Archive - Jan 2005

For the love of GOD, people! So how many Iraqis voted? All we know is that it is a historic turnout, a fantastic victory, a resounding success. Judging from what we know, the media either chose their overused descriptive phrases for the election long before the election or they set the bar so low that if any Iraqis voted, they were prepared to consider it a success.

To be clear, I still hope the election is a success. However, we clearly do NOT have enough evidence to know that. What do we know? 8 million out of 14 million eligible voters in Iraq voted. We know that U.S. based media considers this an unimaginable victory. When one of these ignorant cheerleaders was asked this morning on MPR what the turnout was in Sunni areas - which in many ways will be the true measure of how successful this election will be - he said we don't know and won't know for up to a week, but anecdotal evidence suggests not good. STOP Cheerleading then!

Before the election, I think it is safe to say that people were expecting the Kurds and Shiites to turn out in large numbers and Sunni's to largely stay home. In fact, this was the fear! If the Sunni's are not represented in the government, it will be harder for the government to appear legitimate. Now preliminary evidence (which is not good enough) suggests our fears are confirmed and everyone is celebrating it. Morons.

AGAIN, let me say that I think the U.S. occupational forces, the Iraqi police, and everyone else has combined to provide the safest possible environment for Iraqis to vote. I am not disparaging their efforts. But that does not mean Iraq has a democracy now. I hope against hope that Bush and his neocon bumblers have hit the jackpot and somehow not ruined prospects for democracy in Iraq, but we won't know for some time.

The other major annoyance that greeted me this morning was an interview with 2 Congress People (I want to call them Congress Folks, but that doesn't seem standard) and nearly half of it was taken up by them lauding U.S. forces, Iraqi police and so force ... not because it had anything to do with what they were talking about, but likely because they are afraid to say anything negative at all about Iraq or U.S. foreign policy while leaving themselves open to "not supporting the troops" or some such nonsense. I'm so sick of politics for morons, where people have to speak in these well measured snippets which cannot be used against them in the future.

Since everyone takes words out of context and twists them to put on TV in attack ads, no one can actually speak their mind without spending 50% of the interview time hedging their words. Boooooo!!

I have just turned off the TV after a fun day that I will describe later. Turned on CNN to a CNN special report: Iraq Votes. Those who claim that the media has a persistant liberal bias (especially those who claim CNN does) have an answer, no doubt, but to me, it shows the true bias toward whoever is in power, rather than a particular point of view.

I'm watching this program talk in glowing terms of the Iraqis who have turned out in larger numbers than most suspected to vote. This is indeed something good (it appears now, in the early hours while the only news we get is the carefully managed news from official sources). That being said, I do find it funny that while CNN and other news channels describe the Iraqi voters as brave heroes who are risking their lives to throw off modern insurgents and historic tyranny to turn out the vote ... and the perhaps singular thing that unites the Iraqi citizen at this point is a hatred of the U.S. occupation. We'll see who gets elected (from which lists), but from what I understand, pretty much all polls show the U.S. presence as being quite unpopular across political opinion.

So while the media today talks about a victory for democracy, let's see what is says in coming days as the results pour in, and as those who are voted into power, try to get the U.S. to leave their country. I'm hoping that this election, as deeply flawed as it has been, will be the beginning of a safer, more peaceful, Iraq that begins a transition to Arabic democracy.

The notion, as just advanced by British P.M. Blair, that the (in his words, successful) election is a blow to the heart of terrorism around the world, is absurd. Firstly, there are many types of terrorism around the world - but clearly he is talking about Islamic anti-Western terrorism because that is the only kind of terrorism of which he is concerned. Right-wing terrorism against the state of Cuba, for instance, (a state whose government I too hold in low esteem) isn't really considered a problem by Bush or Blair. Leaving that behind, I think disasters like the Abu Ghraib affair probably provided world wide anti-Western Islamic terror with a suit of mithril (like the one worn by Frodo in the Lord of the Rings) that will protect it against things like the elections in Iraq (if they are indeed perceived as a success in the Middle East - something I have heard nothing about).

The point is that the United States has a long way to go following the Iraq elections to repair the damage from its foolish missteps in the wake of invading Iraq. Until then, we are just patting ourselves on the back while still standing deep in a hole of our own excavation.

Juan Cole, Middle East expert, offers a sober view of the election.

U.S. coverage of the election (at least what I am seeing on CNN - and I doubt CNN is unique in this), can only be described as cheerleading. Basically, the media continue to misunderstand what a functioning democracy requires. Elections, or some mechanism by which the people can choose / empower / reject, their leaders is important in an open society. However, the mere occurrance of elections does not mean the society is open, and more importantly, democratic.

In the case of Iraq, people are voting in a dangerous, occupied, police state for lists of candidates of whom they know little (in fact, some of the politicians on the list have been included without their permission!). The bottom line is that the media, who have been criticized by many for running too many negative stories about the war, have taken this opportunity to show their American patriotism and run puff pieces (which does not invalidate them - there are many individuals in this war who deserve attention for their sacrifices) but their coverage promotes a skewed vision of the situation on the ground. I have a serious feeling that in the coming days, as the whole story regarding the elections come in, things will not be as rosy as the press suggests today. But what the hell, journalism is no easy job - they deserve time off also.

Charles Krauthammer recently wrote,

"Mark Dayton of Minnesota accused her of lying in order to persuade the American people to go to war -- a charge that is not just false but that most Americans don't believe. Rice was not a generator of intelligence. She was a consumer -- of a highly defective product."

Wrong wrong wrong. Ms. Rice took select pieces of highly disputed intelligence analyses and presented them as if they were fact. She told United States citizens, legislators, and the press, that certain things were undisputed facts when in fact, many intelligent analysts did in fact dispute the findings. These are lies. Yes, she is not responsible for the inaccuracies in those reports - but when she is told that x agency says one thing, but y agency disagrees and then tells the public that the intelligence clearly says what x agency reports, that is a LIE.

It is not clear to me that the Bush Administration would have been able to carry so much support into the war if they had been honest about things like the aluminum tubes which they claimed for the nuclear program or the supposed yellowcake uranium issues. However, they clearly felt they had to lie, or at the very least, lie by omission, in order to convince both the American public and Congress of their case.

Quick post for a guy with little time tonight. My co-worker quote of the day today comes from Neil - my co-worker in the bookstore. I was looking through a book of quotes and found "No man is justified in doing evil in the name of expediency" by Ted Roosevelt. Neil replied: "On the other hand, Condoleeza Ride is a chick, so it's okay." Nice.

What's up now Randy? Madison billboards are making fun of Randy and his pathetic performance against the Eagles. Good deal. Trade Randy, get rid of Tice, and I'm a Vikes fan again. I don't know how much more of this I'm-the-superstar-I-get-to-do-what-I-want crap the Vikings can take. They already have the talent to be a force in the piddly NFC but between Moss and Tice, they underperform at every opportunity.

I just found out about University United which is a group working to revitalize the University corrider just north of where I live. Apparently, you can take a survey there regarding the Midway area. Coolbeans.

Story about MGM class action suit. Apparently, MGM cheated in creating its widescreen movies for DVD and has now lost a class action suit. Read the story if you are a movie purist.

I understand that the state has to offer competitive pay in order to attact capable people to service, but it seems the state has broken pay rules. I do think that in a healthy society, public service would appeal to people who value helping the community more than their bank account. Honestly, after $100,000 a year, you are getting greedy. But then, working for the government does not have the same appeal it used to. (This ought to prompt a comment from Klink)

Regarding ATV use in northern MN, I am not a zealot on either side. I have no doubt I would love the thrill of driving around on a four wheeler on trails through the woods. However, that is destructive to the environment and should be limited. Unfortunately, the DNR apparently decided upon limits without consulting the locals which strikes me as just plain wrong.

I do support limiting the number of trails that ATVs can use. Locals should be involved in this decision, but they do not get a full veto. I believe society has an interest in maintaining areas (like the Boundary Waters, and most of Alaska) in a pristine condition - without disturbance from adreneline junkies (of which I am one). The balance in never easy, but the cost of allowing too much ATV use is compromising an area for many future generations. It is easier to open additional areas to ATV development in the future, should it be necessary than it is restore an ecosystem after ATVs have altered it.

This is not to say restoring an ecosystem is impossible - afterall, ecosystems are naturally in flux. However, I would not equate suddenly dumping air/noise pollution into a pristine area with the natural cycles of what we would call destruction and healing from forest fires and such.

I have finally finished preparing my photos from the New England 2004 roadtrip. Check 'em out.

Also, the folks at jibjab.com have released a cartoon for Bush's second term.

Well, rather than actually write anything, maybe I'll just post another link or two. Kim just alerted me to the PBS show, "Postcards from Buster" ... one of the upcoming episodes was going to deal with same sex marriage, but it has been pulled after the Education Secretary criticized it. While poking around for background, I found that Wal-Mart is adding gay and lesbian partners to their definition of the family when those partners are recognized as such by the law. So this is sortof a step forward except that Wal-Mart still pathetically underpays its workers while running smaller businesses out of business and forcing larger business to move production to China. But they do have low prices!

From the If-Not-Before-Then-Perhaps-Now Dept, four men who spent 3 years detained in Guantanamo Bay have been sent back to Britain. After one day of questioning, they were released and will be closely monitored. It would seem that after 3 years of being imprisoned and either tortured or not depending on whether you want Bush's Administration determining the definition of torture, they are more likely now to act against the U.S. than before. Undoubtedly their stories about they witnessed in that wonderful little free state from all law will deepen the hatred of the United States among the community to which they are returning.

As they might say in Britain, "Brilliant!" U.S. officials claim, of course, that the men are dangerous but due to the interrogation techniques they use in Guantanamo, any confessions obtained there will be inadmissable in British court, and as we all know, are suspect because people who are being tortured tend not to be truthful.

Meanwhile, in the current issue of The Atlantic Monthly, Richard Clarke has an interesting future history of the 2001-2011 decade in which he describes how the American President squandered the few chances the U.S. had to actually fight Islamic terrorism. It is a worthwhile read, if only to gain an understanding of possible future terror attack targets.

I generally find Clarke quite persuasive, but I do feel that he goes overboard at times. I don't think al-Quaeda is nearly as organized now as he gives it credit for - but he would be the expert. I also think he tends to be very U.S. centric - ignoring that the U.S. may gain a second chance to build an actual coalition to fight Islamic terror as the terrorists strike other countries around the world. That being said, I fully expect the U.S. to totally blow that oppportunity when it develops.

Before I jump into my press conference coverage, take note that another conservative columnist is revealed to have taken money from the Gov to promote Bush's policies. This comes from the Dept of Health and Human Services ... Bush claims he knew nothing about it, but we now know that at least two separate departments have paid off columnists to abuse their supposedly independent position. Freedom of the press is in a sad state here in the U.S. - where we like to pretend we have a long history of it. She claims that she forgot about it and didn't disclose it. That sounds plausible.

It strikes me as odd that multiple departments are paying pundits who already support Bush's policies to promote those policies. Are we missing large parts of this story, or is the Bush Administration that insecure about its policies? Or are they just doing it because they can?

I listened to Bush's press conference this morning while working out at Mac. It does seem that Mr. Mike Moore was onto something when he talked of living in fictional times. I don't agree with the bit about the fictional President - I have problems with Bush, but I honestly don't find the way he wormed his way into office much more distasteful than the ordinary ways one goes about doing that.

But for now, let's do the shadoweyes top 5 press conference moments.

1) Q Mr. President, in the debate over Dr. Rice's confirmation, Democrats came right out and accused you and the administration of lying in the run-up to the war in Iraq. Republicans, in some cases, conceded that mistakes have been made. Now that the election is over, are you willing to concede that any mistakes were made? And how do you feel about --

THE PRESIDENT: Let me talk about Dr. Rice -- you asked about her confirmation. Dr. Rice is an honorable, fine public servant who needs to be confirmed. She will be a great Secretary of State. And Dr. Rice and I look forward to moving forward. We look forward to working to make sure the Iraqis have got a democracy. We look forward to continuing to make sure Afghanistan is as secure as possible from potential Taliban resurgence. We look forward to spreading freedom around the world. And she is going to make a wonderful Secretary of State.

Q No reaction to the lying? No reaction? (Laughter.)

THE PRESIDENT: Is that your question? The answer is, no. Next.

Well that certainly clears it up. I thought both Biden and Boxer offered excellent criticism of Rice, noting in several ways how the Administration lied and mislead the public and Congress before the war. No comment from Bush though. Never admit anything. As I have mentioned previously, check out this report for a detailed description of their lies.

2) As well, it is very important for us to reassure the seniors that nothing changes. I fully understand the power of those who want to derail a Social Security agenda by scaring people. It's been a tactic for a long period of time by those who believe the status quo is acceptable. And so one of the things you'll hear me constantly doing is reminding our senior citizens that nothing will change and that we have a duty to act on behalf of their children and grandchildren.

Bush is actually accusing others of scare-mongering during the social security debate? Ha! His administration, either through incompetence (unlikely, but definitely possible) or policy have deliberately mislead the public by cooking the books to claim Social Security needs to be "fixed." They are the ones trying to scare people into believing the system will cease to exist when I am old enough to collect. Check out thereisnocrisis.com for a reality check. Interestingly, AARP has come out against Bush on this matter.

3) THE PRESIDENT: I am looking forward to working with both Republicans and Democrats to advance a plan that will permanently solve Social Security.

There is -- I met yesterday with members of the United States Senate, I'm meeting today with members of the House of Representatives to discuss the need to work together to get a -- a solution that will fix the problem. And here's the problem: the -- as dictated by just math, there is -- the system will be in the red in 13 years, and in 2042 the system will be broke. That's because people are living longer, and the number of people paying into the Social Security trust is dwindling. And so, therefore, if you have a child -- how old is your child, Carl?

Q Fourteen years old.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes, 14. Well, if she were --

Q He, sir.

THE PRESIDENT: He, excuse me. (Laughter.) I should have done the background check. (Laughter.)

I just have to give Bush some props on this one. It was a quick, funny response. I chuckled.

4) Q Thank you, sir. Any -- back on Social Security -- any transition to personal accounts is estimated to cost between $1 trillion to $2 trillion over 10 years. Without talking about specific proposals, do you plan to borrow that money, or will you, when your plan comes out --

THE PRESIDENT: You're asking me to talk about specific proposals. And I'm looking over --

Q -- will you be able to pay for it, though?

THE PRESIDENT: Over the -- I fully understand some people are concerned about whether or not this is affordable. And at the appropriate time, we'll address that -- that aspect of reform. But personal accounts are very important in order to make sure that young workers have got a shot at coming close to that which the government promises.

It has become readily apparent that Bush will be using the same strategy of avoiding the question of cost to sell his Social Security policy as he did to sell the Iraq War (now heading toward a price tag of $240 billion). This is a total sham and should be rejected by the American public. However, the American public at large still has not caught on - so they will likely screw the pooch.

5) Q Mr. President, I'd like to ask you about the Gonzales nomination, and specifically, about an issue that came up during it, your views on torture. You've said repeatedly that you do not sanction it, you would never approve it. But there are some written responses that Judge Gonzales gave to his Senate testimony that have troubled some people, and specifically, his allusion to the fact that cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment of some prisoners is not specifically forbidden so long as it's conducted by the CIA and conducted overseas. Is that a loophole that you approve?

THE PRESIDENT: Listen, Al Gonzales reflects our policy, and that is we don't sanction torture. He will be a great Attorney General, and I call upon the Senate to confirm him.

Obviously, Bush's response totally ignores the question. In doing so, he answers it. Clearly the United States feels it can do whatever it wants regardless of ideas of International Law. Thus far, no person or nation has proved it wrong. Perhaps history will judge us harshly. I don't think the neocons are much worried about that.

Just had another indoor soccer game. I scored off a weak near post shot in another close loss. Although our record sucks, I'm really enjoying playing on this team. Good sportsmanship and people who enjoy the game make losing a better experience than some of the wins I have experienced on teams with people who didn't understand the concept of rec soccer. Or maybe they thought they were playing wreck-soccer?

I just finished reading the City Pages article: "Minnesota Eats Itself" which discusses the ways in which Pawlenty's pledge of not raising taxes is bogus. When the state doesn't raise taxes while not addressing spending issues, citizens just have to pay in other ways. So it goes. I have to admit that I am somewhat torn - I would like to see the gov fund train based mass transit but I also recognize that at some point, the government simply has to stop raising taxes. This is not to buy into the idea that MN citizens (and U.S. citizens in general) are overtaxed because compared to other Western nations, we are not.

That being said, at some point the government simply needs to be pruned. In the next couple of years, I hope to learn more about where the State puts the money it raises, because right now I don't have a good understanding of where all this money goes.

I just found the transcript of Joe Biden's questioning of Rice during her confirmation hearings. If you haven't heard or read this yet, take a quick look at it. The most interesting part is the area regarding how many trained Iraqi policemen exist. Do a text search on the page in your browser for 'training' to find it quickly.

I had a chance to tune in the new MPR FM station at 89.3 - which plays modern music. I heard some cool music and no commercials. The music was pretty cool and included several artists I hadn't heard before. Give it a shot. You can listen online at MPR.org.

In recent conversations with Klink, he helped me to explain the distaste I have for the powerline blog. Many people accuse the media of being either left or right and say it needs to be more balanced. Reading the powerline blog, one gets the idea that they have no interest whatsoever in creating a balanced media. Instead, they want to usher in an American Pravda style media where conservative viewpoints are privileged and alternate viewpoints would most likely only be introduced in order to demonstrate incompetence.

I guess this leads into another bit where I say that I don't have a problem with the coverage that Fox News provides. I am only bothered by their claims of being "Fair and Balanced." If they came out and said, we are a mouthpiece for the Republican Party, then that would be something. If they even continued admitting that Fox News was conceived as a right wing news agency, as I believe Murdoch did when creating it, that would be sufferable. But to claim to be fair and balanced is upsetting.

Jumping to a different topic, it seems that none of my readers know of good MN based blogs that follow State politics from a liberal viewpoint (or any non-conservative viewpoint for that matter). In trying to follow local issues, I saw that people opposed to a publicly funded stadium are organizing again.

I found an interesting post from the moderate republican blog suggesting that Bush may not be as bigoted as the homophobe base of his party to which he catered before the election.

I had the good fortune of finding a CQ Today publication (Congressional Quarterly) from Jan 18. I wish I had access to more of this stuff. Remember how Kerry kept saying Bush had spent $200 billion on Iraq? Well, we are about to surpass it. According to CQ, Congress has thus far passed $152.4 billion for military ops in Iraq and Afghanistan and $27.3 for reconstruction and foreign aid ($78.5 in April 2003, $87.5 in Nov 2003, and $25 in August 2004). Soon they will likely throw another $80 billion at the whole mismanaged fiasco - although they may start actually talking about oversight now to make sure the money is going toward what it is supposed to, not that we can't trust those lovable no bid contract winners.

I really wish I had some faith in the credibility of the American Forces Information Service because I would like to believe this story showing conditions in Sadr City to be improving as a result of U.S. efforts. However, I have little faith in AFIS presenting an honest portrayal of life in Iraq.

Interesting, the Pentagon is also spending about $5 million a day on the tsunami relief efforts.

I am happy to report that the Eagles have won the NFC Championship. Sad to report the Steelers lost to the Pats. Disappointed. At the very least, I can say that I am happy I will have no divided loyalties during the Superbowl - except for the minor fact that I really wouldn't mind if the Pats win it. They are solid and well coached - with a good, humble QB. I'm looking forward to this game.

In tech news - my personal tech news that is - I suffered another hard drive meltdown with that new SATA drive. Couldn't recover this time and had to format - fortunately, I had it mirrored. I'm not sure what the problem is ... although it could be that I am using a system meant to be RAIDed in a non-RAID environment. So I'm making that drive a mirror (manual mirror that is) now rather than being active and I'll see if it develops another problem. If it does, I imagine I'll have to buy another SATA and properly RAID it. That will mean different drivers and perhaps an end to that problem.

Regarding the problems we have had on this site with URLs in comments - I found that others have had similar errors with the recent blogcms version. I uninstalled the NP_FancyText plugin and reinstalled it and that seems to have solved the problem. At first I wasn't a big fan of blogcms but it is increasingly growing on me as I get more used to it. Mainly I like it because it conforms to web standards and is GPL'ed. And now it seems to be working well here also.

I just found out that my sister's friend Chris (regular reader, never comments) is often looking for people to go out snowmobiling with. I have never snowmobiled - but I would love to give it a shot. Not that I want to break my arm or anything - but I would like to give it a shot sometime. hint hint.

On the brighter side, my friend Max is doing much better. He was in the hospital with meningitis, but he has proved stronger. So he will be leaving the ICU soon and we'll be able to call him to get reports directly from him.

I just got off the phone with Margot in Boston - where they apparently received 2.5 feet of snow. I'm quite annoyed. We got what? 7 inches of show here and it seemed like a lot. I was so jubilant at our pissant snowfall that I walked to work (3 miles +- .1) in it (it took 1 hour). I honestly think that if we got 2.5 feet of snow, I might just freeze to death enjoying it. Of course, you can't ever feel bad after a phone conversation with Margot, so I sorta don't. I do have to get off my bum and captionate the photos from the 2004 New England road trip so everyone can see them though.