor for life shows the degree to which we attach importance to relatively pointless activities. We can enjoy sports, watching or competing, but the business of sports in modern life increasingly works towards distracting us from more meaningful pursuits. Look at all the instant analysis and chattering done about sports on a daily basis, the only thing that compares is politics. This reveals a law of life, at least to me: Any activity subjected to popular instant analysis on a daily basis proves not only the feckless nature of the analysis, but the trivial nature of said activity as well.* Now as Aristotle noted:

The first principle of all action is leisure... Leisure is better than occupation and is its end; and therefore the question must be asked, what ought we to do when at leisure? Clearly we ought not to be amusing ourselves, for then amusement would be the end of life.

Of course this relates to my post a few days back on boredom:

What happens when amusement palls and pleasure fails to please? Boredom yawns before one, a paralyzing abyss. (Compare Tolstoy’s definition of boredom as "the desire for desires.") It is part of Kierkegaard's task to show that boredom can only be defeated by moving beyond what he calls the "aesthetic" conception of life, a mode of life unleavened by moral or religious engagement.

So my further, and final point, is to say that all this business of sports, boredom, leisure is dreadfully important, as I’ve noted previously. The incredible amount of power we put towards misguided forms of leisure, and the selfishness of those very acts, does not bode well for our ability to persevere in order to carry out sustained change in the Middle East. To help the whole world be free and to help continue the life of this civilization which so many hate, and so many others take for granted, is the burden of every generation of Americans. Will we heed the call, or simply change the show to basketball?

* That is to say day-to-day poltics is relatively trite. Political philosophy isn’t however, it should be thought about, on a daily basis too if you want -- but decisions should be made after a period of deliberation, not a commercial break.**

**Of course the act of blogging which is performed here is its own version of instant analysis. Therefore blogging must be trivial. Well not everything trivial should be eschewed, our lives themselves are but a speck on the grand scale of time so we should relish in some triviality -- keeping in mind we aren't here simply by chance. Everything in moderation I guess, stoicism seems to be the order of the day. I'll keep blogging, but aspire to do less polemics and more well-thought out essays exploring a subject. As well as poetry, and of course, the occassional sporting activity. It ain't about being perfect, just about trying to act out on that higher level for whatever periods of time that you can. It helps to be in love.

***Does anyone know the secret to putting in a consistent effort of good work in the work place when you only really half-enjoy what you are doing but really need to keep that steady paycheck coming? Lemme know.

© by Matt Scofield

---

Posted 3:11 PM

Thanks for the day off!

Guests are always welcome at chez Oligarch if they bring guns and absinthe.

Well The Onion is just funny funny funny this week. The Onion in History is funny (Dam Every River! ... "Shit Head" Coined ... etc), the Infographic on why there is Outsourcing is funny ("Ironically the best place to exploit workers is the largest communist nation on the planet"), the story "Awkward Encounter Not Awkward At All When Masturbated About" is funny... just go check it out.

Link props to Eve and the Rat.

© by Matt Scofield

---

Posted 1:42 PM

History: Simulated / repeated

Wretchard of the Belmont Club writes a fascinating post, go check it out: "There is now no real distinction between winning the "media war" and cleaning out a sniper's nest in Ramadi; between Abu Ghraib the prison and Abu Ghraib the media event. Many readers have criticized the Belmont Club's An Intelligence Failure as being too "soft" on the liberal press, arguing that the media's distortions are not simply the effect of incompetence but the result of a deliberate campaign of partisan information. Doubtless many in the liberal press harbor symmetrical resentments. Yet I have held back from framing the argument in these terms until I could place it in the framework of Col. Leonhard's concept of a global battlefield: one in which the WTC towers and the New York Times newsroom are front line positions no less than any corner in Baghdad; and where victory is measured not simply by the surrender of arms but the capitulation of ideas. We have begun the 21st century just as we inaugurated the 20th: at the edge of old familiar places and on the brink of the unknown."

VDH @ NRO strikes an optimistic note on this theme: "Where we have failed is in managing the pulse of the war and the perception of our advance, success, and victory...Our leaders should remember this volatility. In the long run, of course, the present strategy is sound and in a decade will be judged as such by historians. How could it not be sound to remove a mass murderer who posed a threat to the region and our country and then sponsor a consensual government in his place?

But what about the short-term for Americans, who are captives of the 24-hour news cycle? Their support depends on us not merely winning — as the recent routing of Mr. Sadr attests — but winning in such a dramatic fashion that even a global media ideologically opposed to the undertaking is forced to report American success, and report it with genuine zeal."

OJ at Bros. Judd, citing a similar article by Robert Kaplan at the WSJ, is a bit more pessimistic: "Nothing in the history of our democracy suggests that the government can get the truth out about a policy in competition with a press that prefers another."

© by Matt Scofield

---

Posted 2:07 PM

Boredom

"I let myself in for a several hours' boredom every day, Dixon. A couple more won't break my back."

"Why do you stand it?"

"I want to influence people so they'll do what I think it's important they should do. I can't get 'em to do that unless I let 'em bore me first, you understand. Then just as they're delighting in having got me punch-drunk with talk I come back at 'em and make 'em do what I've got lined up for 'em."

"I wish I could do that," Dixon said enviously. "When I'm punch-drunk with talk, which is what I am most of the time, that's when they come at me and make me do what they want me to do." Apprehension and drink combined to break through another bulkhead in his mind and he went on eagerly: "I'm the boredom detector. I'm a finely tuned instrument. If only I could get hold of a millionaire I'd be worth a bag of money to him. He could send me on ahead into dinners and cocktail parties and night clubs, just for five minutes, and then by looking at me he'd be able to read off the boredom coefficient of any gathering. Like a canary down a mine; same idea. Then he'd know whether it was worth going in himself or not. He could send me in among the Rotarians and the stage crowd and the golfers and the arty types talking about statements of profiles rather than volumes and the musical..."

Gore-Urquhart looked him up and down, smiling slightly. Though it wasn't a smile of ordinary amusement, it wasn't unfriendly either. "I recognise a fellow sufferer," he said.
----------------------------------------------------
"All men are bores. Surely no one will prove himself so great a bore as to contradict me in this. . . . The gods were bored, and so they created man. Adam was bored because he was alone, and so Eve was created. Thus boredom entered the world, and increased in proportion to the increase of population. Adam was bored alone; then Adam and Eve were bored together; then Adam and Eve and Cain and Abel were bored en famille; then the population of the world increased, and the peoples were bored en masse. To divert themselves they conceived the idea of constructing a tower high enough to reach the heavens. This idea is itself as boring as the tower was high, and constitutes a terrible proof of how boredom gained the upper hand."

Kierkegaard was very astute on the subject of boredom. He understood "the curious fact that those who do not bore themselves usually bore others, while those who bore themselves entertain others." He also understood that boredom could be far more than a passing mood of nameless dissatisfaction. In Kierkegaard's view, boredom is essentially a spiritual malaise, endemic wherever a purely naturalistic conception of man holds sway. Hence he defines boredom as "the daemonic side of pantheism." It is the dark side of a life devoted to amusement and pleasure. What happens when amusement palls and pleasure fails to please? Boredom yawns before one, a paralyzing abyss. (Compare Tolstoy’s definition of boredom as "the desire for desires.") It is part of Kierkegaard's task to show that boredom can only be defeated by moving beyond what he calls the "aesthetic" conception of life, a mode of life unleavened by moral or religious engagement.

© by Matt Scofield

---

Posted 2:20 PM

More PP via Kingsley Amis

"You sound as if you're in love with her."

"Do you think so?" he said almost eagerly; he couldn't help regarding her remark as a compliment--one that he'd been needing for a long time, too.

"Yes. Your attitude measures up to the two requirements of love. You want to go to bed with her and can't, and you don't know her very well. Ignorance of the other person topped up with deprivation, Jim. You fit the formula all right, and what's more, you want to go on fitting it. The old hopeless passion, isn't it? There are no two doubts about that, as Cecil used to say, before I broke him of it."

"That's rather adolescent, isn't it? If you don't mind me saying so."

"Yes, it is, isn't it? Have you got a cigarette, Jim? . . . thanks. Yes I was quite sure when I was about fifteen that that was the way things worked, only nobody could afford to admit it."

"Well, there you are, then."

"Yes, here I am now. I don't mind telling you, since I've been rather letting my hair down, that after the maturity of my twenties was over I began going back to that way of explaining things with a good deal of relief. And justification, I'd like to think, too. I'm rather keen on that formula these days, as a matter of fact."

"Are you?"

"I certainly am, Jim. You'll find that marriage is a good short cut to the truth. No, not quite that. A way of doubling back to the truth. Another thing you'll find is that the years of illusion aren't those of adolescence, as the grownups try to tell us; they're the ones immediately after it, say the middle twenties, the false maturity if you like, when you first get thoroughly embroiled in things and lose your head. Your age, by the way Jim. That's when you first realise that sex is important to other people besides yourself. A discovery like that can't help knocking you off balance for a time."

© by Matt Scofield

---

Posted 3:50 PM

Pertinent Plagiarism

“That’s right. He leaves most of it to Cecil Goldsmith, and that means everyone gets through. Cecil’s a tenderhearted chap, you know.”

“Tender-headed, you mean. It’s the same everywhere you look; not only this place, but all the provincial universities are going the same way. Not London, I suppose, and not the Scottish ones. But my God, go anywhere else and try and get someone turfed out merely because he’s too stupid to pass his exams—it’d be easier to sack a prof. That’s the trouble with having so many people here on Education Authority grants, you see.”

“How do you mean? The students have got to get their money from somewhere.”

“Well, you know, Jim. You can see the authorities’ point in a way. ‘We pay for John Smith to enter college here and now you tell us, after seven years, that he’ll never get a degree. You’re wasting our money.’ If we institute an entrance exam to keep out the ones who can’t read or write, the entry goes down by half and half of us lose our jobs. And then the other demand: ‘We want two hundred teachers this year and we mean to have them.’ All right, we’ll lower the pass mark to twenty per cent and give you the quantity you want, but for God’s sake don’t start complaining in two years’ time that your schools are full of teachers who couldn’t pass the General Certificate themselves, let alone teach anyone else to pass it. It’s a wonderful position, isn’t it?”

Dixon agreed rather than disagreed with Beesley, but he didn’t feel interested enough to say so. It was one of those days when he felt quite convinced of his impending expulsion from academic life. What would he do afterwards? Teach in a school? Oh dear no. Go to London and get a job in an office? What job? Whose office? Shut up.

© by Matt Scofield

---

Posted 12:12 PM

Hold on loosely, but don't let go

Been caught up in a budding romance, which is making this guy oh so happy, and as such I've pretty much forgotten about the rest of the world while we enjoy the newness of it all. Now I've got to go see some buds graduate out in Arizona this weekend, so posting will still be light, but I've got a lot on track and in store when I return. Seriously, this ain't gonna be no run-of-the-mill site, there IS good stuff coming. In the meantime, try something different: check out the blogroll on the left and pick something! Now if you'll excuse, I'm going to back to la-la land where nothing matters but her smile...ciao!

© by Matt Scofield

---

Posted 4:47 PM

Hyper Traveling

I came across this little story about how accurate the ancient map Carta Marina is, specifically regarding the Iceland-Faroes Front. Not knowing what this Front is, I went looking and embarked on some vicarious travel which, if you have even a few minutes, is well worth following below. You can visit:

• Sunrise in the Faroe Islands


• A haunting shore scene in the Faroes


• The Bluest water that has to be seen in person, at Skye


• Loch Coruisk, Skye


• Applecross at sunset


• Black & Orange at Skye


• Kyoto, Fall, Stunning


• Enkoji temple, Fall, Stunning


• Namibian desert


• Did Salvador Dali ever visit Namibia?


• Evening in the Namib Desert

P.S. via ChicagoBoyz, This is a cool photo as well.

© by Matt Scofield

---

Posted 2:42 PM

Sporting good news

The great Lute Olson is signed through 2009. UofAz fans don't have to worry for another 5 years! The most successful coach in school history will hopefully lead us to a national title next year! ...Lute is probably also happy that the stupid "5-8" rule is no longer in effect.

Dave Roberts, one of the most humanitarian players in the game of baseball today, is a big reason why my beloved Dodgers are off to such a great start this year. For every base he steals the Dodgers give $500 to a local charity. He's 14 for 14 this year, so here's wishing him all the success in the world!

© by Matt Scofield

---

Posted 12:05 PM

Monday Miscellany

Grrrrr, danish band nerds...

Folk seem to have forgotten the level of instability and the volume of slaughter that was required as the West reformed from totalitarianism (pretty much from Germany all the way East) to the Bering Sea. Thus far the reform of Islam has been comparatively easy, quick, cheap, and bloodless.
Point: it is not the reform of Islam to be concerned with, but the reform of the Arab world. Politically, no matter how much the West wants it to be so, they are not the same thing. Ask any imam. Governments can probably be reformed now, with difficulty. Islam will not be 'reformed' until the fanatic screamers are removed just for opening their mouths.
Counter: To the contrary, Islam itself needs to be reformed to allow for separation of the religion from economics and day to day governance. Once that's done government follows. Judeo-Christianity created liberal democratic capitalism, not vice versa...

Brief blogger discussion of pacifism over at Hugo's.

© by Matt Scofield

---

Posted 5:43 PM

Syrup

A good post over at Bros. Judd today. Cardinal Francis Arinze said pro-abortion politicians aren't fit to receive communion. Kerry's camp responded with a nonresponse, saying that religion and politics shouldn't mix. Some good comments follow: "it is not Mr. Kerry's religious beliefs that make his fitness for office questionable, it is his failure to abide by the rules of the religion in which he professes to believe and what that tells us about his character that does so." Also "The so-called separation of Church and state does not exist to sanitize political leaders of religious beliefs, nor of their willingness to act upon them." Finally, if Kerry "really agrees with his spokesman that 'religious affiliation [is] a nonissue in American politics' then maybe he should remove mention of being a lifelong, devout Catholic from the very first paragraph of his bio on his webpage." Word.

It is very telling that Kerry's stance is in direct opposition to the that of the man who did so much work in the founding of America: George Washington. Think about that: some 200-odd years later and a major candidate for office is saying something that our founders would find unthinkable.

"Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports...Let it simply be asked: Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths which are the instruments of investigation in courts of justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle."

P.S. -- Also comes news today that Kerry is not a member of his own family.

© by Matt Scofield

---

Posted 4:18 PM

Wanting what you're asking

There is a massacre happening presently in Sudan. While the U.N. watches. Worse yet, it is making an effort not to notice. This massacre "comes as the United Nations Human Rights Commission adopted a watered down statement on Darfur (Sudan). The United States had pushed for a much harder hitting resolution criticising Sudanese government abuses. " Combined with the well known outrage that is the oil-for-food scandal, can anyone say what f'ing good the U.N. will do in Iraq?

Kerry says we should have done in Iraq what did in Afghanistan, bringing in the EU, etc. The retort to this is, as usual, to use the facts. As VDH notes:

NATO contingents in Afghanistan are not commensurate with either the size or the wealth of Europe. There are far more Coalition troops in Iraq presently than in Afghanistan. As in the Balkans, NATO and EU troops will arrive only when the United States has achieved victory and provided security. The same goes for the U.N., which did nothing in Serbia and Rwanda, but watched thousands being butchered under its nose. It fled from Iraq after its first losses. (my emphasis)

The bad news we hear reported from Iraq is nothing like the magnitude "that once came from Sugar Loaf Hill or the icy plains near the Yalu that did not faze a prior generation's resolve". The lack of will of the int'l community to stop the massacre in Sudan or to enforce the consequences of 10 years of resolutions on Iraq shows, as I noted a few days ago, there is something fundamentally wrong with International law and the int'l community as a whole. The allegation of war-profiteering is a tactic intended to cover-up the fundamental problems of the int'l community. I'm not denying that there has always been some fishy quid-pro-quo in the Defense procurement business, but to assert that $ is the main reason Bush decided to go to war is foolish, as Bob Woodward's latest book shows.

From what I understand contracts are awarded by civil servants, not politicians, under strict guidelines. Max Boot has an excellent article tackling these issues of profiteering and notes that perhaps these "strict guidelines" are part of the problem currently in Iraq (i.e. preventing Iraqis from doing some jobs cheaper). The bottom line in all this is that the "only legitimate accusation of Iraqi profiteering does not involve Dick Cheney or Halliburton, but rather Kofi Annan's negligence and his son Kojo's probable malfeasance" which helped keep a brutal madman in power. Such is what you get from unelected, elitist beauracrats. They have already destroyed their credibility and ran away at the first instance of a bombing. In light of this I fail to see what good they can do in Iraq and it boggles my mind that Shiites want them to help broker a deal on the June 30th handover.

* You can join in giving here to ease the situation in Sudan.

© by Matt Scofield

---