Posts from — February 2007

Driftglass is right: I am Spartacus.

I wouldn’t mind joining major media outlets and Nobel Prize winners on DonoWho’s enemies list, although the list does include the Left Behind books. I wonder if saying that I preferred the Latin mass is enough.

There is another issue to be considered aside from this hate-monger, and that is the character of candidates. Backing down, or even being conciliatory when faced with attacks by this weevil doesn’t bode well for a candidate’s ability to govern or judgment.

As Mustang Bobby of Bark Bark Woof Woof points out in The MauMauing of the Blogosphere, at least Amanda and Melissa can now defend themselves as the effluent from the settling pond that is DohoWho’s base flows in their direction. The small example that Culture Ghost provides is not exactly a testament to the education they presumably received at Catholic schools.

[Read more →]

On the local news they reported that four F-15C Eagle aircraft assigned the 33rd Fighter Wing at Eglin AFB will participate in a fly-over at the start of the Daytona 500 stock car race.

Who is paying for this, and are they paying for the entire cost of this 700 mile round trip?

This isn’t just a matter of jet fuel wasted with the resulting increase in greenhouse gases, but the cost of the crews that will fly, launch, and recover the aircraft on a Sunday during a three-day weekend, the wear and tear on the aircraft.

The only place Bill Donohue deserves to be seen is on a milk carton. The MSM continues its race to the bottom with the National Enquirer. I call it the Murdock effect: when a guy makes obscene amounts of money from tabloids and uses it to buy a media empire, he’s going to use the techniques that made him money. If he makes more money, all of the other media companies will copy the concept.

As Clif of Outside the Tent and American Street points out in Lies and the Lying Anti-Semites Who Tell Them, a minimum of checking would show the man isn’t much of a liar. But the MSM does no fact checking.

Trex at Fire Dog Lake demonstrates in Get Thee Behind Me, Demon Onion Dip!, the man attacks commercials.

Think Progress notes in Bill Donohue Defended Bush Catholic Outreach Staffer Who Was Outed As Sexual Predator, that if you are a male Catholic authority figure, you can expect Bill to be on your side, even if you are creep. This attitude has cost the Catholic Church millions in payments for lawsuits.

The media doesn’t mention any of this when they give Donohue access to the airwaves, nor do they address the real question: What gives William Donohue the right to speak for the Catholic Church, especially on matters of doctrine?

Update: I can’t believe that I forgot to include Echidne of the Snakes and her extensive research on Donohue’s enemies list.

Something other that Peter Pan or Great Value [WalMart store brand] peanut butter with lot numbers that begin 2111, unless they believe that salmonella is one of the required food groups.

They may also choose not to watch NASCAR unless they want to reward cheating. What a surprise, a bunch of G-d fearing, Shrubbery supporting, good ol’ boys are adding illegal chemicals to their fuel.

For those who know nothing about stock car racing, criminally and rule breaking are part of the mystique of a sport started by people who made their seed money by transporting moonshine.

[Slide One]

1. This is known to be a mosque.

[Slide Two – map of Iran]

2. This mosque is known to be in Iran.

[Slide Three – stock photo of Muslims praying]

3. Muslims are known to worship in mosques.

[Slide Four – stock photo of Moqtada al-Sadr]

4. Moqtada al-Sadr is known to be a Muslim.

[Slide Five – Iran map with MaS in label and arrow]

5. Moqtada al-Sadr is in Iran.

[February 18th is the last day of the Islamic month of Murharram which commemorates the martyrdom of Husayn, and during which the Koran forbids killing. Of course, the US forces in Iraq are prepared for all hell to break loose as the Madhi Army takes to the field again on the 19th, right?]

Well, the MSM rushed to report on the US seizing sniper rifles in Iraq that an Austrian company had sold to Iran. Too bad they didn’t think to ask the Austrian company about the report.

Agence France-Presse in Vienna reports ‘No Proof’ That Arms Found In Iraq Were Austrian: Weapons Firm

Austrian arms manufacturer Steyr-Mannlicher insisted Feb. 13 that there was no proof that sniper rifles recently seized by U.S. troops in Iraq were the same ones it had sold amid controversy to Iran in 2004.

“We have not been contacted by the Americans. Usually one would ask us to verify the origin of a weapon through its serial number, something that is not the case here,” Franz Holzschuh, the new owner of the more than 100-year-old weapons company, told AFP.

They are subject to being copied. The serial numbers would tell the tale, but no one from the US government checked them. So far, the media only has the word of unidentified US officials and has not seen the weapons, which are extremely exotic looking and very expensive. Your average Iraqi could live very well, for a very long time, selling a rifle that costs thousands of dollars when purchased legally.

There are a lot of less expensive sniper rifles available that are not as distinctive looking, nor as easy to trace as an HS50.

While you didn’t notice because the basic site was up, I’ve been dealing with some backend routing problems at my host.

I have learned that I should just wait, because every time I devised a work around, they had devised another that defeated mine. Sigh, I’m not patient when I want to rant.

Today on an NPR newsbreak there was a sound clip from the Shrubbery’s press conference:

“My job is to protect our troops, and when we find devices that are in that country that are hurting our troops, we’re going to do something about it, pure and simple.”

Let’s climb in the Wayback Machine and return to December 8, 2004 and a Q&A that the Secretary of Defense had with troops in Kuwait.

CNN reported:

One soldier, identified by The Associated Press as Army Spc. Thomas Wilson of the 278th Regimental Combat Team, a Tennessee National Guard outfit, asked Rumsfeld why more military combat vehicles were not reinforced for battle conditions.

“Why do we soldiers have to dig through local landfills for pieces of scrap metal and compromised ballistic glass to uparmor our vehicles?” Wilson asked.

Donald Rumsfeld responded with the immortal words:

“As you know, you have to go to war with the Army you have, not the Army you want…”

If the Shrubbery is so concerned with protecting the troops, why in February of 2007 is the Washington Post [via Lambert at Corrente] reporting that the troops still lack vehicle armor?

Virgo Tex at First Draft notes Al-Quaida #2 takes Bush’s inventory:

“Bush suffers from an addictive personality, and was an alcoholic. I don’t know his present condition … but the one who examines his personality finds that he is addicted to two other faults — lying and gambling,” al-Zawahri said in the audiotape.

While I realize that Sheikh Dr. Ayman Muhammad Rabaie al-Zawahiri has the academic and professional credentials to make these statements, I think that he should examine the ethics of long distance diagnosis. Just because Republican Senators and ringwing pundits do it, does not make it moral or ethical. Even murderous terrorists need standards.

Why are you being hustled by street vendors to buy sad and drooping former roses, vegetable matter that missed the cut for bouquets, or were too late to the hospital?

Blame Esther A. Howland (1828 – 1904) of Worcester, Massachusetts. Her guilt is writ large by the Greeting Card Association’s Esther Howland Award for a Greeting Card Visionary. She imported the concept to the US from Britain to bolster her father’s stationery store in 1847.

Of course, it wasn’t long before the stationers had infiltrated school boards and imposed the now mandatory exchange in the classroom to push the low end product of Asian children and prisoners and scar children for the rest of their lives.

Seeing the success of the card merchants, the confectioners jumped on board to fill the lull between Christmas and Easter with the benefit that the bulk of purchases would be made by desperate men with less sense of taste than a golden retriever. If the box was red, heart-shaped, and said chocolate, a man would buy it.

There were at least three Saint Valentines and all were martyrs, as they should have been for the trouble they’ve caused. None are the reason for the “holiday”, only the excuse. They lived at a time when life and men were short and brutal, so the romantic aura of the holiday is pure piffle. At least one was reportedly part of a draft dodging scheme during the Roman Empire, marrying people so that men with “other priorities” could avoid being deployed to foreign wars, bachelors being preferred for catapult fodder.

It is to be hoped that the individual who first wrote: “Roses are red, violets are blue” was eaten by rabid wolverines, or had hemorrhoids.

[Yes, this is the same as last year. You don’t think I’m going waste neurons on faux holidays. With the careful application of Liquid Paper you can re-use cards and sometimes get away with it – if you don’t send them to the people who sent them to you.]

While I have been engaged in a number of other things:

Andante of Collective Sigh has had a birthday;

Pissed Off Patricia of Morning Martini had her first blogiversary™;

Watertiger of Dependable Renegade had her second blogiversary™; and

Julia of Sisyphus Shrugged had her fifth blogiversary™.

First off, I was wrong about the Iranians not using English. Dave Bell, in comments, has found the export division of the Iranian arms industry that does indeed use English and provided a link to their export 81mm Mortar Round which is the bomb on the right. The “CTG M43A1” tells Dave what he needs to know before he drops it on the tube.

Dave then demonstrates a knowledge of mortars, noting that the round is designed for a WWII M-1 81mm mortar and talks about why the markings are important.

Talking Points Memo provides the PowerPoint slides from the Baghdad briefing which is the source of the picture of the 81mm Mortar Round on the left.

[Aside: this is why it is important to have comments, so others with specific knowledge can clear up questions, and it isn’t painful to admit you were wrong about something.]

As Dave points out, there isn’t enough information on the mortar bomb the Americans displayed. I would point out that it is printed on the bottom and lacks the clear contrast of the Iranian bomb. Oh, the American exhibit uses a serif font, while the Iranians apparently use sans serif. [Hey, if it was good enough to get a CBS news team fired and net a “blogger of the year” for the wingers, I might as well go for it.]

Regarding the RPG-7 munitions in the American exhibit, the Iranian site doesn’t list the ordnance in their catalog, although they sell the launcher. The labeling “P.G.7-AT-1” and “LOT:5-31-2006” don’t seem military, there’s too much punctuation. The round pictured is generally labeled “PG-7V” and requires a launch charge to be useful.

You have to wonder if the reason this was done in Baghdad was because of the US law against the government spreading propaganda and misinformation in the United States. It didn’t convince the Chairman of the Joints Chiefs, so why should anyone else buy this?

For whatever reason the proprietor of Bark Bark Woof Woof has tagged my dismal effort as a blog that makes him think. This is may be a result of so many years spent writing in Russian, or writing official reports, which makes my syntax “unusual.”

The participation rules are simple:

1. If, and only if, you get tagged, write a post with links to 5 blogs that make you think,
2. Link to this post so that people can easily find the exact origin of the meme,
3. Optional: Proudly display the ‘Thinking Blogger Award’ with a link to the post that you wrote

While “I don’t need no theenking blogger award,” I’m including it for completeness [and the cheap joke].

I believe everyone on my blogroll makes me think, but five people who lead me to stories I might not otherwise notice would be:

Andante of Collective Sigh
Michael of Musing’s musings
Karen of Peripetia
Jams of Poor Mouth
Ellroon of Rants from the Rookery

They are free to post or no, based on their own inclinations.

Just so no one misunderstands my position about the Middle East. The governments and political entities of all types from the Arabian Sea to the Mediterranean are a bunch of murderous, misogynist bastards, without regard to their proclaimed religious affiliations. I don’t want to hang out with any of these people, and wouldn’t trust them with a nickel.

I’m not talking about the ordinary people, who have almost no voice in what happens, but their political “leaders” who all think violence isn’t simply the best solution, but the only solution. They all work on the basest level of human feelings to find justification for their atrocities. They all deal in hatred and death.

All of these people support murder as a matter of policy, and participate with money, weapons, and training to increase the pool of assassins. The Sunni officials support Sunni killers, the Shi’ia officials support Shi’ia killers, the Jewish officials support Jewish killers, and Christian officials support Christian killers. From time to time they will all support the killers of another faith to assist the murder of people they don’t like. Violent death is the official policy of the entire crowd.

The only reasonable course of action for the United States is to get out and stay out of the area. We should be spending our wealth on weaning ourselves from the only thing we currently need from the area, oil. We should have learned from the Oil Embargo that we cannot depend on Middle Eastern oil being available. The area has never been stable, and there isn’t much hope that stability is on the horizon. We have wasted years and hundreds of billions of dollars with nothing except death and destruction to show for it.

Force is not the answer, and until someone in the area figures that out, there is no point in engaging with any of them beyond normal diplomatic relations. We need to reduce their importance in our lives, because they have no reason to wish us well. A curse on all of their houses.