Counting You Out, Like a Mathematician

Conditions: Sunny and warm.


The Same, But Different.

While we wait for General Petraeus's report on Iraq, President Bush is still trying to get people to see things his way. His latest move: comparing Iraq to Vietnam.

On Wednesday in Kansas City, Missouri, Bush will tell members of the Veterans of Foreign Wars that "then, as now, people argued that the real problem was America's presence and that if we would just withdraw, the killing would end," according to speech excerpts released Tuesday by the White House.

"Three decades later, there is a legitimate debate about how we got into the Vietnam War and how we left," Bush will say.

"Whatever your position in that debate, one unmistakable legacy of Vietnam is that the price of America's withdrawal was paid by millions of innocent citizens, whose agonies would add to our vocabulary new terms like 'boat people,' 're-education camps' and 'killing fields,' " the president will say.

The president will also make the argument that withdrawing from Vietnam emboldened today's terrorists by compromising U.S. credibility, citing a quote from al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden that the American people would rise against the Iraq war the same way they rose against the war in Vietnam, according to the excerpts.
- Cnn.com

You know, this is both enormously frustrating, and possibly holding elements of truth. Both were wars that didn't actually need to be fought, and both have turned into quagmires, and both did/will likely descend into even more chaos if and when the American forces pull out. Also, "the terrorists" have to be seeing this as a big black eye to the Americans anyway.

A recent CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll found that almost two-thirds of Americans -- 64 percent -- now oppose the Iraq war, and 72 percent say that even if Petraeus reports progress, it won't change their opinion.

The poll also found a great deal of skepticism about the report; 53 percent said they do not trust Petraeus to give an accurate assessment of the situation in Iraq.

Well, whatever happens I'm sure Bush can rely on Karl Rove to.... Oh No!!



The More Things Are Changed...

So, with the constant rain of death and destruction unleashed upon Iraq every day, is the American mission to bring democracy to the Arabs under any strain at all? Well, yes.

Nightmarish political realities in Baghdad are prompting American officials to curb their vision for democracy in Iraq. Instead, the officials now say they are willing to settle for a government that functions and can bring security.

A workable democratic and sovereign government in Iraq was one of the Bush administration's stated goals of the war.

But for the first time, exasperated front-line U.S. generals talk openly of non-democratic governmental alternatives, and while the two top U.S. officials in Iraq still talk about preserving the country's nascent democratic institutions, they say their ambitions aren't as "lofty" as they once had been.

"Democratic institutions are not necessarily the way ahead in the long-term future," said Brig. Gen. John "Mick" Bednarek, part of Task Force Lightning in Diyala province, one of the war's major battlegrounds.

The comments reflect a practicality common among Western diplomats and officials trying to win hearts and minds in the Middle East and other non-Western countries where democracy isn't a tradition. - Cnn.com

So. We attack Iraq, destroy the government, execute the military strongman, get enveloped in a quagmire, destroy the infrastructure, and then ...appoint another military strongman in order to get out!!! I think I need to lie down for a bit.


Insurgents Have The Power in Iraq, Literally.

And how's the rebuilding phase of the American invasion going, you ask? Swimmingly, if you're an insurgent.

BAGHDAD, Aug. 22 — Armed groups increasingly control the antiquated switching stations that channel electricity around Iraq, the electricity minister said Wednesday.

That is dividing the national grid into fiefs that, he said, often refuse to share electricity generated locally with Baghdad and other power-starved areas in the center of Iraq.

The development adds to existing electricity problems in Baghdad, which has been struggling to provide power for more than a few hours a day because insurgents regularly blow up the towers that carry power lines into the city.

The government lost the ability to control the grid centrally after the American-led invasion in 2003, when looters destroyed electrical dispatch centers, the minister, Karim Wahid, said in a news briefing attended also by United States military officials.
- NYTimes.com

You know, when the military can't even sort out the power stations, let alone anything else, it's a bit more than just a black eye. I mean, when did the actual war end, like a few months at most after it started, and still the electricity is off for most of the time?



Iraq War, by the Soldiers.

A poignant article here at the New York Times, authored by a bunch of actively serving soldiers. I've heard that apparently one of these authors, shortly after writing this piece, was killed by an insurgent.



Calm Like A Bomb.

In a move to make airport security even more paranoid, indifferent and Orwellian, a new tactic is being employed: people. People who are "specially trained", and look for body language and facial expressions that indicate a terrorist amongst the crowd. Sigh.

The watcher could be the attendant who hands you the tray for your laptop or the one standing behind the ticket-checker. Or the one next to the curbside baggage attendant.

They're called Behavior Detection Officers, and they're part of several recent security upgrades, Transportation Security Administrator Kip Hawley told an aviation industry group in Washington last month. He described them as "a wonderful tool to be able to identify and do risk management prior to somebody coming into the airport or approaching the crowded checkpoint."
[...]

At the heart of the new screening system is a theory that when people try to conceal their emotions, they reveal their feelings in flashes that Ekman, a pioneer in the field, calls "micro-expressions." Fear and disgust are the key ones, he said, because they're associated with deception.

Behavior detection officers work in pairs. Typically, one officer sizes up passengers openly while the other seems to be performing a routine security duty. A passenger who arouses suspicion, whether by micro-expressions, social interaction or body language gets subtle but more serious scrutiny.

A behavior specialist may decide to move in to help the suspicious passenger recover belongings that have passed through the baggage X-ray. Or he may ask where the traveler's going. If more alarms go off, officers will "refer" the person to law enforcement officials for further questioning.
- mcclatchydc.com

Gee, people at an airport showing sings of tension, fear, stress, disgust or anger? Unheard of! Everyone knows airports are the most calmest places on earth, where everyone is happy and everything is perfectly fine. And clean. I think we can safely get rid of the metal detectors and guard dogs. Simply looking at peoples faces is a far better and fairer way of figuring out who's carrying a bomb, or a spatula.

...Imbeciles.



In Soviet Russia, You Screw System.

The governor of Ulyanovsk, a region about 550 miles east of Moscow, has decreed September 12th to be a day of procreation, with couples being given the day off work and urged to go home and procreate. With each other.

Russia, with one-seventh of Earth's land surface, has just 141.4 million citizens, making it one of the most sparsely settled countries in the world. With a low birth rate and a high death rate, the population has been shrinking since the early 1990s.

In his state-of-the-nation address last year, President Vladimir Putin called the demographic crisis the most acute problem facing Russia and announced a broad effort to boost Russia's birth rate, including cash incentives to families that have more than one child.

Ulyanovsk Gov. Sergei Morozov has added an element of fun to the national campaign.

The 2007 grand prize went to Irina and Andrei Kartuzov, who received a UAZ-Patriot, a sport utility vehicle. Other contestants won video cameras, TVs, refrigerators and washing machines.
- Denverpost.com

I'm not convinced. Do we really need more people, or just take better care of the ones we have? I realise we all have a certain tax burden that would become worse with less people to lift it, but surely the examples of Angelina Jolie and Madonna show us that if it's kids you want, you don't have to wait 9 months to get them. This is the nineties, you can get them already broken in!



Summer Slate Season Scoreboard.

So, who's the winner of the summer movie blockbuster financial tally?

# Title Gross to Date Listed Budget

1 Spider-Man 3 $336,436,184 $258,000,000
2 Shrek the Third $321,012,359 $160,000,000
3 Pirates3 $307,592,347 $300,000,000
4 Transformers $303,719,648 $150,000,000
5 Harry Potter $273,600,922 $150,000,000

- Chud.com

So, the answer apparently is Spidey 3. Unless you base it on budgets and net profit. One thing's for sure, I know who the losers are of the 07 Summer movie season.

And I suspect you do too.



Google Now Wants The Universe, Too.

Google, authors of the popular online map feature Google Earth, have now turned their servers upwards in search of more things to photomap.

Yesterday it announced a new service which allows computer users to tour space and watch the stars from the comfort of their living rooms. Google Sky, developed with some of the world's leading observatories, lets surfers tour a virtual cosmos at will.

The service is an add-on to Google Earth, the virtual geography program which lets users access a computerised 3D map of the planet. Surfers who download the new Sky application will be able to look to the heavens from any point on Earth.

The service allows them to zoom through more than 200m galaxies and take a detailed tour around 100m individual solar systems. "You can flip up and see the constellations and search for stars, galaxies, nebulae and fly through space inside Google Earth," said Google spokesman Jason Chuck.
- The Guardian

While this is probably a cool idea, I worry that storing these types of things on servers may give industrialists more room to light-pollute us away from our earth-based telescopes. I mean, why squint through an eyepiece into a sky full of cloud and blackness when you can relax in front of the big screen and look at pretty (but static) pictures?


Globe Of Death. And Light.

I have many nightmare scenarios, bad things that could suddenly occur in normal situations, and one of them concerns light bulbs. Light bulbs are globes of glass, and in order to put one in it's socket it's necessary to exert force on the glass with one's fingers. A long held fear of mine is that the glass could break under the pressure and sever a finger.

But that's impossible, right? The glass is stronger than normal glass, treated so that it couldn't possibly break. Well guess what happened yesterday? I'm screwing in one of these new large light bulbs, and I give it a final twist to make sure it's tight, and it literally explodes in my hand. Pieces of razor sharp glass everywhere. My finger was gashed and everything. Totally nuts. I don't know whether to retreat to my armored bunker, or buy a lottery ticket.


Line Up.

Here's a treat, it's a graphic showing all known bodies in the solar system greater than 200 miles wide. No points for guessing the top ten, but the smaller asteroids are interesting.

Wheeeeee.

Film review: Breach

So, what do you do when you want to tell the true story of an American Double Agent who worked at the highest levels of the FBI, was selling secrets to the Russians for decades, but everything he did is classified? Well apparently, you simply focus on the last few days of the investigation, and treat the lead character as a total blank wall. If it does nothing else, Breach teaches us that if you can't tell the truth then at least make up a really interesting lie, instead of just spending a few hours going "Um."

There's no shortage of talent here, either. The actors and actresses are all top notch (even Ryan Phillipe), and the setting is very realistic. Unfortunately, it's also very dull (though in a realistic way). I'm not being shallow. A good spy film doesn't have to have car chases and shootouts on grimy rain-soaked streets, I would have accepted a dramatic spy film, with the focus on what the spy is doing to try and stay ahead of the feds, and the strain it takes on him and his family, but we don't even get that. Instead, Chris Cooper portrays a man who says one thing and (according to the feds), apparently does something else. Ryan plays a form of cat and mouse with the guy as a new secretary who's actually spying on the spy himself. But it's all a bit undercooked.

I mean, why would a staunchly patriotic church-going Republican FBI career man start selling secrets (some of which almost certainly got people killed) to the Russians? It's the primary question one would ask of this film, and it's the glaring omission that this movie runs aground upon. They either can't or don't want to explain why, or they don't know. Either reason is unacceptable, and essentially makes the whole film a waste of time. Half a bug out of Five.




End Transmission.