Friday, March 31, 2006

Pretty pictures 2

It's kinda nice when an Iraqi resistance conference provides some confirmation for the pictures I've been drawing.  Iraq the Model's latest posts throws more light on the relationship of the "political struggle" in Iraq to the insurgency.

These days in Beirut, the fourth conference for supporting the "Iraqi resistance" is being held. It came only less than a year after their grand failure 3rd conference which we wrote about back in August.

The most notable statement given during this conference was made by Hasan Nesrallah of the Lebanese terror organization Hizbullah. The turbaned warlord explicitly said he and his party support the "Iraqi resistance" yet he called upon Iraqis to avoid falling into a Sunni-Shia or Muslim-Christian strife. If you're not familiar with this conference, it's basically a gathering of all kinds of thugs you can think of; pan-Arab racists, Ba'athists from Iraq and Syria, Sadrists, Islamists (including Khalid Mish'al of Hamas this time).

Nesrallah was not specific on which kind of "resistance" he supports except for putting it clear that he means the armed one by saying "I respect those who chose the political way but I urge them to respect the resistance and not to interrupt its work". You know that there is more than one kind of "resistance" over here; one represented by Zarqawi and his ilk, one by Saddamists, another by Islamist Sunnis backed by Syria and another by radical Shias like Sadr's thugs who are backed by Iran.

Iraq the Model characterized the conference held among Ba'athist and Sadrists back in August in the following words.

A group of those who still long for the "good old" past have arranged for a meeting for the different factions of the "Iraqi resistance" whether that resistance was Ba'athist, Salafi, She'at or pan-nationalist doesn't really matter as long as they share the same dream of bringing Iraq back to the dark ages of tyranny and repression.

To continue his  latest post, Iraq the Model says:

The truth is over there, just open your eyes and you will see it shining like the sun in a July afternoon. And do not forger that Nesrallah and his party are the pets raised equally by Damascus and Tehran. To me it is clear that NesrAllah supports both sides of the "resistance" and his advice not to be dragged to a civil war is pure bull^%$#, he wants Iraqis to kill each other because that's what his masters want and remember that he is the one who advised you 4 years ago when you were the resistance back then to "go to Saddam and negotiate with him and spare us the trouble of letting America in"…he and his masters wouldn't mind seeing you all murdered by Saddam if that could've stopped America from coming in and liberating Iraq.

There are a number of things to note about this political conference of the "resistance". The first is that its participants consists of Baa'thists and Sadrists with a lot of coverage by Arabic media networks like Al Jazeera. Second, it's principle spokesman is Hasan Nesrallah, of Hizbullah who is described by Iraq the Model as being a pet "raised equally by Damascus and Teheran". Third, the conference is advocating a "two-track" approach. Track one is the armed resistance. Trace two is insurgency via the "political way". Says Nasrallah: "I respect those who chose the political way but I urge them to respect the resistance and not to interrupt its work". Iraq the Model does not seem to believe that Nasrallah genuinely wants to avert a civil war because he sees the Nasrallah's people as being behind many of the outrages of recent days.

Commentary

One of the interesting things about this information is that while it validates the existence of "insurgency track" and the "political track", Nesrallah hopes to see them operating in parallel.

Although Iraq the Model doesn't seem to think much of the insurgent's conference characterizing it as a collection of losers, it's noteworthy that they are belatedly trying to create the classic national liberation model, which always had three pillars: a national united front guided by a core ideological cadre with an insurgent army under its control with a cross border sanctuary. The Sunni insurgency of 2004 was a failed attempt to defeat America using only one leg; the military leg. Zarqawi saw this was a forlorn hope especially after the new Iraqi Army came on line and, as pointed out elsewhere, began a shift towards the notion of political warfare in early 2004. I think that the insurgent conference is an indication that this strategy is going mainstream. The new theory is that the key to defeating America is a coordinated politico-military campaign. Unfortunately, the US arrived at this conclusion somewhat before Zarqawi and has been waging a politico-military campaign of its own since the beginning. Haltingly perhaps, and with many mistakes, but basically pursuing the correct strategy. Let's draw the politico-military campaign from the US perspective.

The insurgent's conference also provides a glimpse of how the struggle in Iraq is fully international. Elements in Syria and Iran are probably fully behind the politico-military campaign. It is not a case of Iraqi "Minutemen" struggling against the new Redcoats. Rather, Iraq is a central front of the War on Terror. Now putting both pictures together may give us some insight into how both sides are conducting their campaign. You can see both teams playing on the field and keep score, to use a sports analogy.

It's a little better, I think than this not too descriptive picture which is peddled fairly constantly over the airwaves.

Update

Bill Roggio has more in his latest post The Battle for Baghdad

Baghdad has yet again become the center of gravity for the insurgency. For three years the insurgency attempted to establish its dominance in outlying cities such as Fallujah, Mosul, Tal Afar, Ramadi, Husaybah, Haditha, Samarra, Balad, Taji, Najaf and elsewhere, and failed. Baghdad is now the center of power, the seat and symbol of legitimacy of the new Iraqi government. ...

Major General Rick Lynch, the spokesman for Multinational Forces Iraq, aptly explains why the insurgency is focusing on the city, and reports on Coalition and Iraqi efforts to reduce the violence in the capitol under Operation Scales of Justice during his March 30 briefing. ... Soldier's Dad provides a briefing slide of the distribution of attacks in Baghdad, and notes the high violence in the Mansur District. (then Roggio provides a map)

However, the level of violence, or more accurately the perception of the level of violence in Baghdad, is rising. ... the media, being concentrated in Baghdad, reports this, and the perception is the security situation in Baghdad represents the security situation in the rest of Iraq. ...

The Iraqi government and Coalition are making an effort to secure Baghdad, as Operation Scales of Justice demonstrates, however the question that remains is this effort good enough to get a handle on the problems with the insurgency, militias, and gang violence. The Iraqi government and Coalition need to increase security in the capitol and deal with the problems in the police force immediately before confidence in the police is completely eroded. Corrupt police units must be disbanded. The creation of the equivalent of Military Transition Teams for the police is already in the works, but needs to be accelerated. Until then, pair police units with Iraqi Army and U.S. military units. The "call forward" brigade, consisting of the 2nd Brigade, 1st Armored Division, is currently sitting in Kuwait. One battalion was recently moved forward to the Baghdad area to provide additional security for the Muslim holiday of Arba’een. Move the rest of the brigade to Baghdad. Consider the possibility of establishing curfews, closing off roads, placing 'battle positions' in the more problematic neighborhoods.

This actions may be viewed in some quarters as desperation, but they are prudent moves to get a handle on the security situation and change the perception among the residents of Baghdad that something is being done about the security situation. The real solution is the creation of a unity government, with serious and secular ministers in the portfolios of Defense and the Interior, who have the ability to purge the police of militias and take Sadr head on.

With the assistance of some of graphics on this post, the action is easier to follow.

183 Comments:

Blogger wretchardthecat said...

danymyers,

It's Visio.

3/31/2006 04:55:00 PM  
Blogger Red River said...

The center of Gravity is NOT Baghdad - it is US Public Opinion - meaning the US Media.

The US Media should be the target of the Pro-Iraqi colatition as it is the target of the Terrorists.

We have to change the way the Media reports the War!!

3/31/2006 05:34:00 PM  
Blogger Harrywr2 said...

At the moment, we have the Iraqi politico's twisting the truth for political reasons, and the American politico's doing the same.

One would think the guardians of the truth could figure it out.

3/31/2006 07:02:00 PM  
Blogger Marcus Aurelius said...

Red River,

Anyway, the battle you describe is set in Baghdad. If a the poltiicos in Iraq can establish a government then the political piece is set. However, I don't think it can be adquately settled until the militias can be fully controlled.

I have looked at the numbers on Sodier's Dad's site and looked at Bill's map. I wonder who is staging those attacks? Sadrist? Sunnis? Ba'athis?

3/31/2006 07:06:00 PM  
Blogger wretchardthecat said...

Soldier's Dad's map is interesting. It will also allow readers to follow the urban violence as it is reported in the papers.

3/31/2006 07:38:00 PM  
Blogger wretchardthecat said...

We're not too far behind the curve. This from AFP:

FORMER US president Bill Clinton said Iraq needed to get a government up and running soon to stop the strife-torn country from becoming a "launching pad" for terrorists.

He told BBC television this morning that rather than withdrawing US troops from Iraq, he would concentrate first on setting up a unity government that could command the support of different factions within the country.

Asked if history would judge the current instability, sectarian violence and political vacuum in Iraq as a "Vietnam in the making", Mr Clinton said that depends on what happens now.

"The increased capacity of the security forces to do their job therefore is largely irrelevant because they're not working on behalf of a coherent government which seems to have the allegiance of a majority of Shias, Sunnis and Kurds."


Eerie. This is almost Crunchtime Again w/ a Democratic spin. What would really scare me is if the ideas were actually sourced from this blog.

3/31/2006 08:13:00 PM  
Blogger Tony said...

Couldn't agree more, our success or failure is rooted in America's seemingly dull-witted attention. I say 'seemingly dull-witted', so as not to make my liberal brethren's mistake and assuming the other side is dumb.

That's always a bad assumption.
Assume the enemy is smarter, stronger and more evil than you are, and make a plan to kill the sumbitch.

Love these maps, reminds me of W's early analysis of Fallujah I and the sand berms offering free fields of fire down the crossing streets.

But we're past that point? It's not war anymore, it's a criminal matter? I hope so, but I don't think so.

Thanks to George Bush, Cheney, Rummy and their NEO-CON masters, as Taheri explained in The Last Helicopter... No matter what happens in 2009, at least from the end of 2001 until then, America will have fought aggressively and established redoubts far out in front of where they were in the 90's.

Ad astra, per astrum.

3/31/2006 08:16:00 PM  
Blogger Tony said...

Rufus,

The Fajr-3 ain't no Exocet. The WaPo descibes it as The U.S.-based military affairs Web site globalsecurity.org describes the Fajr-3 as a 240 mm artillery rocket with a 25-mile range, one of a group of light rockets Iran has developed mainly for tactical use on the battlefield..

How such a thing could attack multiple targets, I can't figure that out.

Their actual "ballistic missile" is the Shahab-3. href= "http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/31/AR2006033100614.html " rel="nofollow"> Just don’t call them Axis of Evil!

3/31/2006 08:41:00 PM  
Blogger Starling said...

W,

At the risk of complicating your fine "playing field" diagram, I wonder how much would be gained from explicitly noting the existence of "dotted-line relationships" between some of the parties.

In genograms (family trees), dotted lines can be used to show many kinds of relationships including distant relationships, romantic liaisons, adopted and foster children.

In organization charts, they are used to indicate the existence of indirect and/or multiple reporting relationships (e.g. two-boss situations).

What I wondered when I examined the diagram was whether and to what degree dotted-line relations exist. I wondered whether and to what degree people in the "Iraqi political" and "Iraqi Army" boxes still have indirect, intimate, and illicit relationships with their counterparts on the other side of the pitch.

3/31/2006 08:57:00 PM  
Blogger wretchardthecat said...

Starling,

My little diagram isn't very rigorous, it's merely to allow the news listener to make some sense of things. I'm sure it can be improved.

3/31/2006 09:02:00 PM  
Blogger Utopia Parkway said...

There are numerous ironies in this analysis. The US won the military conflict in three weeks. The only reason the US military stayed after that is because GB defined victory in political terms. Victory for the US depends on creating a democratic govt in Iraq.

The terrorists knew from the start that they couldn't beat the US militarily. Their only hope was to win politically. The whole point of their terror attacks is to tire out the US public so the US military will be called home. They might have, or might have had, a chance to beat the Iraq military on the battlefield, but I think no longer.

I think the tipping point was the first election, when it became clear that the terrorists couldn't win politically or militarily.

3/31/2006 09:03:00 PM  
Blogger Karridine said...

"One would think the guardians of the truth could figure it out."

Soldier's Dad, when you investigate the Universal House of Justice, you'll see for yourself that they DO figure it out; that the UHJ is concerned with Justice for all humankind; and that it is uniquely situated and equipped in our world, to find the truth when even CIA, KGB or BBC is shackled beyond redemption!

3/31/2006 10:54:00 PM  
Blogger Karridine said...

Starling,
To support Wretchard without dissing you, I remind us of a Doctor, diagnosing a problem in a patient...

First might be some general ascertaining of 'well/sick', followed by ever more detailed and refined descriptions of the bio-physiological pathways affected, the intrusion points available, severity, duration, possible complications, prognosis...

But first, a Wretchard the CAT-Scan, to let all readers into the ballpark!

3/31/2006 11:01:00 PM  
Blogger Starling said...

Wretchard and Karridine,

Hope I didn't leave the impression that I didn't appreciate the diagrams and accompanying analysis.
I greatly value the parsimonious presentations of ideas which is, incidentally, exactly what the diagrams are.

I find them vastly superior to the ubiquitous "quagmire" non-diagram/non-argument that is constantly making the rounds.

3/31/2006 11:20:00 PM  
Blogger wretchardthecat said...

Starling,

I certainly thought you had a good idea and sorry I didn't have time to get into it more as I had to some other stuff.

4/01/2006 01:00:00 AM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Janet, once you know who the militia members are, where they live, etc. it's game over. They can no longer operate anonymously.

4/01/2006 03:59:00 AM  
Blogger Karridine said...

Methuselah, Starling, Janet...

IIRC, what you're describing IS EXACTLY HOW we got Saddam, Usay and Quday!

Ordinary, sharp, trained Americans went green into the country, found a room, found a couple trustworthy interpreters, and began taping English/Arabic Name/Relationship pieces of paper to the wall, with lines and dotted lines and more...

They worked at the OODA Loop, and got INSIDE the Iraqi's hidden structure... cherished dynamics... "secret loyalties"...

So I bet you BIGTIME we're doing it again, because that's the way the Armed Forces DO IT! (I was a 98C [traffic analyst] while working the NorK problem, speaking from this much experience, at least!)

4/01/2006 06:16:00 AM  
Blogger Starling said...

Karridine,

my thesis was entitled "Information Technology and Organization Structure." Although the work focussed on the US retail industry, it is always gratifying to see that some of the theories which I used have application in the "non-market" arena.

On a related note, at this moment I am sitting in a cafe in Dubai grading papers and prepping for class tomorrow. Two things about this moment in time I find particularly signficant.

One is that as I listen to the ambient/lounge music coming out of the speakers, as I glance around the cafe, as I peruse the magazines on the large table, and as I catch fragments of the conversations taking place in my immediate vicinity, there is nothing that tells me that this cafe is not in Southern California or Miami instead of the Middle East.

Secondly, I am less than a two hours flight from where men and women are putting there lives at risk so that I can enjoy this lifestyle, this freedom, and this opportunity to teach here about our way of life and business.

I take all this in and wonder: how in the hell do I ever repay those men and women for their sacrifices?
I feel as humbled as I do flabbergasted for my lack of an answer.

4/01/2006 07:29:00 AM  
Blogger desert rat said...

First Mr WF Buckley dumped on the Administration's lack of success in Iraq. An eye opening experience for many old time Buckley readers.
Today Rich Lowry sits on the stool.
He says quite a bit, but the bottom line for Mr Lowry is:

" ... The GOP still has a few things on its side - time (the public mood could shift before the fall); gerrymandering (so few congressional districts are competitive that it will be difficult for Democrats to find enough to pick off); and events (maybe, just maybe, Bush does get lucky somewhere). But none of this goes to the White House's real vulnerability: Intellectually, it is running on empty, no matter which long-serving Bush loyalist happens to be chief of staff. ... "

Running on... empty.

Jackson Browne's song is no longer top 40 radio play, it's Classic Rock.

So while Mr Bush is still Compassionate, the National Review, America's first and premier conservative journal must not think Mr Bush is advancing the "Conservative Cause".

War without Victory does not produce political nor electoral Victory. Never has.
Ask Mr Lincoln.
The Republic needs a decisive Military win, soon, or the Democrats will be strengthened in the Fall and beyond.

As the Democrats gain strength, the resolve to continue the "Long War" weakens, as is already the trend line.

Decisive action is needed.
Outside Iraq.
Rich Lowry writes of "Bush administration is running on empty"

4/01/2006 07:31:00 AM  
Blogger A Jacksonian said...

The US Forces have also implemented a training feedback cycle unlike anything I can think of. Daily and weekly material goes back to stateside training areas so that troops spinning up to deploy get to go through the scenarios, analyze them, look at different motives and conflict types, go through those, then feed that back to the in-theater troops. They use that, analyze it and see if anything makes sense, try it out, see what happens, feedback... etc. Plus all soldiers are getting basic language and cultural training and it becomes more intense the higher in rank.

As to Baghdad... I remember the predictions of 'Stalingrad', meaning to those doing the predicting it would eat up any armored force. My reply was, 'Yes, it will be a sniper's heaven to demoralize the enemy. And we have the best snipers around.' And what really happened was a synthesis of new warfare operations that broke down heavy armor units to support and be supported by infantry, snipers and CAS. As we refined our capability, got better at adjusting to the local environment and learned who to trust, information flowed in... and the various enemies started to unravel.

The overall goal of ensuring a Three Part Iraq is proving out to be a good one. No one in their right mind wants to have a two-sided civil war in a three section state. The less we hear of the Kurds, the more their influence shows. As two sides squabble the Kurds look on, simply smiling... if asked to bring peace they would and I do believe the New Iraqi Army would help. Luckily the Army doesn't need that so the Kurds can tend to their knitting becoming more of a trade and manufacturing area day by day. Building a civil society to meet their needs. By quiet demonstration they are showing the way to peace through armed security for a civil society. And waiting for the children in the south to settle down and join them. Unstated, but always there. 'If we backwards Kurds can do this, then why can't you?' And that is the wound that will finally bring down the sectarian militias.

Ensured civil security.

It took Poles to give the lie to Communism and the Worker's Paradise.

And it looks like it will take Kurds to show the Arabs on how to build peace.

A *lot* of steps between here and there, but that is looking to be the heart of the end-game to the factional violence. It could all go to pot, but all the trend lines point differently.

So let the combined units roam to bring peace, under the watchful eyes of snipers as the insurgents get *plinked* to death from silent fire day and night. Better a stand up fight than ignominious death from nowhere... day after day. For that will surely destroy the morale of the enemy...

4/01/2006 07:34:00 AM  
Blogger PeterBoston said...

rat, you could watch an ocean sunrise and walk away with only "10 more hours of radiation poisoning."

4/01/2006 08:12:00 AM  
Blogger Deuce ☂ said...

WHAT IS A SUNNI TO DO ?

Many Americans accepted establishing a democracy in Iraq and then in other Islamic countries would hard wire our future security. Let us look at several recent and current examples of democracy not providing security:

SOUTH AFRICA. Under apartheid there was a common acceptance that being South African meant being part of a society where racial and tribal separation was the norm. Ironically the separation made it easier to accept the notion of being South African. There was a structure where the whites ruled and the colored and blacks took an unwanted subservient role. South Africa despite rigid sanctions, and in some ways because of these sanctions enjoyed a certain level of prosperity unknown in the rest of Africa. (they had to be more self reliant). After democracy and elections, the whites and certain other colored ethnic groups know they will always de dominated to the majority blacks. The cohesiveness and nationhood has diminished and along with that the standard of living in all groups whites, blacks and colored has fallen by 40% during the period 1995 and 2000. Crime has escalated several hundred percent. The income gap between blacks and whites has widened and there is increasing levels of ‘white flight’. The whites, many with eyes on Zimbabwe have come to the conclusion that democracy will not enhance their future.

YUGOSLAVIA AND KOSOVO. Under Tito, Yugoslavia was the wealthiest of all eastern bloc countries. His totalitarian regime used a formula of ethnic balancing and power sharing with the purpose of balancing ethnic and regional rivalries and differences. His regime established a cohesive national recognition. Tito was unsuccessful in establishing a method to maintain this balance after his death. The Serbs quickly realized that they could not maintain their ethnic identity unless they could become a larger majority in a smaller country. One of the true ironies is the US and NATO intervention in Kosovo. The Serbs claimed that over the years ethnic Albanians had illegally immigrated into Kosovo (Sound familiar?). They rightly assumed that the historic rights of Serbs in what was seen as their rightful homeland would be overrun and lost to the ethnic (Islamic) Albanians and they moved to remove them to Albania. Since the US and NATO intervention, Kosovo is democratically moving towards being an independent Islamic state in Europe. Hundreds of historic churches have been destroyed and most Christians have been forced to flee for their lives. The democratic process and the people have spoken.

CALIFORNIA, TEXAS, ARIZONA, NEW MEXICO. Shortly, due to illegal immigration, impending amnesty, pandering by the Democratic Party and GWB, and lots of new working and underclass voters, all of these states will be democratic states. There will be no chance for a true republican party to ever control them again. The legal residents, the legal citizens, the ones who served their country, raised their children and paid their taxes will be out-ruled, out-voted and dictated to by those who jumped the fence, without papers, without permission, and outside the law. The state legislatures will tilt social spending and programs to entitlements for the “needy”. There will be no democratic process available to the producing class. They will be permanently out-voted and large transfer payments will be taken from the productive class to the less so. There will be more white flight and an ever-increasing population of illegal immigrants. These states will become more Mexican, less American and the democratic process will have failed those that believed in it, studied it, practiced it and paid for it.

In all three of these examples, democracy was and is not a unifying force. Clearly the Sunnis realize that they will have no pleasant future under a Shiite dominated government that will be more Shiite and less Iraqi. They face a future of less rather than more. The same for Serbs in Kosovo, whites in South Africa and republicans in The US Southwest. Could it be that representative democracy has within it the seeds of it’s own destruction? Is it easier to accept democracy when you are the dominant party or at least have a chance to be so? Do rational human beings have good examples where they have prospered by placing their fate in the hands of rivals? Will Californians be more happy and secure being more Mexican? Will the Christian Serbs have more security under Islam? Are the white South Africans safer and more prosperous under a black democracy? What is a Sunni to do?

4/01/2006 08:12:00 AM  
Blogger desert rat said...

Skin cancer is a major problem in the desert and in the tropics.
Different perspectives on the same sunrise.
In the gloom of a Boston morning, the sun burning off the river fog is a welcome sight.

By noon in San Carlos, Mexico, in June it's 112F, people will die of dehydration on their walk to el Norte.
So yes, the sun is seen differently indeed.

4/01/2006 08:18:00 AM  
Blogger desert rat said...

From the AP wire
By Qassim Abdul-Zahra
ASSOCIATED PRESS

2:16 p.m. March 30, 2006

BAGHDAD, Iraq – A letter from President Bush to Iraq's supreme Shiite spiritual leader, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, was hand-delivered earlier this week but sits unread and untranslated in the top religious figure's office, a key al-Sistani aide told The Associated Press on Thursday.
The aide – who has never allowed use of his name in news reports, citing al-Sistani's refusal to make any public statements himself – said the ayatollah had laid the letter aside and did not ask for a translation because of increasing “unhappiness” over what senior Shiite leaders see as American meddling in Iraqi attempts to form their first, permanent post-invasion government.

The aide said the person who delivered the Bush letter – he would not identify the messenger by name or nationality – said it carried Bush's thanks to al-Sistani for calling for calm among his followers in preventing the outbreak of civil war after a Shiite shrine was bombed late last month. ... "

" ... At a news conference Thursday, al-Jaafari said he had met with Khalilzad a day earlier and that the U.S. ambassador denied remarks attributed to him about the prime minister's candidacy for a new term.

“I don't care much about these matters. I look at the Iraqi people and the democratic mechanisms,” al-Jaafari said.

Al-Sadr, who is staunchly anti-American, met with al-Sistani in Najaf on Thursday but emerged without making a statement. ... "

" ... An airman assigned to the 447th Air Expeditionary Group was killed Thursday near Baghdad. A fellow airman was injured when a roadside bomb exploded as they worked to disarm it, the Central Command reported. ... "

The other go without comment, but the loss of the Airmen is lamentable. One wonders why they were attempting to disarm the devise, not blow it in place.
As any Airborne Engineer Company Commander can confirm, back in the day, destruction in place was SOP for armed Enemy explosive devices.

the San Diego Union Tribune
dateline Baghdad

4/01/2006 09:36:00 AM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

ajacksonian, odd note, two old enemies who finally made a peace that worked for a hundred years because both sides thought the other hated it more, the king of England and the Arabian mahdi, Saladin was actually a Kurd from what is now Iraq, and Richard I was French born, and spoke only French.

4/01/2006 09:38:00 AM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Damn good post, 2164th. "Democracy" per-se ain't quite the panacea it looked like even a few years ago. Jefferson early on had it rigjht, that it can't work without an informed electorate. I guess that's why so many people are on the net when they oughtta be out cutting the grass, grrrr.

4/01/2006 09:53:00 AM  
Blogger Unknown said...

2164, A most excellent post!

Just to weight in a little.. It's not the nation state as a democracy that carries it own seed of destruction, it's the "non-ethnic" multiculti nation state that is the real albino. It is an unnatural construct. Representative democracy just exposes this defect.

4/01/2006 09:59:00 AM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

It's only a defect if you prefer liberty and prosperity to the various alternatives.

4/01/2006 10:01:00 AM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

The idea being, only a growing pie can let voters keep voting themselves larger pieces.

4/01/2006 10:03:00 AM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Buddy,
You might want to check your Calculus. There's a Limit to your Math.

4/01/2006 10:12:00 AM  
Blogger Tony said...

Yes 2164th, nice post. I think it may be a bit of stretch comparing Democrats in California to whites in South Africa, but still very interesting.

As a friend says, "Our form of government and politics stinks, but it's the best in the world."

4/01/2006 10:20:00 AM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Mika, that's a mighty dark corner. Think "new tech breakthroughs".

4/01/2006 10:33:00 AM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Buddy,
The only thing I can think of is starting a new integral on the bright side of the moon.

4/01/2006 10:39:00 AM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

There ya go, Mika--where there's no life, there's hope! (*gag*)

4/01/2006 10:46:00 AM  
Blogger Jack said...

The US elites seem to sense a rising tide of frustration and fear that the citizenry will say "to hell with the world."

How about to hell with the world and the elites.

4/01/2006 10:49:00 AM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Buddy,

You smell that?

Do you smell that?

... Napalm, son.

Nothing else in the world smells like that.

I love the smell of napalm in the morning.

You know, one time we had a hill bombed, for twelve hours. When it was all over I walked up. We didn't find one of 'em, not one stinkin' dink body.

The smell, you know that gasoline smell, the whole hill. Smelled like ... victory.

Someday this war's gonna end.


- Lt. Col. Kilgore

4/01/2006 11:03:00 AM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

See French Revolution. Elites lost their heads, the French people went permanently insane, no winners except Napoleon, for awhile. History is somehow marching forward into the present--people are arguing the Crusades like they were 5 years ago, and the La Raz are attacking Christopher Columbus. So, we might as well re-do the French Revolution, too. Lessee, our new Napoleon, can we see him yet?

4/01/2006 11:11:00 AM  
Blogger Doug said...

I encourage all who care about this country to read and ponder 2164th's comment two threads back .
You might also want to see what I found on the pages of the reactionary, right wing, nativist, exclusionary, unwelcoming LA Times.

Let your corrupt representatives know what you think about their giving this country away.
(if you just happen to give a damn about your kid's futures)
...for what it's worth.
---
Buddy's Bigger Pie is in Truth a Shit Sandwich for the People.
...care of the elites.

4/01/2006 11:17:00 AM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

"Bigger pie" was a general comment re the theory of democracy, Doug. "Bigger pie" being the only solution to the problem of democratically-voting oneself someone else's property. Whether it is still operable or not--if it *can* be, or not. General stuff--not a plea for La Raz. La Raz is doing itself in as we speak--the marches woke up the country, and we will in due time come up with a reasonable guest-worker program, and some sort of earned-citizenship program that will avoid a France-along-the-border. That's it for me, not gonna join another thread-hijack on this.

4/01/2006 11:42:00 AM  
Blogger Tony said...

Speaking of Democracy, I've copied below a letter written by a friend of a friend that appeared in the Philly Inky yesterday, I suppose because it succinctly expresses their editorial policy but they're afraid to state it this clearly.

Now, if our Constitutional process of voting has led to the imposition of a "regime" in America, I wonder what this guy thinks of the 62 million of his fellow Americans who voted in the regime? Are we evil, or just stupid and brainwashed? That's what I'm wondering.

An unpopular regime

Re: "2 women's groups endorse Casey foe," March 22:

In response to the report that NOW and the Feminist Majority will campaign for Bob Casey's Democratic primary opponent in the governor's race, I feel thrown back to the Ralph Nader presence in the 2000 election. I sympathize with the ideals of those two organizations. But this is a moment when the Washington regime has turned its back on rationality as it champions a wait-and-see approach to global warming and species extinction, a "teach the controversy" stance toward intelligent design, and a censoring of its own scientific boards.

It is a regime that has shattered the sympathies of the world, which gathered behind us as we entered Afghanistan and deserted us as we entered Iraq. It is a regime that has had ambitions of dismantling most of the protections on which we have come to rely, whether the economic safety net, environmental standards, privacy protocols, or legal recourse. It has turned an unfeeling eye toward a world in which the chasm dividing the super-rich and the rest has grown larger.

It is a regime that must be defeated. Our most important goal locally can only be the defeat of that regime's chief apologist, Rick Santorum.


You know, I can see how all those Pew polls going back decades always show Dems and libs as the most miserable among us, if this poor soul is an example of their "thinking."

(Poor Prof. Wretchard, the students NEVER stay on point.)

4/01/2006 11:44:00 AM  
Blogger Doug said...

You could continue it back there Bud, but you know you'd lose taking the part of Belafonte sayin Socialism just needs one more FAIR test. (better another empty promise of no more hijacks! ;-)
No Mas, No Mas!

Teddy and the boys are fixin it alright, just like he did nearly half a century ago when things REALLY started going downhilll faster.
But Boy Howdy of no Veto fame will save the day again, no doubt.
In your dreams.

4/01/2006 12:01:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Don't hope, PRAY for Uncle Ted.
He Cares.
Just ask W.

4/01/2006 12:07:00 PM  
Blogger PeterBoston said...

But Boy Howdy of no Veto fame will save the day again, no doubt.
In your dreams.


A Kos worthy comment. I always expected better.

4/01/2006 12:12:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Trish, it'll *have* to be worked out. It's here, finally, the issue will have to be worked out, as the Dems have been called out on their look-the-other-way for the added voters, and the Pubs have been called out on the look-the-other-away for the added business. It's come to a head. What we don't want to do is shovel ammo to the agitators. Overheated rhetoric is conterproductive to making a deal that'll work.

4/01/2006 12:24:00 PM  
Blogger PeterBoston said...

That would be called nonresponsive trish. There are better places to play Clockwork Orange.

4/01/2006 12:27:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

I think we all realize that GWB ain't got no ride on this thing--he's late on it, the six million that've been turned away under him just ain't a big enough number. The economy has been booming, the demand for labor is nationwide, and Mexico is just flat moribund with new job creation. Sux all the way around, needs a solve, will get one.

4/01/2006 12:30:00 PM  
Blogger Tony said...

Employment Situation Summary”

Nonfarm payroll employment grew by 243,000 in February, and the unemploy-
ment rate was little changed at 4.8 percent, the Bureau of Labor Statistics
of the U.S. Department of Labor reported today. Job gains occurred in con-
struction, financial activities, health care, and several other industries.

Unemployment (Household Survey Data)

Both the number of unemployed persons, 7.2 million, and the unemployment
rate, 4.8 percent, were little changed in February. A year earlier, the num-
ber of unemployed was 8.0 million, and the jobless rate was 5.4 percent.

Following a decline in January, the unemployment rate for adult men edged
up to 4.2 percent in February. The jobless rates for the other major worker
groups--adult women (4.3 percent), teenagers (15.4 percent), whites (4.1 per-
cent), blacks (9.3 percent), and Hispanics (5.5 percent)--showed little or no
change over the month. The unemployment rate for Asians was 3.2 percent, not
seasonally adjusted. (See tables A-1, A-2, and A-3.)

After declining in January, the number of unemployed persons who had been
without a job for 27 weeks or longer returned to its December level of 1.4 mil-
lion. These long-term unemployed accounted for 19.0 percent of total unem-
ployment in February, down slightly from a year earlier.


If we did the impossible, as the extremists in the House demand, and got rid of all the illegals, who would do all their jobs?

4/01/2006 12:38:00 PM  
Blogger RWE said...

In addition to Wretchards's analysis we need to note the phrase: "You know that there is more than one kind of "resistance" over here..."

So there is not one set of diagrams but multiple ones. And all of the players are being played to some extant by the others.

I recall an article by one of the political leaders of the Viet Cong, written in the mid-80's. He explained that the outcome the VC were working towards was a coalition government, brokered by the Americans. Their Communist brothers from the North were just supposed to help and then go home.

But Tet failed - purposely he thought, in retrospect, being designed by the North to get the US to wipe out the VC. Then the unthinkable happened - the US abandoned South Vietnam, leading to the VC belatedly realizing that they had handed their country over to the North - not the preferred plan at all.

The same thing is going on in Iraq - everyone has his own diagram. Sadar certainly has no desire to hand the country over to the Sunni and probably not even the Iranians. Al Quada wants destruction and chaos - hoping that everyone loses and they can pick up the pieces, ala Afghanistan. The Iranians have their own objectives, as do the Batthists - and there are Syrian Batthists and Iraqi Batthists.

There are more characters in this than in Russian novel. And odds are not one of them has made both his own set and reproduced a copy of the other's set of Wretchard's Pretty Pictures.

4/01/2006 12:39:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Virtually NOBODY is asking for that Tony.
DC Talking Point.

4/01/2006 12:40:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Bud leaves out that MORE have come in under GWB than anyone previous.
...nor that the Bill under consideration will INCREASE the flow.
(Caps are a sure sign of "nativism," just ask Bud, or GWB.)

4/01/2006 12:45:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Tony, the big construction firms are short a hundred thousand tradesmen rebuilding the Katrina coast. Florida is spending state-tax money to recruit and train construction workers.

4/01/2006 12:47:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

"Vigilantte, Nativist, Unwelcoming, and etc") is the overheated rhetoric of your hero, but not mine, GWB.
Used to describe the very people that got him in office, I might add.

4/01/2006 12:47:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

12:47 PM,
Right Bud:
Border Control would increase Global Warming, causing MORE Katrinas.

4/01/2006 12:48:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

trish, thank you, m'dear--may I compliment the guffaw qualities of your "sunshine-out-the-shirtsleeves" image?
\:-D

4/01/2006 12:53:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

What's left out of the WSJ Utopia theme, is all the phoney accounting, and uncounted social costs mounting under our Drunken Sailor's Spending Spree/cum free labor drive.

Big mystery that spending now would help the ecomomy boom, but some of the social/infrastructure debts mounting up make the monetary ones pale in comparison.

4/01/2006 12:57:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Are you saying you want your congresspersons to support a larger INS budget, Doug? Have you written your representatives and said so?

4/01/2006 12:58:00 PM  
Blogger Tony said...

Nobody's saying that, Doug? I saw Tom Ridge give a speech as Dir of Homeland Security something like: "When the cops stop a car and the guy is an illegal alien, we'll drive him to the nearest airport." Words to that effect. Isn't Tancredo leaning in that direction?

Buddy, maybe we need to train all those skilled workers because the current skilled workers are unavailable because they're all employed in the sustained housing boom of the last several years. Besides, we can't count on a Katrina to keep the economy growing every year! ;>

4/01/2006 01:00:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Past that, past making wishes known to the lawmakers and execs and the judiciary via letters, calls, faxes, and emails, there's not a whole lot left to do. The Minutemen need volunteers, though, AI'm not sure whether a week of patrols every six monthsa is doing anything other than providing LaRaz with a golden propaganda op. The Minutemen need more numbers and more money, if they're going to be effective to the point of overcoming the ammo they provide to La Raz. Want to volunteer, or send money?

4/01/2006 01:06:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Oops, bad link-

4/01/2006 01:11:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

(sigh) here:
www.minutemanproject.com

4/01/2006 01:13:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Undocumented Persons Policy: Twenty years with Hard Labor.

But isn't that the policy already?

4/01/2006 01:21:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

By and large, reasonable people know we ain't gonna round up ten or twelve million people and truck 'em to to Mexico--for one thing, their kids and grandkids are legal, if born here. And we can't do blanket amnesty either. Simpson-Mazzoli, and Clinton's tinker in '96 both got as close to that as politically possible. The problem of process for guest programs, and earned citizenship for those who we identify and qualify is a big enough problem without demagoguery, and that much harder, and less effective, with it.

People have pride, labor has value, and we do not--repeat not--need to be presenting an ugly face to the world. That's precisely what our enemies--I mean our real enemies--would love to see us do. The brass ring here is assimilation.

Given that there'll be no trucking away of millions, the problem becomes how to get these people into the 'United States' frame of mind, rather than the 'LaRaz, Our Continent' frame of mind that the agitators are pushing using the "racism" word.

This isn't an intellectually difficult point, I don't think. Is it?

4/01/2006 01:29:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Why not circumcise them?

4/01/2006 01:33:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Hanging out a subsidiary shingle, Mika?

4/01/2006 01:34:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Reminds me of the secretary who went to find her boss in the barber shop. She opens the door and sez, "Bob Peters here?" Barber sez, "No m'am, just haircuts and shaves."

4/01/2006 01:37:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Err, Pedro mi español no es tan bueno.

4/01/2006 01:39:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

beats the hell outta my Lithuanian--

4/01/2006 01:43:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

And lots of them have a South African accent. Go figure.

4/01/2006 01:44:00 PM  
Blogger PeterBoston said...

JILL CARROLL: I WAS COERCED

"During my last night in captivity, my captors forced me to participate in a propaganda video. They told me they would let me go if I cooperated. I was living in a threatening environment, under their control, and wanted to go home alive. I agreed."

Did I miss the reporting that her "exit" interview was conducted by the jihadis? I thought it had been done by Western media.

4/01/2006 01:45:00 PM  
Blogger Tony said...

It's not an intellectually difficult point that there's a world war going on either, but demagoguery obscures the point for half the voters of the USA.

I have to recuse myself from talking about immigrants. My experience working as a landscraper through high school and college with Irish immigrants taints my thinking. When we got done cutting grass, these guys worked the night shift at the Acme warehouse. Wives stayed home, had kids.

Ah America! It's a bootyful ting, ain't it.

4/01/2006 01:45:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Yeah throw good money after bad to the INS, Buddy, but make sure they don't do their jobs.
The "secret" to the increased attractiveness of border busting, is the wink and nod policy, increased since GWB, of giving away good paying jobs, like those in Meat Packing, to ILLEGALS.
There are well documented cases of congressmen coming down on the INS for trying to enforce the laws at the workplace. ...in multiple states.

GWB doesn't see that, since the people that CALL the congresspeople against the INS donate, big time.

I will link some other time, gotta go:
Continue the FDR/WSJ/Boy Howdy Free Lunch Happytalk. Labors free at the Commune.

Just keep lookin at this neat Potemkin Village here, not the plastic tents in the mud for the WORKERS over there.
(discuss)

We need REFORM, not enforcement.
La Raza, here we come!
(wife and kid report first signs of Mexican Gangs on the Magic Isle of Maui)

4/01/2006 01:54:00 PM  
Blogger Tony said...

My bro-in-law works in immigration. He loves it every time I bring up the "sent the visas to the 9/11 hijackers six months after 9/11" story!

4/01/2006 01:59:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Tony--LOL--what else can he do but laff--it's like the Ghostbusters up against that Giant Pillsbury Doughboy-

4/01/2006 02:14:00 PM  
Blogger Tony said...

Right Buddy,

It's one of those times you gotta laugh to keep from crying. And it's NORMAL.

4/01/2006 02:25:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

That's a good link, to Jill Carrol--wish I hadn't shot off my mouth about her being a tool. So close in time to CPT, yes, but wise commenters here who said 'shut up for awhile' were right--

4/01/2006 02:25:00 PM  
Blogger Jack said...

Stayed out of the thread-jack until now.

But basically, it seems to me we're betting the cohesion of our nation merely because we can't figure out that Mexicans aren't the only people who will come here, work, and contribute to our country.

That's the elephant in the room with regards to the labor argument - why does it have to be Mexicans.

Yeah, I hear all the master race talk about hard workers, family oriented, Catholics. Yet, whatever nice qualities they've got hasn't helped Mexico, and it reminds me of how doe-eyed Republicans get over Cubans.

They're human, not superhuman. I've lived among them.

We're creating a Quebec, only right next to France.

It is a matter of national sovereignty, legality, and borders. Mexico was never Paris, and yet for some reason we've never had this problem before. Why is that?

4/01/2006 02:32:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

It ain't new in the Texas end, tho, Cutler. Just the publicity. I broke out as a mud hand in the 1970s oil patch along the border, checking rigs all the way up to Laredo, living near Harlingen. Son was born in McAllen, sister city to Matamoros. Even then the population was 90% Latino, many people spoke no English, everyone had relatives on the other side. The border counties have always voted Democrat, even when the rest of the state didn't. The thing is, I never saw it as a problem, never felt that something was wrong--after all, it's been like that since 1836. That was just "south Texas", that was it, the way it was, the way it developed, is, and always will be.

I don't know enough about California's acute problems, but they seem like another world, the overloaded social services, gangs, LaRaz. I can't help but wonder if the difference is in Sacramento. And I don't mean that as an insult--just that all along, the social programs depended on border security and/or a robust Mexican economy. A gamble, and coming up snake-eyes.

4/01/2006 02:55:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Brownsville/Matamoros. McAllen/Reynosa. Must be getting senile. Actually lived in Edinburg, but can never spell it right, and no one's ever heard of it.

4/01/2006 03:07:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Larsen, take note:

An Egyptian Islamic expert discussing the finer points of female genital mutilation and initiation into the Ummah:

Interviewer: So what about the girl’s opinion?

Dr. Muhammad Wahdan: What do you mean?

Interviewer: What if she says: I don’t want to be circumcised. What happens then?

Dr. Muhammad Wahdan: If a girl says she doesn’t want it, she’s free. No problem.

Interviewer: Is this what happens in reality?

Dr. Muhammad Wahdan: I have no relation to reality. I am talking about how things should be.

Interviewer: You are a religious sheik, from Al-Azahar University. You cannot say you have no relation to reality.

Dr. Muhammad Wahdan: Reality is a mistake, we must rectify it.
.
.
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=19891

4/01/2006 03:26:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

"Reality is a mistake. We must rectify it."

Driving through little towns like Crystal City at night, I kept my .45 auto in my lap. Dope gangs were dangerous, even back in the 70s. And the gangstas' moms dads brothers sisters aunts uncles cousins and nephews then and now own the real estate, stores, hold the judgeships, are the cops, farm the land, run the cattle, build the buildings, consecrate the churches and fill 'em on Sunday.

And have since Santa Anna, and will 'til Gabriel blows his horn.

They don't like cousin Juan from Reynosa running grass over the river, but he's still cousin Juan.

It's the land of "No le hace", "manana", live and let live. Of course the law-breaking is bad, of course we'd all be better off without it. But it ain't gonna change short of a major social upheaval.

Maybe that's what we need, Mika--social upheaval, everyone trace their genetics along some given line, agree upon a date, and everyone sell out their holdings and move back to wherever their genes were on that date.

Reality, rectified.

4/01/2006 03:36:00 PM  
Blogger Tony said...

Hey, if we're worried about immigrants introducing anti-social behavior, you should take a ride through my old neighborhood. What was a stable, working class Irish ghetto for generations is now the murder capital of Philadelphia. No foreigners involved in the transition, all Americans whose families have been here longer than most of us.

-------------

I'd rather talk about missiles than Mexicans, and the more I think about it, the more I think the Iranians are lying about their new stuff.

If it's a ballistic missile, ie., goes out of the atmosphere on its path, it can't hide from radar. Things that "hide from radar" look like the B-2, F-117 and SR-71 from an earlier age. Things that stay below radar to "hide" are cruise missiles, and ours can attack multiple targets. Of course, there can be stealthy cruise missiles, I suppose. And Iran could buy this stuff off-the-shelf from China, if not North Korea. I almost said "it's not rocket science" ... but I mean, it's not impossible.

But, the overall tenor of their bragging, and the mixed terms in the story, make me think the latest Iranian missile story is largely barbra striesand.

Maybe AWST will write about this week, if so, I'll post what they say.

Believe it or not, a lot of people think it's crazy to even keep missiles out of America, let alone Mexicans!

4/01/2006 03:55:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

It's not even missiles or Mexicans. It's us, we're tired.

I've been tired now for some years. I've been blaming it on lack of sleep, not enough sunshine, too much pressure from my job, earwax build-up, poor blood or anything else I could think of. But I think I've figured out the real reason: I'm tired because I'm overworked. Here's why:

The population of this country is 273 million. 140 million are retired.

That leaves 133 million to do the work.

There are 85 million in school.

Which leaves 48 million to do the work.

Of this there are 29 million employed by the federal government.

Leaving 19 million to do the work.

2.8 million are in the armed forces, preoccupied with the war.

Which leaves 16.2 million to do the work.

Take from that total the 14.8 million people who work for state and city governments.

And that leaves 1.4 million to do the work.

At any given time there are 188,000 people in hospitals.

Leaving 1,212,000 to do the work.

Now, there are 1,211,998 people in prisons.

That leaves just two people to do the work.

Me and somebody else.

And there you are sitting on your butt, at your computer, reading jokes.

So, everything wrong is all your fault.

4/01/2006 04:27:00 PM  
Blogger Jamie Irons said...

Fascinating thread!


Buddy,

Altogether OT: check your gmail.

Jamie Irons

4/01/2006 04:43:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Uh oh, another tap on the shoulder from a psychiatrist--
\:-D

4/01/2006 04:59:00 PM  
Blogger Tony said...

I have given up reading books; I find it takes my mind off myself.
- - - Oscar Levant

4/01/2006 05:25:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

"But enough about me. what about YOU? What do YOU think of me?

---Groucho?

4/01/2006 05:28:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Buddy,
I admit. That's reality rectal-fied.

But how to explain me crying at the Western Wall, when every brain cell in my head is in antipathy to that fraud? How how to explain the tears in my eyes when I land at Tel Aviv Ben Gurion airport? How how to explain my soul singing when the sun breaks through the evening clouds over Haifa or Jerusalem?

4/01/2006 06:19:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

'Cause it's the Holy Land, Mika--and your people go back a-ways there.

Everything we know, we learned from you.

You can be an atheist or an agnostic if you want--that's probably in the Commandments. From the Broken Tablet. You remember Moses in that Mel Brooks film--there were Fifteen Commandments, but one of the tablets got broken on the walk back down the mountain.

4/01/2006 07:03:00 PM  
Blogger Tony said...

The 3 universal principles of Enlightenment, American-style, as espoused in the first US Navy flag, and in the Declaration of Independence (before things got all complicated in the Constitution a decade later):

1. You (rest of the world) do your thing;
2. I do my thing;
3. Don't tread on me.

IN a country comprised of immigrants who have idealistically, purposely, permanently moved themselves and their families here on purpose, #1 and #2 above are self-selected. That's why we're here.

#3 is what happens after we're here. (Ref. Andrew Jackson, Scots Irish) Don't dare tread on me.

History proves this is an attractive pitch.

This same 1, 2, 3 applies to internal enemies who might tret on us. Most of us are at 3, you saw this after 9/11. The MSM portrays an America I don't meet in real life.

Don't tread on me was enforced in Afghanistan, with an Air War that was like a polite darts contest. Andrew Jackson woulda used all methods at his disposal in response to such a vicious insult to America.

None of us will be surprised when the American sentiments shift back to post-9/11 aggressive awareness - after the next attack.

4/01/2006 07:33:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Protein Wisdom guy, Jeff Goldstein, was making the point a few days ago that the people saying this is a make-believe contrived war must have tremendous confidence in their bete noir--the prez--because if there *is* another attack, they'll have some nasty and fairly permanent egg on their face. Nobody will ever listen to them again.

4/01/2006 07:46:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

...secret location?

4/01/2006 08:18:00 PM  
Blogger ledger said...

Mika: Why not circumcise them?

Buddy Larsen: Hanging out a subsidiary shingle, Mika?... Reminds me of the secretary who went to find her boss in the barber shop. She opens the door and sez, "Bob Peters here?" Barber sez, "No m'am, just haircuts and shaves."

[Ouch... sounds painful!]

I was going to comment on Red Rivers post "...The center of Gravity is NOT Baghdad - it
it is US Public Opinion - meaning the US Media..." which is essentially correct.

But since this post has gone off-topic I just make it a little more off-topic.

I lifted these from associatecontributor1's post:

Q: What's six miles long and goes four miles per hour?

A. A Mexican funeral with only one set of jumper cables.

Q: Why do Mexicans have big noses?

A: So they have something to pick in the off season.

Q: What are the first three words in a Mexican cookbook?

A: Steal three eggs.

Q: Why don't Mexicans barbecue?

A: The beans fall through the grill.

Q: What do you get when you cross a Mexican and an Iranian?

A: Oil of Ol'e.

Q: What do you get when you cross a Mexican with an octopus?

A: No idea; but it can sure pick lettuce.

see: Liberal Larry's Viva La Raza! 90% down comments (Remember this blog is pure satire and aimed against liberals)

4/01/2006 08:22:00 PM  
Blogger desert rat said...

The US is not at War with those people.They represent the Religion of Peace, not Sponsors of Terror.

That is the US Course upon which we Stay.

No Warrants have yet to be issued for those fellows, so Spec-Ops stayed home. No SWAT allowed.

"Iceberg ahead" yelled the lookout

"Stay the Course" ordered the Captain.

"Great shot of the bow", said director James Cameron.

4/01/2006 08:41:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Everything we know, we learned from you.

Aha. The god Mars impregnates a Vestal Virgin..

4/01/2006 08:51:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

this exchange from ledger's link:

Posted by: Leona de RoCkY mOuNtAiN | March 31, 2006 at 08:20 AM

In light of this, I think we should just surrender to Mexico.


Oh, and Iraq too.

Posted by: Dodger | March 31, 2006 at 08:25 AM


In light of this, I think we should just surrender to Meh-hee-ko

Posted by: Neocon-pincher | March 31, 2006 at 08:30 AM

In light of all this I thinquito we should surrenderaza to Taco Bell.

oh, heck, eets funnee!

4/01/2006 08:52:00 PM  
Blogger Tony said...

Buddy,

You know that if there is another attack, it will be Bush's fault, just like Katrina and the price of tea in China.

4/01/2006 08:55:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

and that ferry that sank off Bahrain the other day, that was Bush, too.

4/01/2006 08:57:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

guy throws a set of jumper cables at this other guy. other guy ducks, and sez, "You trying to start something?:

4/01/2006 09:00:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Doc: "So, you said you have a short-term memory problem?"
Patient: "I did?"

4/01/2006 09:17:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Sorry Bud,

Here's the
Virgin Link Impregnated..

4/02/2006 07:30:00 AM  
Blogger desert rat said...

Yeah, guys, it is just not the desert sun that must make folks come to question the Quanity of our War making against the Mohammedans.

Command Conferences the Enemy holds are unmolested from Sea, Land or Air.

Even the indomitable Mark Steyn sees the real problem is becoming Mr Bush and his Policy of both Peace & War in someone else's time.

"... But there are two kinds of persons objecting to the war: There's a shriveled Sheehan-Sheen left that's in effect urging on American failure in Iraq, and there's a potentially far larger group to their right that's increasingly wary of the official conception of the war. The latter don't want America to lose, they want to win -- decisively. And on the day's headlines -- on everything from the Danish cartoon jihad to the Afghan facing death for apostasy -- the fainthearted response of "public diplomacy" is in danger of sounding only marginally less nutty than Charlie Sheen. ... "

" ... To win a war, you don't spin a war. Millions of ordinary citizens are not going to stick with a "long war" (as the administration now calls it) if they feel they're being dissembled to about its nature. One reason we regard Churchill as a great man is that his speeches about the nature of the enemy don't require unspinning or detriangulating. ... "

" ... Here's the Australian treasurer, Peter Costello, with advice for Western Muslims who want to live under Islamic law: "There are countries that apply religious or sharia law -- Saudi Arabia and Iran come to mind. If a person wants to live under sharia law these are countries where they might feel at ease. But not Australia."

You don't say. Which is the point: Most Western government leaders don't say, and their silence is correctly read by a resurgent Islam as timidity. I also appreciated this pithy summation by my favorite foreigner minister, Alexander Downer: "Multilateralism is a synonym for an ineffective and unfocused policy involving internationalism of the lowest common denominator." See Sudanese slaughter, Iranian nukes, the U.N.'s flop response to the tsunami, etc. It's a good thing being an Aussie Cabinet minister doesn't require confirmation by John Kerry and Joe Biden.

My worry is that the official platitudes in this new war are the equivalent of the Cold War chit-chat in its 1970s detente phase --when Willy Brandt and Pierre Trudeau and Jimmy Carter pretended the enemy was not what it was. ... "

So there you have it Mark Steyn comparing Mr Bush and his Foreign Policy formulations to Mr Carter and his.

Wow!

And peter boston thought I was out of the "Mainstream".
Rich Lowry, WT Buckley & now Mark Steyn all join the "Mr Bush has got it wrong Posse".

Vigilantes & War Mongers, all?

Who ya gonin' call?

4/02/2006 08:59:00 AM  
Blogger desert rat said...

An interesting sidebar to the "Combat Skills" be acquired in Iraq.

Jr's first artillery unit, trained hard. Practised fire and move, shifting position up to six or eight times per day. After each fire mission, to not be targeted by Enemy counter battery fire.

In Iraq there is no counter battery fire. The Enemy has no Artillery. The threat to Marines comes in movement.

Now Jr's latest unit, training in Korea, never moves after a fire mission. Counter battery fire, by the NorKs or Iranians must not be a threat, any more.

You fight as you train, always have, always will.

Just hope we do not do battle with anyone that has counter battery capacity, again.

4/02/2006 09:14:00 AM  
Blogger A Jacksonian said...

buddy larsen - History doesn't repeat itself, but it follows similar rhythms again and again with variations on a theme...

tony - The sons and daughters of Andy Jackson really DO believe in the Terrible Swift Sword of the Republic. The Democrats read 2 out of 3 Jacksons out of the party in the 60's and 70's... they kept the wrong one.

On the NOLA note... yes, I do a thorough look at it and will summarize lest risking boredom of repetition.

I go over the basics of the delta geophysics. Yeah, its a big pile of muck slowly sliding out into the Gulf. This is news?

Now I think it is pure folly to try and rebuild a city that is sinking. And offer the first obvious solution to that. Cost is on the order of magnitude for what is already being proposed. Plus you are *not* populating a sinking city.

Then I get *creative* and use a large structure design concept to put the entire population afloat, start a new heavy industry for the South and offer something that has never been done before. First of all if there is anything to global warming, then the first country to build HUGE ships will have a head start. Second, coastal population centers could expand using these. Third, its neat.

Because when our generation is asked 'What did you do to save New Orleans?' I would like to say that instead of complaining I thought about it and offered a *better* way to do things that kept the spirit of the city, its culture, and its people safe so that there would always BE a New Orleans.

I go into school-teacher mode with this post to help bring some folks up to speed at another site. Not my favorite thing to do, but if it helps people to understand the size and scope of the actual problem, then needs must be done.

And then offer some looks at what our 'wise' oversight of the delta has actually done to it in measureable amounts. It seems that every thing we do to make one thing better ends up making everything worse. That happens when you try to be smarter than a mighty river, gulf currents, the Atlantic Currents and ignore basic physical factors.

And apologies for eating up space and time. But I believe it is a topic of interest in the particulars and the overall view. Instead of changing the delta to keep a city, perhaps we could change our concept of a city to keep the delta.

4/02/2006 09:16:00 AM  
Blogger Tony said...

Yo Desert,

We're a long ways from Jimmy Carter. By the time we got to 1979, we were losing a country per continent per year. In 1979, we lost Iran, Cuba was in Angola, Russia was in Afghanistan, Vietnam invaded Cambodia, the Sandanistas overthrew the government in Nicaragua. All the while, Jimmy was preaching that we'd have to learn to live with the USSR and their commie dictatorship over Eastern Europe.

Under Bush we have overthrown two long-time, self-declared enemies in Afghanistan and Iraq, Iran is under pressure, NoKor is under pressure, Libya gave up (Iraq's?) wmd programs and Bush has declared a policy of no retreat / no surrender, at least while he's in office.

C'mon, there's no comparison with Bush and Carter, 'cept they both talk funny.

4/02/2006 09:18:00 AM  
Blogger Tony said...

Ajacksonian,

Bucky Fuller designed "Triton City" to house 100,000 people in a hollow tetrahedron floating in Tokyo Bay. He proposed this design in the 60's.

I'm having a hard time finding a decent link, but here's Bucky's description:

"Buckminster Fuller designed a tetrahedronal floating city for Tokyo bay in the 1960's. He wrote:

Three-quarters of our planet Earth is covered with water, most of which may float organic cities...Floating cities pay no rent to landlords. They are situated on the water, which they desalinate and recirculate in many useful and nonpolluting ways. They are ships with all an ocean ship's technical autonomy, but they are also ships that will always be anchored. They don't have to go anywhere. Their shape and its human-life accommodations are not compromised, as must be the shape of the living quarters of ships whose hull shapes are constructed so that they may slip, fishlike, at high speed through the water and high seas with maximum economy...Floating cities are designed with the most buoyantly stable conformation of deep-sea bell-buoys. Their omni-surface-terraced, slop-faced, tetrahedronal structuring is employed to avoid the lethal threat of precipitous falls by humans from vertically sheer high-rising buildings...The tetrahedron has the most surface with the least volume of all polyhedra. As such, it provides the most possible 'outside' living. Its sloping external surface is adequate for all its occupants to enjoy their own private, outside, tiered-terracing, garden homes. These are most economically serviced from the common, omni-nearest-possible center of volume of all polyhedra...When suitable, the floating cities are equipped with 'alongside' or interiorly lagooned marinas for the safe mooring of the sail- and powerboats of the floating-city occupants. When moored in protected waters, the floating cities may be connected to the land by bridgeways."

http://www.seastead.org/commented/paper/review.html#TritonCity

4/02/2006 09:46:00 AM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

The Mark Steyn column is great--he always is. The nut is in the last two paras. Steyn admires the hell outta the straight talk coming from the Aussie leadership, and he wants GWB to emulate it. I wish he would write the speech--or a few paragraphs--he'd like to hear Bush say. Then we could muse on how it might help the front project, the institution of government in Iraq. The Aussies, and anti-jihadist media folks, *should* sound more hawkish than the top dawg, who is responsible for the total front--including substituting diplo for divisions if and where possible. It's good that top dawg has a well-publicised, erudite, persuasive, and steadfast hawk pull from the right, tho. It gives him all sorts of help on the total front.

Lincoln spoke of 'binding up wounds' and 'better angels of our nature' while his Generals were hammering the foe.

BTW, FoxNews just relayed the Iran Gov't's press release of their successful test of a 'new type underwater missile with an underwater speed of 222 mph'. 222 MPH?

Unless something got lost in translation, the Mullahs must be a whole LOT less sophisticated than we've been crediting them.

Mika--re Romulus and Remus, I think I get your point, and agree with it.

4/02/2006 09:51:00 AM  
Blogger Unknown said...

d'Rat

Secure the oil fields first, and then go after Empire and its ideology. Just like Iraq can be broken up so can Iran, so can Syria, so can Egypt, Jordan, Saudia, Turkey, and on and on. Democracy exposes the faults in Empire. Whether the Jihadi Empires, the Rus Empire, the ChinCom Empire, the fatal faults will be exposed. The phenomenon is not unique to the American Southwest. :)

4/02/2006 09:52:00 AM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Tony

And the tensile strength and light weight of nanotube-buckybal might make such a project possible. :)

4/02/2006 09:59:00 AM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Buddy,

Sounds like:

The VA-111 Shkval (from Russian: шквал - "squall") torpedo and its descendants are supercavitating torpedoes developed by the Russian Navy. They are capable of speeds in excess of 200 knots (approximately 360 km/h) and are considered far deadlier than any standard torpedo system fielded by NATO.
.
.
With a much greater speed than conventional torpedoes, the VA-111s speed far supersedes that of any standard torpedo currently fielded by NATO. This speed is a result of supercavitation, where the torpedo is actually gliding through a thin air bubble. As the torpedo travels, the water around it is literally vaporized and forms many small bubbles of gas around the body of the projectile; significantly reducing drag and allowing for extremely high speeds. In effect, the Shkval is an underwater missile.
.
.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VA-111_Shkval

4/02/2006 10:51:00 AM  
Blogger NahnCee said...

The immigration issue in the U.S. is knocking Iraq out of the headlines and out of Americans' direct line of attention.

How can we care about who's beheading who in Iraq (which they've been doing for hundreds of years with or without American intervention) when we have 500,000 ILLEGALs marching in Los Angeles demanding their land back ... or some damned thing.

And then Dubya goes to Mexico and promises Vincente that we'll be a kinder, gentler nation towards all his Mexican brethren streaming into our country ... and sending American dollars back home to the failed and corrupt nation of Mexico.

I don't think Bush is running on empty in Iraq. I think he's put the whole Iraqi issue on automatic pilot, in the hands of the military. He's focusing on whether/when to nuke Iran, and what to do about the potential insurrection among armed American citizens fed up with having to be nice to Muslims, and REALLY pissed off about Mexicans burning our flag.

4/02/2006 10:58:00 AM  
Blogger Tony said...

Buddy,

This sounds like the Russian "Squall" torpedo, which they sold a bunch of to China in 98 or so. Top speed of that was put at "200 knots."

Mat - Bucky didn't need no steenkin' nano-tubes to build his floating city!

4/02/2006 11:07:00 AM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Re NOLA, cities, immigrants, and unrectified reality, this (from Theodore Dalrymple, ht Jamie Irons), a snip from an important essay:

"Architecturally, the housing projects sprang from the ideas of Le Corbusier, the Swiss totalitarian architect—and still the untouchable hero of architectural education in France—who believed that a house was a machine for living in, that areas of cities should be entirely separated from one another by their function, and that the straight line and the right angle held the key to wisdom, virtue, beauty, and efficiency. The mulish opposition that met his scheme to pull down the whole of the center of Paris and rebuild it according to his “rational” and “advanced” ideas baffled and frustrated him.

The inhuman, unadorned, hard-edged geometry of these vast housing projects in their unearthly plazas brings to mind Le Corbusier’s chilling and tyrannical words: “The despot is not a man. It is the . . . correct, realistic, exact plan . . . that will provide your solution once the problem has been posed clearly. . . . This plan has been drawn up well away from . . . the cries of the electorate or the laments of society’s victims. It has been drawn up by serene and lucid minds.”

Dr. Dalrymple, a volunteer doctoring liberalism's most devastated beneficiaries.

4/02/2006 11:51:00 AM  
Blogger Doug said...

Aw shucks Nahncee, if Boy Howdy wants to give the country away, and Buddy approves of it, who are YOU to complain?
Think your from Texas or something?
THEY DECIDE!
DON'T COMPLAIN!
---
Here's that link I mentioned that points to how the CORRUPT Pols get bought by CORRUPT BUSINESSES so they
DEMAND THAT THE INS NOT DO THEIR JOBS AND NOT ENFORCE THE LAW!
---
RIGHT WING NEWS
---
It was very sweet indeed to be in the car, listening, when Rush mentioned the Answering 13 Frequently Asked Questions About Illegal Immigration post, that I made earlier this week, on the air today.
It's even sweeter that the transcript made it onto his website tonight.

Here's are the relevant portions (You can also listen to this at the link above):
---
And please don't make one of your funny or snide comments in reply Bud:
I'm Sick of Having Boy Howdy Spit on our forefathers's graves, and you guys cheering him on.
Funny Indeed!

4/02/2006 11:58:00 AM  
Blogger Unknown said...

European farm subsidies to fat cat landowners don't sound so terrible anymore.

4/02/2006 01:00:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Read the Dalrymple. Really. We're damn lucky--if that's the word--to have this French model of assimilation out in front of us now, while we still have time to think--think and feel, not just feel--about our own country.

There's not a single detail in the French predicament that doesn't analog with our own. It comes down to, here's this nation, and here's the people in it. Should some of them get out? If so, say so. If not, then what?

There's two choices: assimilate or segregate. Read about how segregation works out. Then if you don't like that, you're left with one choice: assimilation.

The French failed at assimilation. Why? Read the Dalrymple.

As is becoming clear, the control of the border is one thing, and effectiveness *is* ramping up. But we have a mixed population, and we need to control the border without the separatist overtones. This shouldn't even have to be said.

Both mechanics at my son's place of biz took Saturday off. These two guys, both family men and both Latino, are US citizens, have been all their lives, one is an ex-Marine. Both extended families are mixed US and Mexican-born, some are here and some are in Mexico, and they all visit back and forth. Tony and Carlos took Saturday off to go downtown to the Capitol building and demonstrate against the House Bill. Tony and Carlos are US citizens, top mechanics, work hard, are the nicest, most trustworthy and helpful guys you can imagine. Top-drawer human beings. Top mechanics, too, they run the back end of the biz, are indispensable, and help keep a nine-person shop afloat.

What the hell are they doing down at the Capitol? They don't want Dr. Dalrymple writng about their nation 20 years from now. That's what they're doing down at the Capitol.

It's easy to sit off in the distance and generate heated pronouncements. Being where the action is means finding solutions. Neither Tony nor Carlos approve of the illegals. They note that illegals work too cheap, and draw down the wage scale. But they feel like they had to go stand for the pride of the Latino race, in going down to the Capitol yesterday.

That of course is not the proper frame for the issue, and that has been my point all along, the point I've been so unsuccessfully trying to make.

Let's not let this thing create gratuitous hatred, there's no upside to it. That's what Dalrymple is trying to point out--the bad breaks, the unhealable chasms, are not anything but emotions.

4/02/2006 01:31:00 PM  
Blogger NahnCee said...

The Mexican demonstrators are sounding like the Palestinian demonstrators: "That land is OUR land and we want the (white) usurpers out (you know, the ones who actually did something with it), and oh, by the way, leave what you have for us when you go."

I want the same solution for our immigration problem as the Israeli's have for their problem with unwanted, unskilled, uneducated deadbeats who wish us badly. I want a Wall installed and I want it installed next week. AND a moat with piranha, AND a mine field, and open hunting season for any American citizens with a rifle who wants to aim it in a generally southern direction.

After we cut off the inward flow and make absolutely clear to everyone involved that they do NOT have a god-given right to come to America just-because, then we can debate assimilation and segregation and amnesty, and whether or not Western Union should be forbidden to ever send any money south of the border again.

And what kind of an American you'll make if you fly a Mexican flag.

4/02/2006 01:44:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Nahncee, right--that's the right attitude for the agitators, seperatists, reconquistas, and assorted rabble. What I'm trying to say is only that we ought to watch our rhetoric on this issue, because there's millions and millions of long-term Americans--here on the border, long-term to back before the Alamo--who are Latino-surnamed, and, as the senator from Florida Mel Martinez said yesterday, hearing anti-Latino code-words breaking out everywhere.

Where these sorts of mis-communications go, is where Dalrymple was writing about.

As you say, there's some serious shit afoot in the Mideast, the big game with Russia, China, AQ, oil, and the future of humanity is on the front burner glowing red. You made the headline point--fine time to go the mattresses on a several-hundred year old porous-border problem. Perspective,perspective.

Work the problem, yes, but tone down the freaked-out rhetoric. I swear to you, to Latino ears it sounds like "F*ck the lousy Meskins!" --and concentrate the rhetoric on the thing that's on top of us bearing down.

4/02/2006 02:03:00 PM  
Blogger A Jacksonian said...

tony - Indeed the Buckminster Fuller design is an impressive thing but for all of that it will take quite some time to build an entire sea city and there is no price tag on it while the Freedom Ship concept works off of easily manufactured pieces, known design work and costing, and has only a minimal amount of custom work in it so that the pieces can be distributed for work on a global scale. I do appreciate the Fuller design, but when budgetary factors are included, I tried to stay within the realm for the current NOLA price tag and the Fuller option moves out of that realm for consideration at NOLA. And once you start moving down from an entire Tokyo sized city, you might as well go for convenience of design via a Freedom Ship. Plus there is an actual company looking for support to *build* a Freedom Ship, so most of the heavy engineering work is done beyond exterior schematics. Plus, for the cost of redoing the Lake, you then have a production zone established to make more of them. Once you get supplies flowing the capital expenditures down, then the cost per ship drops. My guess would be a *ready to go* group with at least a solid price tag would be easier to sell than the Fuller design. I could be wrong however.

With the NOLA recovery (not improvement and upgrade, mind you, *recovery*) heading into the high double-digit billions and probably the triple digits, a mega-concept looks better than... well... throwing money into a swamp.

4/02/2006 02:22:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

IMPORTING POVERTY
Why U.S. Doesn't Need Guest Workers
Since 1980, the number of Hispanics with incomes below the government's poverty line (about $19,300 in 2004 for a family of four) has risen 162 percent. Over the same period, the number of non-Hispanic whites in poverty rose 3 percent and the number of blacks, 9.5 percent.

What we have now -- and would with guest workers -- is a conscious policy of creating poverty in the United States while relieving it in Mexico.
By and large, this is a bad bargain for the United States.
It puts stresses on local schools, hospitals and housing; it feeds social tensions (witness the Minutemen).

The most lunatic notion is that admitting more poor Latino workers would ease the labor market strains of retiring baby boomers.
The two simply aren't close substitutes for each other. Among immigrant Mexican and Central American workers in 2004, only 7 percent had a college degree and nearly 60 percent lacked a high-school diploma, says the Congressional Budget Office.
Far from softening the social problems of an aging society, more poor immigrants might aggravate them by pitting older retirees against younger Hispanics for limited government benefits.

It's a myth that the U.S. economy ``needs'' more poor immigrants. The illegal immigrants already here represent only about 4.9 percent of the labor force, reports the Pew Hispanic Center.
In no major occupation are they a majority. They're 36 percent of insulation workers, 28 percent of drywall installers and 20 percent of cooks. They're mainly drawn here by vast wage differences, not labor ``shortages.''
In 2004, the median hourly wage in Mexico was $1.86 compared to $9 for Mexicans working in the United States, says Rakesh Kochhar of Pew.

4/02/2006 02:25:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

It's like this, Nahncee:
Muzzies Cut off our heads,
but we are cautioned not to raise our voices in protest, lest we offend them
---
People Burn the Flag and Express Support for Retaking the Country, and the vast majority of the people of the USA should remain quiet lest they offend a small minority.
I understand the argument, Bud, but the net result has been the Castration of Free Speech in America while enabling Insurrection and Hate Speech.
---
Condemn White Racists,
Give Mexican Racists a Pass:
Screw That!

4/02/2006 02:37:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

"As is becoming clear, the control of the border is one thing, and effectiveness *is* ramping up. But we have a mixed population, and we need to control the border without the separatist overtones. This shouldn't even have to be said."
---
Did you even READ my link above about interference with the INS by CORRUPT Pols, Bud?
Efforts at the Border have been a waste, without a fence, PRECISELY because the INS is prevented from doing it's job at the WORKPLACE.
---
That's why illegal immigration has mushroomed DESPITE, any activity tried so far at the Border.
I already brought this up:
You must have missed it.

4/02/2006 02:48:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Yep, I agree, a pox on all that bad thinking and policy and behavior, Doug.

Hey, jacksonian, that link is the 'whole earth catalogue' of littoral-living --it's great.

Nothing there about the Brits' ice aircraft carrier, tho--

4/02/2006 02:53:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Doug,
The reduct of the problem is corrupt politics. You need to figure how to work the system, or figure how to bring it down.

4/02/2006 03:08:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Politics is pistons, we overhaul rings and valves regularly on schedule.

4/02/2006 03:24:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

You need ingenuity and heart to be competitive in any race. Money doesn't hurt either.

4/02/2006 03:30:00 PM  
Blogger allen said...

desert rat,

re: your 8:59 AM

Apropos Mark Steyn, the following was submitted for the consideration of the Jewish military community at Robins Air Force Base, Georgia. It is self-explanatory.

“Congress has responded to the Hamas victory with a threat to cut off all U.S. aid to the PA. A bill formulated in the House, led by Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Florida Republican and chair of the House subcommittee on the Middle East and Central Asia, would place the PA on the State Department’s list of terrorist sponsors.

But the administration plans to oppose the bill. Officials said President Bush has quietly decided to continue aid to the PA to prevent an Arab backlash as well as Iranian efforts to take over the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

"The president will tell Congress that helping the PA is an integral part of the U.S. withdrawal strategy from Iraq," an official said.” – News World Communications, Insight on the News, 6 Feb ‘06

If the Administration does continue to fund the PA (Hamas) by either the front door or (surreptitiously) through the back, can a Jewish service member continue to serve in the Armed Forces of the United States?

Recall that Hamas has institutionalized three unalterable precepts within its Constitution (now the de facto constitution of the PA):
___the destruction of the state of Israel
___the conversion, enslavement or extermination of the Jewish people, worldwide
___the destruction of our Torah

Moreover, if the Administration’s alleged concern about continued Iranian militancy in the West Bank and Gaza is sincere, is not the purported action of Iran another act of war, much like its attack on our embassy and the hostage taking of our diplomats in 1979 or the murder of 241 service members in Beirut in 1983? Iran and Hamas are staunch allies. Therefore, rather than seeking funding for Hamas from Congress, should not the Administration seek of Congress a Declaration of War?

With respect, if Administration spokesmen do come to claim that Hamas was brought to power because of its obvious social outreach and that said outreach is sufficient justification for continued financial support of the PA, would this not be as disingenuous, irrelevant and immoral as arguing for the support of Adolph XXXXXX and the Nazi regime because they put millions of restive, bellicose, genocidal, unemployed Germans back to work? Indeed, they did, among other things building concentration camps and factories for the murder and wartime enslavement of European Jewry; not to mention, of course, the deaths of 40 – 60 million other souls, including nearly a quarter-million American service personnel.

Additionally, the Administration supports democracy in the Middle East, i.e. (by definition) “rule by the people.” Well, the folk of the PA have spoken, among other things, electing a member to parliament with the nom de guerre “Hitler” (the highest vote getter besides the Hamas elite). The election was no squeaker; Hamas won handily and garnered so many seats that it may rule arbitrarily, needing no coalition partner. So, the people of the PA are the government and the government (Hamas) is the people - following the sacrosanct tenet of Lincoln, “Government of the people, by the people, for the people.” This outcome should come as no surprise, given that every poll done for years has shown that the citizens of the PA overwhelming support Hamas’ three genocidal precepts above.

If a Jew continues to serve in the military under such a circumstance, is this not the same thing as countenancing, supporting and protecting Hamas? (A certified terrorist mafia) Would this be not suicidal, patricidal and an act of the utmost apostasy? In the event, would not the United States, through the action of the Administration, have abandoned to their mortal fate its Jewish service members (and all Jewish Americans for that matter) to perverse, cynical and homicidal expediency?

If my government does in fact give aid and comfort to a regime (Hamas), whose sole purpose for existence is the annihilation of me, my family, my people, my religion and my safe haven, have not, in fact, the terrorists won? And, what, then, exactly is the Global War on Terrorism?

Finally, to honorable men everywhere, for myself only, I may have to say, “J’accuse!” and I will say, “Never again!”

Just asking, respectfully.

Long live the United States! Long live Israel! Long live our Torah!

4/02/2006 03:49:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Whatever you do, rufus, don't consult the FACTS that I linked to:
Might interfere with your preconceptions and personal opinions.

4/02/2006 04:09:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Earth to rufus:
65% of LA County Jails are filled with the best and brightest you refer to.
The hospital emergency rooms have been bankrupted and gone out of business because of them.
Chief Bratton said the gang problems are worse than he had in New York City.
Latino Gangs.
I could go on.
Ask Nahncee or 'Mouse who live in LA and San Diego, respectively I think:
See what they say.

4/02/2006 04:27:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

If Nahncee and Mouse are not sufficient authority, ask Victor Davis Hanson who has lived there all his life, and now lives in a community comprised of 65% illegals and regularly has his property destroyed as a result.
Not Good.
His book is called MEXIFORNIA.

4/02/2006 04:30:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

As for control:
It is presently Out of Control, and the Pols want to make present levels legal!
...at the expense of the USA, but to the benefit of the Ruling Elite and those that pay them to break our laws, and their oaths of office.

4/02/2006 04:33:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Hanson's Home is surrounded by 45% illegals, sorry.

4/02/2006 04:35:00 PM  
Blogger allen said...

rufus,

re: "I think W is worried about protecting the safe haven of people called ‘"Americans."’

You make me feel like one of the hundreds of thousands of German Jewish WW I veterans, who as a group received more decorations for bravery than any other. The ashes of thousands can be found at places like Auschwitz.

Very unbecoming of you, sir.

"Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel."
Samuel Johnson (1709 - 1784), quoted in Boswell's Life of Johnson

"When I am abroad, I always make it a rule never to criticize or attack the government of my own country. I make up for lost time when I come home."
Sir Winston Churchill (1874 - 1965)

We can all be thankful that Churchill did not follow your advice, although his adversaries in Parliament probably wished he had.

4/02/2006 04:46:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

What about this, tho, Allen, that you're allowed to dance with the devil long enough to get over the bridge? As in, USA is doing what it has to do to maintain influence inside pali politics. The Pali gov't only today denounced USA for it's 'lack of support'.

If American Jews were to stop supporting the USA government, how delighted would Hamas be?

It seems to me like a question of permanence:

If Hamas will be broken, the Israel/USA alliance will be the breaker.

OTOH, if Hamas is to be the strong horse, then I'd agree with proposition in the statement. And, man the lifeboats.

Rufus, right about the ocean of facts, and economic impact analyses, and costs of services vs unclaimed withholdings. Backing out of the often conflicting details to take a quick look at the macro picture is a good help to grasp the whole issue. Also, in addition to the exec branch controlling borders, the legislative ought to re-visit the quotas, too. The current quotas were arbitrarily set in a different era.

4/02/2006 04:46:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

"Well, maybe poor old VDH's BOOK will do well, and he can move to a better neighborhood, one that has better law enforcement. "
---
You must have close to zero knowledge about the subject to make that statement:

The locals are powerless due to actions of the Feds.
Actions which are against the laws they put on the books and our Constitution.

4/02/2006 04:51:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Pick and choose your "facts" Bud:
Pretend California does not exist.
Texas Uber Alles!

4/02/2006 04:53:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

I'm gone, too. Adios, muchachos, hasta luego, viya con Dios, le deseo amor, el dinero, la salud, y tiempo para gustarle.

4/02/2006 04:59:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Doug,
Slow down. We're all on the same side.

4/02/2006 05:10:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Rufus,

Ok, I guess I need to ask. What is this long term good for the United States?

4/02/2006 05:27:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Maybe there would be more "unity" if those who ignore the law because it's profitable, at the expense of the good of the nation, will rethink their behavior.
No sign yet.

4/02/2006 05:29:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

Doug,

I find it interesting that the labor unions are quiet about this. Maybe this is something that needs to be looked into.

4/02/2006 05:33:00 PM  
Blogger allen said...

buddy larsen,

re: “If American Jews were to stop supporting the USA”

The question raised by me is whether the government of the United States will jettison its Jewish citizens? It is a moral question which cannot be finessed by the administration. To support the Hamas would be to do exactly that; the issue is existential: the survival of not just Israel but the survival of Jews everywhere. You may be certain, American Jews are not hyphenated.

No question raised by me attacks the President’s sincerity or purity of motive. What concerns me, and should concern all Americans, is whether his sense of real politick, with reference to the Hamas, will come to undermine the American casus belli. Any support for the present Palestinian mafia (the admitted protégé of Iran) will provide cover for all manner dangerous, hostile regimes and, most importantly, will irreparably erode the morale of those who support the struggle against Islam. Our enemies will find us predictably effeminate and vacillating; our allies will find us untrustworthy.

4/02/2006 05:36:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Mika, these are four Very Long Articles that I'm confident you don't have time to read, but the upshot is that the legacy of the United Farmworker's has been completely corrupted too, as the descendant's and cronies of Cesar Chavez use his name for personal gain.

Although too long for you to read, at least look at the pictures which tell what to me is the essence of the situation:
EXPLOITATION of young illegals, who are then discarded and replaced by a new crop of young, healthy, illegals.

These folks live in much worse conditions than they did in the 50's, living in the mud in Plastic Lean-Tos, with no sanitary facilities as they pick our crops.
All so we pay only 10% for labor on a head of lettuce, as though we could not afford to pay for legal workers.
So we have the specter of homeless workers next to multimillion dollar homes, while in the cities, many of the illegals that aren't employed in sweatshops, resort to free services, and the "communities" breed crime and hatred for this country.
---
Farmworkers Reap Little as Union Strays From Its Roots.
---
Today, a Times investigation has found, Chavez's heirs run a web of tax-exempt organizations that exploit his legacy and invoke the harsh lives of farmworkers to raise millions of dollars in public and private money.
The money does little to improve the lives of California farmworkers, who still struggle with the most basic health and housing needs and try to get by on seasonal, minimum-wage jobs.

Most of the funds go to burnish the Chavez image and expand the family business, a multimillion-dollar enterprise with an annual payroll of $12 million that includes a dozen Chavez relatives.
The UFW is the linchpin of the Farm Worker Movement, a network of a dozen tax-exempt organizations that do business with one another, enrich friends and family, and focus on projects far from the fields:
They build affordable housing in San Francisco and Albuquerque, own a top-ranked radio station in Phoenix, run a political campaign in support of an Indian casino and lobby for gay marriage.
The current UFW leaders have jettisoned other Chavez principles:
The UFW undercut another union to sign up construction workers, poaching on the turf of building trade unions that once were allies.
The UFW forfeited the right to boycott supermarkets and stores, a tactic Chavez pioneered, in order to sign up members in unrelated professions.

And Chavez's heirs broke with labor solidarity and hired nonunion workers to build the $3.2-million National Chavez Center around their founder's grave in the Tehachapi Mountains, a site they now market as a tourist attraction and rent out for weddings.
A few hundred miles away, in the canyons of Carlsbad north of San Diego, hundreds of farmworkers burrow into the hills each year, covering their shacks with leaves and branches to stay out of view of multimilliondollar homes. They live without drinking water, toilets, refrigeration. Fireworks and music from nearby Legoland pierce the nighttime skies.
In a larger camp a dozen miles to the south in Del Mar, farmworkers wash their clothes in a stream, bathe in the soapy water, then catch crayfish that they boil for dinner.

Part one: The UFW betrays its legacy as farmworkers struggle.
Part two: The family business: Insiders benefit amid a complex web of charities.
Part three: The roots of today's problems go back three decades.
Part four: A UFW success story — but not in the fields.

4/02/2006 05:46:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

I meant "Mat!"

4/02/2006 05:48:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

What utter horseshit. Doug, you have no idea what motivates other's ideas. You only know what you want to assert. Texas Uber Alles--what an argument.

How would you like it if I asserted that your motive in going so hog-wild over this issue is your fear of native Hawaiians, who are the same color as Mexicans, and who want your white ass off the islands?

Profit? How much have you sent the Minutemen since I posted their site for you? Joined up yet? Why not? Too much trouble?

Asserting that no one cares about California is just demagogic ignorant idiocy. Are you doing anything for California with all these crap posts?

No, all your type attitude is going to do is put the anti-war people back in control in DC. Then you and I and everyone else will be in a heap o' shit. And meantime you're not even helping your pet issue. Just blabbing, and blabbing, and blabbing.

4/02/2006 05:48:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

I was refering to the fact that you simply ignore any post I make on this subject that contains facts or relates to conditions different than those around you in Texas, Bud.
(or just make a point of not responding to them)

Much as POTUS ignores the laws of this country, and the will of MOST of his supporters and 70% of the people of this country.
---
Then he tells us to keep quiet.
Sorry.

4/02/2006 05:54:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

As to "motives:"
The motives of the "Businesspeople" that demanded that their corrupt Politicians prevent the INS from doing their jobs to enforce the law, that's clear enough for me.
Sorry you took it personally.

4/02/2006 06:06:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Allen, What concerns me, and should concern all Americans, is whether his sense of real politick, with reference to the Hamas, will come to undermine the American casus belli."

That's pretty much Desert Rat's warning, too. Wish I had a comforting thought on it. So much of the politics over there is sub-rosa that anyone who can't find confidence in the administration is sure to be a little bit at sea, in these momentous times.

As Rufus said, sometimes even when your confidence is low you try to hold it up deliberately, on the grounds that there's no better alternative handy.

4/02/2006 06:06:00 PM  
Blogger NahnCee said...

You need to figure how to work the system, or figure how to bring it down.

I said in the last Presidential election that if the Dem's had only added a plank to their position on shutting down illegal immigration, Kerry would have won.

I'll say it again: WHOever -- and it doesn't need to be either Democrat or Republican but could be a Ross Perot type -- promises to make stopping illegal immigration the MAJOR priority of his or her administration will be elected in the next Presidential election. In the same way that Sharon rammed through a solution for Israel that is working. Also for senators, congressmen and governors.

What Mr. Bush is doing yammering with Vincente is NOT what most Americans consider to be "doing something about the problem".

Iraq, France, Saudi Arabia and bin Laden are all distant 2nd or 3rd issues now. The rest of the world needs to see and understand that America's priorities are changing, and I don't think they do.

I don't think it's the same thing as a retreat internationally, a pulling back of the American presence in the rest of the world, although it might be. The way I'm reading it is we're still perfectly willing to do our part "out there", but we do want to take care of business internally first. We should be able to do both.

4/02/2006 06:10:00 PM  
Blogger allen said...

rufus,

See “buddy larsen” above.

Imagine a time in the early twentieth century when an American president actively supported the Ku Klux Klan. You really do not have to imagine. Would it be your position that blacks had divided loyalty or that the government of the United States had divided loyalty?

May G-d allow for my quiet demise. If so, I will do three things: first, I will kiss my very American family, goodbye; next, I will proudly exclaim “Semper Fidelis”; only lastly, will I turn to Jerusalem and recite “Shema”. When I am borne to my grave in a simple pine coffin, body rapped in a plain white shroud, that coffin will be embraced by an American flag.

4/02/2006 06:13:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

I take things as directed to me when they are specifically addressed to me, Doug.

And I know all your facts, have for years, know yours and Cesar Chavez' too.

Most everybody is fully aware of these situations, and feel no need to continually blast the same position out over and over until--what? This Blog rips itself loose from our monitors, grows feet and marches to the barricades?

Rome wasn't built in a day, and it wasn't overthrown in a day, either.

4/02/2006 06:18:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

I thought it worthy of attention how the INS is prevented from doing it's job by corrupt Pols.

First time anyone has linked to that, I think, first time for me.

Mat asked about the unions, so I put those links up.
It was the second time I had done that.
Sorry Again.

4/02/2006 06:28:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

And I apologize for going off on you like that. Just, ease off the baloney, please.

4/02/2006 06:29:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

...and I did link to and invite you to join me on a previous thread that had the Times links on Chavez.
You prefered to resume the discussion here.

4/02/2006 06:32:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

As I said earlier, you can bust Rufus's parents trying to get the cotton in before it rains, or you can bust a large fraction of the Fortune 500. Either way, you'll be hauling in the perps who broke some laws written by some economic interests protecting themselves back on the eastern seaboard years ago.

4/02/2006 06:33:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

I know the Chavez story--it's the same union story, the members don't care if the leaders get rich off 'em--it's a source of defiance and a sort of perverse pride. Besides, Chavez told me his philosophy personally, in Austin, back in 69 or so.

4/02/2006 06:40:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Whit,
Right, the issue is about enforcing our laws and our borders:
The Mexicans are Pawns, as they are in their own corrupt country.
---
Prior to the "last" amnesty, namely Simpson/Mazzoli, TEDDY KENNEDY in 1965(!) pushed through ANOTHER set of "Reforms," Hart/Seller.

At that time he had a list of assurances of everything the would not happen:

They all did! Just like Simpson/Mazzoli.
ENFORCEMENT, not "Reform!"

4/02/2006 06:47:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Rufus, that's some good stuff. Whit, amen, from end to end--closing para is the right line. I've been getting shoved to the left on all this, just trying to hold the idea that it's individual flesh and blood in the mix, too. But, you're right in that sequence.

4/02/2006 06:49:00 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

I said in the last Presidential election that if the Dem's had only added a plank to their position on shutting down illegal immigration, Kerry would have won.


Nahncee, I hope someone is paying attention.

4/02/2006 06:51:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Whit,
Haven't kept up, but it is mostly ignored, except in Govt and the Universities, and etc.

This place is TRULY multiracial, and has been since way before it's founding.
Up to now, those that get along just make fun of one another, rather than taking things too seriously - every ethnic group has had their turn to make fools of themselves.
My son hopes the Latino Gang Sprout runs into the Tongans quick-like:
Problem Solved!

4/02/2006 07:03:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

oh, i bet he's been planning one all along.

4/02/2006 07:21:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

rufus,
You remind me of my own BIZARRE MLK/Military story:
I had just arrived in Kansas from Korea at the time.
The captain in charge of the Motor Pool wanted me to work on his car in another shop and had invited me over for dinner.
When the announcement came over the TV, he muttered something to the effect about him getting what he deserved!!!
I was dumbfounded and struck silent.
The look on my face must have been amazing.
His very proper Christian Wife admonished him.
My memory is usually quite good from those days, but the rest of that evening is a blank!

4/02/2006 07:27:00 PM  
Blogger Don M said...

The Iran "Stealth" Missile attacks multiple targets by exploding prematurely, then raining down low velocity fragments over a wide area.

4/02/2006 07:29:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Allen, try to keep in mind that a duly-elected terrorist government is a whole new animal--and there's support promised thru old deals to the "legitimate pali gov't". And guess who has been promoting democracy for the Palis. No need to reply--I know the right thing to do is treat the bastards like what they are. It's a damn crazy situation tho.

4/02/2006 07:37:00 PM  
Blogger allen said...

buddy larsen – 7:37 PM

If I understand you, the point you have raised is the first that could successfully counter the argument I have raised. You are to be congratulated – no sarcasm intended.

It is a sad commentary that the elite of Israel would consistently undermine the very survival of the country by submitting to American foreign policy in order to continue the flow of money and “big guns” (blocker busters, etc.). But, thus it has ever been; for example, consult Isaiah. Be that as it may, as an American, I expect more of my government.

Administrations come, administrations go. Some, as our recent history shows, are better than others. What remains constant are our Declaration and its subsequent enabling Constitution. The Constitution is inspired (Greek sense). The founders were enthused (again, Greek sense). Consequently, politically, the Constitution is greatest invention ever produced from the mind of man (?).

It is the duty of every true American (Chauvinism intended) to uphold the Constitution, even when that means conflict with whatever administration may be sitting. While partisan politics cannot help but cloud reality, it is imperative to remember that administrations, as human beings in general, are capable of folly and error. Therefore, when we see a tendency in the direction of folly and error, we must make that case in the strongest possible terms.

The letter to the Jewish community of Robins Air Force Base was not submitted as a gauntlet thrown done in defiance of the administration; rather, it was offered as a reasoned, plaintive plea. Unless the Bush administration considers not only the apparent benefit of the moment, but the unintended consequences as well, the struggle against the enemies of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness will be limited, if not defeated. Had Americans risen to the challenge to our Constitution in years past, many tragedies would have been avoided. That was the sole intent of the letter.

As Mark Twain attested, the Jews are eternal. Our persecutors have come and gone, relegated to the pages of history texts. Yet, the Jews continue to exist. Whatever happens in the Mideast in this century will not change that reality. What will change are the players. America must always remember as did John Adams, “I will bless those who bless you; I will curse those who curse you’; this, Israeli administrations, notwithstanding.

4/02/2006 08:13:00 PM  
Blogger NahnCee said...

Seems to me that part of the reason that illegal immigration is heating up so hard and so fast is that Real Americans are sick and tired of being harassed and treated like terrorists.

Those Fortune 500 exec's are really really tired of being strip-searched on business travel, and watching their purple-haired grandmothers also being poked and prodded.

And the Mexicans swarm in.

The high-rise building I work in in downtown LA was threatening last December not to allow Christmas trees because they might -- somehow -- be terrorist Christmas trees.

And the Mexicans swarm in.

In a lot of places you have to phone ahead and have your name put on a list to be expected and allowed to enter.

And the Mexicans swarm in.

The Department of Homeland Security has been amassing great and wonderful powers, and spending gazillions of dollars, taxpayers and voters are being inconvenienced and harassed, and EVERYone can see our homeland is most definitely NOT secure ... because the Mexicans are swarming in.

I wonder what would happen if we just dropped all the airport surveillance and fears about terrorist Christmas trees, put in some enforceable laws along our borders and went back to letting Americans provide for our own individual security?

4/02/2006 08:56:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Allen, well said, and us short-historied Celtics do appreciate how the Old Tribe has held together through thick and thin.

All I can add re foreign policy errors and missed opportunities is that once you've learned the lesson there, once you're sure it's contained, it's probably done you all the good it's gonna do you.

You know, spilt milk and all that. When it starts interfering with your tomorrow, you're a victim in a new way. I'm not speaking of Israel, just, a person, any person.

Rufus, women with .44 Mags, mmmm....

4/02/2006 09:15:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

"Hi, sweetie, I just called to ID your locatio...I mean, see how you were doing!"

4/02/2006 09:28:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Ah, jeez...a Ruger. That's a tough one, alright. It coulda been beautiful, them things are so nicely balanced.

4/02/2006 09:45:00 PM  
Blogger allen said...

To all,

post of 6:13 PM

"wrapped"

Pardon me. "Yahoo" would have picked-up on that faux pas, instantly. Thank you for you generosity.

4/02/2006 10:02:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

IN WHICH IT IS EXPLAINED THAT THE BIGGEST LATINO ORGANIZATION DREADS BECOMING AMERICAN
[Michael Ledeen]
...They don't want their people to assimilate, and they don't seem to like "patriotism" or "traditional American values."

Somebody might mention this to President Bush...

4/02/2006 10:12:00 PM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

"seeker" was pretty fitting, too, lately.

4/03/2006 06:59:00 AM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Si, estoy pensando...oops, I mean, yes, i think so.

4/03/2006 08:42:00 AM  
Blogger Unknown said...

In 1991, Medina got a call asking for help from an old UFW acquaintance. Liza Hirsch Du Brul had become a New York labor lawyer, representing musicians around the country. The San Diego Symphony was in the midst of a contract dispute and the musicians needed to stage a protest, but she was stuck on the East Coast.

Medina agreed to organize a human billboard around symphony hall.

When she took him to lunch to thank him, he told her he had been happy to help but pointed out that the musicians shouldn't be relying on "borrowed power" and needed to organize themselves.

4/03/2006 09:30:00 AM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

Meeting in bars, she noted the measures, hoping she would finish in time.

4/03/2006 10:51:00 AM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

From the going off half-cocked dep't, here's a Newsweek cover story from 1975: global-cooling will drastically reduce world food supply in as little as ten years.

(ht instapundit) the Washingtome Times asks some very penetrating questions about what if the pols, people, and pundits had listened.

4/03/2006 11:33:00 AM  
Blogger buddy larsen said...

This is better--scroll to "More on Eco-Theology" by Iain Murray.

4/03/2006 11:43:00 AM  
Blogger Doug said...

How the Country Is Run

The one major new initiative Bush has left — a guest-worker program and quasi-amnesty for illegal immigrants — might pass Congress, but it’s unpopular with the public. Congressional Republicans have been distancing themselves from Bush, but key GOP senators embraced a version of his approach after massive anti-enforcement protests. It’s a sign of the times that Mexican flag-waving immigrants might have as much sway on the Hill as Bush’s congressional-relations shop.
---
Good that half a million illegals in LA are more important in DC than 200 Million Americans.

4/03/2006 02:26:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

...and of course, the Constitution and the law, but that is SOOO, yesterday!

4/03/2006 02:29:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Buddy, my foil: (or anyone)

Peter Beinhardt talks about a problem of it becoming a racial/cultural debate.

Obvious, but what is it that's not true about MY view, (don't expect a vigorous debate on it in DC) that it is an ECONOMIC Debate?

ie, between those that want to continue to profit from low paid quasi-legal workers in unlimited supply, and those that want to have market-determined wages of legal citizens.
Thanks.

4/03/2006 04:34:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

And, of course, the Bastards on ALL sides that want to have a bidding contest in the
Socialist Handouts for Votes Sweepstakes.

4/03/2006 04:41:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Illegal immigrants are causing a monetary catastrophe in America's health care system.

From July to December 2005, a six-month period, University Medical Center in Tucson treated 681 foreign nationals at a cost of $6.9 million dollars, according to a study by the University of Texas at El Paso.
Hospitals in Pima County absorbed $76 million for treating illegal immigrants in the year 2000.
Most of the time they simply walk out of the hospital once they're treated and released.
---
No Problemo, says Senor Bush:
Money for Nuthin,
Drugs are Free!

4/03/2006 05:43:00 PM  
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