Still Here

Apologies for the tremendous lull in posting. University coursework can be challenging! Will return to posting on events (past, present, and future) after final exams in early May.

In the meantime, treat yourselves to some Basic Hip Digital Oddio.

"Cheney Visits Iraq; Attacks, Kills 19"

I suppose the mainstream media's coverage of Iraq is finally getting to me, because that is how I initially read the headline, Cheney Visits Iraq; Attacks Kill 19.

Not sure if I misread this one, though. (Via Dave Barry's Blog)

Color-Impoverished Phosphorus (And Other Weapons Of Mass Distraction)

Scott Burgess did a fine job of exposing last month's lies about white phosphorus (further details here and here); however, the Dec 1, 2005 comment by Rabbitvoz on Burgess' follow-up provides a clue about why the myth-making began:

I am cringing in terror from some of the most disadvantaged people on Earth,

Are we talking about truly disadvantaged people, like those being slaughtered in Sudan, or the 'poor' killers who are as likely to be well-off (Osama bin Laden was disadvantaged?) and well-educated as they are the alternative? Because the reaction to the first seems to trend toward shameful indifference, and the reaction to the second involves no cringing 'round these parts (heck, most complaints seem to argue the exact opposite--that there are too many people like Amir Taheri who lack humility in response to terrorists.)

while I unleash gargantuan forces of destruction,

It takes a fascinating mind to cringe toward terror, and to do so with superior firepower.

poisonous Depleted Uranium

Michael McNeil wrote a must-read essay on depleted uranium a couple of years ago: "Depleted uranium has two possible modes of instigating biological damage--ionizing radiation due to the fact that it's a radioactive metal, and biological toxicity due to the fact that it's a 'heavy' metal. Regarding the first of these, radioactively 'depleted uranium' is basically as little radioactive as it's possible to be and still be radioactive and not inert. This may sound like a quibble, but the half-life of uranium-238, the major radioactive component of depleted uranium (since it's been 'depleted' of other uranium isotopes) is 4.5 x 109 (i.e., billion) years (not '109' years as news pieces have erroneously reported). In other words, over the entire 4.6 billion year age of the Earth, the quantity of uranium-238 on this planet has decreased by only half. That is barely detectably radioactive at all, on the human timescale. Even when it does decay, virtually all (> 99.99%) of uranium-238 follows the mode of alpha decay (emission of a Helium-4 nucleus), which cannot penetrate beyond a couple of inches in air and is stopped cold by sheet of paper. Contrast with gamma rays (high energy electromagnetic radiation emitted by some radioactive decayers) which can penetrate through feet or meters of lead and are highly destructive to biological tissue. The possibility of heavy-metal toxicity by uranium is potentially of greater scientific import. That, though, is fundamentally no different than toxicity due to say lead, which has traditionally been used (without environmentalists' extraordinary complaints) as bullets on battlefields for centuries."

Or are we really writing about Depleted Uranium?

and Torture, Murder and Rape against their citizens.

Rabbitvoz should be more like the United States. Murder, rape, and torture are illegal, and those who are caught are punished (not always as they probably should be, but then justice is not always linear). Correcting problems like torture among military ranks is difficult and others are quick to see malice where there are mistakes, but necessary reform is always possible.

Ia sit at home and watch it all on Television

Careful. Press coverage can be misleading.

and pontificate about the righteous nature of the great crusade for Freedom,

"What would you do, if you were asked to give up your dreams for freedom?
What would you do, if asked to make the ultimate sacrifice?
Would ya think about all them people who gave up everything they had?
Would ya think about all them war vets, and would ya start to feel bad?
Freedom isn't free. It costs folks like you and me,
and if we don't all chip in we'll never pay that bet.
Freedom isn't free. No, there's a hefty fuckin' fee,
and if you don't throw in your buck o'five, who will?
Oooo, buck o'five. Freedom costs a buck o'five."

which for me means the Patriot Act.

Do I detect a hint of sarcasm? In the words of Eugene Volokh: "Remember, 'Patriot Act,' like 'fascism' and 'unconstitutional,' is not Latin for 'government action I don't like.'"

I am America

Did anyone not see that coming?

I am a complete nimcompoop, a hubristic arrogant, ninny

That comes through in the writing. No need to spell it out.

and such a trigger happy prick that I kill my Allies like its duck hunting season everytime any of them are stupid enough to get mixed up in the wars I make.

Some folks need to be more straightforward with arguments like this. For example, an American opponent of the Iraq intervention could find all the British or Australian armed servicemen he can, and then personally inform the soldiers of their stupidity one-on-one rather than boasting of superiority from behind a screen-name or protest sign.

I would rather bomb TV stations and shoot Journalists in the back than allow news of my atrocities to reach the world.

Intimidation of the press-at-large requires that they uniformly recognize that they are targets, but accidents are so frequent in combat zones that illegitimate kills on the battlefield are rarely convincing as deliberate acts. One can get around that challenge by shooting journalists in the public square rather than in the back, but that creates another set of problems in that murders are bad for public relations. Saddam Hussein's old method of bribing with access and information appears shrewder, and when that does not work, killing journalists' obscure friends and family does. That is the proven way to directly corrupt or threaten journalists, have them believe the threats, but not create any serious repercussions for the dictator and his stooges. Or one could try being good, support press freedoms, and also push his own stories, while the likes of Joe Katzman, Michael Yon, and StrategyPage share the lesser-known side of his atrocities.

I am just deluded enough to think this will stop the truth getting out, and also believe if my eyes are shut it is dark for everyone.

Oh, go boil your head.

I am America

Not the one I know.

My point in citing Rabbitvoz's comment is not to be snarky (that is a bonus), but to point to its needless hysteria. Intelligent criticism, not fashionable cynicism, is essential. Let's not confuse the two.

Cake & Ice Cream For C.S. Lewis

C.S. Lewis' birthday is today (or was today, by the time most of you read this).

Being a Lewis aficionado, I decided my own birthday plans should have a theme this year: Have lunch with family & friends at an Irish pub, since Lewis was born in Belfast, and then see The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe on a 65-feet-high, 98-feet-wide screen.

At least the beer would make Prof. Lewis proud!

My Fellow Americans

Happy Thanksgiving!

Yes, I Can ACT

Given the circumstances, my exam turned out nicely. I needed a 21, and...

I scored a 25!

So no need for despair.

Those Musicians Are Up To Something

Late composer George Antheil is at the heart of one of the most unusual tales of celebrity service:

At a dinner party given by Janet Gaynor, George Antheil met Hedy Lamarr. Shortly after this meeting, Lamarr and Antheil invented and patented a secret communications system, U.S. Patent 2,292,387. The patent was applied for June 10, 1941, and received August 11th, 1942. The purpose of the system was to provide reliable and jam proof control of long range torpedoes. The system involved the use of the frequency hopping principles of Spread Spectrum radio. However it was 20 years before it was put to effective use by the United States Navy in torpedo guidance systems, and 40 years before it was permitted by the FCC to be used in commercial radios. Among other things, Spread Spectrum forms the basic principle that allows the use of simultaneous multi-channel operation used in modern digital cellular telephone systems. Spread spectrum is the basis for the communications security of the strategic $25 billion MILSAT Defense communications system.

Now, rock guitarist "Skunk" Baxter serves as an adviser for the U.S. Department of Defense:

As a member of the Doobie Brothers and Steely Dan, and as a session guitarist for Carly Simon, Bryan Adams, Ringo Starr and many others, Jeff "Skunk" Baxter has been a clandestine rock and roll hero since the '70s. Now, as a specialist in terrorism, missile defense and chemical and biological warfare, he's also a covert hero for the U.S. military.

He's currently working for the Department of Defense as an adviser to the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization and has also served as a top military adviser for numerous congressmen and senators.

And country singer Clint Black talks about rocket science:

"Did you know my guitar is like a rocket?" he asks.

Show-business exaggeration? No. It's scientific fact. Black's guitar is like a rocket.

"They both resonate," explains aerospace engineer Rodney Rocha of NASA's Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston.

"When you pick up an acoustic guitar," Black demonstrates, "one of the first things you'll notice is the body is basically an air chamber. The shape of the chamber is designed to be 'in tune' with the sound from the strings." He plucks the E string and the body of the guitar vibrates, producing "sympathetic" E-frequencies of its own.

What are the odds on Britney Spears having a missile silo under her swimming pool?

Going All The Galloway

On October 25th, the U.S. Senate's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations released their report (PDF file) on George Galloway's testimony before them. Two days later, the United Nations' Independent Inquiry Committee into the United Nations Oil-for-Food Programme added relevant findings of their own (PDF). Among the shared accusations are that Galloway's wife received more than $120,000, and that Galloway received several million barrels of oil, with several million more allocated in his name. Blogger George at Seixon claims to have further evidence of his own, centering on Galloway's failure to register Fawaz Zureikat's donations for the Mariam Appeal and how his claim that the organization "publicly brandished [Zureikat's sponsorship] on all of our literature, along with the other donors to the campaign" appears demonstrably false.

These are not the only charges against international actors, but Galloway may be the most recognizable. He is almost certainly the loudest, apparently having become a minister of Parliament through browbeating rather than by legislative accomplishment. An English friend of mine suggests that by pursuing the MP, the U.N. and, particularly, the U.S. are playing with fire. I doubt it. For one thing, Galloway does not appear interested in becoming an American politician, and a teaching post at Berkeley seems more logical. Secondly, Galloway's Sir Oswald Mosley shtick plays well with the chattering class, but provides Lord Haw Haw-flavored entertainment for everyone else, such as this goofy attack on President Bush over Hurricane Katrina (the fisking of which I cheerfully purloin from Tim Blair)...

His is the America of Halliburton,

Curses to Bush for having a Vice President with ties to one of the world's most qualified businesses--one that has consistently served the U.S. government since World War II. We deserve less.

the M-16 rifle,

Made in Canada... (Bush is outsourcing the American War Machine!)

the cluster bomb,

Invented by Germany... And Great Britain still uses them, too.

the gated communities of the rich and of the billionaires he grew up with in Texas.

The gated communities of the rich and the billionaires Galloway knows in Syria are far more stylish.

There is another America.

I think I know this one: South America?

It is the land of the poor of Louisiana,

Oh. But as P.J. O'Rourke once noted, "Political scientist Robert Rector has worked up figures showing that when the official U.S. measure of poverty was developed in 1963, a poor American family had an income twenty-nine times greater than the average per capita income in the rest of the world. An individual American could make more money than 93 percent of the other people on the planet and still be considered poor." The poor of Louisiana are a lot richer than, say, the poor in African or Middle Eastern kleptocracies. I wonder why Galloway expresses more interest in discussing the poor of the U.S. than he did in freeing the needier people of, say, Saddam-era Iraq?

it is the land of the young men and women economically conscripted into the military.

Sure, the U.S. military is volunteer-only, but when made to choose between working at a grocery store, busing tables, or getting shot at, obviously people will rush to join the armed forces. The most damning evidence: The government offers additional financing and education to citizens in return for military service, and we even have career soldiers who "love" fighting for their country! Is any more proof of wickedness necessary?

It is the land of the glorious multiethnic mix that was New Orleans...

Complete with corruption and a murder rate nearly eight times the national average. Also, the hardest-hit section of the city, St. Bernard Parish, was 95% Caucasian. So not such a glorious multiethnic mix, really.

The oil-for-food charges are merely indicative of a more troubling problem: Galloway is a load of bull. Like too many of the "anti-war" crowd, he is not against a war on fascists; he is cheering for the other side. (Compare his appreciation for dictators to Condoleezza Rice, who literally tagged the president of Kazakhstan, brought him to a podium, and put in the position of answering questions from the press.) Galloway allegedly bruised the Senate in May; if so, it was because they failed to hold him to any rules of order: he freely dodged questions, interrupted senators, and gave a very clever performance of some very bizarre statements. (Comment at The Big Pharaoh: "US Senators are notorious gasbags who love to hear themselves talk. Apparently Galloway didn't realize that when a US Senator shuts up, he's giving you an opportunity to incriminate yourself.") It would be much more interesting to see whether Galloway could get away with his diversions in a hearing before a grand jury. Would a member of a foreign government stonewalling an American investigation, insulting American officials, demonstrating profound ignorance of American systems, and attempting to single-handedly boss the United States around impress many American citizens?

That brings us to the latest left-wing conspiracy, which is that Galloway and Bush are working together:

Where did this guy come from? Who invited him here? The answer: US Senate REPUBLICANS. As Cindy Sheehan was gathering public sympathy as the Gold Star mom against the killing in Iraq, the Republican party decided to import an easier target to pummel. So they brought over the "I-salute-your-courage, Saddam" religious fundamentalist crack-pot who can't tell us where the money went.

Maybe there is some truth to this paranoia. At the moment, few in the U.S. know or care about Galloway, but it might not be so smooth when the face of the anti-intervention movement becomes that of a man who engaged in duplicitous accounting; called the collapse of the Soviet Union "the biggest catastrophe" of his life; told Saddam Hussein, "Sir, I salute your courage, strength, and indefatigability;" cited Fidel Castro as his political hero; and in September of this year, in New York City, publicly suggested that America deserved the September 11, 2001 attacks.

A Man Of Few Words

For the time being, anyway. Apologies for not being my usual loquacious self. My only excuse is that my mind is elsewhere... and, alas, not the sort of "elsewhere" wandering minds prefer!

So, how about a link to jumping cats?

Update: Might as well offer a potpourri while I am here...

Just what the world needed: A beer advertisement that cleverly (ab)uses Carl Orff's Chiquita Banana, Carmen Miranda, whatever.

Soldiers in Iraq are using advanced technology to save lives.

Barbeque is indeed pulled pork smothered in red sauce, but as a native Memphian I must add that the sauce should be sweet rather than sour, the meat should have some gristle, and the environment is absolutely vital: It is not real barbeque unless it is homemade or comes from some hole-the-wall restaurant. High dining barbeque is a myth.

California is preparing for a real-life remake of The Birds.

Senator John Kerry is trying desperately to be taken seriously, and failing comically.

Would this discovery qualify as good sex, or bad sex?

One of the title characters in "The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe" is rather wooden. Guess which one.

South London is dreaming of a politically correct Christmas. Not to be outdone, Brussels is dreaming of a politically correct Christ. (The Grinch could not be reached for comment.)

German authorities are not all smiles and sunshine: Some of Germany's taxes recently went toward the creation of Jew-hating agitprop.

Slither looks like another movie I can miss. The trailer brings back too many memories of cleaning aquariums.

Speaking of creepy things (hello, Mr. Carter), check out the National UFO Reporting Center.

And speaking of spacey things (hello, Mr. Luthor), it looks like Pluto has new-found companionship.

Film Music on the Web has my Cinderella Man and Jericho/The Ghostbreaker reviews.

For more aural goodness, try the archived shows at Mercury Theatre on the Air.

So, A Frog Goes Into A Bank...

A frog goes into a bank and approaches the teller. He can see from her nameplate that her name is Patricia Whack.

"Miss Whack, I'd like to get a $30,000 loan to take a holiday."

Patty looks at the frog in disbelief and asks his name. The frog says his name is Kermit Jagger, his dad is Mick Jagger, and that it's okay, he knows the bank manager.

Patty explains that he will need to secure the loan with some collateral.

The frog says, "Sure. I have this," and produces a tiny porcelain elephant, about an inch tall, bright pink and perfectly formed.

Very confused, Patty explains that she'll have to consult with the bank manager and disappears into a back office.

She finds the manager and says, "There's a frog called Kermit Jagger out there who claims to know you and wants to borrow $30,000, and he wants to use this as collateral."

She holds up the tiny pink elephant. "I mean, what in the world is this?"

The bank manager looks back at her and says...

"It's a knickknack, Patty Whack. Give the frog a loan. His old man's a Rolling Stone."

(via Ron Burbella)

Magic Surrealism

"We will remain here until Bush disappears from the planet or leaves Brazil, whichever comes first," said one demonstrator, Rosa Marques, a history student at the University of Brasilia.

My bet is that he will leave Brazil first. Still, I wonder... If President Bush remained in Brazil but made himself invisible (American stealth technology, of course), would they leave? What if Brazil disappeared from the planet, taking Bush with it? Sounds too David Copperfield.

Wasn't McDonald's the favorite of that other President?

Hands Off, Jedi! He's Mine!

Revenge of the Sith is out on DVD today, which means I have an excuse to post this still from a deleted scene...


The movie has steamy romance, and deep affection...


It is worth owning.

Something Fishy In Italy

Goldfish bowls, widely regarded in the U.S. as sanctuaries for goldfish opposed to consumption by predators, are now illegal in Rome.

In Turin, failing to walk your dog three times daily is punishable by a 500 euro fine.

More expensive aquariums do tend to show more commitment toward proper animal care; but, as someone who tends to just let the dog run in the backyard, I hereby endorse James Lileks' suggestion:

The fine for not walking your dog, incidentally, is almost $600. If you were charged with such a thing, I recommend feeding high-denomination Euro notes to your dog, waiting 24 hours, then and leaving the money in a bag on the boulevard outside the city hall.

Trick and treat.

Does That 'I'...

In I. Lewis Libby's name stand for 'innocent' or 'incarcerated'?

A few observations, though...

1) In April 1999, CIA officer Valerie Wilson publicly listed (pdf file) her $1,000 contribution to Al Gore's presidential campaign under her married name, but listed herself as an employee of "Brewster-Jennings & Assoc.", where she was in fact employed covertly as "Valerie Plame", her not-so-covert maiden name.

2) As noted in this amici curiae brief (pdf), "Plame was not given 'deep cover' required of a covert agent" and a Washington Times report pointed to Plame's cover having been compromised at least twice previously. Also, MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell and former New York Times correspondent Clifford D. May suggested that Plame's status with the CIA was well-known in D.C. political circles.

3) Joe Wilson publicly identified himself as a CIA employee investigating weapons of mass destruction, his wife's area of expertise, further drawing attention to what former CIA official Fred Rustmann said was an already unraveling cover as a result of his marriage. Wilson claimed that she "was not a clandestine officer the day that Bob Novak blew her identity," but that phrasing is subject to interpretation. The Washington Times did report that she hadn't been a covert agent since 1997.

Perhaps Libby's alleged cover-up is graver than the alleged original crime.

Update: President Clinton's former counsel more-or-less tells everyone to grow up.

Update II: Heh:

This leaves two possibilities. One is that the mission was intended to result in the New York Times oped all along, meaning that the CIA didn't care much about Plame's status, and was trying to meddle in domestic politics. This reflects very badly on the CIA.

The other possibility is that they're so clueless that they did this without any nefarious plan, because they're so inept, and so prone to cronyism and nepotism, that this is just business as usual. If so, the popular theory that the CIA couldn't find its own weenie with both hands and a flashlight would appear to have found some pretty strong support.

Can I ACT?

I took the ACT this morning. It was tougher than my last academic exam: more questions, greater complexity, and less time to respond. I found myself rushing, or trying to rush, through nearly every question. My English and reading scores are probably going to be acceptable, but I fell dangerously behind on science (usually my strongest subject), and I fear a grading massacre in mathematics (always my weakest subject).

The most uncomfortable desk in student history became my workspace for a few hours. The torture device was a construction of metal bars and hideously-colored plastic, shaped into a seat that digs into the backside and a desktop barely wide enough to hold an open Reader's Digest. Two examinees forgot to turn off their cell phones, with one in a deep slumber while his phone sounded (and sounded, and sounded). There is the possibility that I am simply making excuses here, but is it too much to ask that conditions for a standardized test be, well, standard? I was already having trouble concentrating; my glasses broke and I had to buy a fresh pair yesterday night, so my eyes are still adjusting to the new lenses. Adding numb buttocks to my testing plan is not appreciated.

My scores should arrive next month. If I receive a composite score of 21 or higher out of a possible 36, then I am all set for college; if I do not pass, I've already reserved a seat for another exam in December. So the bright side is that I am still here to screw up another day!

Temporary Outages And Outrages

I have an exam coming up, so blogging will be light, possibly nonexistent, till next week. Must git my self en edukayshun!

Meanwhile, a few questions to ponder...

Illustrating the right to be offended is one thing, but is making f-wad Neo-Nazis look better behaved a good way to fight the hate?

Government knows best?

Was President Bush's Iraq conference less staged than Wrestlemania?

Did you know that terrorists hate their bosses, too?

Donated toward Pakistan earthquake relief yet?

What Would Aslan Do?

Frank Cerabino bashes part of an effort to get children to read because the classic literature in question has Christian parallels, and one of the movie makers donated to the Republican party:

When you can combine the forces of Disney, the McDonald's Happy Meal and Gov. Jeb Bush in one tidy package — all of them working together to cram thinly veiled Christian theology down the gullets of Florida's schoolchildren — you've got yourself a hell of a plan.

Please. Prof. Lewis, author of the The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, would be most displeased...

"Some people seem to think that I began by asking myself how I could say something about Christianity to children; then fixed on the fairy tale as an instrument; then collected information about child-psychology and decided what age group I'd write for; then drew up a list of basic Christian truths and hammered out 'allegories' to embody them. This is all pure moonshine. I couldn't write in that way at all. Everything began with images; a faun carrying an umbrella, a queen on a sledge, a magnificent lion. At first there wasn't even anything Christian about them; that element pushed itself in of its own accord."

J.R.R. Tolkien wrote his famed books much the same way. I suppose they ought to be banned as well, since Tolkien stated, "The Lord of the Rings is of course a fundamentally religious and Christian work; unconsciously so at first, but consciously so in the revision."

From a letter Lewis wrote in 1951:

"I am glad you all liked The Lion. A number of mothers, and still more, schoolmistresses, have decided that it is likely to frighten children, so it is not selling very well. But the real children like it, and I am astonished how some very young ones seem to understand it. I think it frightens some adults, but v. few children."

It still frightens some adults.

Auf Wiedersehen

German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, that country's most responsible and skillful leader since a certain Austrian held that job over six decades ago, concedes that he is a loser, but not without taking the opportunity to be a sore one...

"I do not want to name any catastrophes where you can see what happens if organised state action is absent. I could name countries, but the position I still hold forbids it, but everyone knows I mean America," he said to loud applause.

When did Louisiana become just 'America'? Good thing he made an effort at clarification, though, or I would have thought he was referring to Germany's large-scale unemployment, regressive socialist policies, and worse-than-Katrina disaster death toll.

I liked him better when he played piano.

If You Don't Want To Stereotype, Type With One Hand

Live Science reports on a National Institute of Aging study showing that stereotypes are incorrect. The study found, for example, that Germans are not more efficient (as German elections occasionally remind us), and that Czechs are actually caring people (see the Czech Republic's involvement in Iraq as evidence, such as this good news). Americans and Canadians scored almost identically on aggression in the study, which no doubt comes as a surprise to an almost identical number of both Americans and Canadians.

Stereotyping is a dangerous act of laziness. Lumping people together cuts down on thinking on a case-by-case basis. Fortunately, stereotypes are prime targets: Monty Python, South Park, Blazing Saddles, etc., would be rather unfunny without them.

And now for something completely different...

Alas, Poor Piglet

I wonder if my review of the Piglet's Big Movie soundtrack makes me a target for Muslim extremists? I ask, because there appears to be a load of Pooh in the U.K. concerning make-believe pigs. (via Instapundit)

Update: First, I read about Piglet's forced exile. Later, I see Thomas the Tank Engine in depictions of the London bombings. Now, the United Nations Children's Fraud is massacring Smurfs.

Is the international community trying to destroy my childhood?!

This sounds like a job for robots in disguise, heroes in a half-shell, or, more likely, well-armed, anti-fascist Americans.