Posts from — January 2009

The BBC takes a look at the question: Gaza conflict: Who is a civilian?

If you accept the Israeli definition of a “combatant” and apply it to the Israeli population, the only civilians are those below 18 or members of certain religious groups, because everyone else does national service.

This is how Israel can claim that civilian casualties are only 25% of total casualties, by playing Six Degrees of Separation with the population to “prove” they are all Hamas terrorists. Of course, they can’t show you any proof of their claims because that would reveal sources and methods.

It is Twelfth Night and the party is just about over. It’s the night of the last of the celebrating and time to take down the Christmas decorations.

Via Danger Room, some media outlets are trying to use the available tools for reporting.

Al Jazeera has set up a site, War on Gaza that is attempting to integrate input from people on the scene with a map to give an up-to-date view of what is going on. Cell service is still functioning to a limited extent and people are sending text messages to Al Jazeera reporting what they can see.

The Israelis aren’t going to like this, and there will be jamming activities shortly, if they don’t just cut off all Internet connections. Of course that cable cut between Egypt and Europe was just an accident.

The Pensacola News Journal says that Florida House Speaker Ray Sansom announced that he has resigned his job with Northwest Florida State College [OWCC, who are they kidding] because of the controversy over “possible” conflict of interest.

It would have been better if Ray had resigned from the House, because the job will probably still be there at the end of his term, and everyone already assumes that he’s compromised. The Panhandle will get short shrift in the legislature because of Ray’s problems, and we have been ignored for years because the Republicans take the area for granted.

Too bad Ray couldn’t have sold out for something the area needed, rather than the empire building at OW.

What if the Second Coming has already occurred and no one noticed?

Hezbollah was formed as a response to the Israeli occupation of Lebanon. Hamas was formed as a response to the Israeli occupation of Gaza and the West Bank. Isn’t that a hint?

The standard football field or pitch with both teams and the referee on it has about the same population density as Gaza. How do you do anything separately from your neighbors, and doesn’t dropping bombs guarantee civilian deaths, given the standard blast radius?

Did you know that according to the UN official registration, two-thirds of the inhabitants of Gaza, a million people, are refugees … from Israel?

Since January 3^rd [or 4^th, depending on your time zone] in 2004 the rover, Spirit, has been tracking through the dust of Mars. Designed for a 90-day mission, Spirit and its sibling, Opportunity, have been chugging along showing us and telling us things about out neighbor.

There was a time when we knew how to do things, but we are losing the skills.

CNN is reporting that Israeli ground troops are entering Gaza, having prepared the way with artillery fire and bombing mosques.

Given that all of the rocket fire has been coming from the South end of Gaza, does anyone else think it’s strange that the Israelis are entering from the North. If you are trying to stop the rocket attacks, why not go after the locations the rockets are coming from? So far the only people who don’t seem to be targeted are those firing rockets.

I was going to write something about the end of the first week of the Israeli insanity, but EBW at Wampum saved me the effort by writing A minor problem of (political) targeting.

One thing he didn’t write about was why Hamas won the election that the Shrubbery demanded the Palestinians hold. The answer is simple: corruption.

The Fatah party was as corrupt as Tammany Hall under Boss Tweed. If it weren’t for Israel, they would probably be the most corrupt party in the Middle East. [Did you forget that Olmert has resigned to spend more time with his defense attorneys; that the President of Israel was replaced for inappropriate behavior; Sharon’s problems?]

Hamas was providing the social services that the Palestinian Authority under Fatah was being paid to provide, but wasn’t. When they entered the voting booths in a monitored free and fair election that Fatah couldn’t rig, Palestinians threw the bums out. With Fatah controlling everything, it was impossible to gauge how truly ticked off the Palestinians were. The prevailing “wisdom” was that Hamas would make some gains, which would frighten Fatah into being more pliant in negotiations. Just another Hedgemony failure.

If you have never read George Washington’s Farewell Address, you really should. Unlike the clowns who appear on talk shows these days, George understood what could go wrong, and warned against it two centuries ago.

In paragraph 17 of the linked version he describes the Hedgemony. He knew that if we weren’t careful this would happen, and he lays it out.

Paragraph 29 is a very succinct statement of why public education is important to the country.

In paragraph 33 he explains why the current state of US-Israeli relations is a terrible idea.

He told us this would happen, and we went ahead and did it anyway.  Isn’t it amazing on how many points “liberals” agree with him, and “conservatives” do the opposite of what he counseled?

Catnip Napping

Not the flash, man…

[Editor: I told Sox it was organic and he should go easy, but, hey, it was New Year’s.

Friday Ark

Mustang Bobby has a new look for Bark Bark Woof Woof, courtesy of his brother. Stop over and kick the tires.

Ted Barlow’s disease has struck PSoTD after almost five years in existence.

I finally go around to adding News Writer’s Stop The Press! to my blog roll, so I don’t have to use Steve Bates’s comments to find her place.

Former Rhode Island Senator Claiborne Pell has died at 90 from Parkinson’s disease.

Millions of low income student were able to attend college because of Pell Grants, but he also championed the arts through the NEA, and a responsible American foreign policy as chairman of the Senate foreign relations committee.

He was an old school New England patrician in the best sense of the term and a firm believer in the equality of all. He was one of the good guys.

By now you’ve read the quote by Jimmy Carter’s National Security Advisor, Zbigniew Brzeszynski, speaking to my former Congresscritter, Joe Scarborough:

“You know, you have such a stunningly superficial knowledge of what went on that it’s almost embarrassing to listen to you.”

Well, that’s pretty much how I feel listening to politicians talking about various tax cutting schemes to deal with the economic problems.

Excuse me, but people without jobs don’t pay taxes, and there are hundreds of thousands of people becoming unemployed every month. Those with jobs are not going to start spending, they are reducing all of their expenses and paying down debts in anticipation of becoming unemployed. Taxes are totally, absolutely, unequivocally irrelevant in the current situation.

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С Новым годом
Prosit Neujahr
Feliz Año Nuevo
Bonne Année
Felice Anno Nuovo
Gelukkig Nieuwjaar
Gott Nytt År
Sehe Bokmanee Bateuseyo
Blwyddyn Newydd Dda
Onnellista Uutta Vuotta

Thanks to the western Aleutian Islands of Alaska, the United States is the last country on the planet to make it completely into a new year.

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