The Future

Of Darcy, the Blogs and GOOGLE



I suspect that Google is going to release its rumored phone in early 08.

Imagine a $100 device with nearly free access to the web and to personal communications. Unimaginable? Hardly. This is not far from the price point expected when low end PCs .. full PCs .. enter the market next year in developing countries. Free service? Even this is imaginable. There are some places that now offer blanket wifi as a civic service. Wireless net in Seattle, wi unlimited telephony, is only ~$30/month. What computing resources would be needed? Hint: Google to the Googleth power is called "Googleplex." Google bought Googleplex(a) last year.

Two things come to mind. The Matrix and a curious Onion ARTICLE about Starbucks' plans for world wide domination.

A technology like this would transform the world as much as .. or maybe more than .. TV.

The financial implications for Google are dwarfed only by the political implications of universal, seemless access to the Web. Imagine the Darcy fundraiser .. but on a world wide basis. The challenge will be social! How will we handle the cacophony of free voices? Google. with its focus on "search" is in a unique position.

I am not simply being humorous. A lot of times today we talk as if we have achieved some of the wild things I read about as sci fi in the fifties and sixties. This would easily qualify as having that impact. Consider:

a. what happens to free speech when we all can to talk to each other across the globe?
b.How will the g-phone evolve vis a vis our own evolution? Graham Steele is worth a read. Human evolution is a complex interplay of our social environment and the rules of genetics. We changed this dramatically 20,000 years ago, or so, when we invented cities. From then till now we select for the fittest in the environement, a continually changing environment, we control. Then, in the last two decades we changed the rules again as we gained dirtect control over our genes. NOW, we will have added vast powers, comparable to the telepathy of science fiction but with access to far more information than any SciFi writer I know of ever imagined. It is awesome to imagine the co-evolution of the human-google interface.

A reply to a Republican mouthing the party line

You claim the dems are committed to:

"Tax, spend, cut, run…'

Lets see … US incomes have fallen for the first time in 20 years, out debt is astronomical and owned by our largest opponent/ I may be simple minded but is there a reason you think BORROWING money is better than taxing ourselves?

Oh cut and run .. you mean as in we bomb the hell out of Afghanistan then get out? Or do you mean Lebanon? haven't we left the palestine-israel thing fester for six years as oppsed to what Mr. C did? Compare Bosnia to Afghanistan.

Political correctness

Aha!!! As in appointing Clarence Thomas? Or invoking Jesus as part of a campaign team? Or dd you mean calling the French names? How about pretending that Coni Rice is amajor foreign plicy expert or keeping a fellow on as AG after he has drivelled in public?

The Nanny / Welfare State

now … now I understand, you mean exerting state control over the use os different orifices for sex, being sure kids all pray to your Jesus in school, underwriting rich folks investment in China, or assuring that certain kinds of income are never taxed so rich folks can get richer without having to work?

Oh yeh, howsa about keeping out them nasty furriners so real Mericans can work at Msoft?

Big Corporations = Bad

I think you have this one wrong, assuming your idea was to support the liberal side, Isn;t ti the demns who opposed Enron, want to tax oil companies, etc?

Big Government = Good

Yep, we do have the biggest government in history (it shrunk under Clinton, tsk tsk),

“All diversity is good as long as it isn’t diversity of opinion…”

Errr ahhhh … Darcy meets in a bar, Jimmy Carter bloodies his hands at building sites, Hillary and Barack hold open town meetings. Demo candidates include true Vietnam vet and heroes. Bush bans tee shorts and speaks only at meetings of the retired veterans of the Spanish American war? He can’t seem to hire anyone who actually fought in Vietnam ,, is he prejudiced against vets?

Repricans won’t even vote for John McCain, the man favors immigartion reform for Jesus’ sake. And then there is that polygamist form Mass. Lets ee what is real diversity?? Clarence Thomas vs Barck Obama? Is one of these a Tom?

You need to correct a few words in your last two paragraphs:

“None of the above — all publicly stated beliefs of the Leftright in one form or another — are in any way “progressconstructive,” regardless of your definition. Not saying that the Far Right has any greater claim to progress, but they also don’t try toeven though they do misappropriate the term.

The true “progressives” patriots on the Left right are folks like the Gang of 14 members and the few politicians like Chuck Hague — leaders who put progress a head of politics. “

Blogdom OUTraises Bush Dinner

Here are the results. The Blogs, in 4 days, raised ~120,000 for Darcy Burner. The Bush visit at $1000/plate raised $125,000. Darcy's total keep rising. Bush et all need to pay the airfare for bringin him here plus 125 chyicken dinners. Lets estimate:

Bush 125,000
airfare 10,000 (est first class, assuming Reprican paid for Bush and 1 assistant.)
chicken at $35/plate (inlcuding room, a bargain) 4375

Bush 110625 Darcy 110625 Contributors Bush 125 Darcy more than 2000.

BTW are those "horns" behind Reichert's head?

Bush Propaganda leads to Gonzo Going

Bush admin manual on how to control pubic meetings.
National Guard cheer call for withdrawal.
Can Bush still appear at military gatherings? Putsch anyone?

and now ... Gonzales resigns!

The Presidency is now a Regency

I predicted this months ago. When a President fails, his own party should put him aside. The question who is now running the US?

My guess? GHWB, Bush I.

All of the newbies in the Bush II orbit are folks from his Dad or James Baker’s shop.

Before congratulating the Repricans too much, remind yourself about Bush I and Lee Atawater, Bush Daddy was as much anb underhanded POS as the current guy, the difference was IQ. Bush I/Baker were smart people.

If I am correct, the folks who brought us Clarence Thomnas, brought Jerry Falwell into the govmnt, passed of Dan Quayle as a Vice President, … them folks, they are BACK.

Watch for:

a. Iraq .. a more clever poicy, the “surge worked.” A token force will be withdrawn by January.

b. SA … support for the Saudi. This may not be bad .. their position on Israel is rational. Their stance on Baghdad and the sunnis not so good.

c. Drama and Deception .. possible reconciliation with Cuba.Agree with Russia on missiles? Fired attorney to be new AG?

d. Nomination of a successor. My guess ? Fred Thompson will be backed or possibly Romney, McCain, RG are now the walking dead.

e. Chaney will disappear. He might even have a heart attack,

f. Bush girl to wed in White House.

Any one wanna bet? How about every time I am right, the trolls here get to donate $25 to Darcy?

Optimism

Blogdom Replaces Party Apparat.
For thise not living in Seattle: Darcy Burner is running for the democratic nomination to run against the current Republican, Dave Reichert. In waht may bea historic even this weekend, here friends in bloggerdom have launched a weekend on-line fund raiser to rival a fundr raiser GWB will attend for Reichert next Monday. The goal? $100,000! The reuslts to Sunday AM are shown on the left. To contribute, click on the thermometer.
If this works, then the traditional role of parties may be at an end.

Brezinski endorses Obama.

Obama names Republicans he sees as allies.

Obama only dem to make all campaign funding available on web.

Rove to Receive Largest Fees Ever for Movie Script

(SJ News April 1, 2010)

Sony Pictures head, Clarence Thomas, and former Bush aide , Karl Rove, held a news conference today to announce that Columbia would produce the movie version of Rove's soon to be released, "There's a Republican Born (Again) Every Day."
This tell tale, already leaked by the Wall Street Journal,.describes how Rove was influenced by Soviet era policies of disinformation.

Rumors that Rove had formal training by the KGB were denied by Rove spokesman Vladimir Ulyanov.

Mel Gibson has reportedly agreed to write the screenplay.

Of Courage and Statesmanship: Brian Beard

If you click on the title, you will come to a very important OP Ed piece by one of our Congressmen, Brian Baird*.

The piece is worth reading, but I will summarize: as an anti-war, anti-Bush Democrat, Mr. Baird is arguing for caution in Iraq, he is especially arguing against a precipitous, politically driven withdrawal led by anti-war ideology rather than wise strategy.

The essence of the piece confirms the recent NY Times op ed by O'Hanlon and Pollack, highly impressive analysts for the Brooking's Institute. In their piece the analysts detail specific areas of progress made since General Petraeus took command and implemented the "surge." Their bottom line, changes in strategy and better leadership were making inroads in the Iraqui mess. Although criticized as too optimistic by equally impressive antiwar experts, even the critics need to agree that O'Hanlon and Pollack are serious thinkers whose opinions must be weighed. No Roves there! Bottom line, there is reason to beleive that we have alternatives between rapid withdrawal and Bushism. This is the simple counsel also offered by Congressman Baird.

Why is this important? One reason is that we have almost two years left of Bush. Anything precipitous will be done under his failed leadership. Or will it? Who is running the White House.?

SJ suggests that we now have a caretaker, Daddy Bush::Jimbo Baker regency. Frightened by their boy's mess, the Publican leadership has (finally) staged something of a coup. Bush and Chaney may still be the bosses, but they are in th care of babysitters.

While I am no fan of the senior Bush or his advisers , there can be no comparison between the Colin Powel/Baker led policies of the Bush I era and the failures of his son's Chane-Rummy led regime. Gates, Gillespie, Rice are competent replacements for Rummey. Rove, and their ilk. Disgust with Bush ought not to cause Democrats to jump on a poorly thought out course led not by their own brand of strategery.

Mr. Baird is saying that we need to look at what General Petraeus's work before deciding where to go next. Petraeus is the antithesis of the Bush appointed folk. Those amateurs ran Iraq as if it were a Texas border town. Does this mean Petaeus is succeeding NOW is what Bush failed to achieve? Everything I read says yes, but in a limited way. But, Bush achieved nada. Petraeus needs to undo vast amounts of mistakes, starting with rebuilding the Sunni tribal structure that Bush turned into an enemy. We may not like 'em, but these "allies" are a hell of a lot better fighting with us than agin us.

If the early runmors are true, Petraus 's surge demonstrates what might have been achieved. Now, his talents and goals are limited by the damage done by the amateurs. The moral and strategic thing now is to decide what we should do with that power.

Baird's caution is being attacked by Lee (picture) over at his blog, Effin Unsound. I have debated with lee before on other issues. he is a very knowledgeable guy but I believe in this issue he is being blinded by the need to get out form under the Bushies. Lee's rebuttal is basically this: The surge has not solved all problems. The biggest of these is the lack of a working government. So, Lee and othe s argue, the best we can do is get out. Here is an example of Lee's logic:

He says the the Congressman was" hauled around Iraq to the areas where we’re temporarily working with our enemies to fight Al Qaeda. That is neither an indicator of overall success, or even a positive development. The fact that we’ve resorted to arming some of the people we were once fighting in order to fight Al Qaeda is a good indication that we’re not accomplishing anything of value militarily over there. The history of our involvement in the Middle East is filled with instances where temporary alliances came back to bite us in the ass (see: Saddam Hussein, Osama Bin Laden, etc, etc)."

That makes no sense. First Baird ain't no dumbass. Surely this bright* guy knows he was dragged around but that does not mean he has no sources of his own.. If I may put the Congressman's comment in perspective. Having wasted a trillion dollars does not mean that we should fuck the Iraqui people and just leave. We need to ask what can be saved from Bush's follies. Pertaeus has shown us that there may be a solution . The Kurds seem to be making progress and the Sunni chiefs seem able to dominate their region as well.
Gen Petraeus has had remarked success in Anbar , His new tactics may be working ... the diminishment of Iraqi el Qaeda seems real.

Rather than demagogic calls for a rapid withdrawal, I wish we could here more thought about what still can be done. From my perspective, hardly an expert, here are the balancing facts:

Why we will need to leave Iraq PDQ:

1. We stll have no clear goals.
2. Our military is overstressed, we lack the military resources to continue at this level for much longer, by Spring we need a way to find more troops and equipment, or withdraw.
3. The Bush:Bremmer designed government is not a government. It has failed. We have besmirched the very concept of democrcy by supporting a charade.
4. Our presence in Iraq has strengthened the el Qaeda effort in Afghanistan and the Ahmadinejad party in Iran.

What Petraeus has shown:

1. The strategy advocated by the military is a lot better than that advocated by the Bushistas.
2. Iraqui Kurdistan is well headed toward the ability to control its own future as long as we help keep Turkey happy and detur Iran.
3. Sunni Arabs hate el Qaeda and Shiite Iran. While not prepared for democracy, the Sunnii are at a feudal level of development that can protect its own territory and can prevent a Shia government from controlling the region.
4. The newly found oil in Anbar could provide the basis for a self sustaining Sunnii community
5. There is, at least so far, no sominant Irani-Shia polity in the South. It is likely, but nor certain, that a moderate non Irani shia party will dominate the South if supported by the US.

The options:

1. Precipitous withdrawal (anything that leaves us with no more than a token, say 30-50,000 force, by next summer.

Most Worrisome Outcome:
N In the north, the Kurds fall to internal forces that would provoke Turkey.
S In the south Shia interests fight but some force dominates. Any such force, as pure shia, will be a threat to Kuwait and SA, causing them foment trouble in Sunni areas.
C Ethnic cleansing in mixed Sunni/Shia central areas.The Sunni areas break out into Bosnia style tribal warfare, Syria, Saudi Arabia, and Iran back their respective faves. El Qaeda emerges as a "peacemaker."

This chaos could lead to any of several regional wars ... Turkey:Kurd:Iran, Syria, Suadi:el Qaeda;pro-Iran:anti Iran Shia;etc.

2. Containment strategy: I am not sure of all this entails but some parts seems clear:

a. draw down to something close to 100k troops.
b. by agreement with Turkey, guarantee integrity of Turkey and Kurdish Iraq
c. Announce abandonment of Potemkinite central government. Issue of how to govern up to regional governments ... that is the North, Central and South of Iraq and the neighboring powers..
d. Agree to support exile as needed.
e. Work with others (Syria, Saudi, Egypt) to create Sunni regime in central area.
f. Support anti-Iran Shiites to create Iranian-neutral South.


Hoped for outcome:

N: Development of a stable Kurdish entity.
C. Establishment of an all Arab peace force to minimize inter-arab ethnic cleansing. Saudi-Egyptian-Iraqi alliance becomes local counter balance to Syria.
S. Non extremist Shia regime grows, provide Arab/non triumphalist alternative to Farsi dominated Theocracy.

What would this mean for all of Iraq? I do not know. Personally, I think Iraq, like most of the world, is better off with regional, European Union style Federalism than the nationalistic model they acquired from the Europe of the 1800s. I think such a model might also be in the interest of the other major powers ... India, China, Europe, Russia that have a major interest.



*Brian Baird is US Representative of Southwest Washington in the United States House of Representatives.Brian was elected to Congress in 1998 , replacing a radical Republican, Linda Smith. Smith was known for her staunch anti-abortion stance and her maverick tendencies, such as opposing the Balanced Budget Amendment, supporting campaign finance reform. He was promptly elected President of his Freshman Democratic Class and was among the first to oppose the Iraqui war. Despite his relatively Junior status, Baird is .the Senior Democratic Whip, outting him in a leadership position well above more senior WA reps like Jim McDermott who represents Seattle.

The Coalition of the Willing, as the Will Poofs

Hit the link above for a very good photoessay on the reality of Bush's Rovian fiction that Iraq has been fought by a coalition of the willing. This never was true, but now the American troops are rapidly being abandoned by the last of the dribble and drizzle of allied troops.
Whatever side one takes on whether the Iraq invasions should heve been done, the conduct of this war has been disastrous. The misuse of propaganda, what I call Rovian news, was a big part of this. Rovisim is NewSpeak grown big in a democratic soceity. The media should have ridiculed Bush for play acting that there ever was a meaningful coalition.

Mother Theresa Called by Jefferson's Deity?

This is a great story. Mother Theresa had a spiritual crisis, unsure of her contact with her Deity the nun began her charitable works!

Is this a chance view to the "god" of Jefferson and Franklin? Is her struggle, her jihad, a conflict between the internal drive to do good and the external imperative to follow a mind-graven image of a super human being?

Once more. I find myself wondering at how much more wonderful good people are then the Deities they may credit for goodness.

Unexpected Courage

I must admit that I had always assumed that Bill Clinton, like many others, had been self deceptive when he avoided the draft by falsely signing up for ROTC. The I can across his actual letter to the ROTC. To quote Peter Lori in Casablanca I am shocked, shocked. In this case, though I am surprised at the young Clinton's maturity ans= clarity of insight. Read the letter for yourself:

.

Clinton’s December 1969 letter to his ROTC Director

The following is Bill Clinton’s December 1969 letter to his ROTC Director, Colonel Eugene Holmes. This text was taken verbatim from “SLICK WILLIE”, by Floyd G. Brown. Not a word has been changed.

——————————————————————————–

I am sorry to be so long in writing. I know I promised to let you hear from me at least once a month, and from now on you will, but I have had to have some time to think about this first letter. Almost daily since my return to England I have thought about writing, about what I want to and ought to say.

First, I want to thank you, not just for saving me from the draft, but for being so kind and decent to me last summer, when I was as low as I have ever been. One thing which made the bond we struck in good faith somewhat palatable to me was my high regard for you personally. In retrospect, it seems that the admiration might not have been mutual had you known a little more about me, about my political beliefs and activities. At least you might have thought me more fit for the draft than for ROTC.

Let me try to explain. As you know, I worked for two years in a very minor position on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. I did it for the experience and the salary but also for the opportunity, however small, of working every day against a war I opposed and despised with a depth of feeling I had reserved solely for racism in America before Vietnam. I did not take the matter lightly but studied it carefully, and there was a time when not many people had more information about Vietnam at hand than I did. I have written and spoken and marched against the war. One of the national organizers of the Vietnam Moratorium is a close friend of mine, After I left Arkansas last summer, I went to Washington to work in the national headquarters of the Moratorium, then to England to organize the Americans for the demonstrations Oct. 15 and Nov. 16.

Interlocked with the war is the draft issue, which I did not begin to consider separately until early 1968. For a law seminar Georgetown I wrote a paper on the legal arguments for and against allowing, within the Selective Service System, the classification of selective conscientious objection, for those opposed to participation in a particular war, not simply to “participation in war in any form.”

From my work I came to believe that the draft system itself is illegitimate. No government really rooted in limited, parliamentary democracy should have the power to make its citizens fight and kill and die in a war they may oppose, a war which even possibly may be wrong, a war which, in any case, does not involve immediately the peace and freedom of the nation.

The draft was justified in World War II because the life of the people collectively was at stake. Individuals had to fight, if the nation was to survive, for the lives of their countrymen and their way of life. Vietnam is no such case. Nor was Korea an example where, in my opinion, certain military action was justified but the draft was not, for the reasons stated above.

Because of my opposition to the draft and the war, I am in great sympathy with those who are not willing to fight, kill, and maybe die for their country (i.e. the particular policy of a particular government) right or wrong. Two of my friends at Oxford are conscientious objectors. I wrote a letter of recommendation for one of them to his Mississippi draft board, a letter which I am more proud of than anything else I wrote at Oxford last year. One of my roommates is a draft resister who is possibly under indictment and may never be able to go home again. He is one of the bravest, best men I know. That he is considered a criminal is an obscenity.

The decision not to be a resister and the related subsequent decisions were the most difficult of my life. I decided to accept the draft in spite of my beliefs for one reason: to maintain my political viability within the system. For years I have worked to prepare myself for a political life characterized by both practical political ability and concern for rapid social progress. It is a life I still feel compelled to try to lead. I do not think our system of government is by definition corrupt, however dangerous and inadequate it has been in recent years. (The society may be corrupt, but that is not the same thing, and if that is true we are all finished anyway.)

When the draft came, despite political convictions, I was having a hard time facing the prospect of fighting a war I had been fighting against, and that is why I contacted you. ROTC was the one way left in which I could possibly, but not positively, avoid both Vietnam and resistance. Going on with my education, even coming back to England, played no part in my decision to join ROTC. I am back here, and would have been at Arkansas Law School because there is nothing else I can do. In fact, I would like to have been able to take a year out perhaps to teach in a small college or work on some community action project and in the process to decide whether to attend law school or graduate school and how to begin putting what I have learned to use.

But the particulars of my personal life are not nearly as important to me as the principles involved. After I signed the ROTC letter of intent I began to wonder whether the compromise I had made with myself was not more objectionable than the draft would have been, because I had no interest in the ROTC program in itself and all I seemed to have done was to protect myself from physical harm. Also, I began to think I had deceived you, not by lies because there were none but by failing to tell you all the things I’m writing now. I doubt that I had the mental coherence to articulate them then.

At that time, after we had made our agreement and you had sent my 1-D deferment to my draft board, the anguish and loss of my self-regard and self confidence really set in. I hardly slept for weeks and kept going by eating compulsively and reading until exhaustion brought sleep. Finally, on Sept. 12 I stayed up all night writing a letter to the chairman of my draft board, saying basically what is in the preceding paragraph, thanking him for trying to help in a case where he really couldn’t, and stating that I couldn’t do the ROTC after all and would he please draft me as soon as possible.

I never mailed the letter, but I did carry it on me every day until I got on the plane to return to England. I didn’t mail the letter because I didn’t see, in the end, how my going in the army and maybe going to Vietnam would achieve anything except a feeling that I had punished myself and gotten what I deserved. So I came back to England to try to make something of this second year of my Rhodes scholarship.

And that is where I am now, writing to you because you have been good to me and have a right to know what I think and feel. I am writing too in the hope that my telling this one story will help you to understand more clearly how so many fine people have come to find themselves still loving their country but loathing the military, to which you and other good men have devoted years, lifetimes, of the best service you could give. To many of us, it is no longer clear what is service and what is disservice, or if it is clear, the conclusion is likely to be illegal.

Forgive the length of this letter. There was much to say. There is still a lot to be said, but it can wait. Please say hello to Col. Jones for me.

Merry Christmas.

Sincerely,
Bill Clinton

Health Care Myths

I have been meaning to write more on this subject. For now, though, it will suffice to say that I strongly suport a single payer system run by the government.

That said, I suspect many people with this opinion are naive. For example they point to Canada as a similar country that get bette rhelat6h care for less. Maybe true, but someone needs to point out that there is a substantial US--->Ca subsidy
.

Tribute to Mark, the SUV Driver

A Movie
Opening scene,

Mark, muscles bulging, peks visible under the tattered twin-tower Tshirt, opens the door of his Lincoln Navigator BLACK Hummer H2, and enters the driver's side.

The Hummer humms , engine starting as the slim, sliver of pocket hot metal enters the exposed seemingly hungry, well lubed keyslot. Mark pulls the seatbelt around his heaving chest, biceps gleaming and inserts it decisively in the slot, pffft. Svvvfffft ... the sound of webbing being slashed at the 12 inch Bowie knife cuts through the troublesome webbing, the motor growls and smoothly, as if covered with a wine flavored lubricant, the BLACK vehicle pulls free of its too small garage.

The H2 seems to grow as it backs off, emerges onto the street and thrusts its way into traffic. In no time, MTR is on the freeway autobahn, silent but for the steady growl of 473 horses and air slipping by the rough cut surfaces ... feminine, svelte Ferrari, the H2 is a man's car.

For the next thirty minutes the movie screen focuses on Mark's wind burned face, behind the deep blue ovals of his almost feminine, too small sunglasses. With intense concentration, MTR thrusts the wheel first to the right, then the left, right, left, right left, and the H2 responds .. surging to one then the other side. The BLACK car and white driver seem to almost fly down the precise, smooth surface of the endless roadway.

Then, the film goes black and we segue to a tired Mark, still in the tattered t shirt but now supported by pillows, sweaty, sitting up in the rumpled, beer stained bed, eyes closed, breathing deep, lazy smoke rising from the Camel cigarette loosely held between his wet lips.

The End

When AntiSemitism Leaks Through

Let me make it perfectly clear. I am a Zionist and a supporter of a Palestinian state. There is nothing new about this ... the early Zionists were very supportive of Arab culture and a great majority of Israelis believe in the two state solution.

Why do I begin with a defensive protest? Because I am tired of reading the subtle antisemitism that passes for liberal opposition to Israel. These people protest that they are not antisemites, some even play the linguistic game of saying they can not be antisemites because the Arabs are semites. Then, of course, they defend their stances by accusing Jews who dispute their points of view of misusing the word antisemite.

The result is a kind of Newspeak that makes discussion of the truth impossible and hurts the efforts of all people who want peace. When we talk, Lee and I or others with his views, there is NO interest in the kinds of positive things that are being done by Israelis, Palestinians, Americans, Egyptians, Jordanian and Japanese to promote peace. Sad, a little more support for PeaceNow might push this humpty dumpty over to the peace side!

This form of antisemitism almost always begins with an equation of Israel to the biblical Hebrews, Cannan to modern "Palestine," and the Palestinians to the descendants of the Canaani. In this view Israel shares the guilt of the crusaders and the jihadist ...making war in the name of God. In this view the Jews weirdly get the blame for the crusades and Islamic holy wars..

Recently a comment of mine on this issue was censored at HorsesAss because one of the editors, Lee, got upset when I confronted his charge that Judaiamjs is like Christianity and Islam because Israel is motivated by the cheredi .. that is by orthodox Judaism and the belief that this land is promised by Hashem. Weirdly, after censoring my posts, he explained himself by accusing me of accusing him of racism.

Truth be told I like Lee a lot, though he makes me sad. Why each of these? Lee is a devout and good liberal with strong ideas abut equality, fairness and esp. the need for decriminalized drugs. All admirable. Lee, however, is a self described person of Jewish descent but does not want to be considered Jewish.

Lee is all too typical of many folks I know ... admirable folks with obvious Jewish intellectual heritage, pride in Jewish relatives, interestinterst in Israel and stated support for its existence, BUT an insistence that they are not Jewish because they do not follow the Jewish religion. My African American friends know this syndrome too, it afflicts Clarence Thomas.

I certainly have never slandered Lee. Indeed, I despite his frequent effort to win arguments by calling others, me included, a prick, stupid ass, fool, etc. I write this off to immaturity and never respond in kind. . The worst thing I have ever called Lee is “Bubbelah” ,, an affectionate term for a small. older Jewish woman. His words for me have ranged over a more ill tempered, sarcastic tonal scale.

To be a bit more specific, I have never accused Lee of racism or anything of the sort. I have even introduced Lee to some folks I know in the Black community because I think Lee’s ideas about drugs have a lot of merit and would hope he could help get some things done.

So how have Bubbelah and I disagreed?

1. He got upset with me when I wrote about the need to recognize intolerance and hatred in the Muslim community after the murder here in Seattle.

I do not believe tolerance should extend to religion when religion is intolerant. Click here for relevant posts. There is major need for reform in the Islamic community because of the role of extremists. Lee simply does not believe this is an issue, he maintains that Islamic Extremism is a rare affliction of a very few people around the world and that the issue is not important here in the Good Ol USA. I disagree,

Rather than dealing with Lee's equation of the Israelis and the crusaders I wold rather move upscale to three authors SJ usually admires. Jefferson.. Russel and Armstrong.

Tom Jefferson himself regarded us a money grabbing Pharisees, obviously influenced by the Christian Bible and the same world that produced Shylock. It is so said that Jefferson did not know that the philosophy he admired in Jesus was, in fact, Pharisaic. But then, he also never figured out that the french trained chef at Monticello, members of the Hemings family, should be free men. Imagine what TJ missed in the great meals a FREE James Heming might have cooked. The mind boggles .. how might history have changed if Jefferson had the chance to dine at a seder, read our stories of freedom and enjoy a seder meal prepared by James?

In a famous essay, "Why I am not A Christians," Bertrand Russel BLAMED the Jews for Christian and Islamic irredentism. Bertie singled out monotheism and the hatred of polytheism as the origin of the atrocities of the west. to easily this allowed thye great phlosopher to transfer western guilt to the Jews.

Finally, Karen Armstrong, a brilliant writer on Abrahamic religions, shares Russel's point of view AND equated the invasion led by Joshua to the criusades and the modern Israeli-Palestinain conflict.

With all respect to Tom, Bertie, Karen AND Lee, I think none of these folks knew or know enough about Judaism or archeology to support the accusation that Jews invented religious wars of conversion.

Since Lee deleted my posts at HA, here (briefly) are the ideas again.

The process of conversion to Judaism is hard enough that the Christian concept of war would not make any sense. Moreover, as the chosen people, Jews consider themselves selected for a special burden. Why would others want that burden?

Jews, like most peoples, have conducted nationalistic wars. We have never, however, fought a war of religious conversion, i.e. a crusade, or to bring our law to other peoples, as in the Islamic explosion. As for conquest to establish the rule of Hallakah (Jewish Law) over non Jews, that is an imaginable interpretation of the Christian version of our bible, the"old testament,” but is not historically accurate.

The "sacred" stories on the invasion of Canaan by the tribes led by Joshua are, to Jews, part of our founding myth .. not part of revelation from Hashem. Jews, unlike Muslims and Christians do not and have never considered these books (Judges, Kings and Prophets) to be revealed truth. Only the Torah .. Moses' 5 books, is considered revealed. These books of prophets and kings and judges are mythic. Like others' myths these tales likely represent an admixture of history, legend and, esp, propaganda. THERE is no imperative in Judaism to consider the actsin these books as factual, ethical or moral.

The wars described are wars of national conquest not religious conversion. Joshua’s battles are closer to those of Shaka Zulu then they are to the crusades or Islamic expansion.

Archeology now says that these conquests NEVER occurred. There is no evidence of a sudden invasion. Rather there appears to have been a gradual emergence and dominance of hebrew tribes over many years.“Moses” as described in the Torah may not have existed. No one can be certain whether or not this fellow did or did not exist but the archaelogical data says there was never the sort of invasion led by Joshua that the texts describe. One fascinating idea is that Moses was one of the Hyksos, a semitic people who ruled Norther Egypt for quite awhile and were driven out. Bottom line:The myths are no more and no less than founding myths. of Rome You like Romulus and Remus?

The practice of equating the Cananni to the Palestinians is absurd. Both modern genetics and archaelogy suggest that the Hebrews arose indigenously within the Cannani people, probably in the hill country now called the West Bank. The Philistines were not indigenous they were part of the sea people and came to the coast as conquerors. Most may know the sea people as Carthaginians and Trojans. FWIW, fighting them off would be roughly comparable to the Iraquis evicting the American occupiers.

BTW the term “Palestine” comes from the Latin, hebre Arabic word for Phillistia and was invented after the Jewsih wars t demean the memory of the Jewish state by anming the land after a then extinct people. Until 1948, the word “Palestinian” refered to the Jews of Palestine.

Lee is correct hat there are some fanatical cheredi who regard Israel as a gift of Hashem. That is true and is a real issue because this view is a new aspect of Zionism. The only people who saw the founding of Israel as a religious matter were Christians and Muslims. The founding Zionists and to this day the great majority of Zionists are at least secular and many were atheists. As a matter of fact … to this day a very large number of orthodox Jews OPPOSE Israel because they feel Jewish state should not be established until the messiah comes .. including the red calf and the lineal descendent of King David.Some of these folks have appeared with Arafat and more recently with Ahmadinejad.

Bottom line, Jews do not celebrate these conquests, nor do we believe in conversion by conquest. To the best of my knowledge, the ideas about religious war orginated with the Romanization of Christianity and were later adopted by Islam.

Lawyers, Lawyers and who cares about civil rights?

From Yahoo:

CHARLESTON, W.Va. - A couple arrested at a rally after refusing to cover T-shirts that bore anti-President Bush slogans settled their lawsuit against the federal government for $80,000, the American Civil Liberties Union announced Thursday.

Nicole and Jeffery Rank of Corpus Christi, Texas, were handcuffed and removed from the July 4, 2004, rally at the state Capitol, where Bush gave a speech. A judge dismissed trespassing charges against them, and an order closing the case was filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Charleston.

"This settlement is a real victory not only for our clients but for the First Amendment," said Andrew Schneider, executive director of the ACLU of West Virginia. "As a result of the Ranks' courageous stand, public officials will think twice before they eject peaceful protesters from public events for exercising their right to dissent."

White House spokesman Blair Jones said the settlement was not an admission of wrongdoing.

"The parties understand that this settlement is a compromise of disputed claims to avoid the expenses and risks of litigation and is not an admission of fault, liability, or wrongful conduct," Jones said.

In other words, the Bush admin violated the first amendment and doe snot even ahve to admit their act! This is one of the worst examples I have ever seen of the lawyer game interfering with the intent of our founders. Maybe we need law to fix law. SJ suggests:

Any willful violation of the first amendment by government agents shall be considered as treason and the perpetrators subject to the same penalties as they would receive for knowingly working with an enemy government.

On a related subject, if we were to enact such a law, how would we deal with people who promote such treason?

Of Tolls and Trolls

My good friend Darry over at Hominid Views has posted news about an effort to bring trolls to Seattle. He is worried that more trolls will bring more congestion.

I hope that trolls WILL cause congestion. That may be the only way to get people to move to make better use of our geography by living in cities or spend the $$ needed for mass transit.
I like tolls. Esp the one under the bridge in Fremont.

The other kind are good too. It seems to me that tolls are a sort of free market correction to our subsidization of cheap oil and highways. In days of old folks lived in cities because … well because that is where the jobs were. The car and highways freed folks Americans from cities because we subsidize4d the hell out of oil and roads.

Now we are gonna have to pay the piper. The right cries “There is but one Market, and that must be Free,” thertefore opposing anything that they see as subsidized. Tou wanna have busses, pay the fares. You wanna have light rail, pay the fares. Tolls level the playing field.

Hillel's Worm

How cool.

This is a new sort of image of C. Elegans, the worm Hill, my son, works on.

Here is a movie with the same method.

Hay Hillel!

Fundies in Green

"The founding fathers built this country on Christianity."

Of course this is anything but true. What is true is that the FF were Christians and alot of what governs us grew from Christian culture. Contrast this with Pakistan .. is it politically incorrect t point out that Pakistan is an Islamic State? Pakistan was created because Muslims did not want to live under secular law. Unlike our FF, however, the Pakistanis DID want a country built on the Quran.

Sad.

The Future of Bill's Dream

I have an image of the great story of Bill Gates. In my image, Bill is still striving to get enough time on the PD{8 he used at Lakeside. From then till now I see Bill as trying to build a one world OS. He has come close.
Now he is beign really challenged. The web makes it all too easy to imagine a computing environemtn where the real OS is the web and the local OS shrinks to managing the disk and other HW. I will write more about this later but for now here is an interesting article on what could be an effort by Adobe to virtualize applications so they no longer depend on the loacl OS.

Pessimism

There is a Republican over at HorsesAss who frightens me.

Klake

Folks the easy way to end the war is to win it not become a defeatist like the far left. Oh I forgot you all are losers and don’t know how to win. Roger are you still selling bumper sticker on Freeing Tibet? .... Roger is the Minister for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda for the Socialist Democrats Party today just like Paul Joseph Goebbels was in Hitler Germany. His Nazi friends taught him the trade when he visited them in jail.

Roger is "Roger Rabbit,: another poster, a thoughtful fellow blogger who is an attorney. Imagine anyone confusing Willy Brandt's Social Democrats with Hitler's National Socialists. Twisti ng Roger into Goebbels take a psychotic. Is Klake a paranid? Does he hear voices or is she 13 and living outr some Oedipal fantasy? How many Kool Aid drinkers are there who still feel like Klake?

The sadness of the web is we can not know if this is some misguided twelve year old or one of Seattle's megabuck Daddy Warbucks imitators. To make it even wierder doesn't he know that Tibet is occupied by the Commies? Or is it OK because the Chinese are now on "our" side? Maybe it would help him to know that 95% of the "publicly owned" companies in the new China are majority owned the govmint or the "people's Army?"

The worst of this is the Newspeak, Orwell would have been smug, for Klake defeat is whatever fantasy GWB has. Same folks think Reagan won the cold war and tax cuts pay for themselves in increased revenue and evolution is for monkeys.

I used to be smug about the followers of LePen in France. It can't happen here

Speakoing in Newspeak, another Publican, Mr. Guiliani, running for President:*

Freedom is about authority. Freedom is about the willingness of every single human being to cede to lawful authority a great deal of discretion about what you do.

I don't think Mr. Guiliani and Mr. Jefferson would get along too well. The former Mayer should be careful. I hear that the ghost of the red haired Virginian stalks the White House.

OTOH, maybe the Mayor would feel more comfortable in Malaysia where freedom is so good that Muslims can not violate Sharia even when they want to marry non Muslims. Seems very much like the Republican ideas for the role of Christianity here. Well, maybe I am being extreme, I am sure that fundies her would NEVER want to prevent anyone form marrying whom they love.

Karl Rove, resign? Really? Nahhh!

And then there is the singing politician.

*cite from Lee at HorsesAss. Tx.

Optimism

I guess there are many kinds of optimism .. optimism of the past and optimism of the future. Dan Savage summarized my own views of why we should of invaded Iraq in 2002. Were we wrong? I do not think we where, what we were was naive about the awesome incompetence of the Bush regime. I still believe a large enough, truly multinational force, combined with a real-politic acceptance of the interests of Russia, Turkey, SA, and Sunni elite would have led to a great outcome.

But Savage and I were wrong this fool, this faux president is simply incompetent. How then can anyone realistically beleive we can withdraw now? A strategic retreat led by GWB would be suicide.

At the same time, can we have optimism about Israel and Palestine? I have long believed that peace would come when the Palestinians were able to find decent leaders. Could this be the time?

From the Stranger:

Say "YES" to War on Iraq

Liberals Against Liberation

By Dan Savage

"

No to War! No to Oppression!"

The above anti-war message was delivered to me via a sad-looking pink poster. I pulled the poster off a light pole and hung it in my office over my desk. I look at the poster every day when I sit down to work, and every day I wonder how and when the American left lost its moral compass.

You see, lefties, there are times when saying "no" to war means saying "yes" to oppression. Don't believe me? Go ask a Czech or a European Jew about the British and French saying "no" to war with Germany in 1938. War may be bad for children and other living things, but there are times when peace is worse for children and other living things, and this is one of those times. Saying no to war in Iraq means saying yes to the continued oppression of the Iraqi people. It amazes me when I hear lefties argue that we should assassinate Saddam in order to avoid war. If Saddam is assassinated, he will be replaced by another Baathist dictator--and what then for the people of Iraq? More "peace"--i.e., more oppression, more executions, more gassings, more terror, more fear.

While the American left is content to see an Iraqi dictator terrorizing the Iraqi people, the Bushies in D.C. are not. "We do not intend to put American lives at risk to replace one dictator with another," Dick Cheney recently told reporters. For those of you who were too busy making papier-mâché puppets of George W. Bush last week to read the papers, you may have missed this page-one statement in last Friday's New York Times: "The White House is developing a detailed plan, modeled on the postwar occupation of Japan, to install an American-led military government in Iraq if the United States topples Saddam Hussein."

These developments--a Republican administration recognizing that support for dictators in Third World countries is a losing proposition; a commitment to post-WWII-style nation-building in Iraq--are terrific news for people who care about human rights, freedom, and democracy. They also represent an enormous moral victory for the American left, which has long argued that our support for "friendly" dictators around the world was immoral. (Saddam used to be one of those "friendly" dictators.) After 9/11, the left argued that our support for brutal dictatorships in the Middle East helped create anti-American hatred. Apparently the Bush administration now agrees--so why isn't the American left claiming this victory?

Because claiming this victory means backing this war, and the American left refuses to back this or any war--which makes the left completely irrelevant in any conversation about the advisability or necessity of a particular war. (Pacifism is faith, not politics.) What's worse, the left argues that our past support for regimes like Saddam's prevents us from doing anything about Saddam now. We supported (and in some cases installed) tyrants, who in turn created despair, which in turn created terrorists, who came over here and blew shit up... so now what do we do? According to the left, we do nothing. It's all our fault, so we're just going to have to sit back and wait for New York City or D.C. or a big port city (like, say, Seattle or Portland) to disappear.

It seems to me that if supporting tyrants creates terrorists, withdrawing our support from those very same tyrants might help to "uncreate" terrorists. Removing the tyrants from power seems an even better way to uncreate terrorists.

But wait! Taking out Saddam means dropping bombs, and dropping bombs only creates more terrorists!

That's the lefty argument du jour, and a lot of squish-brains are falling for it, but it's not an argument that the historical record supports. The United States dropped a hell of a lot of bombs on Serbia, Panama, Grenada, Vietnam, Germany, Japan, and Italy. If dropping bombs creates terrorists, where are all the German terrorists? Or the Italian terrorists? Or the Vietnamese terrorists?

But wait! Iraq isn't in cahoots with al Qaeda, so why attack Iraq in the war on terrorism?

Because we're not just at war with al Qaeda, stupid. We're at war with a large and growing Islamo-fascist movement that draws its troops and funds from all over the Islamic world. Islamo-fascism is a regional problem, not just an al Qaeda problem or an Afghanistan problem. To stop Islamo-fascism, we're going to have to roll back all of the tyrannous and dictatorial regimes in the Middle East while simultaneously waging war against a militant, deadly religious ideology. To be completely honest, I would actually prefer that the United States go to war against the ridiculous royal family in Saudi Arabia. The Saudis have been using American money to export their intolerant and deadly strain of Islam all over the world (the kind of Islam that inspires people to blow up discos in Bali), and getting rid of the Saudi royal family and their fascist clerics makes more sense than getting rid of Saddam. But the Saudis are our "allies," so perhaps we can pressure them to reform, as Josh Feit suggests.

In the meantime, invading and rebuilding Iraq will not only free the Iraqi people, it will also make the Saudis aware of the consequences they face if they continue to oppress their own people while exporting terrorism and terrorists. The War on Iraq will make it clear to our friends and enemies in the Middle East (and elsewhere) that we mean business: Free your people, reform your societies, liberalize, and democratize... or we're going to come over there, remove you from power, free your people, and reform your societies for ourselves.

Post-9/11, post-Bali, what other choice do we have?

From the Jerusalem Post:

We want to offer the Palestinians something different and a new way," said a meeting attendee. "We are actually trying to set up a Palestinian version of the Israeli Kadima Party, which attracted voters from both Likud and Labor. We are aware of the fact that many Palestinians are disenchanted with Fatah and Hamas and would like to see a new party that can offer them a better future."

From Tom Jefferson's Autobiography:

The bill for establishing religious freedom, the principles of which had, to a certain degree, been enacted before, I had drawn in all the latitude of reason & right. It still met with opposition; but, with some mutilations in the preamble, it was finally passed; and a singular proposition proved that it’s protection of opinion was meant to be universal. Where the preamble declares that coercion is a departure from the plan of the holy author of our religion, an amendment was proposed, by inserting the word “Jesus Christ,” so that it should read “a departure from the plan of Jesus Christ, the holy author of our religion.” The insertion was rejected by a great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of it’s protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mahometan, the Hindoo, and infidel of every denomination.

Obama and Melanin

Obama from CNN

“What it really does is really lay bare, this notion that if you appeal to white folks then there must be something wrong,” he said, adding it’s the same sort of suspicion many blacks face when they attend a predominately white Ivy League institution.

And that’s when he issued this provocative challenge: Instead of asking Obama if he’s black enough, black journalists should dig deeper, and ask why there exists this mistrust in black America of a black man like Obama running for office?

Bottom line: Obama nailed it. The question of his blackness has always been a ridiculous one. And maybe now he won't have to answer it again.

Growing Up Poor at Pike PLace Market

Here is a wonderful essay about the history of Pike Place Market.

thanks to Goldy at HorsesAss.

Gonzales' Documents Forged (SJN Aug 10, 2007)

Gonzales' Documents Forged (SJN Aug 10, 2007)

The Washington Times this morning reported that an investigator for the INS has found the Attorney General Gonzales is in the United States illegally.

While Mr. Gonzales parents are American citizens, it now appears that he was adopted from a destitute Venezuelan woman, Maria Vargez. Unfortunately, the Gonzales family did not have money for a legal adoption so the AG remains legally a Venezuelan citizen. It appears that Mr. Gonzales knew this because the INS reports that he has corresponded with Ms. Vargez and sent her money for many years.

Seantor Patrick Leahy (D. Vermont, ch. Judiciary) has said that this saddens him but he now feels it is important to determine whether Mr. Bush, who once employed the young Alberto as a gardener ever paid social security taxes on those wages.

In the meantime, the Venezuelan government has said it would not accept Mr. Gonzales as acitizen since it regards him now as an enemy combatant. Hugo Chaves, the President of Veenzuela has counseled the US that they might consider putting Mr. Gonzales, who isa catholic, in Guantanmo as an ecnemy combatant. In a surprise move, the White House has agreed.

Press Secretary Snow read the following annuncement, "Mr. and rs. Bush are saddened to learn of the illegal status of their old friend the Attorney General. Mr. Bush reminds us that under the now failed immigration plan, r.Gonzales could seek US citizenship but without such a clear law his old friend is now in an unclear legal status. Aasv a result, we have decided to relocate mr. Gonzales to Guantanao where he will have the status of guest enemy alien as opposed to prisoner enemy alien. Unfortunately this means that the Attorney General will not be available to answer any questions posed by the US Congress or any investigation agency NOT associated with the US military."

The Press Secretary, in answer to a a question, also said that the AG was imemdiately resigning and the President had asked hid brother Jeb to serve as AG. This is allowed because Congress is currently in recess.

Bringing Balance to All Things.

The sad truth is that there is obvious bias against the right in today's Universities. How else can you explain the large number of conservative beliefs that science finds as unreal?

As one example, consider evolution. There have been any experiments testing Darwin's theory. While these have worked, how can one conclude Darwin was correct until a comparable number of experiments have been done proving that intelligent design is correct?

Of course, truth is relative. Chris Mathews recently delivered an amazing defense of GW Bush.
In this 3 minute panegyric, nothing we all think we have learned about Bush is true. This sort of balance is a triuph of modern American journalism. We should expect no less from reality in other spheres.

I think we need legislation to require the reality of intelligent design. Experiments that seem to support Darwin's theory should be balanced by experiments with the opposite results.

The Dutch may already be taking this progressive step.

A Tiny Remnant

8
8 Jews left in Baghdad.
They do not want to leave.

How to Buy My Ballot

I vote by mail-in-ballot (MIB) but I consider this a real time bomb. Once you lose secrecy, I believe you open the door to all kinds of mischief.

The most extreme might be the possibility of folks selling their ballots. A lot of folks might gladly sell their votes for $5 or maybe for a raffle ticket.

So, I wondered, what would happen if I announced here that my vote for Governor was up for bid. I would offer to vote for whoever the high bidder wanted. I asked blogdom's major legal scholar, Roger Rabbit from HorsesAss, whether this was legal. Here is the eared one's answer:

"You can try to persuade someone else to vote for or against a candidate or ballot proposition, or not vote at all, provided the means used are merely promotional or persuasive and not menacing, coercive, or an offer to exchange something of value. You can show your ballot to someone else if you want to. I don’t see anything in the laws that would prevent you from holding a “voting party” where like-minded voters mark their ballots together, perhaps even in a drunken state. So far as I know, no law requires voters to be sober or of sound mind when they mark their ballots, nor do I know of any law that prohibits consuming beer, potato chips, and/or appetizers while marking a mail-in ballot. I believe you could ask a chicken to scratch her feet on the candidates you should vote for, if you wanted to. Nothing in the law prevents you from moistening the envelope sealing strip with whale piss."

Ok. So, I wonder if the crowd at DL would be interested in this idea ... free beer for your vote. On free beer night, you need to bring in a ballot to get a free beer and show everyone HOW you are voting.

You want my vote? I promise NOT to vote for whoever buys me a drink (wink). Does this sound a little like bringing lobbying to the roots? As Hillary says, "you certainly do not imagine I would sell my vote for County Prosecutor for a beer?"

The Decline of the Majority: Today's horse manure.

Current blogs are full of comments, to the right and left, about the claim that the % of "anglos" or "whites" is getting below majority in a number of places in the uS.

This is racist manure. If we were to define anglo as it might have been in 1800, I 'spect the number of Brit:German descended Americans has been FAR below a majority for over a 100 years.

To the extent that skin color is a real issue, how in hell does such a stat deal with Black immigrants form the Caribbean or England itself?? On the other hand, what unimaginable quality distinguished a second generation Italian from a second generation Spaniard?

All of this has happened before. At the end of the 1800s there was huge concern about the cultural effect of Irish, Italian, and Jewish immigrants. Guess what .. dem Wops, Kikes, and feckin' oirish they is all now part of the "majority." The same thing is happening and will happen inevitably to the light skinned Hispanics.

That leaves the issue of color vs class vs race. Can the US adsorb culturally "anglo" folks if their skin is duskier than that of an Italian tenor? Maybe Barack knows the answer.

Then there is the BIG issue ... if Barak were Prexy, would he invite Barry Bonds into the White House for an honor? Politico thinks BO's waffling on this central issue is a big deal.

Mutatis mutandi

Free Advice

OK, free advice is worth its price.

Still I want to say a few things about David Goldstein's new career as a radio host.

His station, KIRO, has just gone through a reprogramming. Relatively minor changes were made because KIRO is doing well. However, Goldie's airtime did not increase and last Tuesday at DL he seemed very much disappointed. Me too.

KIRO's decision is likely a reflection of ratings showing that KPTK, the syndicated liberal radio station in Seattle is NOT doing well. However, those same data show that conservative syndication at KVI is failing. There may be a message here that is NOT about lib vs con but about LOCAL content vs. SHRILL . See Mike Hood's blog, Blatherwatch.

All of the gains Mike mentions are by people with a strong Seattle flavor. Losers including Hannity and KPTK share a kabuki/vaudeville like approach that may be becoming passe. Locals like Dori, Medved, Ross, and yes Goldie, share a complexity of ideas, and manners that make the ore interesting. ALL the successful names share .... BREADTH. Take Medeved (please), he riffs about culture and movies. Listening to Ross or Dori is like going to dinner with an old friend ... Bush/Gregoire is only one topic.

I mention this because I am disappointed that KIRO did not choose to increase Goldy's role. I think I know why. I think they (and then listeners) see him only through the lens of Goldy's political activism.

So, from my extensive demographic analysis of our household of two, I would like to suggest that Goldy enrich his air time by exploring the broader context of Seattle, still liberal but not limited to elective office.

Here are some ideas for Goldie .. again free advice but lovingly offered.

1. SLU ... this will be a new city of 100,000 souls.n Whos is building it? How does this affect Seattle's tax base? Who will live there? Schools ?????

2. Seattle Public Schools ... nuff said, but why not FOCUS on specific programs and personalities? Seattle DOES have some ass kicking programs that get to little attention.

3. Bumbershoot, etc. What is planned?

4. Seattle's Black leadership ... we NEVER hear from these folks.

5. Is Seattle becoming a suburb of Redmond?

6. Microsoft. Why not devote an evening to MS?

7. The Discovery Institute. I hear so much bullshit about this place, bring the smelly stuff into the light!

8. The Seattle music scene.

9. Daybreak Star's future.

10. Kid's nite. Katie is great!

Goldy, I know there are too many ideas here, but I think your audience ... at least tyhe potential audience, both the pro-Goldy and anti-Goldy people, see the elective process as only one aspect of their ideas.

I hear from Mike and you that the number one demographic in Seattle is NPR. Why not commercialize some of their market?

Defence Department Prepares US Iraq Force for Armageddon.

Apparently the DOD Chaplain's office is working with a fundamentalist Christian group to distribute a video game devoted to Armageddon. See article in the Nation. Related SJ entries about Krishna and the US Air Force Academy. Interesting perspective, recently the Secy of Defense claimed the US does not have a formal plan for retreat from Iraq!

The Market Rules the Election.

OK ...

here it is ..... a place to invest in candidate futures.

I KNEW there was a way to make money off of politics.

At the same time the Communist Party of China is proposing to crash the US dollar by calling in the debt it owns.

And Goldie wants the Fed to lower rates to make more money available to bail people out of the housing market crash.

AIN'T CAPITALISM GRAND?

Optimism

A recent editorial by the UW president expresses optimism about new ways of achieving diversity at the university level. Kudoes to the President


As I have grown up, it has seemed to me that there has been a social ebbtide ... moving the US from the full tide and froth of its egalitarian period toward a classist society a lot like that of Imperial Britain.

Seattle, in particular, for all the innovation and new industries created by our current crop of megawealthy people, will enter the era of second generation great wealth at a time when the Jeffersonian presumptions of equal opportunity seem to have been submerged in the triumphalism of both the Clinton and the Bush years.

I have never been fond of skin based affirmative action. The goals set by Dr. Emmert seem to me, therefore, both exciting and very timely.

It would be really interesting to see how well the UDub is doing in attracting and serving our State's different classes.

I would also vote and work for any candidate who dedicates herself or himself to this new kind of affirmative action. That idea is a large part of my enthusiasm for Mr. Obama. I am less convinced that Ms. Clinton has that same commitment.

In the meantime Michelle Obama has fulfilled one of my male fantasies ... she goes around with her real face! Years ago Barb and I went to a wedding and Barb was supposed to be made up by a paid artist. It really irritated me. I love my wife and I love her face. Any fantasies we engage in belong in our bedroom. Kudoes to the lady from Chicago! Imagine going barefaced! From Burkha to Hajib to Makeup to barefaced femininity .. free at last.

I am often angry at the fauxista claim that the moderate press is left wing. Here is something to rival the Washington Times .. a leftish magazine, really!

Where is a Republican to go?

I am beginning to wonder whether Gingrich might just be the winner of the coming debacle. He is setting up a new web site that could be interesting id well run.. SO FAR IT SEEMS NOT TO BE WORKING.
Still, the fascinating thing about NG is that he has managed to insulate himself from GWB. Even if .. or esp if ... NG is NOT the candydate, he may well be the inevitable person to pick up the pieces after the Nov. events.

BTW, the yarmulke image is not mine, don't know if it is real but then I have never figured out what NG really believes either. he seems to me to be an ambitious power monger ..kind of like the image he and his kind tried to paint for Clinton I,.

Two Peoples in One City

This was the weekend for the Seattle Center Arab Festival. All sorts of nice things to say. I do wish more folks had attended.

I did not see any African Americans .. more of the Seattle Apartheid situation I am afraid.

On the down side there were some phenomenally stereotypic fundie Christians who came to convert the Muslims. I spoke with several ... the theme was that man is bad, we all sin and are damned by the Deity unless we accept Jesus. I think I finally understood the mentality of the abortion clinic terrorists .. these are people who can justify anything in the name of personal salvation.

I am not sure if this quote helps, but there may be an insight into fundieism in the thoughts of Einstein:
You see, wire telegraph is a kind of a very, very long cat. You pull his tail in New York and his head is meowing in Los Angeles. Do you understand this? And radio operates exactly the same way: you send signals here, they receive them there. The only difference is that there is no cat.
- Albert Einstein

The insight? Einstein was a believer. He was convinced that there was a cat of SOME kind responsible for the raido AND every other kind of causality. But Einstein's cat was not involved in human free will. The cat could care whether I type SOS or FUCK. So who is more moral .. Einstein or the Pope? The dilemma is not, in my Jewish POV, whether one does or does not believe in God, but whther one or deos not believe in doing good deeds ..what we call mitzvot. GBeleif in God is more than fine by me, I applaud the belief ..if it leads to a Cesar Chavez rather than a Pope Benedict or one of the fundies I met yesterday.

One of the things I have done as a civil rights activist is use my camera to intrude on rightist rallies. I wonder if I should retaliate and bring my kippah and cameras to Church next Sunday? Do ya think these good folks would mind an atheistic, camera toting Jew offering them surcease from their disturbed belief in a vengeful Christ?

More Manure

Horseshit ... the news that did not fit.

President Sarkozy of la Belle France is vacationing in a quaint New Hampshire town. What next? Hell .. Tom Cruise is making a movie about Nazis in GERMANY! I know, maybe we should celebrate Dr. King Day by having a parade in downtown Tehran. The marchers can all be Jews!

Survey shows just 3% of Americans approve of how Congress is handling the war in Iraq; 24% say the same for the President. Hmm ..3% is likely in the margin of error. What would the "people" WANT Congress to do?

The writer must earn money in order to be able to live and to write, but he must by no means live and write for the purpose of making money.
-- Karl Marx

Dinesh D'Souza is a bright man but I just read that he is engaged to Laura Ingram, one of the rights sharp mouthed blondies. Unless her on screen behavior is an act, I wonder if this could be a modern redux of My Friend Irma?

Poor Dinesh D'Souza! What can he be thinking? Is this a race thing? Short, handsome dark man weds tall harpy? Is he THAT desperate?

Can you imagine the snappy breakfast talk?

I DO hope they do NOT plan on children. While I personally like the idea of the golden human as a replacement for the golden retriever, but crosses like this are all too likely to produce a mean spirited cocker spaniel.

All the news, all the time

New SJ feature.

I am often irritated by the lack of coverage of the news by the US media. Therfore, as a new feature of this blog I am adding a regular section called "Horseshit." HorseShit is a tribute to the HorsesAss blog that has become the center of much that is good in Seattle.

Horseshit policies and why this is a Jewish issue:

HS will relate news that has not been given much attention by the media. To make the news more interesting, however, Horseshit will not be limited by the truth. I will use farce, exaggeration, and satire in the hope of exercising my readers' imaginations. This is an old Jewish tradition. In his preface to the "Guide to the Perplexed"Maimonideds warns that some of what he will say will not be true but that he has done this to challenge tghe reader to look within himself for truth.

Horseshit: All the News that did not fit.

1. Hamas and Fatah leaders admit to being closet lovers. Both are in exile in San Francisco. The Sudi and Iranian governments have approached Israel with a proposal to collaborate in cleansing the Palestinain people of the abomination of homosexuality.

2. Alberto Gonzales has admitted to being an illegal alien. Senate committee has requested documentation of his role in writing the BUsh immigration amnesty proposal.

3. Huge deposits of oil have been discovered at Hunts Point and Medina, wealthy neighborhoods near Seattle. Estimates are that there is enough oil beneath the wealthy neighborhood to fule the world for 1000 years. Neighbors, led by Malinda Gates, have requested assistance from the Sierra Club in making this areq a natural reserve.

4. John Silva announces for Office. The image is of a candidate SJn is supporting for offcie. John is one of my favorite people and he is as qualified ad anyone has ever bgeen to run for office. The office he has anounced for is Congress, a job that requires exactly the sort of intermediary expertise and translational innivationb John showed in his role as founder and CEO of Himsoft, the largest bioweb enterprise in the owrld. More to the poiint, Johjn's phenomenal record as a reservist serving in Iraq and origins as the adoted child of poor gay parents gives him a unique perspective on the issues.