February 2003 Archives

"Politics today is too much about careerism, special interest, campaign contributions and access—what I need, what I want, about my rights. But the ideal I believe in is about all of us together. It is about the common good. What is best for all of us. What is best for our children and future generations. Politics is, as Plato said, "an art whose business is a concern for souls". For me, the ideal of America is about a nation of people still searching for a nobler cause, for a better destiny. We are better than who we are today. And because we know this, we are frustrated by the gap between who we are and who we should be.

America still represents a promise, a promise that democratic people can learn to live together better, that we can rise above autonomy and selfishness, that we can create a "city on a hill". I want to challenge you to join me in realizing that promise, in holding our nation and ourselves to a higher standard, to use the creativity of our heads to find new ways to realize the passion in our hearts—a passion for a just society, a passion for a great society, a passion for the ideal of the American republic."

Another of Hart's major policy speeches, this one delivered at Thomas Jefferson's University of Virginia and dealing with the topic of his Oxford doctoral thesis - restoring Jefferson's forgotten "republic of duties" to our "democracy of rights."

"There is within almost every American soul a desire to make a contribution, to invest time and energy to make things better, to know the unique satisfaction of helping one's country. We call that sense idealism—the notion that the gap between what is and what ought to be can be narrowed if we will simply try.

The world does divide itself between "realists" and idealists, or perhaps it is between those who accept a kind of Darwinian determinism dictated by fate or natural selection—a Calvinistic predestinarianism between the saved and the damned—and those who believe that nothing is "written", that the human condition can be improved, that none need be left behind. Or, as Robert Kennedy said: "Some men see things as they are and ask 'Why?' I dream things that never were and ask, 'Why not?'"

The sense of idealism has roots in political theory and reality. It is the very essence of the republic. From ancient Greece and early Rome, the ideal of the republic was founded on civic virtue, the sense of citizen duty; on popular sovereignty, the notion that we are self-governing and thus determine our own destiny; on resistance to corruption, requiring the common good to prevail over special interests; and on the commonwealth itself, the proper stewardship of all those things we hold in common."

I won't try and break down his thesis.  He's written an entire book on the subject, and does a much better job of presenting it in the speech than I could summarizing.  Give it a read and see why this man must run for President.

"When I was your age, I believed in an ideal of America. And now, more than four decades later, I still do. I have only one goal in the public arena, to serve my country and perhaps also to try to inspire people like you to do so. I want you to imagine a picture of America that is above self-interest, above commercialism and materialism, and above ordinary politics. "

From anyone else's mouth this would be the clumsiest of political clichés.  But from my perspective - having now read two of his books and given careful consideration to his views on government and contemporary American politics - Hart honestly feels this way.  It is reflected in his thoughtful writings and a career of public service, of which the last 20 years has been spent in the political wilderness.  Its time to bring him back.

"A little more than half a century ago, Vinayak Savarkar was on trial for his life, accused of conspiring with seven other men in the assassination of Mohandas K. Gandhi on Jan. 30, 1948.

The court acquitted Savarkar, citing insufficient evidence, but there was never much doubt about where his sympathies lay: A hard-line Hindu nationalist who wrote admiringly of Nazi Germany, he made no secret of his antipathy toward India's Muslim population or toward Gandhi, whose embrace of religious tolerance and diversity he saw as a threat to India's cultural purity.

Moreover, Savarkar was personally acquainted with Nathuram Godse, Gandhi's assassin and one of Savarkar's most devoted followers. Some historians still believe that Godse would not have committed the murder without a green light from Savarkar, who died in 1966.

But yesterday's suspect is today's hero. In a ceremony this afternoon, India's Hindu-nationalist government unveiled a portrait of Savarkar to hang opposite Gandhi's in the central hall of Parliament, describing him as a neglected and misunderstood patriot who deserves his place in the pantheon of India's great leaders."

No real commentary on this, but I thought it relevent to a discussion over at John-Paul's a few weeks back about the merits of Indian culture and the powers-that-be.

"It has been 16 years since former Sen. Gary Hart, D-Colorado, last ran for the Democratic presidential nomination, but he may be getting ready to take another shot. Is the third time the charm for Hart? Find out if he'll run for president and whether he would go to war with Iraq."

Gary Hart is making another appearence on Crossfire tonight at 7pm (5pm Mountain)

"What does Saddam Hussein see in himself that no one else in the world seems to see? The answer is perhaps best revealed by the intimate details of the Iraqi leader's daily life"

On the eve of Saddam's interview with Dan Rather - and almost certainly of war - I thought it important to direct my readers to a profile of Saddam that might provide a good base on which to judge his public behavior and the abovementioned interview.  In May of last year, Mark Bowden, author of Black Hawk Down (the book, not the movie), presented the most comprehensive profile I've yet read of Saddam Hussein.  I've found this article (which, incidentally, solely convinced me to become an Atlantic subscriber, rather than continuing to buy it at newsstands) to be immensely useful in understanding the situation we find ourselves in today. 

I'm sure CBS will replay the interview, and if not, the important bits are available at the above URL.

"What all this means is that when it comes to building democracy in Iraq, the Europeans are uninterested, the Americans are hypocritical and the Arabs are ambivalent. Therefore, undertaking a successful democratization project there, in a way that will stimulate positive reform throughout the region, will require a real revolution in thinking all around — among Americans, Arabs and Europeans. If done right, the Middle East will never be the same. If done wrong, the world will never be the same."

Thomas Friedman calls everyone to the carpet on Iraq and the Middle East.  First, Europe:

"We all know what this is about: the Jewish question. "For too many Europeans, Arabs are of no moral interest in and of themselves," observes the Middle East analyst Stephen P. Cohen. "They only become of interest if they are fighting Jews or being manhandled by Jews. Then their liberation becomes paramount, because calling for it is a way to stick it to the Jews. Europeans' demonstrations for a free Palestine — and not for a free Iraq or any other Arab country — smell too much like a politically correct form of anti-Semitism, part of a very old story."

Then the US

"Only after 9/11, as we realized that what was going on out back in these countries threatened us, did the U.S. begin to call for democracy in the Arab world — but only to get rid of Yasir Arafat and to punish those Arab regimes it did not like, namely Saddam Hussein's. You still have not seen any serious democratization effort being directed at Saudi Arabia or Egypt or Kuwait. For America, government of the people, by the people and for the people is only for our enemies, not our friends."

And lastly, the Arabs themselves

"But then, other than a few courageous Arab liberals, Arab intellectuals have not made democracy promotion a supreme value either. In part it's because liberating Palestine has always been treated by them as a more important political value. And in part it's because many Arab societies are still so tribalized, and have such a weak sense of citizenship, they fear that democracy could bring forth fundamentalists, a rival tribe or anarchy. Hence the Arab saying: "Better a hundred years of tyranny than one day of anarchy.""

John-Paul may now proceed to make mustache jokes.

"Turkey has reportedly been offered the right to occupy much of Iraqi Kurdistan. Yes, that's right: as we move to liberate the Iraqis, our first step may be to deliver people who have been effectively independent since 1991 into the hands of a hated foreign overlord. Moral clarity!

Meanwhile, outraged Iraqi exiles report that there won't be any equivalent of postwar de-Nazification, in which accomplices of the defeated regime were purged from public life. Instead the Bush administration intends to preserve most of the current regime: Saddam Hussein and a few top officials will be replaced with Americans, but the rest will stay. You don't have to be an Iraq expert to realize that many very nasty people will therefore remain in power — more moral clarity! — and that the U.S. will in effect take responsibility for maintaining the rule of the Sunni minority over the Shiite majority."

Paul Krugman pokes another pin in the "We really just want to invade Iraq to help the Iraqi people" balloon.   Trudy Rubin also touched on the possible Turkish occupation of Iraqi Kurdistan on Morning Edition today.  Krugman also demonstrates what's in store financially for Iraq, by way of Afghanistan's recent experiences.

"...President Bush promised that our interest wouldn't end once the war was won; this time we wouldn't forget about Afghanistan, we would stay to help rebuild the country and secure the peace. So how much money for Afghan reconstruction did the administration put in its 2004 budget?

None. The Bush team forgot about it. Embarrassed Congressional staff members had to write in $300 million to cover the lapse."

Moral clarity!

I just received an email today saying Sportbrain is back up and running.  For those unfamiliar with Sportbrain, they sold a tiny pedometer and a wireless heart-rate monitor that you would wear during the day, and at night pop into a special cradle which would upload the gathered data to Sportbrain's servers where you could graph and keep track of activity levels throughout the day.  They even had prizes for those who 'scored' highest.  Naturally, this company didn't survive the dot-com bomb, but it appears to be back (minus the prizes for the time being) and ready to use again.  I still use the heart-rate monitor regularly with my stationary bike but I'm not sure where the pedometer and cradle have gone.  Time to go digging.  Yay!

"But if the antiwar movement dissuades the United States and its allies from going to war with Iraq, it will have contributed to the peace of the dead. Saddam Hussein will emerge victorious and ever more defiant. What has been accomplished so far will unravel. Containment is doomed to fail. We cannot forget that despots protected by their own elaborate security apparatus are still able to make decisions.

Saddam Hussein has dragged his people into at least two wars. He has used chemical weapons on them. He has killed hundreds of thousands of people and tortured and oppressed countless others. So why, in all of these demonstrations, did I not see one single banner or hear one speech calling for the end of human rights abuses in Iraq, the removal of the dictator and freedom for the Iraqis and the Kurdish people? If we are going to demonstrate and exert pressure, shouldn't it be focused on the real villain, with the goal of getting him to surrender his weapons of mass destruction and resign from power? To neglect this reality, in favor of simplistic and irrational anti-Americanism, is obfuscating the true debate on war and peace.

I agree that the Bush administration must give more time to the weapons inspectors to fulfill their mandate. The United States is an unchallenged world power and will survive its enemies. It can afford to be a little more patient. Kofi Annan, the secretary general of the United Nations, has proved himself to be a strong mediator and no friend of dictators. He and a group of world leaders should use this time to persuade Saddam Hussein to resign and go into exile. In turn, Saddam Hussein could be credited with preventing another war and sparing his people. But even this approach will not work without the continued threat of force."

A good opinion piece in the New York Times by Nobel Peace Prize winner and East Timor's Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Ramos-Horta.  He brings up an important point which is being ignored by the majority of anti-war protestors:  Sometimes war is necessary for peace.  He also makes another important point - one that is being ignored by the "rush-to-war" crowd: the US can afford to be a bit more patient.  There's no need to go tearing up the UN charter just yet.

"In meetings yesterday with senior officials in Moscow, Undersecretary of State John R. Bolton told the Russian government that "we're going ahead," whether the council agrees or not, a senior administration official said. "The council's unity is at stake here."

A senior diplomat from another council member said his government had heard a similar message and was told not to anguish over whether to vote for war.

"You are not going to decide whether there is war in Iraq or not," the diplomat said U.S. officials told him. "That decision is ours, and we have already made it. It is already final. The only question now is whether the council will go along with it or not."

President Bush has continued to say he has not yet decided whether to go to war. But the message being conveyed in high-level contacts with other council governments is that a military attack on Iraq is inevitable, these officials and diplomats said. What they must determine, U.S. officials are telling these governments, is if their insistence that U.N. weapons inspections be given more time is worth the destruction of council credibility at a time of serious world upheaval."

What a frickin mess.  That's all I have to say.

"The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee plans to launch an investigation into alleged payolalike practices by some of the big radio groups that also own concert venues.

Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, told the Recording Academy on Friday at its annual Entertainment Law Luncheon at the Waldorf-Astoria in New York before Sunday's Grammy Awards that he plans to conduct hearings on the issue within a month.

"While I am a strong believer in free markets, I am also a strong believer in the antitrust laws and vigorous competition policy," he said, according to a copy of his speech. "These allegations raise serious competition issues, which my committee will investigate and deal with appropriately. I would expect to hold a hearing on these issues in the coming month to examine the allegations and see how they affect artists and their ability to distribute and promote their music." "

Wow. Real musicians winning Grammys and the Senate investigating payola.  I'll be keeping an eye on this.

[via DrudgeReport]

"KABLOG is a tool for mobile phones and PDAs that allows you to post new blog entries to a MovableType blog server. (It should also work with other blog servers that support blogger.getUsersBlogs as well as metaWeblog.newPost)"

Schweet.

[via Slashdot]

Two names: Norah Jones, and Steven Van Zandt.

Norah Jones, a Blue Note recording artist and amazing musician who I first witnessed live at The Fillmore in Denver opening for MMW 10 months ago has swept the Grammys, winning Record of the Year, Album of the Year, Best New Artist, Best Female Pop Vocal Performance and Best Pop Vocal Performance .  I have no idea what was behind her incredibly fast rise to the top of the entire music industry, but who cares.   She is an amazing artist, and I can only hope that this is indicative of NARAS's future direction.  When was the last time Bill Frisell, Tony Scherr and Kenny Wollenson got shout-out's on prime-time network TV from a Grammy sweeper (let alone winner)?  Her performance of "Que Sera Sera" with MMW at the 4/12/2002 show I mention above had me up off my seat screaming like a little girl and I'm sure those readers who attended with me can attest to my girlish fandom ;)  Congratulations Norah, every accolade you receive is well deserved.

Secondly, Steven Van Zandt - Is there a more interesting human being on earth than this guy - otherwise known as Sil from The Soprano's and the E Street Band's bandana-clad guitarist.  He featured prominently in both Springstein's performance of "The Rising" and also as the only soloist in the tribute to Joe Strummer with Springstein, Elvis Costello, Dave Grohl and Tony Kanal.  He is the proverbial bizomb.  Bow down!

"That most lamentable duct tape suggestion last week by a Homeland Security official -- which drove countless panicked citizens out to buy the product -- has been widely derided as useless and pretty crazy.

But maybe not so crazy. Turns out that nearly half -- 46 percent to be precise -- of the duct tape sold in this country is manufactured by a company in Avon, Ohio. And the founder of that company, that would be Jack Kahl, gave how much to the Republican National Committee and other GOP committees in the 2000 election cycle? Would that be more than $100,000?"

Cute.

[via BoingBoing]

"Barry Melrose is going into the hall of fame tonight. Not for hockey, 33 points in 300 games as a player or 79 wins as a coach are not enshrinable numbers, even for a place that honours Harold Ballard as a member.

No, tonight during their game against the Portland Pirates, the Manchester Monarchs are inducting the Kelvington, Sask., native into the mullet hall of fame."

Some of you will have no idea who Barry Melrose is.  You are the lucky ones.

"Life. Death. Guilt. Afterlife. For the Fishers, the more things stay the same, the more they change. On March 2 at 9pm ET, it's time to break new ground with the Season Three premiere of the Emmy®- and Golden Globe-winning series Six Feet Under! "

Yay! 

"The band Great White's performance rider contains no mention whatsoever of pyrotechnics being used during the rock group's current tour of clubs and small theaters, The Smoking Gun has learned. TSG today (2/21) obtained copies of the band's rider from two separate promoters who booked shows by the group during the past month. A copy of the Great White performance specs can be found below. A third promoter, Domenic Santana, told TSG that the band set off a pyrotechnic display without his permission during a show in Asbury Park, New Jersey last Friday (2/14), putting the "lives of a lot of people in danger." Santana, owner of the Stone Pony, said that he "had no idea" that pyrotechnics were part of the rock band's show and pointed to Great White's standard performance rider, which makes no reference to pyrotechnic displays. Last night, at least 95 concertgoers were killed and 170 people were hurt at a West Warwick, Rhode Island show when the club erupted in flames following a pyrotechnic display during the group's opening song. Owners of The Station, the Rhode Island club where scores perished, this afternoon released a statement claiming that they, too, were never told about Great White's pyrotechnic plans."

Die filthy hair band, die.

"Every icon needs an origin myth. Born in the same city as jazz, Wynton Marsalis was blessed with a signifying provenance. "I'm from New Orleans," he has told an interviewer, as shorthand for his musical background. "We don't need a concert hall for jazz." In many ways Marsalis's story is so neatly connected to jazz history that it defies credulity. Had a screenwriter created Wynton Marsalis, a cynical producer would have sent back the opening scenes for rewrite: too perfect. Not only did he come from the cradle of jazz but he plays the trumpet, the instrument that originally defined the music. "The first jazz musician was a trumpeter, Buddy Bolden," Marsalis once said, "and the last will be a trumpeter, the archangel Gabriel." Moreover, Marsalis rose to prominence in the mid-1980s, just as jazz was approaching its centennial. "There's a tremendous symbolic resonance that has always been a part of what Wynton's about," says Jeff Levenson, a veteran jazz writer who also worked as an executive at both Columbia and Warner Bros. Records. "This kid emerges who's a hotshot ... and the whole thing has a kind of symmetry to it. Louis Armstrong starts things off—trumpet player, New Orleans, turn of the century. Wynton closes it out—a trumpet player from New Orleans." "

The Atlantic Monthly article on Wynton Marsalis I mentioned here a few weeks ago is now available online for those that are interested.

"He’s a best-selling author who’s caught in a real-life cliffhanger. Arrested, accused and convicted of high crimes, he may be writing his next chapters in prison. But the jurors who found him guilty are now feeling guilty themselves. It all centers on a growing controversy that could be headed to your state, about the law of the land, the will of the people, and what can happen when they clash. Over the years “Dateline” has interviewed many juries, but what these jurors had to say was truly remarkable."

Dateline covered the Ed Rosenthal case tonight (for background look here).  It was heartening to see a mainstream media outlet covering this story in a reasonable manner indicative of how mainstream medical marijuana as a "Good Thing"(tm) has become.  I suspect there are a lot of folks around Mr Rosenthal (if not Mr Rosenthal himself) who wouldn't mind seeing him go away for a while as a martyr for the cause.

"And with voters in more and more states contemplating medical marijuana laws like California’s, the conflict between states’ rights and federal law may grow even sharper."

Amen, hallelujah and bring-it-on!  We've got plenty of other things to spend our federal tax dollars on.

"Ninety-six people died Thursday in a fast-moving fire at a Rhode Island nightclub, Gov. Don Carcieri said Friday afternoon, adding that only a handful of the bodies have been identified."

As a Connecticut Yankee with relatives in Providence I had to post something about this.  Rhode Island and Connecticut have a lot in common, comprising the entirety of Southern New England (otherwise known as "those tiny-ass states south of Massachusetts").  Watching the videos which CNN keeps replaying OVER AND OVER it looks like the same crowd I hang out with whenever I'm back in Hartford at The Spigot.

I hope they lock up Great White if for no other reason than they shouldn't still be touring with their crap-ass 80's hair metal - and definitely not with pyrotechnics.  Does anyone honestly think the club would have allowed it given the apparently-flammable soundproofing foam everywhere?

R.I.P.

The Fred just started selling this CD online.  It was previously only available at their shows, and being that they've only been through town once (a show I missed because of work) since this live set was recorded in Telluride (a show I missed because I'm incredibly lame), I just received it.  If you think the Fred is amazing live, you should hear them live and acoustic.  To be fair, they're not entirely acoustic here - Reed uses some effects - but I'm not sure Reed would be Reed without some electronics.  Only four tracks for a grand total of about 30 minutes, but its only $10.  Along with Live at the Knit, required listening to get a sense of the Fred live.

That rarest of rare things - a truly engaging Nicolas Cage film.  I've never been much impressed by Nicolas Cage (née Coppola, which may explain some of his acclaim), and in fact usually have a fairly hostile reaction to his roles.  Outside of Raising Arizona, I'm not sure anything he's done has been deserving of the raves normally tossed his way.  And that's why I haven't seen this movie until now.  However, just having watched it, I'm giving it up for Mr. Cage.  Maybe he's just extremely good at playing self-destructive drunks, but honestly who cares.  He's great in this movie, and so is Elisabeth Shue.  The soundtrack is unbelievably good, with Sting providing the vocals over a selection of jazz standards, including a transcendent "My One And Only Love".  If you haven't seen this movie, give Nicolas a chance.  It's worth the time.

"With war in the offing, Slate asked prominent people in politics, the arts, entertainment, business, and other fields to answer the following question: Do you favor a U.S. invasion of Iraq? The respondents run the gamut, from those who believe war is a bad idea (Spike Lee says we're being "hoodwinked" by the Bush administration) to those (like Mark Bowden) who think we should have invaded already. "

An interesting compendium of opinion compiled by Slate.  Some of the more interesting comments:

"Paul Berman is the author of Terror and Liberalism, to be published in March.
I do not favor an invasion of Iraq solely for the purpose of disarming the regime. If disarmament is the goal, there is no reason we shouldn't keep up a pressure short of invasion. I would favor an invasion for a larger purpose, though, which is this: to begin a roll-back of the several tendencies and political movements that add up to Muslim totalitarianism. I would favor an invasion whose purpose was to foment a liberal revolution in the Middle East. Unfortunately, Bush has not spoken of such a thing. He has not tried to summon the support of liberal revolutionaries from the Muslim world, or from any other part of the world. He will probably stage his invasion, anyway. I will protest against it, but not because I want him to withdraw the troops or to do less. I will protest because I want him to do more. In our present terrible predicament, a liberal revolution is our best hope—the best hope for ourselves, and the best hope for the Arab world."

...

"Charles Peters is the founding editor of the Washington Monthly.
No. This country has been conned by Karl Rove and the superhawks. They've succeeded in changing the subject from George W. Bush's failures and embarrassments, making Iraq number one on the national agenda for nearly six months at the expense of more important matters—like finding Osama Bin Laden, securing peace between Israel and Palestine, drastically improving the FBI's and CIA's ability to deal with terrorism, keeping nuclear weapons from being used by the nations that already have them, including North Korea, and engineering economic recovery here at home. If we end up paying practically all the bill for the war with Iraq and the subsequent military occupation, that money won't be there for badly needed health and education programs.

Thinking about Iraq alone—which is what the administration has tried to get us to do—it's not hard to get fired up about teaching Saddam a lesson. But once you think about these other higher priorities, the danger from Iraq just isn't imminent enough to justify war. War, however, does offer the probability of a quick and dramatic victory, and that, I fear, is why it has such enormous appeal for Bush and his colleagues."

...lastly...

"Sarah Vowell is a contributing editor for public radio's This American Life and the author of The Partly Cloudy Patriot.
I reminded myself to answer this question by writing it in my to-do list, just below "buy duct tape and plastic sheeting." The reason I would rather not rush off to war in Iraq is also a to-do list issue. The first thing on my foreign affairs post-it note is obliterating Bin Laden and the rest of al-Qaida, followed by giving North Korea the attention they apparently crave. Then, the U.S. might consider Colombia and/or Zimbabwe, after which it could indulge in a wistful moment pondering the legacy of Havel and how he was the only world leader who knew who Moe Tucker is. Finally, America could polish off the list by ganging up with the U.N. and deciding what we are all going to do about Saddam and how France is getting on our nerves."

The commander of Pakistan's air force, Air Chief Marshal Mushaf Ali Mir, his wife and several senior officers were among 17 people killed in a plane crash on Thursday, the air force said.

Air force spokesman Air Commodore Sarfraz Ahmed Khan said it was an accident. The air force Fokker F-27 turboprop in which Mir and the others were traveling crashed in northwestern Pakistan and all 17 people aboard were killed.

State-run Pakistan Television said the crash was caused by "technical reasons," but did not elaborate.

Hmm.  Odd, especially in light of this.  Bad luck?

"No one in the administration embodies this bottom line mentality more than Dick Cheney. The vice president is one of those ideological purists who never let little things like logic, morality, or mass murder interfere with the single-minded pursuit of profitability.

His on-again, off-again relationship with the Butcher of Baghdad is a textbook example of what modern moralists condemn as "situational ethics," an extremely convenient code that allows you to do what you want when you want and still feel good about it in the morning. In the Cheney White House (let's call it what it is), anything that can be rationalized is right.

The two were clearly on the outs back during the Gulf War, when Cheney was Secretary of Defense, and the first President Bush dubbed Saddam "Hitler revisited."

Then Cheney moved to the private sector and suddenly things between him and Saddam warmed up considerably. With Cheney in the CEO's seat, Halliburton helped Iraq reconstruct its war-torn oil industry with $73 million worth of equipment and services -- becoming Baghdad's biggest such supplier. Kinda nice how that worked out for the vice-president, really: oversee the destruction of an industry that you then profit from by rebuilding.

When, during the 2000 campaign, Cheney was asked about his company's Iraqi escapades, he flat out denied them. But the truth remains: When it came to making a buck, Cheney apparently had no qualms about doing business with "Hitler revisited."

And make no mistake, this wasn't a case of hard-nosed realpolitik -- the rationale for Rummy's cuddly overtures to Saddam back in '83 despite his almost daily habit of gassing Iranians. That, we were told, was all about "the enemy of my enemy is my friend."

No, Cheney's company chose to do business with Saddam after the rape of Kuwait. After Scuds had been fired at Tel Aviv and Riyadh. After American soldiers had been sent home from Desert Storm in body bags.

And in 2000, just months before pocketing his $34 million Halliburton retirement package and joining the GOP ticket, Cheney was lobbying for an end to U.N. sanctions against Saddam. "

Nothing groundbreaking or new here, but Arianna puts together a nice summary of why I have a hard time taking the "It's all about the Evil" arguments seriously.   The fact that Saddam is evil just makes a nice pretty package in which to wrap the money.

[via BoingBoing]

"Today I woke up in a Dictatorship. Up to now Hugo Chavez and his hoodlums had been using the law to "hide" the repressive and intolerant nature of this Government. Last night they detained one of the two most important leaders of the opposition and an order is out to capture the Head of the Federation of Unions (CTV) the other visible leader of the opposition. The charge: treason and inciting rebellion. This is political, this is repressive and coupled with assasinations last Monday indicates to me that Chavez has decided to step out of Democracy. The charges against the two most important leaders of the opposition are just an excuse to neutralize them and silence others. The Government quickly charges two political opponents on these charges, but assasins from April are still free or not charged, no investigation has been made of other gunmen on Dec. 6th. and many other political and violent crimes have yet to be investigated. But this one has, with efficiency. Maybe the world will now understand what is going on here in Venezuela."

Venezuela takes another turn for the worst.  Maybe those on the left who are screaming that we're living in a dictatorship should take a look at Chavez and Company to see what one is really like.  Stay tuned to The Devil's Excrement for further developements.

"North Korea may already possess one or two nuclear weapons, but U.S. policy correctly calls for the Korean Peninsula to be free of all nuclear weapons. In a matter of months, the six to eight bombs' worth of plutonium Pyongyang could then possess would be enough to support an offensive military strategy -- and to export. North Korea has announced the restart of its existing nuclear reactor, and it could finish construction of two larger reactors that were frozen under the 1994 Agreed Framework. Within a few years it could be churning out dozens of bombs' worth of plutonium each year. By then, its secret enrichment program could be producing bomb-grade uranium, too.

Under those circumstances, intense pressure would build in South Korea and Japan to acquire nuclear weapons. The reverberations would quickly extend to Taiwan and China, then India and Pakistan.

If North Korea continues to view unconventional weapon exports as its chief cash crop, it will find numerous customers with adequate means and motive. Access to plutonium could shave years off the efforts of al Qaeda and other terrorists to obtain the weapon of ultimate destruction."

George H W Bush wants his son to wake up.  So he sent his former National Security Advisor and a former member of his National Security Council, message in hand, to the op-ed pages at the Washington Post. 

[via Talking Points Memo] 

"Iranian-backed Iraqi opposition forces have crossed into northern Iraq from Iran with the aim of securing the frontier in the event of war, according to senior Iranian officials.

The forces, numbering up to 5,000 troops, with some heavy equipment, are nominally under the command of Ayatollah Mohammad Baqir al-Hakim, a prominent Iraqi Shia Muslim opposition leader who has been based in Iran since 1980 and lives in Tehran."

Well, this is an interesting development. 

[via Drudgereport]

"I know it's easy to read our latest financial filings and assume, as some correspondents have, that Salon's tragic fate is already a done deal.

Here's the situation: We are a public company, I am an executive of the company, and as such there is no way I can sit here and go into detail about all the steps we're taking to secure Salon's future. Our SEC filing, upon which all the coverage has been based, specifically stated that Salon would run into trouble if it fails to raise new funds. Somehow that conditional clause seemed to drop away from most of the press reports. Sure, nothing in business is certain, but Salon also has a long history of raising the money it needs to survive.

This is the quote from our CEO, Mike O'Donnell, in our press release:

"We are in active, continuing discussions with potential investors to complete an equity financing that would give the company financial stability for 2003. Salon has reported the issuance of notes with equity conversion features in recent months and believe these will become part of a significant round."

Unlike the AP, which didn't even bother to call us for comment before running its imminent-death notice, this CBS Marketwatch report tells more of the story from our side."

Scott weighed in on the Salon blogger's mailing list yesterday reassuring everyone that the end was not so nigh.  Today he reiterates on his blog.

I though it was an interesting show, featuring Bob Dole, and a panel consisting of former Senators George McGovern, Alan Simpson, Warren Rudman, and Gary Hart.  Hart didn't get much play, which was a little surprising considering he may be running for President, but I guess thats the price you pay for being coy ;)

The most surprising viewpoint in the show was that of Dole and Rudman (Republicans both) that the Administration had not made the case that Iraq posed an imminent threat or was linked with al-Qeada, and that attempts to make this case were taking away from the more reasonable reasons for war: freeing the Iraqi people and promoting democracy in the Middle East, and stopping Saddam from eventually developing WMD capabilities that could threaten the US through terrorist ties.  When Dole and Rudman are both making this case, while being fully supportive of the Administration's goals, it is time to reconsider the strategy.

I may have some further comments on this once I get a copy of the transcript.

"AURORA - Several ambulances were dispatched to a King Soopers grocery store near I-225 and Parker Road Friday morning following a freon leak.

The store is at 3190 South Parker Road. Employees realized there was a leak around 6:30 a.m. when they noticed a cloud in the store. It appears a pipe broke on a refrigeration unit spraying freon into the air."

Well, this explains all the sirens that woke me up this morning.

"Online magazine publisher Salon Media Group Inc. on Friday warned that it may not survive beyond this month if it can't raise more money to pay its rent and other bills.

The San Francisco-based company painted a grim financial picture in a quarterly report filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Things are so bad, Salon said, it stopped paying rent for its San Francisco headquarters in December, prompting the landlord to issue a Jan. 29 demand for a $200,000 payment."

Put up or shut up folks.  If you think Salon is worth anything, they need your support now.

[via Drudgereport]

"Music, like love, is best experienced in the flesh. Sometimes, alas, it's not so convenient - while driving, for instance - so we must search out the next best thing. For many, MP3s are the musical equivalent of a hairy kiss from a maiden aunt: it's music, yes, but it lacks a bit. So many fans have turned to swapping music in another file format: music recorded from concerts, with the permission of bands."

A short article in The Guardian on Etree, Shorten, and the live-show trading community.

[via BoingBoing]

"You can write the next paragraph yourself. Sixteen months ago, Powell wanted to isolate Bin Laden from other Muslims, so he said Bin Laden was lying about being involved in Iraq. Now Powell wants to justify war against Iraq, so he says Bin Laden is telling the truth. Same claim, same media outlet, same speaker, same U.S. official assessing the claim, same congressional venue, different U.S. agenda, different result.

The punch line? Bin Laden was talking about hypocrisy."

Slate's William Saletan commenting on Powell's reaction to the latest message from Bin Laden.  These are the kind of actions that make it VERY easy for folks to question the link between terrorism and Iraq that the Administration is attempting to draw. 

Questioning that link as presented is not un-American, it's the end result of completely rational thought processes.  If the Administration wants to be taken seriously, they need to drop their presumptive claims that al-Qaeda and Iraq are in bed together.  Its not a convincing case, and there are much better cases to be made - namely that Iraq is in breach of UN resolutions, is deceiving the inspectors as we speak and is a dangerous regional force that needs to be put down.

Unfortunately, I suspect they've botched up their political strategy on this so badly that there is probably no recovery and they will have to live with the fact that completely reasonable people are going to question their every move.  I can only imagine the mess we're now going to be in if the war goes badly.

"CIA Director George J. Tenet, who joined Jacoby in briefing the Senate Armed Services Committee, also acknowledged the North Koreans have the capability to reach the western United States with a long-range missile.

Previous U.S. intelligence reports have said such a missile probably could carry a nuclear weapon-sized payload across the Pacific Ocean."

How long do you suppose the missile will remain untested once we move on Saddam?

I wonder how much longer Bush can pretend Iraq is the bigger threat.  Combine this with the recent reports (subscription only) that North Korea may have sold Iraq some intermediate range scuds and I think it's easy to see who is the bigger threat to American interests.

Note that this shouldn't imply that I'm against war in Iraq.  I just think Bush's priorities are bass-ackwards in this particular case and have said so for a while.  Whatever happened to that two-war doctrine anyhow?

Every day we don't do something about North Korea, we display the same irrelevance we're so excited to point out at the UN and NATO.  The lesson that will be learned from our continuing cries of regional containment in the Koreas while screaming for Saddam's head in the Middle East: 

If you want to avoid pre-emption by the US, get yourself some nukes as quick as you can.

[via Drudgereport]

"We are now more than a decade beyond the Cold War and as yet our political leadership has failed to provide a comprehensive sense of America's role in the post-Cold War, early 21st-century world. For almost half a century our central organizing principle, upon which both a foreign policy and defense policy were built, was "containment of communism". The world in which we now live defies the simplicity and predictability such a doctrine offered. And even containment of communism left unanswered the question of how to achieve that goal, a question that often divided our country deeply, not least between those advocating the use of power to promote our interests and those advocating adherence to human rights as defining of our values.

But rather than presenting a new foundation and framework to define America's role in the world, our current administration has embarked on a dangerous effort to apply power without relationship to America's principles. Its doctrine seems to be that we are powerful enough to do as we wish, and those not with us are against us. A world divided between pro- and anti-Americans is not a world in which we will hope to be secure.

Moreover, the administration's preoccupation with military superiority erodes our greatest strength—the admiration the world has for the American character. We drive the world's prosperity. We are the champions of the ideal of democracy. We are the world's greatest source of optimism, energy, and hope. Global citizens by the hundreds of millions say that they disagree with the United States government but like the American people. To compromise that goodwill through belligerence is to squander our greatest resource.

In direct contrast to a policy featuring force, and to replace a decaying Cold War-era debate between interests and values, today I would like to propose a foreign policy based upon principle, indeed a set of principles upon which I believe America should base its relations with the peoples of the world in this new century, principles representing the best traditions and beliefs of the American people."

Presented yesterday at a World Affairs Council event in San Franciso, Gary Hart reveals his foreign policy platform and outlines the principles that would guide it:

• First, our alliances, both old and new, should be characterized by equality of status, common interests, and greater shared responsibilities, and participation in these alliances should not require compromise of our principles;
• Second, we must resist imperial designs by others without seeking empire for ourselves;
• Third, our economic strength, arguably our greatest strength, should be used to help create opportunity and open societies for those nations left behind;
• Fourth, our military power should be used only to defend our nation, protect our justifiable interests, fulfill our alliance commitments, and prevent imminent attack.
• Fifth, with our allies we must seek to prevent the failure of states or, if they fail, seek to manage their peaceful restructuring;
• Sixth, we should encourage democracy—especially among regional powers—including forms of democratic government possibly different in design and structure from our own;
• Seventh, we should adopt a new definition of security in an age where the nature of conflict is rapidly evolving;
• And, eighth, we must explore new areas where international cooperation may relieve disproportionate burdens on U. S. economic and military resources.

He goes into MUCH greater detail and I won't attempt to summarize since I'm not sure I could do all his ideas justice.  Some of the highlights in my view

• Replacing "top-down" foreign aid with more grassroots efforts focusing on micro-loans, empowering the women of the third world, agricultural technologies and opening the US market to third world products.
• Ensure corporate America behaves as well abroad as they are expected to at home.
• Establish clear standards for the use of military force
• Stop allying ourselves with the "enemy of our enemy" and reform existing alliances to make them more relevent to the 21st century
• Encourage democractic evolution in Russia , China and India and, recognizing their key regional leadership roles, assist their integration into the emerging internation system and encourage their emergence as regional powers.
• Recognize that nation-state sovereignty is changing under the pressures of globalizing economic forces and there is nothing that can be done to stop this process.  New sovereign international organizations must be carefully constructed to deal with the resulting issues.

If you have any interest in the future of foreign affairs, even if not in Hart the candidate, you need to read this document.  He effectively distills the most progressive forward-thinking ideas in foreign affairs into a policy that I feel could make a real difference both in the wider world, and here at home.  He finishes with the following, which I could not agree with more fervently.

"Perhaps most importantly, all Americans must now become engaged in America's conduct in the world. Our foreign policy, our relations with the peoples of the world, is no longer the province of so-called experts. The forces of globalization, the spread of American commercial and cultural influence, the internationalization of the Internet, the immediacy of travel, the rise of a global environmental common, all now require the engagement of the American people. We must not let our role in the world be dictated by ideologues with their special biases and agendas, by militarists who long for the clarity of Cold War confrontation, by think-tank theorists who grind their academic axes, or by Americans who too often find it hard to distinguish their loyalties to their original homelands from their loyalties to America and its national interests.

As war is too important to leave to the generals, so, in the 21st century, is foreign policy too important to be left to specialized elites and interests. In the 21st century, the veil separating the foreign policy priesthood from the people must be removed. We, the people, must insist that our nation's finest principles characterize our dealings with our global neighbors. In this new age, our policy toward the world must be the policy of the American people—a policy that reflects our belief in our freedom, a policy that shows our desire to be friends and helpful neighbors, a policy that makes us proud of our heritage when we meet our foreign neighbors abroad and when we greet them here at home, and most of all a policy that leaves a legacy to our children that makes them proud of us.

Gary Hart
Kittredge, Colorado"

I've said it before, and I'll say it again.  This man gets it.

"FRANCE BLOCKS NATO WAR PLANNING, blares a February 10 CNN.com headline. But click through and you find a story about how France, Germany, and Belgium vetoed moves to prepare Turkey for war with Iraq. The headline is startlingly inaccurate, but in today's climate not at all surprising. With baseball's opening day still almost two months away, Americans in recent weeks have adopted an off-season national pastime: France-bashing.

Jonah Goldberg of National Review has revived the phrase "cheese-eating surrender monkeys" from its Simpsons provenance to describe the French, and now bloggers can't get enough of it. George Will, who doesn't often borrow from Rush Limbaugh's lexicon, recently called foreign minister Dominique de Villepin "oleaginous" and quipped that de Villepin's response to Colin Powell at the United Nations Wednesday showcased "the skill France has often honed since 1870--that of retreating, this time into incoherence." The New York Sun published a column last week claiming that France's "Last Great Coup" was the Kellogg-Briand pact of 1928, which "roped" the United States into defending France from Germany. Richard Perle has groused that France has lost its "moral fiber." And on and on. All this obsessive loathing sounds oddly familiar. It reminds one of, what is it again? Oh, right--France's purported obsessive loathing of the United States. "

As I mentioned yesterday, France-bashing is one thing that Americans of all political persuasions take some pleasure in.  Today, Economist's countries editor, Robert Lane Greene explains why at The New Republic Online.

This was the album that introduced me to JFJO, a band which any regular reader of this here blog knows I'm a big fan of.  It was recorded live during several shows in 1998 and was released on Russ Gershon's Accurate Records, which I've mentioned in this space before which is the sole reason I picked it up to start with.  This was recorded back when Jacob Fred was a septet with the continuing core of bassist Reed Mathis and keyboardist Brian Haas joined by trombonist Matt Leland, trumpeter Kyle Wright, guitarist Dove McHargue, percussionist Matthew Edwards, and the late Sean Layton on drums.  This album reflects the much different sound the band had before it was stripped down to the current trio of Haas, Mathis, and Jason Smart on drums (replacing Brian's brother Richard).  The band was a much cleaner and funkier experience than the out-there free-jazz exploration to which the trio has since been able to strech themselves.  Nonetheless, it gives you a very good base on which to build your Fred experience.  One of my favorites.

"This is a video taken in 6000 feet of water.  An undersea robot is sawing a 3mm wide slit (1/10th of an inch ... remember that width) in a pipeline. The pressure inside the pipeline is 0 psig, while the pressure outside is 2700 psi, or 1.3 tons per square inch.  Then a crab comes along.... "