And one for the road.
May. 23rd, 2008 05:54 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
silveradeptEverybody have a good long weekend. Happy Defenestration of Prague Day today, remember to wear your towel on Sunday, and take a moment or two on Monday to think about the horrors of war and what it does to those who serve, whether the cause was noble and just or not.
Happy thoughts before the rest - After being dead, with no pulse, nor brain waves, cooled down and then warmed back up, with no heart function and nothing helping but a ventilator, a comatose patient woke up and started talking. To me, it almost sounds like the doctors figured out a way of rebooting the brain and body. If that were the case, it would be quite a medical advancement to be able to replicate the process.
A laugh in the international section, although NSFW - Olbermann covered it, but it was pixelated, this one isn't... Gary Kasparov's political meeting is interrupted by a flying penis. To which he makes a few jokes about the opposition and moves on.
And then something that is no laughing matter - 11 people were burned to death as a mob went from house to house, seizing and killing those who they suspected were witches and wizards. Scapegoating in such a manner only kills people. Soon enough, there will be more witches and wizards when things don't improve. It's frustrating at times to watch this happen, because the world has done this shtick before in other places. And like the bits in our pasts, the affected were women by almost a three-to-one margin.
Isn't it always nice to know what the United States government is doing in our names? Torture and abuse of both children and adults, using a method that doesn't work to try and get information. Shouldn't we be trying the people who ordered these things?
Larry Elder thinks that historians writing off the Bush administration as "a failure" are premature and not reading all the facts. Iraq will continue to be a disputed point among both sides. Claiming that there hasn't been an attack since 2001? The absence of proof is not proof of absence. AIDS work and the supposed drop in the popularity of Muslim extremism may have nothing to do at all with Mr. Bush, and a lot to do with people worldwide seeing what happens when extremists have too much of a hold in one's country. And claiming that the U.S. isn't alienating others because the current crop of European leaders is friendly to the U.S. means squat. It means that the U.S. hasn't done anything stupid to alienate the leaders in Europe lately.
Those who led the country into the Iraq war still believe Iraq had the capability to produce WMD on short notice. Finding nothing is an error, not a lie, according to the author of a new memoir, who also says that all the doomsday-type scenarios were considered before making the decision. Elsewhere, the Congress is once again accused of "holding the troops hostage" because it did not swiftly pass a supplemental war funding bill and loaded it with domestic spending programs. Which sets us up for a showdown where it looks like Congress will stand firm on something, and then give way at the very last because they don't want to give the opposition any ammunition for "weakness" on security issues. Especially around Memorial Day, where anyone can give a rah-rah for the troops and request more spending be done on the implements of war. I'm more sympathetic to Victor Davis Hanson, who hopes that the right colonels, the ones who understand counterinsurgency, are promoted to brigadier general rank, honoring their successes on the field. I'm of two minds about Thomas Donnelly and Frederick W. Kagan's call to further increase the size of the military and modernize the troops, noting that the troops are already stretched thin as it is, so more bodies would be helpful, but also noting that being spread out so thinly might be taken as advice to the United States to contract its operations worldwide, where possible. Considering the climate, I don't know - perhaps the appeal will be made to those most likely to join up while serious consideration is made on which missions actually should continue. I'd rather see health insurance than guns and bombs, myself.
The Texas Supreme Court has said the raid on the FLDS compound was not done according to law or correct procedure, not accepting the argument that the beliefs held and actions practiced by the compound was sufficiently abusive and harmful to warrant all the children being removed. Lacking more specific evidence and proof of abuse, the state is likely to lose their case and be required to send all the children back to the compound.
There is some good news, however - the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has reinstated a lawsuit on the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy, which requires the dismissal of any service person who is openly homosexual or found to be practicing homosexuality. The appeals court has finally decided that the government must show why dismissing homosexuals is necessary for morale and cohesion reasons, and that dismissal is the appropriate step to take. The policy has not yet changed, but it will be good to force the government to prove, on the record, and before a judge, why their policy is good.
Getting into the opinion columns, Chris Wren welcomes the arrival of expensive oil, believing that as the pressure mounts, alternatives will develop rapidly thanks to ingenuity and necessity.
The FunSmith lauds the continuing work of researchers challenging the claims that children play too many video games, and that the games are turning children into amoral killers. As with most things, such simple and bold assertions aren't true, mostly because we have evidence that not everyone who plays video games goes out on shooting rampages. Besides, if people wanted to kill brain cells, there's always reading fashion magazines that have detailed descriptions of how to take a shower.
Fred Thompson assures his fellow conservatives that sticking to their guns will result in success for themselves and for the country. Conservatism works well when nothing's wrong, sure, but at the point where problems develop, continuing to do things in a conservative manner is not often the correct solution. Not just because conservatism sometimes causes the problems, but because it often resists necessary change all the way up to the point where it is inevitable that this change must happen. Not to say that conservatism and tradition don't have their place - they keep us from flitting about at every new thing and trying to do too much. In the same way taht I wish the conservatives would get with the program on necessary changes, they probably wish I would slow down, wait, and do some thinking on some of my flights of fancy. Such is politics.
In our science (SCIENCE!) section, perhaps perspective is everything - astronauts returning to earth report experiencing a sense of oneness with the Universe. Nowhere else do they get the ability to see the entire world and its interactions, so I think the perspective probably helps some.
Our art department offers up Spanish 1950's science-fiction covers as appeasement and trying to tie into some of the perspectives gathered from space travel.
Thinking deep thoughts about extramarital affairs and having other partners in non-poly relationships, Aaron Ben-Zeév suggests that affairs and problems start when one person in the relationship feels they deserve more, or feel that they don't deserve the relationship they have. The "feeling one deserves more" makes sense, but I never thought that someone who feels they got something better than what they deserve would consider affairs as well.
Last for tonight, a different sort of perspective - thanks to the Internet Medieval Sourcebook, we have managed to preserve and bring forward into the Internet age the questioning of John Ryekener, the only document (so far) regarding legal proceedings against someone who cross-dressed and engaged in homosexual sex. With priests, no less. So how long has this priestly need for sex been going on, then?
That's all for today. See you all again sometime soon. Have fun.
Happy thoughts before the rest - After being dead, with no pulse, nor brain waves, cooled down and then warmed back up, with no heart function and nothing helping but a ventilator, a comatose patient woke up and started talking. To me, it almost sounds like the doctors figured out a way of rebooting the brain and body. If that were the case, it would be quite a medical advancement to be able to replicate the process.
A laugh in the international section, although NSFW - Olbermann covered it, but it was pixelated, this one isn't... Gary Kasparov's political meeting is interrupted by a flying penis. To which he makes a few jokes about the opposition and moves on.
And then something that is no laughing matter - 11 people were burned to death as a mob went from house to house, seizing and killing those who they suspected were witches and wizards. Scapegoating in such a manner only kills people. Soon enough, there will be more witches and wizards when things don't improve. It's frustrating at times to watch this happen, because the world has done this shtick before in other places. And like the bits in our pasts, the affected were women by almost a three-to-one margin.
Isn't it always nice to know what the United States government is doing in our names? Torture and abuse of both children and adults, using a method that doesn't work to try and get information. Shouldn't we be trying the people who ordered these things?
Larry Elder thinks that historians writing off the Bush administration as "a failure" are premature and not reading all the facts. Iraq will continue to be a disputed point among both sides. Claiming that there hasn't been an attack since 2001? The absence of proof is not proof of absence. AIDS work and the supposed drop in the popularity of Muslim extremism may have nothing to do at all with Mr. Bush, and a lot to do with people worldwide seeing what happens when extremists have too much of a hold in one's country. And claiming that the U.S. isn't alienating others because the current crop of European leaders is friendly to the U.S. means squat. It means that the U.S. hasn't done anything stupid to alienate the leaders in Europe lately.
Those who led the country into the Iraq war still believe Iraq had the capability to produce WMD on short notice. Finding nothing is an error, not a lie, according to the author of a new memoir, who also says that all the doomsday-type scenarios were considered before making the decision. Elsewhere, the Congress is once again accused of "holding the troops hostage" because it did not swiftly pass a supplemental war funding bill and loaded it with domestic spending programs. Which sets us up for a showdown where it looks like Congress will stand firm on something, and then give way at the very last because they don't want to give the opposition any ammunition for "weakness" on security issues. Especially around Memorial Day, where anyone can give a rah-rah for the troops and request more spending be done on the implements of war. I'm more sympathetic to Victor Davis Hanson, who hopes that the right colonels, the ones who understand counterinsurgency, are promoted to brigadier general rank, honoring their successes on the field. I'm of two minds about Thomas Donnelly and Frederick W. Kagan's call to further increase the size of the military and modernize the troops, noting that the troops are already stretched thin as it is, so more bodies would be helpful, but also noting that being spread out so thinly might be taken as advice to the United States to contract its operations worldwide, where possible. Considering the climate, I don't know - perhaps the appeal will be made to those most likely to join up while serious consideration is made on which missions actually should continue. I'd rather see health insurance than guns and bombs, myself.
The Texas Supreme Court has said the raid on the FLDS compound was not done according to law or correct procedure, not accepting the argument that the beliefs held and actions practiced by the compound was sufficiently abusive and harmful to warrant all the children being removed. Lacking more specific evidence and proof of abuse, the state is likely to lose their case and be required to send all the children back to the compound.
There is some good news, however - the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has reinstated a lawsuit on the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy, which requires the dismissal of any service person who is openly homosexual or found to be practicing homosexuality. The appeals court has finally decided that the government must show why dismissing homosexuals is necessary for morale and cohesion reasons, and that dismissal is the appropriate step to take. The policy has not yet changed, but it will be good to force the government to prove, on the record, and before a judge, why their policy is good.
Getting into the opinion columns, Chris Wren welcomes the arrival of expensive oil, believing that as the pressure mounts, alternatives will develop rapidly thanks to ingenuity and necessity.
The FunSmith lauds the continuing work of researchers challenging the claims that children play too many video games, and that the games are turning children into amoral killers. As with most things, such simple and bold assertions aren't true, mostly because we have evidence that not everyone who plays video games goes out on shooting rampages. Besides, if people wanted to kill brain cells, there's always reading fashion magazines that have detailed descriptions of how to take a shower.
Fred Thompson assures his fellow conservatives that sticking to their guns will result in success for themselves and for the country. Conservatism works well when nothing's wrong, sure, but at the point where problems develop, continuing to do things in a conservative manner is not often the correct solution. Not just because conservatism sometimes causes the problems, but because it often resists necessary change all the way up to the point where it is inevitable that this change must happen. Not to say that conservatism and tradition don't have their place - they keep us from flitting about at every new thing and trying to do too much. In the same way taht I wish the conservatives would get with the program on necessary changes, they probably wish I would slow down, wait, and do some thinking on some of my flights of fancy. Such is politics.
In our science (SCIENCE!) section, perhaps perspective is everything - astronauts returning to earth report experiencing a sense of oneness with the Universe. Nowhere else do they get the ability to see the entire world and its interactions, so I think the perspective probably helps some.
Our art department offers up Spanish 1950's science-fiction covers as appeasement and trying to tie into some of the perspectives gathered from space travel.
Thinking deep thoughts about extramarital affairs and having other partners in non-poly relationships, Aaron Ben-Zeév suggests that affairs and problems start when one person in the relationship feels they deserve more, or feel that they don't deserve the relationship they have. The "feeling one deserves more" makes sense, but I never thought that someone who feels they got something better than what they deserve would consider affairs as well.
Last for tonight, a different sort of perspective - thanks to the Internet Medieval Sourcebook, we have managed to preserve and bring forward into the Internet age the questioning of John Ryekener, the only document (so far) regarding legal proceedings against someone who cross-dressed and engaged in homosexual sex. With priests, no less. So how long has this priestly need for sex been going on, then?
That's all for today. See you all again sometime soon. Have fun.
no subject
Date: 2008-05-27 05:20 pm (UTC)