Very Interesting!

You may call me naive but...
Isn't raising interest rates to counter inflation a little bit like fighting for peace or, ummm, fornicating for chastity?
"I want to keep prices down, so I'm going to increase the price of the Ultimate Commodity - money!"
Huh?
I understand the stated underlying principle is that increasing the cost of money - the cost of borrowing, that is - will supposedly dampen demand for 'consumer goods'.
Good Idea; Too Bad It's Wrong!
Raising interest rates to reduce demand would do very nicely in that mythical market: You know, the one where the marketplace is always right; everything is bought and sold at a price agreeable to both participants; supply meets demand; stocks always reflect the true value of corporations, etc. The very definition of a capitalist economy.
We don't have a capitalist economy though. Haven't for a long time now. What we have today is a consumerist economy. In this economy consumption, therefore spending, is driven primarily by two factors; need, and desire. In this economy increasing the cost of borrowing has very little to do with driving consumption. Raising the price of food, for instance, does nothing to reduce peoples' need for food. Raising the price of a luxury SUV does very little to reduce peoples' desire for one. Cost is at most a secondary factor here. Demand is largely inelastic. Expectation trumps reality.
What raising interest rates - will - do is to keep people (and institutions, and governments) buying, not selling, bonds. Despite the vice president's saying that US government bonds "aren't worth the paper they're printed on", they do represent an island of predictability in a sea of uncertainty. So far.

At the moment, what Alan Greenspan is doing is walking a tightrope (and doing it very well, thank you) of increasing interest rates in step with inflation, so as to make it appear that he is countering inflation, while disguising the inflationary influence his rate increases have on the economy.
The President thanks you, Alan Greenspan.

Brain-Dead Congress

Good morning Dear Reader!
I was going to say something about our idiot-child congress and their obsessive infatuation with 'roid-riddled baseballers, but...
All it would have amounted to would have been a few hundred words best summed up as: Who Cares!
Instead, there's this...
The president, George W. Bush, talks big about The Sanctity Of Marriage.
But!
When it comes right down to it, George believes his judgement regarding Terri Schiavo (a woman whom he has never met, either before or after her brain death) is superior to that of her husband. Also superior to her doctor's judgement, and the judgement of the courts in his own brother's state (well, perhaps he has reason for that)...
Now, George has long since taken over the High and the Low Justice throughout the world; arresting and imprisoning people from various countries without allowing them recourse to courts of law. In some cases torturing and killing them. Not with his own hands, mind; rather using his employees in the CIA and the DOD as surrogates.
It's okay though - each and every such person is an evildoer, or at least a potential evildoer, and deserves his fate. Besides, George is following the instructions of his Father to destroy them all. Not his father; his Father.
Moving ahead; George is now assuming the Droit de Seigneur; the right to dispose of his subjects in any way he sees fit. Some might say this is all an attempt to divert attention from the deadly morass of Iraq. I favor the idea that it's an attempt to displace discussions of the brain-dead congress with discussions of the now (through no fault of her own) needlessly notorious brain-dead Terri Schiavo. In any event, let us hope George doesn't decide to exercise this droit in the more classical sense - it would make Lady Laura awfully angry.
It might make George's Dominatrix, Madam Condi, pretty happy, though.

Ready for a tin chapeau...

I'm starting to think I'm almost ready for a tinfoil chapeau.
I'm a "consumer of news" - I read newspapers, I listen to news radio, I watch news on teevee. I discuss the news, I write about the news; A news junkie, you might say.
But lately, the news just seems to leave me confused. I can't consume it at all. I can neither chew it nor swallow it. It's either a case of early senility or near-total cognitive dissonance. The latter, I hope. Though perhaps it's time to begin thinking of memory loss as my friend, rescuing me from too much toxic information.
Two weeks ago, I saw that supposedly mythical headline in the paper: Man Bites Dog. Yes. I checked. It wasn't April First. It was a Reuters byline; not a company known for extreme levity. And just today, a report, on page one, no less, about a Cambodian farmer who discovered he has a Holy Cow! (!) A witch saw the cow, fell down, and, upon recovering, told the farmer she saw the spirit of a Holy Cow from Thailand in his Holy Cow. However, and this is the really interesting part, the local governor said the farmer was wrong. "We had a Holy Cow around here just a few years ago - they don't show up again so soon."
What is one to think? Holy Dog, Man Bites Cow, Mad Cows... It's all too much for me.
Then, in what might seem a more normal kind of news, we see that South Korea is threatening action against Japan, because of some little rocky islets unfortunately situated between the two countries. Meanwhile, Japan is theatening action against --- North Korea! Apparently because North Korea is refusing to return the remains of Japanese citizens it abducted some decades ago. Not, mind you, because of the kidnapping; because Korea stubbornly refuses to return the right set of bones. Not wanting to be left out, North Korea is threatening to take action against, you guessed it, South Korea! Seemingly for holding war games. Which could not possibly be (and here I agree) to defend itself against anyone other than North Korea. Unless it's to "take action" against Japan.
A perfect triangle, though not in any sense a love triangle.
The United States, meanwhile, is threatening to take action against pretty much anybody and everybody. Mostly to stop them from doing things the United States already does better than they can do anyway. We hear concerns about China's massive military buildup. They've increased their military budget to thirty billion dollars. I suspect they're actually budgeting in renmimbi; but we'll use dollars for clarity. If clarity in such a thing is possible. At the same time, the US is increasing its military budget by thirty billion dollars.

Speaking of the US congress: What are they up to now? "Congress shall make the laws of the country." So I was taught in school. Just laws to govern a just society, one would presume. Though, historically, when the congress actually did create just laws it was pretty much an accidental confluence of parochial interest and the common welfare. But then I have become pretty cynical about the entire legislative process. Some would say I was born a cynic. Anyway: now the congress has decided it's terribly important to find out every least detail about the use of steroids by professional baseball players. Why? Who cares? What common good is served by this 'investigation'? If someone wants to trade his future health for a few years of enhanced physical performance, who am I to say he can't? Such tradeoffs have always taken place. In a classical simile - it's the choice of Achilles - who chose early death and eternal fame over a long and normal life. Not that I can think of any baseball player who is likely to win fame as eternal as Achilles. Except for the Babe. Ruthian is a word destined to remain in the language (I believe) as long as will Herculean. So why is congress investigating this miniscule issue? Because there is some significance to society? Because they are concerned about the health of baseball players? Because they want to preserve the purity of baseballers as role models? Because it's a tremendous photo opportunity? Gee; tough call.
Then there's the current topper: Tom DeLay talking about saving the 'life' of a brain dead woman. Now, I know some of you will say that Rep. DeLay knows more about brain death than most doctors, but I do not believe he has ever actually experienced it first hand, no matter how his actions seem to indicate that he has. Again, what is the national purpose served by congress butting into medical issues? Do you really trust your congressman more than you trust your doctor? Is that why when you feel sick you call your congressman? Or does your congressman make you feel sick?
Well, that's enough diatribe for one day.
Hope to be posting again soon.

I'm Shocked!

Shocked! To discover misfeasance in our government!

So now, it turns out, the government is going through a bunch of contortions (read: distortions) to make scientific studies/reports/opinions read the "right" way. I'm shocked! Shocked! To find out that such a thing would go on in this country!
We all like to think, I believe, that scientists and suchlike are selfless seekers after the truth. This definitely falls under the heading of "Good Idea; Too Bad It's Wrong"
Much as I'd like to attribute this to the current administration as yet-another-example of the perfidy of the president and his neo-con-neo-religio-cabinet-without-portfolio; this is not a new story.
Example: In or about 1994 (pretty sure it was '94, but I'm too lazy to look it up). National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) biologists were about to release a "Biological Opinion" regarding the impact of the Columbia River dams (18, count 'em 18!) on the river's salmon populations.




Long in the works, and containing the results of years of investigation and observation, the summary of the report concluded that yes, the dams did in fact have an impact on the salmon fisheries. Hardly a surprising result.

{A quote from a Pacific Northwest National Laboratory report:
"This is a fishery biologist's opportunity to provide specifications for use in turbine design," said Duane Neitzel, Pacific Northwest project manager. "Turbines are integral to the operation of hydroelectric dams, but they also can injure fish." Turbine passage can be considered one of the more fatal routes that fish take through hydroelectric dams. Mortality rates range from 4 to 20 percent, depending on factors such as type of turbine and type of fish.}

Also, not the result desired by the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA), or a number of other Columbia River Basin industries who faced some impacts of their own as a potential fallout from this report. Well. If you look at the report today, you will find the conclusion reads that the dams do not have an impact on the salmon fisheries; a conclusion so at odds with common sense, to say nothing of being in utter contradiction to the body of the report - some fifty years of observation and study that it beggars the imagination to understand how such a statement could be inserted.
Here's what happened.
The team of biologists studied the years of census data (salmon census, not people census), analyzed the data, built a model based on the data. Wrote the report, including the data and the analysis. Added a conclusion that said the dams did have an impact.
Sorry, not acceptable. Enter the political appointee. In this case, Western States Director of NMFS

Rollie Schmitten (The Honorable, as he liked to have himself referred to in many many many press releases). He returned the Opinion to the team of biologists. It ended up being a very simple fix, due to the wonders of modern word processing. No need to retype the document. Simply insert "not" between "do" and "have".
Now, this Rollie Schmitten (The Honorable) had previously been a lobbyist for Washington and Oregon lumber companies. He showed such promise in that job that he was hired by the government to represent the interest of the citizens, presumably all the citizens, not just the citizens who happened to own logging rights. The appointing authority?

Then-President Bill Clinton.
With the conclusion that the dams (18 dams!) had no impact on the salmon, the BPA was relieved of any need to further mitigate the effect of dam operations beyond the current operations. It also means that the area industries are, to a degree, inocculated from having to change the way they operate. The cities can continue to light their signs, the farmers can continue to take subsidized water, the aluminum refiners can continue to get cheap electricity. The salmon can continue to be ground into burger by the turbines.
Later that year, President Clinton promoted The Honorable Rollie Schmitten to National Director, National Marine Fisheries Service.
Well done, Rollie!
Oh: About the bioligists who wrote, and then changed the report. Why did they allow this to happen? Simple. They, like most of us, have a degree of economic self-interest. They like to eat pretty much on a regular basis. They have mortgages. They have children to school. They are subject to pressure applied by their employer (read blackmail).



Galileo caved; can you expect greater fortitude from a government employee, be he scientist or accountant or army general?

What About Justice?

Now that John Ashcroft has left the Department Formerly Known As Justice, Will new Attorney General Roberto (Burning Bamboo Sliver) Gonzalez free

Lady Justice from her winding sheet? Literally and figuratively? Did anyone on the Senate Judiciary Committee ask him this at his confirmation hearings? If so, who? If not, why?

Going Around

Well, the news is filled with stories and photos of Ellen MacArthur, who just completed a solo round-the-world sailing venture, in record time. Much less than 80 days.

This was not an easy thing to do. It takes a lot of determination, drive, whathaveyou, to be willing to go through the sleep deprivation, the sensory deprivation, the fear. I've been on the water for long periods, and it really isn't a good place to be alone.

Acknowledging all that, I have to say that I have always had a difficult time believing that operating machinery (a hi-tech speed-sailing-yacht, a Formula 1 or Indy car, hydrocarbon-belching dirt bike, etc.) can be classed as a sport. Seems more like a chore to me ---

As well, going in a circle seems non-productive to me. A Formula 1 race consists of cars made up to look like cigarette cartons starting at Point A, proceeding past Point A some number of times, and ending at ... Point A! The idea is to do this faster than the other cigarette cartons. I strongly believe that if I never left Point A to begin with, I would arrive there in very nearly zero elapsed time, thus easily winning the race. And saving a lot of energy in the bargain.

Ellen began some 70-odd days ago in Falmouth, and is today back in Falmouth. What has changed is, of course, that she is now a celebrity. This in spite of her horribly choreographed "spontaneous" victory dance. I can imagine her blushing when she views it on the to-be-often-repeated-on-BBC film clips. A celebrity! Is it at all possible that celebrity, rather than accomplishment, was her goal from the getgo? You think? There is today (probably always has been) a considerable human wish to be famous. Rich, too. Today, we are able to pursue celebrity far more easily than before. Wierd and wonderful TeeVee shows enable us to become famous overnight, in return merely for spending a few days in a box filled with scorpions, or somesuch heroic stupid endeavor. I guess, thinking about it, I'd really rather sail in a circle around the world than sit in a box full of scorpions. Or appear on a TeeVee show that encouraged such kinds of activity.

So, congratulations Dame Ellen! Hope the aftermath isn't too much of a letdown.

Governments Have Strange Rules (Part One of Many)

Last week I found I needed to fill out a few (well, quite a few) federal bureaucracy forms. The very best way to get such forms, here in Bangkok, is to go to the U.S. embassy. About 1/2 hour before it opens is a good time to queue up. So I got to the waiting room, the one for U.S. citizens, in good time. While I was waiting, a Buddhist monk came in.

This seemed a bit unusual. So, having not a lot else to do, I asked him if his appearance in the line to get into the citizens queue, instead of the Thai queue, caused any confusion at the front gate. A little, he agreed. He was at the embassy to renew his passport. This led to the question of just why a Thai Buddhist monk has a United States passport to begin with. Well, here's an interesting set of factoids. For those who believe that the U.S. has a lock on Strange Rules, you need to hear this. Once upon a time, this man went to the U.S.; Los Angeles in fact, to study at a monastery there. At completion of his studies (well, the study of a Buddhist monk is never complete, really) he was ordained in the order of that particular monastery. He stayed there, learning and teaching, for twenty-one years. All the while as a citizen of Thailand, with a Thai passport and a U.S. resident visa (the famous and treasured "Green Card"). When his order called him back to Thailand (watch carefully now), the Thai government swung into action. An interesting law in Thailand is that if you are a Buddhist monk, and you were ordained in a foreign monastery, you cannot be a Thai citizen! So, this monk was forced, by this peculiar circumstance, to become a U.S. citizen. Ahah! I love this symmetry. While the monk was once teaching in America as a Thai citizen with a U.S. visa, he is now teaching in Thailand as an American citizen with a Thai visa!
The reason for this particular law is clearly not easy to articulate. Logic clearly has nothing whatever to do with it. (likewise, logic has nothing to do whatsoever with the reason I had to be at the embassy, either). At a guess, this law is just a subparagraph of a rather byzantine set of laws that taken together form the Thai Citizenship Act. Under this act, there are a lot of people living in the Kingdom, some being members of groups that have lived in the land for many generations, who cannot become Thai citizens because they are not sufficiently 'Thai'. When some group is sufficiently persistent, they may get their status reviewed. One of the methods by which a member of one of these tribes may gain Thai citizenship is by passing a DNA test. I suppose if one has a Thai gene, it's pretty certain one deserves to be a citizen.
In any event, its quite clear that Thailand is completely up to date, and yields nothing in the way of bureaucratic tomfoolery to the United States.

The Clever President:

I was relaxing with a cup of tea the other day. Thinking that in these tumultuous times we need to look for help from any place we can find it, I decided to consult the leaves at the bottom of my cup.

Here is what they said (approximately):
George W. Bush (The President) is, contrary to common belief, really a very clever man. So clever that he has, in fact, created a new thing in American politics.
Since the office of Vice President became an elected office, rather than being awarded to the second-place finisher in the presidential sweepstakes, the candidates running for president have typically selected V.P running mates they hoped would help their own election chances. Afterwards, toward the end of their term of office, the presidents would try, in one way or another, to help their veeps advance to the top position. This requires a kind of makeover whereby someone who has spent years carrying out the presidential garbage is magically transformed into someone who looks presidential himself. This is a difficult thing to do - particularly if the president dislikes his v.p., or vice versa, as is usually the case.
President Bush has completely changed this paradigm (I apologize, but this much-abused word is sometimes the appropriate one). He (Bush) chose for his v.p. running mate a place-holder. Someone who is not going to be running in his turn for president, whether Dick Cheney realizes it or not. The v.p. is an excellent attack dog it is true, and much loved by a bellicose, perhaps even apocalyptic, segment of the population, but he really has not brought any voters to President Bush that Bush would not otherwise have had. He is thus, as I (or rather, my tea leaves) have said, a place-holder. A cypher. Nil. Nada. Nothing. {I loved writing that}
Here comes the cleverness.
When some member of the neo-con class emerges from that morass and assumes a presidential appearance, expect Dick Cheney to experience "A Cardiac Incident". This will cause him to decide to "Wish To Spend More Time With My Family And Loved Ones." He will, regretfully, offer his resignation. President Bush will, also regretfully, accept the tendered resignation. The President will, after a diligent search, turn up his already-determined successor.
The new Vice President will be:
1. Already presidential in appearance;
2. Unencubered by the negative baggage the office of Vice President always accumulates;
3. Able to avail himself of the opportunities the office affords in the awarding of patronage and consequent accumulation of political IOUs.
Thus, the V.P. will begin his presidential campaign against Candidate Hillary already looking presidential, and the GOP won't have to attempt a makeover.
Brilliant!
The one hitch, which of course the attentive reader will have already spotted, is finding that presidential-looking far-right Republican Stalwart. Looking back, it's pretty clear that President Bush has been previewing potential candidates right along. Unfortunately (or otherwise, depending on your viewpoint), they have all flopped.
The first, certainly, was Colin Powell. The man looks and sounds presidential all right, but his long and heretofore honored record shows him to be a reliable follower, but no leader. Fotrunately he knows this about himself and declines to pursue an office beyond his competence.
The next offering was, I think, Tom Ridge. President Bush made use of the otherwise useless office of Homeland Security forced upon him by Joseph Lieberman to present his friend Tom Ridge to the public. However, Gov. Ridge always appeard in public looking as if he was waiting for a Drop Drill to begin. He won the award for Most Uncomfortable Looking Personality On TV two years running and has now, blessedly, retired.
Senator Bill Frist was next, elevated before his time to Senate Majority Leader. A telegenic man, with truly wonderful credentials. A man of demonstrated intelligence, skill, humanity. The Senate, in no mood to be trifled with by a relative rookie, routinely savaged him until he retreated into the background. They may be trying to rehabilitate Sen. Frist by bringing him out once again to talk to us about the Indian Ocean Tsunami Disaster.
Arnold Schwarzenegger is today the obvious choice (you knew this was coming, didn't you?). There are some problems of course. The obvious one is that he can't legally be president. There is a comma in Section v. of Article II of the Constitution of the United States of America, put there by his enemies to prevent Alexander Hamilton from becoming president, that keeps Gov. Schwarzenegger ineligible. A Constitutional Amendment to make it legal for native Americans AND Austrian-born bodybuilders to be president would likely take too long in the tortuous pathways of Constitutional-Amendment-Passing to qualify him for 2008. He's also too easygoing on those un-American homosexuals and abortionists, as far as the hard-right-moral-rectitude-above-all GOP shadow leadership is concerned.
Porter Goss has just been trotted forth, and in Father Bush's old job, even! However, Spook-in-Chief Goss has almost immediately fallen into the -umm-... manure of the Augean stables that the national intelligence services have shown themselves to be. For a worse performance by an administrator, you'd have to look at the current resident of the White House himself.
The man Pres. Bush really would like for a successor is probably Brother Jeb Bush. And he certainly owes B.J. big-time. But he (Jeb) also fails the public appearance test. And besides, the dynastic appearance of candidate Jeb would just be too much - I think we'll have to wait for 2016 and George Prescott Bush for the next Bush presidency. By which time the Bush-Iraq war will have cost America, or rather the "Coalition of the Willing", more lives than Vietnam, possibly finally making Yet-Another-President-Bush problematic.
So, who is it to be?
Who will step up to the plate?
Who will take on Senator Hilary Clinton in 2008?
It's going to have to be someone who is abjectly sycophantic to the present administration, yet one who doesn't appear to be so. Who? Condoleeza Rice? Tommy Franks? Paul Wolfowitz? Don Rumsfeld? Anybody Else?
The field is wide open!
The tea leaves have spoken.

Happy 2005!

It's the first day of 2548 B.E. (that's 2005 C.E.). Sunshiny but cool (around 17 C) here in Bangkok.

A time to watch a surfeit of football, if you're in America. A time to reflect on the fragility of life, if you're in Southeast Asia. A time to make, or break, resolutions, anywhere at all. In the past I've made some pretty good resolutions. Resolutions that improved the quality of my life. Here are a few I feel safe in recommending:

Resolve to Greet the first person I meet each day with something like "Its a beautiful morning.", or "Its going to be a great day!" If you say this with conviction, its a definite possibility that it will be so. On the other hand, if you begin by saying something like "Today is really going to be hard.", or "Looks like bad weather today.", your day is absolutely certain to turn out as predicted. An odd sort of metaphysical effect. If you predict joy, you might be right. If you predict sorrow, you're certain to be right. Its as if you have a lot more negative power than positive power. Sort of like the situation with the current president. I've found doing this has improved my life greatly.

Resolve to stop having opinions about things I don't know anything about. This saved me huge amounts of time, both in not having to think up answers to questions I don't understand, and not having to defend my point of view in useless arguments. This is defintely the most effective and useful resolution I've ever made.

As you can readily see, I have long since lapsed in the application of both these resolutions.

Its a beautiful morning!
Have a happy new year.

Disasters!

The tsunami that hit nearby last week seems likely to end up causing more deaths even than the United States, or perhaps I should say the Coalition Forces, will manage in Iraq before they finally throw in the towel and depart. Hopefully sometime before the arrival of the next century.
In times of such large disasters (the tsunami, not the invasion of Iraq) a lot of people ask why. "Why is God doing this to me?" asks a Hindu woman in Tamil Nadu. "Its because of all the evil in the world" says a priest in England. "God likes to remind people of His power" replies a rabbi from the safety of his schul in Scandinavia. A much more intelligent rabbi (in my opinion), in Oregon, says God doesn't do things like this - go with the scientific explanation instead.
For the most part its easy to predict what some of our more prominent leaders will say. Here goes.
Pat Robertson: It's because of all the homosexuals and abortionists.
Osama bin Laden: It's because of all the Christians and Jews.
President Bush: It's because of Saddam Hussein.
Tony Blair: It's because people aren't listening to President Bush.
Colin Powell and Crown Prince (Jeb) Bush, the two special experts on disasters who are visiting the stricken area, will doubtlessly return a verdict of... WMD. It was WMD that caused the Indian Ocean Tsunami.

WMD - a term so bandied about that it is almost certain to become the punch line for an entire generation of bad jokes.
"Timmy is sick today; he has a fever and diharrea." "He probably ate too many WMD last night."
"The US economy unexpectedly shrank last month." "Economists blame it on an 18 per cent drop in consumer purchase of WMD."
"I lost my job, and can't find a new one." "That's probably because the WMD manufacturers are moving production overseas, to India, China and, of course, Iraq."

Merry Christmas

Writer's Block

End 'o year blues...

Well, once again I seem to have made myself too busy. I plead time'0'year. Also work stuff is occupying a lot of my time. Still, there are lots of interesting things going on in the world out there. Some need commenting on; most really don't. Here's one that doesn't, but I am going to comment anyway ---
Once again it appears that form is more important than substance, at least to the American public (sometimes referred to as the Boobocracy for obvious reasons). There is a loud public outcry over the discovery that Secdef Don Rumsfeld failed to actually, personally, in his own hand, sign the letters of condolence he has been sending to families of the soldiers who are dying in Iraq. No outcry over the fact that he sent them there to die! Just anguish over his lack of sufficient sincerity in condoling over the deaths he has caused! "Oh My Oh My", he might exclaim; "these liberals are getting awfully shirty for a group that can't even win an election." "You should just shut up", he might well further exclaim.
Am I to infer from this hullaballoo that it's okay for one to send people out to die for a pointless purposeless demonstration of raw military power, as long as one apologises sufficiently abjectly for doing so?
So it would seem; so it would seem.
Merry Christmas!

Voting For Moral Values

I've been seeing a lot of mention in the news that a huge number of people (20%?; 22%?; 25%?; 40%?) voted for Candidate Bush based on "moral values". Not sure what that means, but hey, polling questions are notoriously opaque.
Stunned Democrats everywhere, checking the sheep's innards, are calling this a sure sign of The End Of Civilization. This is nonsense. If you want a sign that Civilization As We Know It has ended, I ask you to note that at the same time the votes were being counted a music CD was being released under the title "Britney Spear's Greatest Hits". If this little manufact of MTV-meets-pedophilia can emit a product called greatest hits, we are certainly at the End Time.
In any event, having myself stared at the sheep's entrails, I've seen something quite different than the conventional wisdom. First, understand that someone's motive for an action, and the proclaimed motive, may be quite different. In this case (the election I mean, not BS's greatest hits), it seems likely to me that for many voters who cited moral considerations as the basis for their vote, the actual reason was simply that they didn't like John Kerry. Sory John - you're just not cuddly and lovable.
The encouraging thing about all this is that the voters who chose to disguise a bad motive with a good one were at least not so badly misguided as to claim that they voted for the incumbent based on his record on: the war on terror, the war on Iraq, taxes, the economy, the environment, education. They didn't claim to vote for Bush based on his intellectual reach.
On the down side, the number of voters who profess to believe that recognition of same-sex marriage will be more destructive of their own, personal, marriages than will divorce, which is far far more common than gay relationships, is a little disheartening. The boobocracy, as my favorite cynic labelled it, is alive and well, as ever.
But, Be Of Good Cheer, as my parents used to say. Democracy Is On The Move, the President has told us. I believe that when we have exported it all to the Middle East, and none is left for us here, the Middle East will generously return it to us - largely untouched.
Autocracy appears to be the governing principle of the moment. I'm hopeful that the autocrats, being fundamentally flawed, and destuctive in nature, will run out their welcome and be duly swapped out for a more progressive set of governors.
Hopefully in my lifetime.

Lets Appoint a Committee to Study It.

There's an old saying in rural America: You don't fatten a calf by weighing it. Similarly, you don't halt a species decline by counting its numbers. There is a ntable mania, worldwide it seems, among scientists to document the numbers and range of various species of animals. In 2000 for example, in San Francisco, the keynote speaker at the State of the (San Francisco) Bay conference noted that ninety per cent of the fish and other aquatic species in the bay were either in steep decline, or had disappeared entirely. Her proposal - "We need to get funding for projects to study this problem." Revealing, I believe, her principal aim. Money, to wit. If the good doctor (PhD; not a real doctor) gave a hoot about the problem, she would probably have suggested something else; like not diverting all the freshwater flows from the bay, or stemming the flow of industrial waste into the bay. These seem to me to be relatively modest and fairly obvious steps to take. We are hearing similar calls now at the meeting of the World Conservation Union, being held this week in Bangkok. At the same time that ministers in the Thai government are decrying the "waste" of water being allowed to flow into the sea instead of being diverted to dry areas (most of the nation at the moment) to grow rice for export. Exported at a price that makes middlemen rich while increasing the debt of the farmers who sell at a loss. Sorry, I digress again. To resume: However, it is well understood among scientists as well as politicians that a solved problem receives no funding. A study in the hand is far preferable to remediating action.
Thus we find, not to our surprose, that legions of "concerned scientists", possessed of mortgages, credit card debt, and an addiction to regular meals, display a marked tendency to wish to weigh the calf rather than to actually do the necessary things to fatten it.
Just to establish that I'm not totally cynical, I do acknowledge two things. One, that it is indeed important to study these isssues, which are not simple at all, and two, that there are a lot of people who are calling for action, and even some people who are simply acting.
Good for them!

Not the Great Satan After All...

I have thought for a while that the United States has been, not the Great Satan, but rather the Great Hypocrite. How has it come to make sense that the U.S.A., with its thousands of nuclear (pronounced nookyoular) weapons, and its huge stockpiles of chemical and biological agents, can tell North Korea such weaponry is forbidden to it? Especially considering the United States has used its weaponry (Hiroshima, Nagasaki), and sold it to others to use (Saddam Hussein, e.g., against Iran). If North Korea does this, its called "proliferation"; as in "Non-Proliferation Treaty". I guess when the U.S. does it, it's called self-defense or something.
But I've begun to see all this in a somewhat different light.
Consider: North Korea last invaded a foreign country (well, South Korea isn't really so foreign, really) in 1949. Since the armistice North Korea (henceforward to be referred to as DPRK) has devoted most of its efforts to oppressing its own citizens. And face it, a nuclear bomb is not really suited to that sort of thing. Too much collateral damage, to say nothing of the public relations nightmare! So, why then does DPRK believe it needs all this fancy hardware? Are they afraid the United States might attack them?
In that span of fifty five years, come to think of it, the United States has attacked approximately a dozen foreign countries, some of them more than once. I say approximately because I may have overlooked a banana republic or two. We invade those countries so frequently it's hard to remember if this invasion is new or merely a continuation of a previous attack. I also omit to mention the various coups instigated by the CIA. Overthrowing a foreign government we don't approve of and replacing it with a government we end up also not liking. Like Manuel Noriega, or Shah Reza Pahlavi.
With all this military activity, it's pretty easy to see the United States really does need more lethal weaponry than DPRK, or Iran, or, well, than anybody. Good thing we have all that stuff. Although President Eisenhower warned against it, his successor presidents fearlessly increased the "defense" budget 'til the United States now posesses more megatonnage than the rest of humanity combined. And as we have seen, the current president isn't afraid to use his military. In fact, in the new, 1984-ish, all-war-all-the-time environment it seems likely we will need to at least brandish our WMD, to make sure everybody understands our commitment to freedom and democracy. Demonsrated by frequent mouthing of the now-empty shibboleth "free and open elections".
In a sidebar, I really do feel obligated to note the self-referential irony of George W. Bush lecturing Vladimir Putin on the dangers of attempting to concentrate too much power in the presidency.
I sometimes wish I could just do cartoons, because words fail me; but I can visualize some wonderful pictures. Fortunately we are blessed with some puckish genius political cartoonists. Some of them have links here, over on the left side.

Tony Blair...

Is such a sniveler!
He is now complaining that "thousands of men are entering Iraq illegally to fight." Well, yes, Mr. Blair! You should know that very well. You sent thousands of them there yourself. Not a single one of those British soldiers has a valid Iraqi visa, I'll wager. The United Nations says they're in Iraq illegally. So now you're complaining that the people you sent your fellow countrymen to Iraq to fight --- are going to Iraq to fight your soldiers! Shouldn't you rejoice? Saves you the transportation costs to send your troops to the next country you're planning to bring democracy and freeedom to.

Or is it that you actually believed your Commander in Chief George W. Bush when he told you that Ahmad Chalabi's mythical friendly Iraqis would smile and bestrew your path with flowers? I notice you only began to complain when your troops were ordered away from their sinecure in the south and into the actual battle zone. Perhaps it's time to reflect on the down side of being America's Best Friend.

I haven't been posting for a few days...

because The People Have Spoken... And pretty much left me speechless. Not unlike many others I know. You know, it's kind of odd, but when the local citizens make comments regarding the mental (or emotional) characteristics of the Average American Voter - comments not unlike the ones I make - I get resentful. Why this should be, when I agree with them, is strange. Perhaps it's because I worry that they are including me in their evaluation of that Average American Voter. I wish to state here that while I may look like an Average American Voter, I am not, in fact, an Average American Voter. You'll just have to take my word for this.

Tomorrow is Veterans Day in the United States. Formerly Armistice Day. Memorializing the end of the Great War in 1918. An odd phrase, but I suppose politicians everywhere are in search of a great war to fight. Helps the resume, you know.
We celebrate Vets Day by listening to politicians extoll the excessive virtues of "those who served their country so nobly and so willingly". And not so willingly, if you remember the time when we still had a conscript army. I myself have not been able to discover any special nobility among those who served in the military. Like those who didn't spend time in uniform, the ex-military (and those now in the military) number among them saints and sinners, virtuous and, ummm, less-than-virtuous. Some of the worst people I've ever met I met while in the Navy. And some of the best, I suppose. I really wasn't paying much attention at the time. I just wanted out.
Except for November 11 one's veteranhood or lack of same is pretty much ignored by everyone. The only other occasion for singling out our wonderfully virtuous veterans is when the congress gets itself into a bidding war for their votes. Then various GI Bills and VA Bills get passed. After a while the funding for whatever program gets cut, and the veterans are returned to the pool of ornery citizens.
But on November 11, just for that one day, I, and millions like me, are extolled as being significantly better than the rest of you. Those who served are catered to by those who ducked out. I wonder if tomorrow George Bush and Dick Cheney will pay tribute to John Kerry?
On November 12 we can all go back to whatever passes for normal these days.

Some People Don't Like The President...

Some last minute thoughts before Big Tuesday:
In 2000, candidate Bush campaigned as "a uniter, not a divider." Since then, he has governed pretty much as a divider, not a uniter. Is this a flipflop? Or was candidate Bush lying? In either case, I think some of us kind of expected it to work out like this.
A lot of potential voters (as opposed to those who actually bother to vote) are distinctly anti-Bush. They're likely to vote more against the incumbent than for his opponent. Some hate the president for his policies. Some for his principles. Some for his disregard of their principles. For most though I think it's more that they're embarrassed that the president of their country is a putz, and they think it reflects badly on them personally. Kind of like being embarrassed to be seen in public with your wierd cousin (and, let's admit it, we all have one). You really should only be embarrassed if the wierd cousin is you.
In a try at lightening things up a little before D-Day, here's a copy of an online ad seeking a native English speaker for a school in north Thailand. Unfortunately, it ran sometime last year. Still, there may be an opening, so you might want to note the email address.
In case the wierd cousin gets re-elected...

Native English Speaker Needed
Info: Okay. Due to unreliable teachers leaving us in the lurch somewhat(they got better deals elsewhere) ,we desperately need two new teachers to fill positions for our outside primary school contracts.
Before I give you the all important details about the job, I need to get a few things straight. Firstly, the positions are at schools where the classes are large. One of the positions you will be dealing with around 25 semi-catholic rich fat kids, the other school has nearer 40 thin middle class Buddhist kids per class. Therefore, if you are not used to teaching this type of class then it might not be the job for you. For those who know what they are doing it's a breeze. Although we do have a short training program for people who are enthusiastic but dont have the experience. We have all the gear, flashcards and songs and activities and suchforth. For those used to teaching a hanful of kids in a small air con room these classes can be quite daunting. Right then, with that out of the way I will get down to some details. We need you to work from the 1st November until at least march. And if all is ship shape and Bristol fashion and you are happy then you will be offered a new contract for next year. Guaranteed. Our contracts include free medical insurance, work visa, end of year bonus, an extrememly friendly and informal atmosphere, a bloody nice boss by the name of khun lek, and a salary of 26,000 baht for 24 hours teaching a week. Since there is only around 4 months left until the end of the school year we cant offer you all these things. But we can offer you 28,000per month and a reduced bonus if you stay with us until march. It would be a good way to get your foot in the Chiang Mai door actually. It's allright up here. Pleeeeze, only people who are willing to stay and work until march apply. Officially you should have a degree and a Tefl, but to be honest we tend to overlook these requirements. If you have half a brain then that is enough. You can write to me and I will get back to you ASAP.
Date Added : 11th October
Job: full time - young learners
School: Nava Chiang Mai
Tel: N/A
CEmail: navachiangmai@yahoo.com

How not to handle a demonstration...

A long time ago, thirty-something years ago now, in the now fabled "Vietnam Era", There was a lot of unrest in America. People were demonstrating across the length and breadth of the oucntry. ALso from North to South and East to West. College campuses were esepcial hotbeds of this activity. In some places special police units were mobilized. In Berkeley we had the Alameda County swat teams, known as the "Blue Meanies". They were all really big and really intimidating. There was lots of tear gas in the air. There were also lots of bruises, and some broken bones. We were outraged at this. Of course, we were demonstrating because we were outraged in the first place.
In some places the National Guard was called out. One such place was Kent State University.
The result was a shocker. Also, in hindsight, fairly predictable. On May 4 1970, 4 students were shot to death, nine were wounded by concentrated fire from a squad of guardsmen. "A group of seventy National Guard troops advanced on the protesters with fixed bayonets in an attempt to disperse the crowd. The National Guardsmen were wearing gas masks in the hot sun (obscuring their vision and causing heat exhaustion) and had little training in riot control." This was caught live on television. The film is sometimes replayed today.
The newspapers next day all showed a picture of an anguished young woman kneeling over a very dead young man. With bloody hands. Won a Pulitzer, I think. Since then, Kent State has been the name of the event, not the school. If you want to talk about the school you have to say "Kent State; you know, where Kent State happened."
Last week there was a demonstration in the south of Thailand. In Thailand, as at Kent State, troops were called. Here, as there, people died. Predictably. Needlessly.

It's easy to understand why this should be if you just ask yourself "What are these troops trained to do?" If they're being trained for their proper job, they're being trained to kill. To go into combat against an enemy force and to kill the enemy. There couldn't possibly be a worse force to send to police a group of demonstrating citizens. Using military troops for crowd control is a hopelessly bad idea. Bad, Bad, Bad! They have no skills for the job, no training. Kills the civilian protestors and destroys the troops as far as ever being an effective force is concerned. Ask yourself what life has been like for the guardsmen who were at Kent State that day, and what it's like when they see themselves again and again on that film clip.
Next time (and there will be a lot of next times), call in the specially trained crowd control police unit. If you don't have one, create one. Today wouldn't be too soon to make a start.

"It's Not At All Certain..."?????

Dick Cheney
seems to parse reality differently than most of us. When he hears what he wants to hear, like 'intelligence' from the well known fabulist Ahmad Chalabi, nothing in the world is more certain. When he is told something he doesn't want to hear, like news of another military bumble in Iraq, like the failure to sequester a large store of explosives (at the very location he claims Saddam Hussein was "reconstituting his nuclear program"), this information is "not at all certain". Thinking about it, I suppose most of us practice this sort of denial to some degree. When it reaches this level, and the practitioner is so happy to share his deeply felt skepticism (read:fantasies) with the world, well, any total sociopath would be proud. I guess the only certain knowledge he possesses is the data that fits his preconceptions. Sort of todays version of "All The News That Fits, We Print". Anything he doesn't want to believe, well, it's just "not at all certain".
And then the Vice president calls John Kerry an "Armchair General"? Come on! This is the man who had "other priorities" when it came his time to serve in the military. Some of us think his other priority was to nestle deep in his armchair, where he was much less likely to get his ass shot off. Or become a victim of the ever popular "friendly fire".


Besides, Mr. Vice-Commander-In-Chief, the phrase is Armchair Admiral! You're in Pensacola! Pensacola's been a Navy town for longer than you've been a crooked politician! And that's a long long time...

I Could Use a Little Help Here...

Right now, especially with all these elections under way (assuming that most of them, at least, will in fact happen), there are just too many things going on. I'm overcome with, as the late great


Steve Allen once put it:

Too many answers are going unquestioned.

Here are some of the things I am hearing said, with precious little evidence being put forth in support of the assertions:

We Need Tax Cuts To Increase Employment...

This is a subset of 'Trickle-Down Economics'. Bush-wa. If money trickled down, there'd be a cycle where the rich would become poor, and the poor become rich. In fact (observably so), money trickles up. Except where it rushes up. Give the poor some money and they'll waste it on things like food and shelter, giving the money to the rich in the process.

The Economy Is Strong And Getting Stronger...

The same source, with the same lack of supporting evidence. The President appears to be positively phobic about facts, since he certainly never employs any to back his assertions. It's really quite spooky. I've known lots of people who happily demonstrate their ignorance, but never seen a successful politician ('til now) who does so.

Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions Would Hurt The Economy...

What do you suppose the increased energy in global weather is going to do to the economy? Four hurricanes in Florida. Ten (Ten!) typhoons in Japan. No harm to the economy there by God. Why would developing new technologies to change the way we interact with the environment be harmful to the economy? New technologies have always increased economic activity, though often at the cost of the environment, not to its benefit. New technolgies do, however, have a negative impact on obsolete businesses. The automobile was, as many have noted, a disaster to the buggywhip industry. Similarly, solar power might be bad for the oil industry. Bad for Saud. Dangerous stuff.

Foetal Stem Cells Have Never Cured Anybody...

Well, geez; before it was used, Jonas Salk's polio vaccine never worked, either. Why would anybody bother to do research on something that hasn't been proven to work?

Not the President this time, it's the First Lady who's parading her willful ignorance. Though, I'm ready to admit it's probably just to give cover to the First Husband. It's really hard for me to believe that someone who can walk and talk (albeit in Texas-speak) at the same time could be so obtuse.

Democracy Is On The Move...

It seems to me that the word Democracy has been employed to such an extent, and in so many inappropriate contexts, that it has now become little more than a shibboleth. It has come to mean nothing more than a government President Bush approves of. It is defined by an open public election, won by a candidate favored by the United States.

We're Winning The War In Iraq...

(alternate claim: We're Winning The War On Terror)...
Again, we certainly don't want to crowd out the message by including anything even resembling a fact here. Those dismal reports from the congressional investigating committee, the CIA, the FBI, an assortment of other three letter acronyms? Well, those reports were written by beaurocrats, you know, so you can pretty much disregard them.

The Largest Coalition In The History Of The World...

This one by Donald Rumsfeld. Noted historian. How far back does his memory go anyway? I guess not even as far back as 1991, and the first Gulf War. That was a century ago, after all. On the other hand, maybe he's talking about the coalition of Rumsfeld-Cheney-Rice-Ashcroft. Now that's an axis to be proud of. Or frightened of.

I forgot: I should probably include the enforcer; Tom DeLay here.



These, and many other subjects need questioners. Many many questioners. You can help! Send me your suggestions, comments, whatever. Just click on the email me... link. Hint, if you're using the Firefox browser, things like the pics in the posts and the sidebar links might or might not show up. If I knew anything about HTML, XML, Javascript, and the like, I'd try to do something about it. Or not. I do have another life, after all. Hope to hear from you at:

Email Franksmaunderings

Is this any way to treat your best friend?

What a thing to do to your best friend! Your ally. The ever maladroit George Bush

wants his best (perhaps only) friend Tony Blair,to send British troops into the war zone in Iraq.
Of course, Mr. Blair will acquiesce to President Bush's 'request'. He has no choice. He's finding out what it means to be an 'Ally of the United States'. The request may already have been 'approved' by the time I post this. To turn down the the request (to disobey the order, rather) will make it clear that when Mr. Blair says attacking Iraq was "Absolutely The Right Thing To Do", he was, to use a wonderful Briticism, being economical of the truth. Not being entirely candid, as some would say.

Karl Rove, the Presdent's evil genius, knows this very well. Knows that there is no real choice for the Prime Minister. He is required to demonstrate his fealty. But for President Bush to treat his staunchest ally in this manner is almost beyond belief. It's like making your girlfriend 'prove her love' for you. That's probably exactly the kind of act Mr. Blair feels he is being asked to submit to. Sending British troops into harms way, and putting them under U.S. command to top it all, will expose Mr. Blair to a full frontal attack in Parliament, and probably end his hopes for a third term. For all his political skills, and his likability, to be exposed openly as the sycophant of the highly unpopular president of the United States, will almost certainly cost him his majority.
Wonder what is going to happen to the rest of the 'coalition of the willing'? Will Poland, Italy, Japan, Korea, Thailand, et. al., be ready to recommit troops to a place where their good friend and ally, the United States, might at any time require them to prove their fealty in a similar way?
Wonder also what will happen if in spite of all, George Bush endures the same fate as his father? Mr. Blair, in addition to being exposed as nothing more than an avatar of America, will also be shown to be the backer of a loser.

GM Crops: To What Purpose?

GM: Genetically Modified. Applying genetic engineering techniques to add/modify the DNA of economically valuable plants or animals. Sometimes referred to as making Frankenfood.

There is a pretty vociferous debate going on these days about the pros and cons of GM foods. There are the proponents, who claim a moral imperative to feed the starving masses, and the antis, who claim that these hi-tech foods, or Frankenfoods, can be dangerous to your health. I disagree with both of these claims. Perhaps this is not the best stand to take, but please bear with me.
To begin, the likelihood that GM foods will prove dangerous to the consumer is, let's face it, fairly remote. The creators of these altered plants are pretty knowledgeable people, and their purpose is not to poison their customers, but to make money from them. It's hard to sell food to dead people. And the testing needed to show dietary safety of food that is really not so different from stuff that's been around for a long time isn't terribly difficult.
However, the promoters of such stuff are being disingenuous. They're trying hard to distract your attention from the man behind the curtain. There are other issues besides food safety. Issues that go far beyond food safety. Especially given that there is no shortage of food in the world today. There is, as always, an economic problem: poor people can't afford to buy food. When people of means take note, they send food off to the poor starving . When their attention wavers, the poor return to being poor, and continue to starve. Sorry - different subject.
About frankenfood; there are definitely other concerns than just safe nutrition.
How about the environmental problems? For the most part, GM plants are being designed with three goals in mind. Disease resistance, pest resistance, and herbicide resistance. Crops with such characteristics can be grown more successfully, where success is defined as the greatest yield of a single crop measured in Tonnes/Hectare. A field where nothing except the desired plants can survive, the ultimate in monoculture, is the most 'efficient' of farms. The result of this kind of farming is, however, not unlike the current situation where increased use of chemical fertilizer, pesticide, herbicide, have caused a tremendous increase in the level of contaminants in food, as well as degradation of watersheds and the environment that is dependent on uncontaminated water. Pursuers of this kind of efficiency are not unlike the landowner who dams the river flowing through his property, unconcerned with the damage to his downstream neighbors.
In the ultimate farm envisioned by these pioneers of GM cropping, the plants will unaided create a circle of death around themselves, destroying all other plants, destroying insects harmful, benign, and beneficial as well. Result: the farmland so used becomes infertile to any other crop except for this or another similarly engineered plant.
What does this mean in terms of economics? The farmer who has planted such a crop is now a client of the patentholder of the crop. The corporation now dictates the means and method of growing - and the price - of the seed, the fertilizer, the chemicals to be applied; the entire system from planting to harvesting. The farmer has just become a tenant, or sharecropper, on his own land! Of course, his crop yield will increase (probably). Ask any farmer or fisherman, or anyone at the bottom of the commodity production process. An increase in output goes hand in hand with a decrease in price. Grow more; sell for less. The profits are made by the people higher up the food chain. Of course, this is a description of the small family farm. Something that hardly exsists in North America. Agribusiness is the rule rather than the exception. Fields with but a single crop, as far as the eye can see. These businesses can deal quite well with GM crops. They grow them, take their price support money from the government, and invest it in the company that sells them the GM seed! Not a bad way to do business.
Not exactly related to the vision of Feeding The Starving Masses though, is it?
All the above is not at all an indictment of GM technology, nor of all applications of that technology. There is a lot of promise in genetic modification for creation of wonderful compounds for medical purposes. It seems to me that there's a very real possibility that genetic engineering can be used to help in environmental restoration as well. Perhaps to help corals and planktonic life adapt to the increased temperature of the oceans (yes, there is global warming, and no, I'm not blaming you in particular for it).
Using genetic engineering to search for new compounds, new biological entities, and new knowledge is a great idea. Even if it weren't, it's pointless to try to tell people to not know something they know. Sort of like telling them to forget how to make nuclear bombs, please!
Personally, I'd really rather not see plants, or animals, with odd assortments of genes from odd assortments of other life forms, set loose on a large-scale basis, with the near certainty of negative unforseen consequences. Those unforseen consequences that always seem to go along with any human endeavor.

Thinking about that conventional wisdom...

I just finished with my (almost) annual physical. Results: excellent. As the Dr. said, "You should thank god for your health. Worth more than money." A good thing too, because I have lots of good health (thank god), but not lots of money. Along with what they call a check-up here, I got a free breakfast. Free in the sense that it was included in the price of the examination. About two kilocalories of good old American style breakfast, only without the potatoes. Within minutes, I was hungry for more. It's probably going to take all day to walk that free breakfast off.
Got me to thinking about that old, conventional wisdom. "Breakfast is the most important meal of the day." "It gives you energy so you can do a good day's work." In keeping with this recieved wisdom, millions of Americans, and people worldwide, eat good hearty breakfasts, then get into their cars, drive to work, and sit at a desk for the rest of the day. Except for the lunchbreak, when they eat another good hearty meal. Go back to the desk and sit some more. What happens to all that energy you consumed to allow you to do a good day's work? Gets turned into fat, is what. So it will be available if you ever decide to do a good days work. Work in the sense of the world of physics. Work = Force X Distance; something like that. Exertion. Exercise. Etc. The kind of work most of us do not do in this post-industrial society except as a hobby.
I used to be a member of the Seattle downtown Y. A wonderful old 1914 vintage building, with classic but worn tile floors, a great basement natatorium, great gym facilities. Even had convertible squash/handball courts, you could reconfigure with a hand crank on the back wall. In the mens locker room there was a classic old balance type scale; also vintage 1914 I'm guessing. On the pedestal of the scale was an old ideal height/weight table. For me, the correct weight (it said) was around 215 lbs. I recall also that the table showed that a woman 5'6" should weigh around 145-150. Doctors today say those weights are too high, by about seventeen per cent. How come our ideal body sizes have changed? I don't think it's so much in response to the supermodel women in the fashion magazines. You know, the ones who look like one woman famines? I think it has more to do with weight trend than with actual weight. Today, the problem is to avoid gaining weight. Ninety years ago, the problem was more likely to avoid losing weight. That healthy five foot six woman who weighed one-forty-five was well nourished, and had the strength and stamina do do a day's (1914 day's) work. Before the advent of all the labor-saving devices, which aren't labor saving at all - they just shift the labor from actual labor to working longer hours at a desk to make the money to buy the devices - a work day involved physical activity. Laundry meant washing the clothes, not dropping them into a machine. If you wanted to eat some ice cream, you'd better figure on some serious cranking on the ice cream machine. Probably, you'd have to expend more calories making the desert than you'd get from eating it. So, the problem, if problem it was, was eating enough food to keep your weight up, rather than eating little enough food to keep your weight down. Calories were in short supply rather than too easily got.
Conclusion: If you're going out into the fields to pick, dig, hoe, plow, lift, carry, sweat and strain, eat a big ol' two thousand five hundred calorie stick-to-your-ribs breakfast; if you're going to sit at a computer (as I am doing at this very moment), eat a two hundred calorie breakfast. That's enough energy for sitting down. Or, if you're worrying about your weight compared to your height, find a scale with a hundred year old weight table...

Campaigning --- in Florida?

I see that Sen. Kerry has been campaigning in Florida.

That's really a shame. A waste of time and resources that could be put to better use elsewhere. As it stands, he has as much chance of getting an honest count in the State of Bush as Richard Nixon had of getting an honest count from Mayor Daly in Cook County in 1960. The fix is in. The Florida deck is so frozen the oranges are trying to flee north.
If the Senator wants to capture Florida's electors, he'd better be prepared to hire a ton of lawyers to file suit in every precinct in the state, asking to have the ballots sequestered for a total hand-and-eyeball recount.
Oops. Sorry. forgot, there are no ballots! If you really want, Senator, you can look at the computers we used for the count. Best we can do. At least, you know, we don't have any of those pesky chads this time!

Superman is dead...

Christopher Reeve died on Sunday. Too soon.
I admired Mr. Reeve. As I admire anyone willing to invest himself (or herself) so completely in carrying a message to those in need of hearing it. Whether they want to her it or not.
You were very eloquent. I'm sorry you didn't get to walk again. We will all miss you.

Waxing Poetic

As some of you know, I am currently teaching at a small university in Bangkok. English, yes. I'm trying to invent myself as a teacher at the moment. I hope I'm not sailing under false colors to too great a degree. Sometimes I like to show my students a picture, and ask them to write something about it. They're not very English-proficient, but they can be very poetic. Here are some recent examples:

"When I look at this picture. I feeling to the natural. It's beautiful so much. It's amazing in Thailand because the other nationalitys are rarely gives feel to green. It's for me when I don't happy time. It looking for my friend when I'm alone. I feeling want to live near river. I want to look out from confuse of the city. I want to live with my family, father, mother, sister and brother, It feels hapy for me. I hope it gives me to happy everytime."
Or this one:

The Chinese Old man likes fishing along the river. He loves to do it everyday because fishing is his hobby. He feels happy when he's waiting for the fish. Sometimes if he can get the big one, he will cook and eat it.
Sometimes he can't get anyone but he still sits and relaxs with the nature. The happiness in life is not the money, The true happiness in life is to do the thing that you like.

Couldn't have said it better myself - Miss Rossukol appears to be a sort of modern-day Thai Isaac Walton.

Irony Unleashed

I can only imagine that Charlie Rangel (Congressman from NYC) must be chuckling to himself. Last year he decided it would be educational for the nation to have a dialog about racial/social/economic equality. Or lack of same.

He chose aseemingly appropriate means to initiate the chat, by introducing a bill to reinstate the miltary draft in the congress. Seemed like a good idea at the time. Things have changed in this world of high technolgy. Warmaking is no longer for the cannon-fodder conscript. Warfighting requires highly trained, highly skilled, highly engaged professionals. Or highly angry, highly motivated, willing-to-die amateurs (guerillas, insurgents, whatever you care to call 'em).

Donald Rumsfeld
said as much in response to the draft proposal. I guess you could actually call it a draft draft proposal. Mr. Secretary Rumsfeld is right.
However; while warfighting is now the province of highly trained, etc.; if the United States is to pursue its present course, it will need a large army of occupying troops. As has been historically the case, these occupying forces have been the poorest and least effective troops the occupier has. The weakest of the conscript forces will suffice to patrol the streets of subject countries and shoot insurgents or others who anger them. So, irony of ironies, Rep. Rangel set out to raise a ruckus over the exemption of the privileged from doing the dirty work of war, and is now the author of a bill which will begin to enable the country to occupy any country that makes the mistake of offending our (easily offended) President.

On becoming reradicalized

I hate it, but it appears that I am being rapidly re-radicalized. Returned to the emotional state of my adolescenthood. It probably started when I joined an anti-war march in January of last year. Marching along Market (I think) in San Francisco, I found myself marching under a banner that said Berkeley Students Against the War. Remarkable! I mentioned to one of the banner-bearers that I'd marched under that same banner back in 1970, and that the only difference seemed to be that this time there wasn't (yet) any tear gas in the air.
I'd like to insert parenthetically here that among letters to the San Francisco Chronicle and other papers in the following days, there appeared to be a number of writers who accused the marchers around the country of being 'naive' for thinking they could stop the war. I responded by pointing out that for me, at least, I was simply establishing my right to say I told you so later, when the venture degenerated into the fiasco it has now become. I wish I'd said then that the naive ones, in my opinion, were those who thought there could be a successful conclusion to this cynical, hegemonic war. I always think of the good retorts too late to use them.
Now about that phrase so much in the news today:

Precision Bombing.
Precision bombing, along with Body Counts, Captured Enemy Documents and Hearts and Minds was a phrase coined back during the Vietnam war by DOD publicists to describe how we were winning that war. It belongs in the lexicon of war right up there with Collateral Damage as a misleading and obfuscatory way of sanitizing the death of unknown numbers of people.
Let's look at the precision we have achieved. In March 2003, the grand enterprise began with huge numbers of cruise missiles being fired at Iraq. Most of the missiles did, in fact hit their target (Iraq), but numbers of them also hit: Iran, Turkey, Syria, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia! Hundreds of the missiles completely missed a country the size of (we are often reminded) California! The DOD estimate finally was that approximately 80% of the cruise missiles hit their targets. This news tidbit was not greatly noticed, as at the time we were "winning" the war. Eighty per. cent. is actually not too bad for an obsolete system that we had to use up anyway, as the missiles were approaching their bar-coded "best used before" date. Honestly, our military "consumables" as they are euphemistically called, have expiration dates.
Of course,now that we control the skies of Iraq, we can target our, mmm, targets much more reliably. Especially if we venture close enough to use laser targeting. We can achieve absolute to-within-a-third-of-a-meter accuracy in hitting the XY coordinates of our goal. That's how we came to pinpoint the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade so exactly. Oops. Some of our targets seem to be cases mistaken identity. Must have something to do with military intelligence.
It's remarkable to me that there are so many people who believe that the government is completely inept when it comes to domestic issues, like making them pay taxes, while that same government is infallible in its judgements about killing people (other than themselves). Then there is the problem that, while one can strike at the predetermined X and Y exactly, it's not possible to know who will be at that location when the bomb goes off.

This isn't a novel. There are real people, children, noncombatants, people who just want to be left alone, who stubbornly insist on wandering into the bomb zone. When the DOD figures this one out, I want to know about it. I can't even imagine the feelings of people who hear the planes, see the planes, feel the explosions, and are completely powerless to prevent the death and destruction from occurring. My imagination says anger, rage, vengefulness. But that may be too mild a description of the way the people we are bringing freedom-and-democracy feel about us.

I wouldn't count on any future government of Iraq being friendly to the United States. Not unless we own it. How the perpetrators of this disaster ever thought they could re-create Iraq, and the middle east, is beyond me. Hey! It was a play you idiots! George Bernard Shaw wrote it as a comedy!

A Tip of the hat (or whatever)

A tip of the hat to the young lady in Strasbourg France who shaved her head!
Caught between the Scylla of her religious obligations and the Charybidis of the French law, she chose a third way. Rather than comply with one, but not both, of the competing forces, the young Muslim girl has found a way to be in compliance with both religious and secular rules. As a shave-pate, she displays no hair (very important, somehow, for observant Muslims), while not wearing a headscarf (very important, somehow, for the French gov't). With perhaps a touch of sarcasm, she has stepped outside the conflict. The message I get, and which I hope others get as well, is that both sides in this dispute have opted for form over substance, while ignoring the needs of the individuals involved. Rather than think of the needs of the collectivist institutions, religious and secular, perhaps it is time to turn our attention to the needs of the people, spiritual and educational.
Her solution is vastly superior to a suggestion I made to the French government a few months ago. Seeing that the law called for a ban on 'large crucifixes, skullcaps (yarmulke) and headscarfs', I proposed that the law should go on to define just what dimensions of the specified items ought to be. My opening suggestion was: crucifixes, no more than five cm in the long axis; yarmulke, no more than 5 cm in diameter; headscarves, no more than 10 cm square. Properly displayed, I believe these could all become popular fashion articles. In fact, if one were so disposed, one could wear all three simultaneously!
However, my suggestion went unheeded. Instead, we can hope to see large numbers of shaven heads in the schools of France in the near future. I hope the young ladies do not forget to apply sunblock to their scalps.
I wonder what the observant Jewish young men can come up with as clever as this?

And the winner is...

I managed to watch the Great Debate this morning (my time). The candidates belied the title (candidate). Candid they were not. They both remained on message, stubbornly so it seemed to me. Lots of lost opportunities to actually say something. That might well have caused coronary problems with the staff though, so it's probably best they just read from the prepared statements.

However, I was pleased at the performance of one person. I was cringing at the thought that I was going to have to witness Jim Lehrer struggling to be right-down-the-middle-to -the-second fair to both uncandidates. He far exceeded my expectations. He has grown so much since his previous outing in 2000 that I am tempted to either nominate him for an Emmy, or vote for him!
For the rest, it seems that there is much confusion between a 'war on terrorism' and a 'war on Iraq'. How the two have become confused is puzzling to me. Aside from the fact that the occupation of Iraq is creating large numbers of rank and file terrorist soldiers, that operation has as much to do with overcoming terrorism as Vietnam (sorry to bring it up) had to do with halting the spread of Communism. That is, it has nothing to do with it at all. However, I do believe I was wrong in January of 2003 in my belief that the President wouldn't be able to keep the electorate believing that things were going okay in Iraq. If he'd waited 'til 2004, maybe, but over 18 months, I thought the results would be pretty easy to see.
I guess I was wrong about that, too.