Anniversary days - 11 September 2008

Let me say to start - I absolutely love service outages with my provider. They make it so very much fun to try and do anything at all with the Internet. They keep me from finding parodies of the Iocaine scene from the Princess Bride. They stop me from learning about a printing error that left words insufficiently black-barred in a Frank Miller Batman comic, confirming that the writing has no worries about the use of four-letter words. Some part of me thinks it would probably be better to leave the dialogue unbarred and market accordingly. There are enough older comic book readers that it wouldn’t be too bad of a sales hit, I’m sure. They prevent me from admiring someone cooking a six foot pizza on their smoker grill. Seriously. They suck! Also, did you know Target has hired Domo-kun as their Halloween mascot?

Beyond that, for Americans, and for those of other countries that wish to observe, today marks the seventh anniversary of the 11 September terror attack. Which means, of course, that the American media is going to mention it in every other word. As Mr. Olbermann put it last night, it's become 9/11(TM). So, let the parade begin. Awful art, museum designs, music videos of how it's been since the Concept War started, how it's affected the NYPD (and the expenditures ongoing to secure the site of the rebuilding),

And it will be a topic of opinions. Daniel Henninger uses it, and the subsequent War On a Concept, to express a faux confusion about why the Democrats oppose the current administrator's anti-terror policies, when they were so enthusiastically supportive of them in the beginning stages of the Concept War. Ann Coulter speaks glowing praise for the current administrator because no further attacks from foreign terrorists have happened in the intervening time, choosing to believe that the absence of an attack is proof that the anti-attack measures are working. It is an inexact measure, because it’s not like we can keep statistics on “unsuccessful attacks v. total number of attacks, planned or executed”. And really, when fight a Concept War, taking a look at the big picture is usually a better metric of success. If we do that, as greyweirdo and bradhicks have done, we find that it's been regress instead of progress, and things have gotten worse and more expensive since the beginning of the Concept War, without much to show for benefits. Although, in the comments, bradhicks notes that really, we won the Concept War when we smashed Afghanistan. All the rest has been extra.

Elsewhere in the world, The Pentagon admits that their current Afghanistan strategy isn't working. Which means it’s only a matter of time before we see a “surge” there, perhaps with the troops that are going to be drawn down from Iraq’s “surge”... except we still haven’t taken all the troops poured in for the surge out yet. Tactics are suppsedly shifting in the hunt for Osama bin Laden, though. al-Qaeda denounces the Iraqi leadership... so what else is new? Apparently, though, investors feel Iraq is safe enough to start sending in capital. The United States is now impatiently demanding that Russia remove troops from Georgia and honor the cease-fire agreement totally, and the Greens get into the debates in Canada. Oh, and Saudi Arabia has left OPEC, apparently not agreeing to the idea of production cuts (so as to squeeze certain markets?).

In the domestic sphere, the top six Episcopal bishops in California have expressed their opposition to Proposition Eight, a ballot initiative aiming to overturn the Supreme Court of California's decision to permit homosexual marraiges in the state. Considering how many waves the American Episcopals are generating within the Anglican Commmunion, this is definitley in character, and a good reminder, especially in the current political climate, that not everyone who claims Christ as their Savior also believes that homosexuals should be denied things granted to heterosexuals.

Candidates McCain and Palin took time out to meet a family with a Down Syndrome, which at least indicates consistency of message - if you’re giong to mention that the child you have has Down and you’re okay, and they’re okay, then the “shake hands, kiss babies” part suggests that you should meet some families who also have Down Syndrome kids. I’m not being cynical about this, even if the tone sounds like it. Glenn Greenwald predicted when Palin would go on TV for interviews, even as he smacks the mainstream media around for not being an effective and adversarial press corps dedicated to rooting out the lies and propaganda. At Obsidian Wings, an opinion as to whether the McCAin candidacy can be counted on to do things like enforce basic wage laws, so that managers aren’t required to illegally report less hours than are worked by the subordinates and the subordinates get paid the minimum wage at minimum.

John Kelso describes the "small-town values" that Governor Palin doesn't talk about, many of which are absolutely true. This leads Liberal Seagull to wonder why a more careful vetting wasn't done - after all, just asking he town's residents would have generated at least as much dirt as the MSM and the blogosphere has. Rebecca Traister talks about how strange it is that feminists find themselves afraid of a the possibility of a woman in the Vice Presidency, but because of the way that Governor Palin is achieving, her stated positions, and how Palin presents an alternate-world feminism where the strong women are still playing within the confines of the men’s rules, it’s become a weird nightmare scenario. Perhaps most depressingly, and also potentially most accurately, Adam Greenfield hypothesizes that the reason Americans like Palin, are mesmerized by her, and will probably vote for the Republicans is because most of America is afraid of the future and what the future brings. It’s not future shock, it’s future terror, seeing the world and technology and life rush by at such a quick pace, and not diving in to embrace, but trying to hold back and cling, not seeing the great things that are down the river.

In Governor Palin’s defense, Janet Albrechtsen opines that Governor Palin's popularity and selection is irritating to foreign audiences because she's rabidly pro-America, instead of the fashionable elitist anti-American that she paints Senator Obama and the rest of the world as. Camille Paglia sees Governor Palin as a new type of pro-life feminist, seeing feminism as a big tent that can acommodate both the pro-life and the pro-choice, advising liberals and Democrats to cool down on her views, unless she tries to make them and their religious justifications the law of the land. It does generate a bit of a twinge in the eye to read that Palin supports life for all, even in the cases of rape, though. And Turd Blossom opines that Senator Obama can't win a fight against Governor Palin, so he should focus on beating John McCain. Some part of me snarkily believes that Senator Obama has already beaten Senator McCain, or that Senator McCain was running a campaign that would make it easy for him to be beaten. That Governor Palin seems to be providing drive and life to an otherwise dead campaign would mean the crosshairs focus on her a bit. Plus, with as much as I’ve already seen about people praying for the McCain ticket to succeed and then for McCain to give way to Palin, it’s probably not unwise to keep up the fact-checking on both of their statements, so that if both turn out to be fibbers, truth-stretchers, unfit for the office, and low-blow fighters, apparently interested in making it easier for children to be molested, that can be exposed to the eyes of the populace.

David Rivkin, Jr. and Lee Casey make the point that in the upcoming election, judiial selection will be important, and although they believe that Senator McCain’s picks will be superior because they will interpret the law as written, rather than as intended, and leave the matters of law- and policymaking to the other two branches, the point is well taken. In addition to the Commander-in-Chief role, the President, with the advice and consent of the Senate, makes appointments to high judicial offices. The more people think that there will be vacancies on the bench, the more the candidate’s opinions on judicial matters counts. (Not to say it it’s unimportant when there are no likely vacancies - sh*t happens, after all.)

Were the election of the American president up to the world, Senator Obama would cruise to victory. Of the sixty percent that had a preference, anyway. Or, as theweaselking found as an exaggeration of the story: the map, for the record. Only one country on that map that’s too close to call.

Our science department finds Ten Little-Known but Beautiful Lemurs, a town designed in the shape of a star crystal (at least I think that’s an accurate description. Anyone with a more accurate description is welcome to comment), more on the LHC tests, e-mail as the work-killing distraction, a good reason not to trust the computers too much with investing, and a wireless sensor device that records quite a bit about oneself, making it easy to make comparisons .

Last for tonight, SideTaker, a website that lets couples in dispute upload their sides anonymously and then lets the Internt vote on who's right. In other words, the court of public opinion, writ rather large. Plus, Dalek Cell Phone Call Alert Charms. For those who like the Doc, give a spin to Chronotron, where one must think ahead to future time loops to permit a robot to retrieve a time circuit, and to avoid a paradox that would prevent all copies of oneself from returning to the time pod. I’m sure such a game would be no problem to the person driving around a solar car that looks rather UFO-like.

Weekend, ho! - 12 September 2008

Fair warning - reports claiming contact with ET life are hiding trojan horses. Besides, if we haven’t already heard about the plans to destroy the planet for an interstellar bypass by now, I’m afraid there’s no changing the decision. So, instead, enjoy some illustrations of ET, mechanical lifeforms, and their spacecraft. And one of a world that is apparently all women and one man.

Internationally, Venezuela has severely pulled back on diplomatic ties with the United States, recalling their ambassador and giving notice to the U.S. to pull theirs out, accusing the U.S. ambassador of participating in government-overthrow protests and attacks. Vlad Putin says the West shouldn't engage in a new Cold War, advising against a new arms race, and Pakistan is threatening to shut off support for the Concept War because of deaths from American/NATO attacks in the tribal region between the two countries.

Confirmed: Kim Jong-Il has suffered a stroke and is recovering well.

An artist known for his off-beat scultupres will have some works displayed in the palace at Versailles, permitting such things as a giant balloon dog to be on the floor with the scultures of French kings. Naurally, some art critics are disgusted by this, others bemused, and the person who arranged the exhibit says that it’s his job to keep the place vibrant. Hope nobody comes in with pins.

In the domestic sphere, big hurricane, meet Texas. So good a storm, this one is, that the authorities are saying “Flee or die!”, basically. Because of Texas’s proximity to Mexico, immigration officials are doing their best to reassure immigrants that there will be no credential checking at evacuation points, but it may not be working, which could lead to people trying to wait out the storm in a shelter and dying rather than have to deal with even the potential of ICE. Liberal Seagull discusses the greater polarization of "immigration" as an issue that will be reduced to sound bites instead of complex thoughts, playing up the fear that illegal immigrants will drain resources without contributing back and dismissing solutions like guest worker programs or ways of applying for legal citizenship, even if one has entered the country illegally.

Roger Ebert takes a hit after trying to get a fellow film critic to move a bit - being unable to speak, he tried to rely on tapping the shoulder, but the person doing the striking, New York Post critic Lou Lemenick, apparently was shouting “Don’t touch me!” every time Ebert asked. Ebert himself gives his account, and feels that it's been blown out of proportion, and that there’s no further incident or animosity from the matter. It’s probably going to end up on a Trivial Pursuit card somewhere.

Talking candidates, considering that it’s only had a few years to develop, I wouldn’t be all that surprised that Governor Palin isn't up on the latest Doctrine Lingo, even if it is supposedly named after the current administrator. I would have probably frozen on it, too. What will likely be taken out of it, though, is the Governor's willingness to commit to war, including nuclear war with Russia, assuming she’s really serious about using Article 5 as written. There’s also the rest of the interview with Charlie Gibson, including that she’s open to the possibility that humans contribute to climate change, and that she thinks the current administrator has done a fine job in ridding the world of Islamic extremists and terrorists, and other positions that have differences from Senator McCain. She’s also someone who believes Iraq and 9/11 are linked, long after that theory was crushed for lack of evidence.

In opinions, Michel Chossudovsky describes the Concept War as an Americanized version of the Inquisition, where Muslims are the witches put up to hide the terroritorial and resource-grabbing conquests and ambitions of the Inquisitors and to keep the populace afraid of demanding that the Inquisition be stopped. Those who dissent outside the accepted form are branded as heretics and conspiracy nuts, and those marked as witches (and quite possibly soem of the heretics) are subjected to possible torture and tried in secret courts where the standard of justice and evidence is much laxer than the normal courts. The cure, according to Chossudovsky, is to go to the root of the Concept War and decry it as illegitimate, unseat those who insist on continuing the Inquisition, and expose the truth of the matter.

Bruce Levine takes the amtter further in supposing that the entirety of American society has gone insane, and that psychiatry, fundamentalist religion, and Scientology are all competing for the most people they can by selling them the idea that they are the problem and need to adjust, and then selling them the things, be it counseling, e-meters, or the collection plate, that will keep them feeling adjusted and normal and a sane individual in the society. The maladjusted may be just fine, and it’s us who need to change. If you’ve ever felt like the only sane person in an insane world, this idea might appeal pretty strongly.

Brent Bozell III basically accuses MSNBC of being a shill network for Obama, with Messers. Matthews and Olbermann and Ms. Maddow looking for any way they can to denigrate the Republicans, under the context of the network deciding to move Messers. Olbemann and Matthews off anchoring campaign coverage, and Mr. Olbermann’s contained fury at the RNC’s decision to show footage of the towers juxtaposed with things like the Iranian revolution, all as a backdrop to Senator McCain and his candidacy. Y’know, making political points out of what was rightly named a tragedy and all that. Bozell also believes that the MSNBC crowd is ruining what little credibility NBC had as a news organization, and that those men and women on their shows are “blabby, childish embarrassments to journalism”. I wonder if he feels the same way about the Fox News crowds and their conservative bent, and if he would willingly call someone like Bill’O or Rush Limbaugh the same things he used for the MSNBC group.

Candidate opinions have a few bits - Ken Blackwell with several of Senator Oabma's apparent inexplicable changes-of-heart, bringing up the standard list of “Flip-flop” talking points - bills for which the Senator supported one version, opposed another (supposedly identical) version, his asociations with Ayers and Wright, and his position on the Iraq invasion, for which Blackwell says all of the Senator’s followers claim that the Senator has always been that way.

Victor Davis Hanson talks Palin popularity in relation to an older feminism that's about equality, not necessarily politically liberal in nature. He also needles those who are feminist champions who got to their influential positions through marriages or good fathers, accusing them of being hypocrites, while Governor Palin worked her way up the ladder indeepndently. This looks to be the standard conservative response to “Governor Palin is so not a feminist” - "Well, according to our definition, she is, and our definition doesn’t have or need any of those pesky things like the choice of raising or terminating. You're all jealous that a beautiful woman who's a devout Christian, a conservative, and supermom is going to be Vice President, when you couldn't even nominate your feminist candidate for President." Except, as Anna Qundlen remarks, it took all the efforts of the feminists before Governor Palin to give her the opportunity to get where she is... and the Republicans have done a supremely fast about-face on a lot of the issues they were harping on as evils not too long ago, while continuing to harp on things that they still consider evil, and trying to hide behind the “sexism” cloud when people actually inquire as to why anyone would want to vote for Governor Palin based on her strengths, outlook, and experience, and, well, treat her like one of the guys.

In science and technologies, Phoenix photographs and measures Martian dust devils, a concept timepiece that sits on and blends with the thumbnail, a hypothesis that humans can see some wavelengths with the skin, an open call for precognitive dreamers from the Arlington Institute, a wireless power transmission demonstration, which can then supposedly be used to beam down power from satellites, more information about how humans navigate, nano-size "cargo ships" that can skirt the immune response and deliver targeted drugs to tumors, deep brain stimulation to ease depression, and building roofs with solar power in mind.

And then there are people committing suicide over the vanishingly small possibility that the LHC will, in fact, rend the fabric of the universe asunder and cause all our untimely deaths.

Getting special mention here at the end, because it’s a pretty hacktastic job, Brian Alexander on the mainstreaming of the adult aspects of otaku culture. His otaku definition leaves much to be desired, and he’s so intent on making the point that anime/maga fans are all about the “moral-free zone”, where genders are bent or disappear, the good/evil right/wrong dualities vanish, and “sexually suggestive or expicit anime” like Gurren Lagann (obviously didn’t get past the point that one of the female characters has boy shorts and a bikini top to actually watch and pay attention to it) is the popular stuff. (And really, putting Gurren Lagann and Legend of the Overfiend together? Hell-o? Coming-of-age story with giant mecha and tentacle hentai together? Argh.)

At least he points out that otaku, while imaginative to the point of boundary-shattering and doing things in comic mediums that would not be legal (or physically possible, at present moment) in reality, are not the kind of people who will be pedos. This looks very much like a hatchet job trying to reinforce the “All Japanese comics are pornos, come close to pornos, or have some weird sexual thing going on” bunk. I’d send that article back for a rewrite, this time from someone who actually understands the culture he’s writing about, and has spent some time understanding how much like other fans the otaku are. Their source material is just less shy about showing sexual things off (sometimes gratuitously). It’s not an exact comparison, but there may be mileage to be had out of the fetishization of violence in our programming (with look-but-don’t touch kinds of sexual teasing), and the interest/fetishization of sexuality in the Japanese material, including a willingness to show and touch a bit before cutting away to the next morning. And besides, we have our own phallic monuments in the West (this one acually needs some rechalking, if you want to volunteer).

Although, it might very well be that this is not the worst hacktic presented. The Jezzies give us a methodologically-suspect study that claims mothers are mostly responsible for the screw-ups of their child. It’s based on self-reporting, and doesn’t look to control for anything. So, perhaps because of greater time, memory, or other factors, mothers end up being more “toxic” than dads do, based on the recollections of the study participants. I think we may have a winner for biggest hack of the night.

I think, however, that with my patience, I have found a winner for tonight’s Worst Person award. Namely, a sign poster who believes that Senator Obama is not only inhuman, but is cut from less-than-pure cloth. Yes, that’s right, in trying to propogate quite a few smears against Senator Obama, including his mixed racial heritage and the tired “Obama is a Muslim” slander as well, someone planted a sign in their yard saying, and we quote, “Obama: Half-Breed Muslin”.