Kerry is what I have to look forward to.??

In an effort to shrug off the political ennui that had me gripped by the very tender balls these past few months, I had resolved to avoid watching or reading overtly political material. Give that old blood pressure a break, as it were.

Which is why I have not watched a single political speech since the election battles for 2004 began, er, almost a year ago. Which also explains why I never watched the Kerry nomination speech, electing to read the transcript instead. Well, color me unimpressed, after I did read it. Very disappointed, really. Okay I admit, there were moments where I had flashes of Touret's Syndrome, causing the dog to cover his ears, and look for refuge under the kitchen table. But enough of that.

This is what our possible Bush-replacement had to say:

I was born, as some of you saw in the film, in Fitzsimmons Army Hospital in Colorado, when my dad was a pilot in World War II. Now, I'm not one to read into things, but guess which wing of the hospital the maternity ward was in? I'm not kidding. I was born in the West Wing.

Okaay.. very first thought that flashed through my mind. What an arrogant jerk! So you believe you were born into the Presidency because of the circumstances of your birth, how the stars were aligned, etcetera...? And note that while he himself is "not one to read into things..", being above it all, he is clearly asking his audience to do the same "reading" that he is so loathe to do himself.

I will be a commander in chief who will never mislead us into war. I will have a vice president who will not conduct secret meetings with polluters to rewrite our environmental laws. I will have a secretary of defense who will listen to the advice of the military leaders. And I will appoint an attorney general who will uphold the Constitution of the United States.

Never mind the mountain of evidence that suggests the administration honestly believed that the intelligence they had, their predecessors had, and that their allies had, was true. And that their only mistake was to act upon it. Or that his shadow cabinet once welcomed the likes of Joe Wilson and Sandy Berger. One who lied about the "yellowcake lies". One who likes to inadvertently stuff classifed documents into his pants and socks, and then promptly, and inadvertently, loses them. Perhaps his dog is an inadvertent paper shredder. Or perhaps the truth is quite simple. The man tapped to be the national security advisor is simply a thief. These are the people Kerry would surround himself with, and wished to appoint to their former posts. The asshats whose incompetent response to over eight years of terror attacks on America has led us to this day.

And yes, when you are invading a country and want to ensure that that country's only source of income is not utterly demolished, you call in the oil companies, not the Red Cross. Just like when you want to build a tall, evil, skyscraper, you have to call in the tall, evil, skyscraper bunnies. Er, I meant architects. And yes, when you do this in preparation prior to a war, you had better do it in secret..!! Why would you do this any other way. What kind of a moron does Kerry think his listeners are..? Oh wait, don't answer that one..

As for not misleading us into war, um, mister Senator. Have you forgotten your own vote on the war? What exactly about that statement is supposed to inspire my confidence. The simple fact that he said it? I'm not so certain of that any more. Kerry's record does not square with the re-writing of his biography he appears to be planning to do.

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My fellow Americans, this is the most important election of our lifetime. The stakes are high. We are a nation at war - a global war on terror against an enemy unlike we've ever known before. And here at home, wages are falling, health care costs are rising and our great middle class is shrinking. People are working weekends, two jobs, three jobs - and they're still not getting ahead.

He could not devote even one complete paragraph to explaining how he views this global war on terror. The single most important issue of this election, and our prospective commander-in-chief mixes it in with labor, health care and middle class angst. Thank you for clearing up for me, Mister Kerry, just how serious you are about the war on terrorism, and where your priorites lie. A rank Republican partisan might conclude that you did this because you know you have nothing to say about it. But that would not be me. I'm simply going to assume you mean what you say, and that getting ones gut ripped out by grinning Islamic fascists is really just as bad as getting a paycut.

As for the substance of the rest of this statement. The middle class is in fact shrinking (some would say re-structuring itself) but for reasons that have absolutely nothing to do with the Presidency. Kerry should know better. Actually, I believe he does know better. This is just a cheap bit of populist rhetoric. A dangerous and divisive game for a presidential candidate to play. But wait, there's more..

We're told that outsourcing jobs is good for America. We're told that jobs that pay $9,000 less than the jobs that have been lost is the best that we can do. They say this is the best economy that we've ever had. And they say anyone who thinks otherwise is a pessimist. Well, here is our answer: There is nothing more pessimistic than saying that America can't do better.

Ah, Kerry the protectionist. Kerry the champion of anti-globalization. Wonder how much it cost the AFLCIO to have that inserted in the speech. A million or two a word, perhaps? Sorry, but outsourcing is here to stay, because outsourcing of various industries has been going on for decades, and unless Kerry is going to single-handedly take us into an era of Pat Buchanan isolationism, whining about protecting outsourcing by punishing companies is not the solution I want to hear. And who exactly is this "they" who claim that this is the "best" economy we have "ever had"..? Putting words into your opponents mouth, eh Senator?

Now I know that there are those who criticize me for seeing complexities, and I do, because some issues just aren't all that simple. Saying there are weapons of mass destruction in Iraq doesn't make it so. Saying we can fight a war on the cheap doesn't make it so. And proclaiming mission accomplished certainly doesn't make it so.

As president, I will ask the hard questions and demand hard evidence. I will immediately reform the intelligence system so policy is guided by facts, and facts are never distorted by politics. And as president, I will bring back this nation's time-honored tradition: The United States of America never goes to war because we want to, we only go to war because we have to. That is the standard of our nation.

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. It takes intelligence to distinguish nuance from ambivalence. The two are not the same. But I give Kerry credit for highlighting two of the biggest failures of the Iraq war effort. Mis-stating the cost of the war, and arbitrarily announcing an end to the mission. Both of these rankle the most in my mind. Yes, I know, technically, Bush said "end of major hostilities" or words to that effect. That's a cop-out on part of the administration and Bush should be whipped for trying to sneak that one through. But this diatribe is about the inadequacies of Kerry, not the idiot he thinks he can replace.

As for the time-honored tradition of not going to war because we only "have to".. er, explain why we went to Kosovo, or Grenada, or Cuba, or Somalia. The problem is, no modern democracy had ever wanted to go to war. No evidence exists that America went to war anywhere simply because we woke up one morning and wanted to. Perhaps events have conspired to make us feel as if we have to. Or the war itself is small and sanitized enough that it falls into the category of "don't know, don't care". Again, Kerry is making a promise he has no intention of keeping, because he knows political reality shields him from having to ever explain the difference between "want to" and "have to". In other words, Kerry has just told me squat about his procilivity to engage in military diplomacy if he has to.

And on my first day in office, I will send a message to every man and woman in our armed forces: You will never be asked to fight a war without a plan to win the peace.

Er, usually winning the peace implies grounding the enemy down so badly, he never wants to fight again. Witness WW-II, and how we fought the Germans and the Japanese. You think the strong thread of pacifism that runs through these formerly rouge nations is due to multilateral diplomacy?? If anything, this criticism holds true for both the current administration and the Bush I presidency. Never tiptoe around the primary purpose of warfare. Which is to utterly and completely defeat your enemy so that your children and their children will never, ever, want to fight each other again.

I know what we have to do in Iraq. I know what we have to do in Iraq. We need a president who has the credibility to bring our allies to our side and share the burden, reduce the cost to American taxpayers, reduce the risk to American soldiers. That's the right way to get the job done and bring our troops home.

You mean the "allies" like the French, Germans, Russians and the Chinese..? Are you suggesting that your craggy demeanour alone would have brought them over to our side? Or are you deliberately choosing to ignore the mountain of evidence that tells even the most dense among us that the truth is far starker. Are you suggesting that you are a diplomatic god who can get the French to ignore their nationsal self-interest and do what Uncle Kerry asks kindly of them, in French??

The simple truth is that these so-called "allies", (who are labelled such by an intellectually lazy media by virtue of simply being voting members of the UNSC), have had their hands deep in Saddams pockets for much too long. Status quo, Iraq's oil in exchange for keeping Saddam in power, was what satisfied the geopolitical goals of the French and the Russians. But more on this later.. and lets not start with the implied insult in his comment to the British, the Australians, Poles, Italians, the Spanish (before the cut 'n run episode), the Czechs, the Bulgarians.

I defended this country as a young man and I will defend it as president. Let there be no mistake: I will never hesitate to use force when it is required. Any attack will be met with a swift and a certain response. I will never give any nation or any institution a veto over our national security. And I will build a stronger military. We will add 40,000 active duty troops - not in Iraq, but to strengthen American forces that are now overstretched, overextended and under pressure. We will double our special forces to conduct antiterrorist operations. And we will provide our troops with the newest weapons and technology to save their lives and win the battle. And we will end the backdoor draft of the National Guard and reservists.

So premption is dead under President Kerry..? We have to be attacked, Americans have to die before he will respond..?? Good Lord Senator, have you not read Sun Tzu? Have you no conception of taking the war to the enemy? If, as you have said earlier, we are a " nation at war - a global war on terror ", then what kind of a commander-in-chief will you be, when you ask us wait to be attacked and hurt, before you formulate a nuanced and complex response. Perhaps after deliberation with countries who have historically, never wished us well on any account? You have defended this country, some would say with honor. But you are no tactician. Only a foolish general fights a war on the enemy's time and tempo. Ever hear of the OODA loop, and the importance of taking the initiative from the enemy? Guess not, huh?

And exactly how does Kerry plan on doubling the number of Special Forces..? These guys are called Special Forces for a reason. They are simply brilliant warriors, to a man. They are all volunteers who often apply for Spec Ops training over and over again, rejected until they are accepted. What does Kerry want to do? Impose Quotas on Spec Op hiring? All this will do is dilute the effectiveness of the Special Forces, making it difficult to use them as they were designed. Again, this tells me that either Kerry knows nothing of the military he claims to be proud of having served in, or this is a cynical and calculated effort at undermining it.


As for providing the troops with the latest gear. oh please. Doctor where is your de-fribrillator? This, from the same Kerry voted to un-fund a great number of military platform requests.
Again, a disconnect between Kerry's record, and his new biography. So when he claims to want to do otherwise as President, he comes off as being not very believable. This might just be a result of his years of manoevering in the Senate coming back to haunt him. But his voting record on military appropriations is quite clear, and they do not match his rhetoric.

The carnard about the backdoor draft is just that, a canard. When you sign up for the Guard, it's not for sunny jaunts in armored cars across the Califormia coastline on a taxpayer funded binge. People join up knowing fully well that there is a eight year commitment, and that the purpose of the military is to fight wars. The Pentagon is now calling up reservists on the basis of something that all enlistees know about when they do sign up. They never have had to in past engagements, because our post-Vietnam entanglements never came close to stretching our resurces until Iraq-II. But this is exactly why the deferred service clause is in the contract. Does it suck? Of course it does? War sucks for everyone, particularly the soldiers. But Kerry is not saying how he intends to line up his promise of more soldiers with his offer to change the length of contract?

We need to make America once again a beacon in the world. We need to be looked up to, not just feared.

We need to lead a global effort against nuclear proliferation, to keep the most dangerous weapons in the world out of the most dangerous hands in the world.

Evidently Kerry has not heard of the PSI, or the Caspian Guard. Both of which are true multilateral engagements initiated by the current administration intent on replacing the crumbing bureaucracy of the UN, and the now-useless NATO. I would like to see my prospective President explain how he intends to do this under the Cold-war framework that he and fellow lefties seem to adore..? The world has changed significantly, but Kerry's foreign policy seems to be stuck in the '90s..

As for being a beacon to the world, the long lines at US consular offices the world over, would attest to the fact that we are doing quite well in that respect.

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You don't value families by kicking kids out of after-school programs and taking cops off the streets so that Enron can get another tax break.

In other words, as President he would like the Federal government to decide matters of local security (a.k.a cops in the street). In exchange for which he will not give tax breaks to non-existent companies. At this point I would humbly suggest that this is a genuine WTF moment? WTF does one have to do with the other, and why does he believe as President he can actually do something about the first. Any why does he believe that he can punish the Enrons of the world better than the marketplace can? Remember Arthur Andersen, anyone? As for kicking kids out of after-school programs, er, education is primarily a State responsibility. Is he telling us our governors don't know squat about little kids in schools and we should consider handing that responsibility over to the warm and friendly bureacrats he plans on hiring after he revokes all our tax cuts? I should hope, for the sake of his electability, that he does not.

You don't value families by denying real prescription-drug coverage to seniors so big drug companies can get another windfall profit.

More dangerous demagogery. The last frontier of medical and drug research is here in the U.S. Kerry is playing fast and loose with the truth here, which cannot be summed up in a sound-bite, since he chooses to play the evil-corporation card. Didn't Al Gore try that, and win, er, lose, er, win the election in 2000..? If a Kerry administration targets drug companies on pricing, I expect we will see a downward freefall where smaller drug innovators will be forced out of business, and large companies will pull R&D; funding in favor of income stability. It's happened already. Ask anyone who has looked at private AIDS R&D over the past five years. It has shrunk to near zero. Note to Kerry. Thanks you, but pretty please do not be so quick to destroy one more American industry. Okee dokee?

We believe in the family value expressed in one of the oldest commandments: "Honor thy father and thy mother." As president, I will not privatize Social Security. I will not cut benefits. And together we will make sure that senior citizens never have to cut their pills in half because they can't afford life-saving medicine.

In other words, I will hide my head in the sand and hope the demographic problem of retiring Baby Boomers who want, want, want every expensive treatment under the sun to extend their playful lives, just to go away.. One more thing. Please give up on the "will not privatize Social Security", you who gets a lifetime, guaranteed, federal Government pension from a fund that is allowed to invest anywhere.. All I am asking for is for the government to let me invest my retirement money where I want to. Not where some ivory-tower bureacrat thinks it should go. You want to give me dignity on retirement? Give me control over how I'm going to pay for it. Also, explain what you will do when Medicare can no longer pay for those benefits you are not willing to cut? Hope people have forgotten your promise. Well, at least you won't be the first politician to do that..!!

You don't value families if you force them to take up a collection to buy body armor for a son or daughter in the service, if you deny veterans health care or if you tell middle-class families to wait for a tax cut so the wealthiest among us can get even more.

You mean the same body armor you chose to not fund after you chose to fund it..? I got a tax refund, so did everyone I know. People with a bunch of kids got a windfall. Guess we are all the wealthiest of all Americans. As for veterans health care, I could not agree more. Shame on Bush. Will Kerry do better? What does his voting record tell us?

Kerry then goes to town with his protectionist theme (I won't bother to quote the whole thing). Manufacturing job loss, etc, etc. Well, I've got news for Kerry. Ever hear of opportunity cost, and competitive advantage and what it means in the great outsourcing debate? I guess not. He then proceeds to say two contradictory things and hopes no one will notice.

Third, close the tax loopholes that reward companies for shipping jobs overseas. Instead, we will reward companies that create and keep good paying jobs where they belong, in the good old U.S.A. We value an America that exports products, not jobs. And we believe American workers should never have to subsidize the loss of their own job.

Next, we will trade and we will compete in the world. But our plan calls for a fair playing field. Because if you give the American worker a fair playing field, there's no one in the world that the American worker can't compete against.

Jobs are tradeable. Except when they are our jobs, then they are not. At the core of a "job", which Kerry appears to view as entitlement, is a service. Much of these services today are commoditized. Hence they are part of the trade equation as a whole. So is Kerry pro free-trade or isn't he? Or is this just par for the course for a man who hides the fact that he cannot make up his mind behind a facade of nuance..?

We value an America that controls its own destiny because it's finally and forever independent of Mideast oil. What does it mean for our economy and our national security when we have only 3 percent of the world's oil reserves, yet we rely on foreign countries for 53 percent of what we consume?

I want an America that relies on its ingenuity and innovation, not the Saudi royal family.

And I want dessert for dinner, but I can't have it. This is meaningless, un-serious prattle. Coming from a Presidential contender, it is downright silly. Dangerous, even. Yes, all of the above is true. And if there were a way for us to be rid of oil, does he not think we would already be there? Pop quiz for the Senator. Name one economical, dependable, scalable, trasportable source of energy that rivals oil. No? Thank you. Your silence is deafening.

What if we find a breakthrough to Parkinson's, diabetes, Alzheimer's and AIDS? What if we have a president who believes in science so we can unleash the wonders of discovery like stem-cell research and treat illness for millions of lives?

Finally, something about his speech I wanted to like, but felt faintly creeped out about in the end. Kerry must know something about the Presidency I do not. Do we need a President who "believes" in science, in order for us poor scientists to be able to unleash the wonders of scientific discovery..? A fair bit of hubris, don't you think? Kind of like Al Gore "inventing" the Internet, only with a bigger God complex.

In the end, I did read his speech a fair number of times. Each effort underwhelmed my previous opinion. I found myself asking: Is this what we are supposed to get in exchange for Bush? A poor bargain I feel. One in which most Americans are unlikely to come out ahead.

Pity that. Not much of a player, this Kerry guy. The only good thing he has going for him is his opponent.

Don't diss My Man Michael Moore

Good heavens! I take a break from blogging, and what do I find.. poor Michael Moore, bashed by his peers, reviled by the right. Man gets no respect.



Personally, I encourage the Moores of this country, nay the entire world, to stand up, and be counted. Not by girth alone, but because, by virtue of their very existence, they validate ours.. Think about this for a minute. If it weren't for M (as I like to call this beloved little skunk), those not unwilling to define America by its failures, would have nothing to direct their focus. M is an industry, centered around his gravity-defying mass, in an universe we should all recognize as familiar. M validates the rest of us. Because M is the poster child of capitalism, of supply finding out demand. He is a fine example of what this country can tolerate, and still survive. He gives people what they want to hear, packaged cleverly with his natural craftsmanship. In that, he is the quintessential businessman, a bit of entrepreneur and used-car salesman rolled into one crafty little package. He is living proof that what he professes to despise, is what sustains him in the end.



M , again for better or worse, is the poster child, the new voice of the political left. In this, he has become indispensable to the right. Circa B.M. the left was an inchoate mass of less well known intellectuals and unserious politicos. Today, his visibility serves as a lightning rod for attacks from the right. Finally, there is an icon of the despised left with universal name recognition. To pound home my point.. Who really knows, or cares about Chomsky outside of the political blogsphere and musty college hallways? A manic, frothing Al Gore is still an ex-Vice president, considered deserving of a pity break by many fair minded people. In contrast, everyone knows all about M, and I mean everyone who has not been sleeping under a really, really, big chunk of mountain. He is the kind of celebrity we Americans enjoy pulling down from their lofty, moneyed perches.



So I say to my fellow conservatives, libertarians, and true classical liberals, enjoy the Moore buffet that is before you. He brings color to the political debate, a sick humor that we must learn to live with from now on, because it will be the norm. Yes, M brings with him a new sub-level of hatred and debasement to the political debate, but it is one that can now be understood and targeted in turn.



Vive la Moore, Vive la America. The land of the fat and the free..

Crotch, meet tight panties..

This gives a whole new meaning to "getting one's panties in a bunch".. heh

Harrods has apologized to customers for selling underwear bearing images of Hindu goddesses.



The store, owned by Dodd al Fayette, Tuesday withdrew the underwear and swimwear range following protests by Hindu groups. The Hindu Human Rights group said that the garments created by Italian designer Roberto Cavalli insulted the religion.

A tad disappointing to observe such orthodoxy flaunted as if it's a wonderful thing. One wonders what "Human Right" was exactly violated here, for the Hindu Human Rights group to be in such uproar. Then again, I am considered an apostate, by what standards of apostasy do in fact exist in Hindu canon.. What do I know about sacrilege and very important soul-saving business such as that?



Perhaps the whole bikini thing is a step too fast, too forward. Sticking to florid Hawaii shirts with grinning Ganesha prints would be a much better idea. Would sell faster than hot jalebis.. And if someone really, really wants to plaster Hindu myth on butt-flossing swimwear, there's three million nymphs and under-clad lesser deities from the many pantheons to choose from. All doe-eyed and impossibly curvy. Buxom and dusky and hot enough to fry eggs on their stomachs.. Might be safer to keep the name-brand goddesses out of the picture. Some people do in fact worship them for non-carnal reasons.

Better hosting at home

Longtime readers will note the new template for TKL. Got tired of trying to massage HTML and CSS all by myself. In case you didn't already know, I buck the trend for web developers, take perverse pride in not being a particularly creative front-end designer. I leave such stuff for the script kiddies, heh!



Made some other structural changes as well. The blog is now hosted at home, over a fat wireless Internet connection, one of only one in our neighborhood. DSL and cable not techie enough for my gadget-loving wife. And it's a fake ASP as well, didn't want to break a hundred permalinks. I know precious few bloggers who care to update permalinks that they may not visit every day. So the blog is now just a set of lightweight html-only pages, served up by a crazy combination of Linux and Apache clones, off a naked server that used to be someone's old laptop.



And it renders faster than it ever has.. go figure!

BRB

Not gone, just preoccupied with non-blogging and non-bloggable stuff.. BRB soon



As a sidenote, NO, I have no strong opinion on the surprise election results in India. Except to say, people get the government they deserve, not necessarily always what they had in mind. This is probably the most unstable coalition government in Indian history. I give them less than a year before the internal alliances corrupt key players and collapse under the weight of political angst. The old-guard communists are playing a very dangerous game, driven by their fear of the BJP-Hinduvta alliance more than love of their own ideology. Sooner, rather than later, those pipes will burst.



Till then, if you have money invested in India, I suggest for your own sake you pull out for now. The new government does not have the first clue how to play hard and nice in the world economy..

Nothing to fear but fear itself..?

I have often wondered, with a certain smidge of embarrassment, at my slow, steady, inexorable drift from the fashionable politics of the Left. Why, I was perfectly happy, smug in my readings of those, who reviewed the critiques that summarized the thrice-translated works of Marx and Engels. Lenins head as graffiti on the park fence was art to my nascent eyes. Red sickle and workers rights on billboards along the mile between home and school where I grew up. Calcutta. City of smog and joy. City of politics and hotheads. Of beautiful women and the despair of hungry nights. Of spiced monsoon winds and mile-long queues for food rations. Of dazzling humanity living with daily rolling blackouts.. This, the home of the Indian political Left. With all your smug, all-knowing, hot-headed Bengalis, happy to be the chosen proletariat, the last scions of Marx.



One speculates on this journey at times. Like an introspective housecleaning, if I may be so bold, from communitarian elitist, to somewhat rugged individualist. From loving the abstract people to loving the freedom that is ones' gift to oneself. From wide-eyed idealist, to a different sort of idealist. A tempered one, perhaps. There is still time, much learning and loving still left. Yearning for new knowledge, new skills, new vistas are still fresh.



So what is it about today's political Left of which I so despair. Rooting out "a" cause, leads me to fear. Something so elemental to the human condition, something so simple, that it is so easily overlooked. What runs in the vein of todays Leftist is fear. It is fear of hurting others, of being hurt. It is fear of doing wrong, and causing others to do wrong. It is the fear of self, the fear of the vast, diverse, chorus of humanity, none of whom can be counted upon to order society in the exact image of their most fervent desires..



Are you fearful of men? Then young boys in schools must, for the sake of their fellows, take Ritalin to warp their personalities. Afraid of the penis are you, of young men holding it as they take their piss. Then teach young boys to do so sitting down. Fearful of freedom for those unsuited to your intellectual class..? Why then, the solution is simple. Take it away, as being good for them. The proles have no need to be free, because they would not know what to do with it. Are you afraid of humanity, crowding the planet? Then wish for more of them to die. Under the heels of well-spoken dictators, and ranting priests. Or under the equally vicious heels of environmental grandstanders.



I have little time for fear these days. Not when I have but one life to live, and die for. Not when there is spring each year, rustling through the cherry blossoms of my yard. Not when there is love, and family, and friends to cherish. Not when there is always hope, always a silver lining to cut the dull pain of despair that hammers and pounds at our lives.



I did not have to abandon the Left. It drifted away from me, on to the jagged shoals of self-loathing, condescending victimhood masquerading as the moral high ground. What a turpid waste of human capital.. what a shame..!

Easter Bunny visits

For a pair of non-Catholics like us, Easter Sunday is just a day some shops close early... (if you really need that Clorox 409 refill today, then better hurry..!). Imagine our surprise at the following irony. Kids who go to bed wishing for a visit from the Easter bunny should have stayed over at our place. We awoke this morning to a visit from an itsy-bitsy, teeny-tiny Easter bunny. Well, er, he actually sort of fell into our window well. But on Easter Sunday..? Coincidence..? I think not..!



No idea how he fell in. There is a window well cover, wedged in with gardening junk, since the wells are on the hidden, utility side of the house. Regardless, here are some pictures of the rescue. The gloved hand is that of the gentle wife.









Cute, ain't it..? Now everyone say Awwwww...

Smoke and Mirrors

When information fails to inform, it becomes meaningless chatter. Just bits and bytes, and leaves of paper. Piling dust in cobwebbed corridoors. Such is this news, which is no news to me..

The administration on Saturday released the memo that warned of possible hijackings and terrorist activity in the U.S.

In his first comments since the memo's release, Bush said the document contained "nothing about an attack on America."

Bush said if he'd known specifics he "would have moved mountains" to prevent the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.

Reaction to the White House release of the memo on Osama bin Laden fell largely along party lines.

Speaking on "Fox News Sunday," Richard Ben-Veniste, a Democratic member of the 9/11 Commission, said the memo held recent information "perhaps should have alerted" officials to boost efforts.

But Gov. Jim Thompson, a Republican member of the Sept. 11 commission, said the document "didn't call for anything to be done by" Bush.

The document -- called a presidential daily briefing -- or PDB -- states that al-Qaida had reached America's shores, had a support system in place for its operatives and that the FBI had detected suspicious activity that might involve a hijacking plot.

Thompson said it did not include a "smoking gun."

"Clandestine, foreign government, and media reports indicate Bin Laden since 1997 has wanted to conduct terrorist attacks in the US," the memo to Bush stated. Bin Laden implied in U.S. television interviews in 1997 and 1998 that his followers would follow the example of World Trade Center bomber Ramzi Yousef and "bring the fighting to America."

It is notoriously difficult to convince Americans that they must fight, for something other than the last Pokemon toy on the shelf come Christmas eve. It took two years, numerous ships lost, sailors dismembered and drowned in the shipping lanes of the Atlantic, before we bore arms against the Nazis.. two years, while the rest of the world continued its slow, mad collapse around us.



What exactly, in the history of this country, convinces some in this rank partisan squabble, that Americans would have tolerated preemptive strikes against Al-Qaida prior to 9/11...? Even today, much of the political Left wants to play the proverbial ostrich. There is no war, they claim. 9/11 was because we never signed Kyoto. We must not inflame the passions of the gentle Islamist, they say. This is a war we began for oil, and will end with us burning in its flames..! Such is the opposition to reality that does not provide comfort to us. Conditioned as the Left is, to view the ills of the world as byproducts of the burps and hiccups of uncouth, overweight Americans, such behavior is not entirely unexpected. But it provides scant comfort to the rest of us.



The fact that Clinton was barely able to get away, with a measly, mouthful of missile strikes on empty tents, is indicative of how much of a political risk he took with his own base. The argument that we could have done more, is meaningless. It is a distraction from the war effort. It is a distraction from the security debate we must continue, if we are to reach political consensus over erosions of privacy, explosion of the federal beauracracy, citizen databases, and other insidious little pinpricks on our lives and liberties. I fear we will lose them, blinded as we are by this irresponsible media circus.

War, what war..

As the pandering to the religous right continues unabated, one wonders what insane political calculation tipped Ashcrofts hand so far. We are in a war, so they say. I believe that, I know in my bones that we have been, and continue to be, in the midst of a spiralling conflict between modernity and the last bastion of fascism.



Now here comes the Attorney General, riding on a high horse of self-defined morality, urging us to pay attention to a more important war.. the war for our immortal soul, wherein the demolition of smut is of singular importance. Perhaps, for the wolf-packs of evangelism, such is true. Perhaps it is even true that only puritanic Christains have souls to be saved.



What is unclear to me, however, is why the legal apparatus of the state must be pressed into such a spiritual quest..? Perhaps because the moral quest has failed..? Because people would laugh with the sinners than at them..? Because morality that denies human sexuality is doomed to practical failure..?



There are many reasons to wish for gridlock after this november. Many, many reasons. This is one of them. We are at war. Not with consenting adults purchasing the sexual exploits of other consenting adults. We are at war with the final, clarion call of fascism. Disguised as disciples of the Koran, who claim, upon pain of death, to be the one true voice of the Prophet. This is not an easy war for us to fight, or to win. We do not need the distractions posed by frustrated religous demagogues of our own. Time, perhaps to send a message to this White house. Start packing your linens..

You may call me Will..

You are a GRAMMAR GOD!


If your mission in life is not already to
preserve the English tongue, it should be.
Congratulations and thank you!


How grammatically sound are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

Pandoras Box

The battle for Fallujah has already passed into the annals of military history, as an event that marks the passage of warfare from rolling countryside to the crumbling concrete of the city. What will emerge from this will shape the fighting doctrine of the Marines and the army for the next few generations.



The fighting is grim, the fighters grimmer. They fight on a sea of information, of a networked battlefield that is unparalleled in history. Of our men and women locked in battle, their numbers are far fewer. Gone are the days of massed brigades, cannon fodder by the millions, remembered only by the tears in a mothers eye, a lump in a childs throat. They are warriors who chose war, it did not chance upon them like the Blitzkreig on hapless, sleeping farmers..



War was always a way of life for some. We are now witnessing the maturing of a fighting force of young Americans, for whom this way of life is now fact. The warrior caste has come of age. How will they now view their fellow citizens? Will they shun the rest of society, selecting only the company of their own? Will they be the children of Heinlein, and suffer no one but those who choose to lay their lives down in the armed service of their countries?

A self-selected minority

I guess ad-jumping PVR owners aren't going to make much of a dent in election year analysis after all, if one is to deduce some correlation between the new Bush TV ads in some key states. (Link via Polipundit.)

A week of hearings on Capitol Hill and criticism from a former counterterrorism aide have eroded President Bush's poll standing on fighting terrorism. But that's nothing compared to the damage that Bush's campaign ads may have done to Democratic candidate John Kerry.



A USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll shows a remarkable turnaround in 17 battleground states where polls and historic trends indicate the race will be close, and where the Bush campaign has aired TV ads. Those ads say Bush has provided "steady leadership in times of change" while portraying Kerry as a tax-hiking, flip-flopping liberal.

One's worldview tends to be contrained by the oddities of ones own existence. My inveterate ad-jumping, live-tv replaying habit using the Personal Video Recorder led me to underrate the impact of TV advertising in this years political campaign. Being blinded by leaves is a good way to get lost in the forest, eh..?

Worth the wait..

Having to sit through a Barbara Walters interview with Karen Hughes to get to John Stossels takedown of Animal Rights extremists.. heh! Pity it was basically a clip show of old takedowns..



The man is annoying, but effective. Seems like he should keep it up.

Weak links in the chain

Now that Musharraf has tipped his hand, his weak wrists are showing..

Eight Pakistani soldiers who were taken hostage by militants in Pakistan’s tribal areas were found shot dead in a ditch near Serwakai on Friday. The eight soldiers had been taken hostage after an ambush on an Army convoy last Monday which left 12 other soldiers dead and 20 others injured. The soldiers were in their uniforms with their hands tied behind their backs. An official who saw the bodies said that the soldiers had been shot at point-blank range.



The executions were the latest sign that the effort by Pakistan’s government to flush foreign militants from the region has gone awry. Describing the killings as ‘‘inhuman, cold-blooded murders’’, the Army spokesman Major General Shaukat Sultan said the eight soldiers appeared to have been killed a few days ago.

Also absent, is the understanding that Musharraf has, in effect, launched a war against a segment of his own people. He is gambling on some very high odds that he will prevail, with the US as the anvil to his hammer in the West. This is not a police operation, with the hardened tribes of Waziristan meekly surrendering to a benevolent magistrate. This is, once again, an unelected leader of a tired nation, taking her to the edge of civil war. He will lose men, while the other side will shed their own blood. This will continue until there is a clear loser. It is far too early to predict a Musharraf defeat, though efforts by his political opponents to paint his failures bright red will no doubt be par for the course..



Armed tribesmen are on the move in the borderless region of Pakistan's NorthWest. He faces the near certainity of a near term coup, most certainly political opposition from within the ranks of his own supporters. He is taking enormous risks. Why..?



Musharraf calculates that he can actually win. If he does, and the stakes are high, he comes out swinging. His long game is not to target the Taliban nesting in Waziristan, or Al-Qaida training camps he knows "nothing" about. Those are mere annoyances. This is a man with a lifetime of obsession over his nations rival and neighbor. With the Americans digging their heels to his West, and training with SpecOps in India, the spotlight on dismantling the infrastructure of state-sponsored terrorism; the thousand year war over Kashmir is all but lost. The status quo is the status quo, and will remain so for much of future history. So what is left? The future, to which he must certainly look to. What does he see? A Pakistan forever locked in battle, a reminder of failed promises and heartbreak? A nation torn between fundamentalist medievalism and modernism?



As his nations leader, he has to look to maximize her future. For now, his calculations lie in the hope, that with the help of the US, and a neighbor increasingly disinterested in waging past wars, he can be the strongman of Pakistan. His nations very own Pinochet, with a legacy that may ultimately be equal parts of heroism, riddled with desperate tyranny.



He is the weak link in the chain that he swings himself.




UPDATE: Ritesh Bansal provides some valuable background into Musharraf's personality, his favorite role models, and why all of it explains his seeming determination to marginalize the Islamists creeping around in the folds of his cloak

Ahh, I can breathe

Interminable client project almost over, I get to go back to home base.. where I have a real cube, with 100% more sunshine, 25% more window, elbow room fit for a Titan. Most importantly.. I get "quiet" around me. No more having to deal with a mass of humanity traipsing down unplanned hallways, conducting loud, impromptu meetings "RIGHT-OUSIDE-MY-FRELLING-DOOR"...! No more hand-holding, gritting teeth at inefficiencies that boggle the imagination. Now, finally, a quiet place where I can think, plan, and help continue the design of our exciting new commercial software product. All the while watching planes land at O'Hare. Very Zen, the whole watching planes bit. Where do they go..? Where do they come from..? Who are the ants milling around their cavernous bellies? Hope one never misses the runway and lands uncomfortably close to my window. What does it all mean..? Is the answer to the Universe really 42, or the square root of PI..? (Ahem)



This product I mentioned, is something a few of us have been working on for the last two years to bring to market. An integrated document and change management system for regulated environments that doesn't cost an arm and three legs. Lets you map unlimited document and event management processes without having to hire expensive script-kiddies or a dedicated programming staff. Our first client piloted with just one process mapped to the application, and now have over 25.. (heheheheee.. quite the Monty Burns moment right there). Said client is now no longer under the gun from a certain unnamed Federal Regulatory body since they have a validated, 21CFR Part11 compliant, change control and event management system in place.. I feel a cracking of knuckles is in order.. ( craaack.. click.. ouch, ouch.. craaaack.. ahhh, much better)



As the Technical Architect for this product, there are some distinct advantages. I get to dictate, well, architecture, for one thing..! I get the satisfaction of seeing the big picture knit itself together over time, as well as the triumphant gotchas that come from everyday code-writing miracles. I get to build something that grows over time, gets used by people I will never meet. Change their 8-hour workdays in ways I cannot imagine. I wonder if development teams at Microsoft get that way? Feel like a little god at the end of the day? A feeling that no amount of custom Intranet-building for 10-people departments can ever give.



We are now too, in the "risky" area of growth, where significant resources have been expended on this product to back out, and the client base is still below the tipping point. Very exciting, I assure you. A little nerve-wracking, every sales opportunity is a call to arms, to let out the dogs.. Hungry, we all are, while the lessons of DOT.COM busts have been examined and learned from. Real business plan, real product, no frelling vaporware here, no siree..!



I just love being one of the wolves of capitalism, what can I say..?