Flexible Reality
Saturday, October 11, 2003
Justice denied at Guantanamo. Has it really been almost two years that the "unlawful combatants" have been held incommunicato at Gitmo; but only now is anything beyond minor reproach being said about it?
And a comparison with Jessica Lynch's "liberation".
By William Saletan
Wednesday, April 2, 2003
"8:30 a.m.: Jessica, Jessica, Jessica. In case you've been without electricity or human contact for the past 24 hours, I'm referring to Jessica Lynch, the U.S. Army POW who was rescued yesterday from Iraq. Last night on television, it was wall-to-wall Jessica. Today in the newspapers, it's yards of column inches on Jessica. U.S. Central Command trumpeted her rescue last night and played video of it at a briefing this morning.
I don't mean to be callous or unpatriotic, but why are we celebrating so loudly? She went into Iraq with a 15-member company. She came out alone. Her company didn't take its casualties while fighting for a bridge or an airfield. It took them because it made a wrong turn.
Worst of all, Lynch isn't one of the millions of Iraqis we're supposed to be liberating. She's one of the putative liberators. We've said this war isn't an invasion. We've said it isn't for us but for Iraq. And yet, while the average Iraqi's liberation gets no Pentagon fanfare and no air time, the liberation of Jessica Lynch is a 24-hour mediathon. We're celebrating her rescue for the worst of all reasons: because she's American."
Friday, October 10, 2003
Win the War, Not Just the Battles.
When we check the daily news there's a tendency to question the tone, accuracy, set and setting of the reports, avoiding flames, mentally precancelling spin, and trying to gain the true nuggets of information in the package. It's not easy navigating through the artificial reality created by advertisers, marketing gurus, on-air celebrities, and politicians.
Some news and articles come through the maze with what appears to be the "ring of truth". Former President Carter's OpEd piece in the WAPO a couple days ago was like that, as he certainly had and still has exquisitve knowledge of the matter at hand, and there was nothing for him to gain or lose by saying what he did. Sure, if he would have come out in support of the Bush Administration's position on OIF there might have been a few grumbles from his audience, and a few less dollars for the Carter Center...but thinking in this manner puts you squarely in the Flexible Reality Zone. It's more realistic to think he wrote what he considered to be the truth.
Retired General Anthony Zinni's address at Forum 2003 was like that too. Nothing Earth-shattering in the address; but a confirmation of one's own view of the situation by what must be considered a knowledgeable and neutral party to and former participant in US Military Actions in the Middle East and elsewhere. Zinni could have said anything he wanted to, and as a USMC General (Ret) he did.
It should be obvious to all that Rumsfeld, Rice, Wolfowitz, et al are incapable of winning this War using the current framework. It should also be obvious that President Bush is not the Roman style Pro-Consul one would hope to have in charge at such a juncture in our Nations history. Perhaps a Drei-Kaiserbund entity would be better next time, with Clinton's intellect, Bush's faithfullness, and Zinni's military outlook...say, maybe we will: "Ah, Gen. Clark would you step in please."
Got another choice morsel for you today: how about a master database where your driving history, name, address, neighbor names, kind of vehicle you drive, arrest record, fingerprints, photo, and any other data obtained by State agencies would be maintained for access by law enforcement personnel.
Florida, Georgia, and several other States either have it already, or are planning on implementing it soon. The AJC article today talks about it from the Georgia perspective. It would be funded by the Dept. of Homeland Defense, and maintained by a private firm under contract to the State.
Gee...what could be the problem with that? You have nothing to hide, and think of all the criminals it will help to identify and catch. It's called the "Matrix Project", like in the movie. You see, the State folks don't really care what mental links you make to the Project, otherwise they would have given it an acronym.
A corollary item concerns the lack of uniformity and access to information about inmates in City, County, State, and Federal Correctional Institutions. Here in Atlanta, if you attempt to see if your XYZ got locked up, you need to go online to at least the Atlanta City Jail, Cobb County Jail, Dekalb County Jail, State of Georgia, or the Fulton County Jail to see where they are being held. The State database shows a photo of the prisoners, but none of the others do.
And please remember, the data on these sites varies considerably, from timely, to weeks old. One would assume the databases accessible to law enforcement personnel are uniform, accurate, timely, and relevant, and they were not susceptible to an episode like in Terry Gilliam's movie with the fly. Nor would they be available to unauthorized personnel, or made available to corporate interests only peripherally related to law enforcement, nor accessible to hackers, foreign agents, identity thieves, a no-longer benevolent Government, Watergate-Style Burglars, et al.
But best of all: consider what it would take for a subject to examine their own file, have incorrect information removed, or even gain access to it. Have you ever tried to change the data about your financial transactions which are maintained by one of the three prime Credit Agencies?
Thirty years ago in Florida, the Florida Bureau of Investigation in Tallahassee could spit out a one-page printout on a subject by entering the persons drivers license number into the search engine. By now, it's probably several pages long, and with the Matrix Project, no one will be invisible to the State. Combine the speed of 64bit operating systems, with natural language query tools being developed by all the major DP companies and Doyle would not have to ask whether you ever picked your nose in Poughkeepsie...he'd know the date, time, and location.
But really, relax. You have nothing to worry about, because you are always above-board, have nothing to hide, and don't care what law enforcement agencies know about you. But if you ever happen to end up on the other side by accident or avarice, you will probably be able to handle anything that might come up.
BTW: For those who are unfamiliar with Terri Gilliam's Movie: "Brazil", here's a blurb:
"Very strange, but wonderful movie by Terry Gilliam (Monty Python) about a dark future where bureaucracy rules. It's a wildly imaginative Orwellian comedy about a future society in which a central bureaucracy regulates everything via endless air ducts, tubes and plumbing. A typographical error (well, a bug.. literally...) plunges a meek governmental clerk named Sam Lowry (Jonathan Pryce) into a Kafkaesque nightmare of bureaucracy and brainwashing. DeNiro plays a heroic non-union plumber unplugging the stopped-up pipes. Academy Award Nominations: Best (Original) Screenplay, Best Art Direction-Set Decoration. As with all Gilliam films, the cinematography, setting, and effects are amazing."
Thursday, October 09, 2003
Andrew Grove, Co-Founder and CEO of Intel Corp said US tech services market set to collapse due to outsourcing. Half a million tech jobs lost because companies must cater to the demands of their shareholders.
Gee...what a novel concept: outsourcing steel production, textiles, semi-conductors, automobile construction, personal electronics, and soon food makes these products cheaper for Americans to buy; however, if there are no blue-collar and skilled labor jobs for Americans the 60% in the middle can't afford to buy anything, help support the bottom 20%, or as these bozos are now learning, have funds available to pay for Dentists, Doctors, Lawyers, Bankers, and Finance Manipulators.
Go ahead, help the Bush Administration and Mega-Capitalists make the "Donald's" of the world the favored social segment. Take away the safety net for the lower 20%, and make it increasingly difficult for the majority to enjoy what they became accustomed to. There will always be plenty of AK47's around to show the present day Ms. Antoinette's of the world, in concrete terms, that they made a mistake putting capital before people! Don't think it can happen here? Neither did Julius Caesar, Louis XVI, or Nicholas II.
Wouldn't you know it...just when I thought I had found an infrequently used but appropriate phrase that would become the title of this blog, I went online to see if anyone else is using it, and lo and behold, it's all over the place !! Website! topics, and key phrases abound.
Re: Bill O'Reilly
There are of course several "Good Doctors"; but the one I had in mind was Sameul Johnson, who wrote:
"Nothing is more despicable than the old age of a passionate man.* When the vigour of youth fails him, and his amusements pall with frequent repetition, his occasional rage sinks by decay of strength into peevishness; that peevishness, for want of novelty and variety, becomes habitual; the world falls off from around him, and he is left, as Homer expresses it, to devour his own heart in solitude and contempt."
Johnson: Rambler #11 (April 24, 1750)
Egads !! Did you hear yesterday's, Wed. Oct 8th, edition of "Fresh Air" on NPR with guest: Bill O'Rilley? He really does that "shut up" thing. Aside from being articulate, opinionated, and quick witted, he came across in the interview as venal, brutish, and displayed a grossly over-inflated ego.
As a book reviewer once said of Ayn Rand: "The author's overconfident sense of their own rightness and persistence at pressing their points with little respect for opposing views can quickly become more than a little annoying."
And like so many other "puffed up on-air celebrities" are prone to do, he stalked out of the interview part way through because the host, Terri Gross, would not respond to one of his baited questions as he expected. While physically he may be 6'4" and 200 some odd pounds, he came across in the interview just like the mentally lightweight bully that we all knew in high school.
His diatribes against Al Franken, the NYT, and "Liberals" sounded like a remake of a TV District Attorney's outtakes. And just as his loud-mouthedness gave a push to Franken's book, it seduced me into listening to Franken's Fresh Air interview which occurred a few weeks earlier.
As Terri Gross said: "...it was a different interview", where O'Reilly was loud and pushy, Franken was mellow and humorous. Befitting their respective public personas. Fine. Samuel Clements or the Good Doctor were highly skilled commentators, and realized the strength of their voice had nothing to do with the strength of their words. O'Reilly proved in the interview he does not value that concept.
Wednesday, October 08, 2003
Following up on yesterday's post about the disproportionate expenditures made to Israel over the years, former President Carter's Op-Ed piece in the WAPO states the case very plainly about the only possible method of attaining peace in Palestine.
Some considered Jesus, some considered Budda, some thought it was Aristotle, Luther, Roosevelt, Batman, or Arnold. Others think differently.
Tuesday, October 07, 2003
And speaking of logistics, guess who is the DOD’s prime transporter of military material to OIF troops, responsible for transporting over 50% of the personnel, equipment and supplies? How much money will be passing thru Brown & Roots hands as a direct result of OIF? What about the next closest NGO provider? How much are they handling?
To obtain a realistic picture of the importance America places on other countries in International Affairs it is instructive to do as “Deep Throat” suggested: follow the money. A quick review of available documents from the CIA Worldbook, FAS, Census Bureau and others reveal that in 2001 American spent 0.11% of that year’s GDP, US Gross Domestic Product, on ODA, (Official Development Assistance), a.k.a. second-tier “Foreign Aid”, which was approximately one-third what Japan spent in the same period, or less than one-tenth what Norway spent. Using the same time period and data sources, America came in 22nd in amount spent in development aid to the World as a percentage of GDP. Just two years earlier Japan spent almost six times more than America did in that year.
In a report by the Federation of American Scientists a more vivid picture appeared by comparing the amount of funding from all sources sent to other countries per capita. For example: Israel obtained $2.82 billion dollars in 2001 for its 5.9 million citizens, while Egypt received $1.99 billion for its 70.4 million citizens, and the whole of Latin America, including Mexico received $0.71 billion for its 530 million citizens.
Quick calculations yield:
Israel $477.97 per person per year
Egypt $28.22 per person per year
Latin America: $1.33 per person per year
No current data is available for estimating the ODA headed for Iraq, so just using the figures that have been thrown around by the administration, Operation Iraqi Freedom should involve about $200 billion dollars spread over three years for its 23.3 million inhabitants, and while it not particularly useful comparing oranges to apples, that amount works out to about $2,861.26 per Iraqi per year.
But the bulk of the appropriation for OIF is not going to the citizens of Iraq, it is being spent supporting the two hundred fifty thousand US troops in the theatre; and the bulk of that allocation is being spent for acquisition and transport of military logistics. Of the $87 billion requisitioned by the Bush Administration for OIF this year, approximately $15 billion is alledgedly for actual repairs, reconstruction, and management, for perhaps as little as $643.78 per person during 2003. Still it is several hundred times more than what we spend in our own hemisphere, even in countries like Venezuela that export oil to world markets. The Heritage Foundation used somewhat similar figures to advance a significantly different perspective than offered here.
How can the average American citizen be asked to support such gross inequality, or even be willing to acknowledge that the numbers shown above are representative of America's priorities.
From JECHOLS1@JUNO.COM
Just offering the following comments.
There has to be a lot of truth in the fact that Iraq is being "(re)built" by us- at our expense - and to the benefit of Iraq and its people - as well as to the benefit of some of the administration's friends. BUT - and this is a huge BUT - it is not, nor has it ever been, this country's policy to invade countries in order to:
1. free its people unless from another country's invasion
2. create a democracy where there was none.
3. rebuild its infrastructure
If we start doing this, that probably means more than three-quarters of the rest of the world is next!
It is good that the media is keeping their eye on the ball in looking at:
1. The necessity, or lack thereof, in our invading Iraq.
2. The possibility/probability that we as a nation were talked into it by leaders who misled us at best and deliverately lied to us at worst.
3. The fact that our country and our people are being bled economically, emotionally and literally and for what reason.
4. The fact that there is no practical end in sight to this mess.
5. What good will be accomplished for our people and our country (disregard that for Iraq and its people since that was not the overriding original intent)
Did anyone ever doubt that the U.S.A., were better at freedom, democracy, and running a country than Saddam? Surely we didn't have to spend 180 billion (so far) and hundreds of lives (so far on our side-not counting the lives lost on the other side) to prove it.
Why should the News Media get sidetracked by "How good it is for Iraq". Please let them stay focused on "How good is it for the U.S.A?" and "How right is it?"
The rest of the world will become convinced that it was and is a good thing that we did - only if it turns out that way.
Monday, October 06, 2003
Former Senator Max Cleland said the War in Iraq has a parallel with an earlier conflict.
What he didn't say was how absolutely wrong the Secretaries of Defense have been in initial diagnosis, prosecution, and qualitative cost/benefit analysis in both conflicts. Nor did he point to one of the primary dissimilarities. The Vietcong had no real way of attacking Americans in America; but the Arab fighters are not so hindered. Nor were the Vietcong fighting for the primacy of their religious heritage, or their ancestral homes. Israel and America are both busy building walls, not fences maintained by neighbors. The Maginot Line, the DMZ and the Berlin Wall spoke of the folly of these feeble efforts to earlier generations; but this one is not listening.
Sunday, October 05, 2003
Israeli air raid in Syria today brings the problem of pre-emptive military actions against sovereign states into clear focus. The bombing raid by Israel was the first such military action against Syria in almost thirty years. Israel claims it was designed to hit a terrorist training center, and as retaliation for last weeks restaurant bombing in Haifa.
However, in the tit-for-tat world of violence in the Middle East there should be an acknowledgement of the difference between bombings carried out by individual suicide bombers and State Supported Military bombings carried out against targets in neighboring States. If the UN Security Council sits on it's hands in response to these kinds of actions by Israel; it would seem reasonable to argue that the UN should agree that Syria is within it's right to bomb Sharon's Headquarters.
In other words, as from the LA Times Article today: "The predawn bombings unveiled a sharp shift in Israeli policy. After three years of battle in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Israel is now declaring the right to chase armed Palestinian factions into their bases in foreign countries. It's a philosophy that echoes the controversial doctrine of pre-emption that has driven U.S. foreign policy since Sept. 11, 2001."
If the International community acquiesces to this political madness where does it end? India bombs sites in Pakistan, or Pakistan bombs sites in India? Russia bombs sites in some of their former Republics? Mexico bombs the homes of vigilante ranchers in Arizona? And how can the US support a censure of Israel, given its entanglements in Iraq, and Afghanistan?
Wolfowitz, Rice, and Company might be brilliant scholars; but it appears they are dumb as a stone to propose and support pre-emptive actions against States that are considered a threat. Many countries have some elements in it that can be perceived as a threat to some other country. But does it follow that, for example, America should consider bombing suspected drug cartel sites in Columbia to "Win the War on Drugs"?
